Coffee Distribution Business Plan

The Coffee Warehouse will be owned and operated by its founders, initially working with a small employee base that will cover sales and delivery. Management and personnel plans are covered in more detail in the topics to follow.

6.1 Organizational Structure

The Coffee Warehouse will be managed by the two founding partners, whose individual areas of expertise cover many of the functional aspects of the business.

The organizational structure is very simple. Steve Smith will be responsible for the routing, distribution management and delivery systems.  Jennifer Smith will be responsible for customer service, accounting, shipping and the general administration of the business.  Together they will be responsible for product selection and sales and marketing.

The support staff at the office and warehouse, as well as the delivery personnel will report to Jennifer.  Because Steve will be spending a majority of his time in the trade, Jennifer will be able to support any day-to-day needs that the personnel may have. However even when Steve is out of the office, he will be in constant contact via computer or phone.

The goal of The Coffee Warehouse is to have a team of committed associates who empower each other so that the customer’s expectations can be exceeded.  Our goal is to offer career opportunities, advancement opportunities and a level of income and benefits that is competitive within the region and job classification.   It is our long-term goal to be the preferred employer within our niche of the beverage distribution industry.

6.2 Management Team

Steven D.  Smith
Steve has a long history of experience in sales and distribution management, specifically in the beverage industry. As the sales and distribution manager for the largest beverage distributorship in the state, he currently manages ten sales representatives and twenty four merchandisers.  During this time as sales manager, he has helped increase market share from 25 to 40%.

Over the last twenty years, Steve has successfully built and maintained rapport with buyers in the city’s largest key accounts, and has strategically routed sales, merchandising and truck routes throughout the city.

Steve has many industry contacts and an in-depth knowledge of the market.

Jennifer L. Smith
Jennifer recently operated as general manager for a local business and directed a staff of thirteen, overseeing the accounting practices, human resource issues, and day-to-day operations of the company.  Prior to this position, Jennifer has held a variety of other inside business management and operations positions.

Jennifer’s strengths and skills include strong management, excellent public relations, high levels of organization, extensive computer knowledge – including desktop publishing and graphic layout – and extensive presentation and reporting skills.

6.3 Personnel Plan

PERSONNEL – GENERAL
Initially we expect to be able to handle business needs with Steve and Jennifer, one administrative assistant, and two product delivery/sales personnel. As business continues to grow, we intend to hire additional employees one at a time and pay premium, over market labor rates to attract and retain quality help.

Not only will we train our employees to deliver excellent service, we will give them the flexibility to respond creatively to client requests. In addition, we will continually monitor our clients’ level of satisfaction with our service through surveys and other convenient feedback opportunities.

To ensure our personnel are meeting our expectations, we will hold a minimum of quarterly meetings with all employees so that results can be reviewed and future plans can be discussed. At least twice a year, a refresher course will be required on product knowledge and how to exceed our customer’s expectations.

SALES AND DELIVERY
In order to deliver high quality, personalized service we will carefully select all employees – with extra attention given to sales reps and delivery personnel who will deal directly with customers. We will carefully review references not just from past employers or manufacturers, but also from retailers whom these sales reps have served. We will also make sure that each employee understands our way of delivering quality service to each customer. We will have immediate back-up support available by phone from our office for more difficult service issues. We will also give employees enough latitude so that they can respond immediately to almost any customer request or complaint – which in this industry usually means granting immediate credit for damaged merchandise, and adding additional merchandise to an order.