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Date: September 12, 2011 1. What constitutes the mission of Minit-Lube? To provide fast, reliable and superior service in a customer friendly environment while ensuring lowest possible prices. 2. How does the Minit-Lube operations strategy provide competitive advantage? A narrow products strategy could be defined as lubricating automobiles that allows the subsequent development of more focused and efficient operations.
Because of limited task variety, high repetition, good training, and good manuals, quality should be relatively easy to maintain. The process strategy allows employees and capital investment to focus on doing this mission well, rather than trying to be a general purpose garage or gas station. Facilities are usually located near residential areas. The three bays are designed specifically for lubrication and vacuuming tasks to minimize wasted movement on the part of the employees and to contribute to the speedier service.
Purchasing is facilitated by negotiation of large purchases and custom packaging. Focuses on hiring a few employees with limited skills and training them in a limited number of tasks during the performance of which they can be closely supervised. Should be relatively low, and they should expect a high turnover. Scheduling: Scheduling should be very direct, assisting both staffing and customer relation. Very little equipment to be maintained, little preventive maintenance required.
With three bay and three systems, there is backup available in the case of failure. 3. Is it likely that Minit-Lube has increased productivity over its more traditional competitors? Why? How would we measure productivity in this industry? Yes, precise task assignments and good training are designed to move the car into and out of the bay in 10 minutes. The idea is to charge no more, and hopefully less, than gas stations, automotive repair chains, and auto dealers, while providing better service.