In: Operations Management
Long range and short range forecasting provides several benefits.
If you owned a restaurant what do you think would be most appropriate to forecast for short-term (ie each week) and why did you chose that to forecast?
If you owned a restaurant what do you think would be most appropriate to forecast for long-term (ie for the year) and why did you choose this to forecast?
Would the above to answers differ if you had a single restaurant or a chain of 400 restaurants (ie like Swiss Chalet)? Explain why.
For short term forecast of a restaurant, best would be to identify the most demanded dishes because it can increase the turnover of the restaurant to a great extent. It can be forecasted by identifying the upcoming events or festivals like christmas, halloween, easter, new year, etc.
For long term For long term forecast, it would be better to understand the opportunities, threats, strengths and weaknesses (SWOT anlysis) of new competitors, strategies of the competitors. You may also use PESTLE analysis for forecasting the i.e. political, economic, social, technological, legal, environmental analysis.
Yes, the answer would definitely differ if there was a chain of restaurants because the working or operations of so many outlets would differ. Some might work quite profitably, whereas some might not be able to generate profits. Therefore, you will need to categorise and then forcast according to their needs.