1. Courtney Newell, manager of the Silver Park Hotel, is considering how to restructure the front desk to improve guest service during the peak check-in hours of 3:00 to 5:00 p.m.  At present, the hotel has 5 clerks on duty each with a separate waiting line.

Courtney is considering two plans for reducing the guest’s waiting time. The first proposal would be to implement a single waiting line in which guests would be served by whichever of the 5 clerks becomes available first.  Observations of arrivals during the peak check-in time show that a guest arrives on average every 40 seconds.  It takes an average of 3 minutes for the front-desk clerk to register each guest.

The second proposal would designate one employee as a “quick-service” clerk for guests registering under corporate accounts, a market segment that comprises about 30% of Silver Park’s guests.  Since these guests would be pre-registered, it would take an average of only 0.5 minutes for the front-desk clerk to register them.  Under this plan, the non-corporate guests would form a single line and proceed to the first available of the 4 remaining clerks.  The average time for registering a non-corporate guest is 3.4 minutes.

Which proposal should Courtney implement?  Provide appropriate quantitative evidence to support your recommendation.

Let’s return to Tallahassee hotel market we considered in Problem Set 1, but now from the perspective of a hotel manager. Consider a hotel which can supply an unlimited number of hotel rooms at the constant marginal cost c = 20 per room per night, so that the hotel’s total cost function is given by C(q) = 20q. Assume that demand for hotel rooms in Tallahassee takes two possible values: on game days, demand is described by the demand curve q = 100−p, while on non-game-days demand is described by the demand curve q = 60 − 2p.

1. First suppose that the hotel acts as a price taker.

(a) What does it mean for the hotel to act as a price taker? What condition determines a price taker’s optimal supply decision?

(b) Assuming the hotel acts as a price taker, what will be the equilibrium price and quantity sold on game days? What about on non-game-days? (Remember, the hotel’s marginal cost is constant!)

(c) Briefly discuss, without solving, how your results in (b) would change if the hotel instead had increasing marginal costs (say for example MC(q) = q rather than MC = 20).

You are the accountant of White Hotel Berhad, a corporation that engages in the hotel businesses. The corporation is having a high value of buildings and has been using historical cost to measure it. The directors of White Hotel Berhad wanted to continue using the historical cost measurement since they feel that the valuation exercise is costly to the corporation. Prepare a note explaining 4 drawbacks of using the historical cost measurement for buildings.

Read and answer the following questions below

Barracuda Inc. is a lamp-fixture manufacturer that is considering an entry strategy into the U.S. home-furnishings manufacturing industry. The existing landscape consists of many players but none with a controlling share. There are currently 2,500 home furnishings firms, and only 600 of those have more than 15 employees. Average net profit after tax is between 4 and 5 percent. While the industry still primarily comprises single-business, family-run firms that manufacture furniture domestically, imports are increasing at a fairly rapid rate. Some of the European imports are leaders in contemporary design. Relatively large established firms are also diversifying into the home- furnishings industry via acquisition. Supplier firms to the home-furnishings industry are in relatively concentrated industries (such as lumber, steel, and textiles). Retailers, the intermediate customer of the home-furnishings industry, have been traditionally very fragmented. Customers have many products to choose from, at many different price points, and few home-furnishing products have strong brands. Also, customers can switch easily among high- and low-priced furniture and other discretionary expenditures (spanning big-screen TVs to the choice of postponing any furniture purchase entirely).

1. Your challenge is to use the five-forces framework to summarize the opportunities and threats facing Barracuda as it considers entry into the home-furnishings manufacturing industry. Which threats are greatest to current incumbents?

2. how intense is competitive rivalry likely to be among incumbents of the home-furnishings manufacturing industry?

The manager of a hotel is negotiating with a client the room rate that will be charged to the attendees of an assembly to be held at the hotel. In this type of activity, the organizers are responsible for obtaining a rate for the rooms that is competitive for the attendees and for a minimum number of people to stay during the activity. The cost of the rooms is paid by the attendees and is NOT included in the cost of registration paid to attend the Assembly. The organizers are responsible for paying for the food during the activities (breakfast, lunch and snack, this includes the service and other activities to support the assembly), in exchange for this they can use the conference rooms for free. The cost of the dinner is not covered in the cost of the rooms or by the organizers. The cost of the room DOES NOT include breakfast, lunch or dinner. It also does not include the cost of washing or ironing clothes. The hotel provides free internet, but does not include long distance calls as part of the room rate. The client estimates that the meeting will be attended by 200 people and that at least 10% of them will stay at the hotel because they come from abroad. The activity will take place during the hotel's off-season, so the manager understands that he will have enough rooms available to fulfill the agreement.

1. What costs do you think the hotel manager should take into account when calculating the total cost per room per night that will be charged to regular clients (assume that all rooms are the same)? DO NOT use monetary amounts, neither real nor hypothetical. Provide a list of 10 costs in the following format. It must include some costs that are specifically for the room and others of the hotel in general

2. What costs do you think the hotel manager should take into account when calculating the total cost per room per night that will be granted to those attending the meeting? Using the same list above, add a column to indicate if it is relevant or not.

3 Assembly attendees always have the option of staying at the Assembly hotel or in another nearby hotel. In addition to the costs, what other considerations or variables can the hotel manager take into account when promoting their rooms and the hotel between the registration of the Assembly? Provide a list

Typewritten answers only, please, no handwritten answers. Thank you.

On April 6, 2018, Home Furnishings purchased $37,000 of merchandise from Una's Imports, terms 2/10 n/45. On April 8, Home Furnishings returned $7,800 of the merchandise to Una's Imports for credit. Home Furnishings paid cash for the merchandise on April 15, 2018.

Required

What is the amount that Home Furnishings must pay Una's Imports on April 15?

Record the events in a horizontal statements model. In the Cash Flow column, use OA to designate operating activity, IA for investment activity, FA for financing activity, NC for net change in cash and NA to indicate the element is not affected by the event.

How much must Home Furnishings pay for the merchandise purchased if the payment is not made until April 20, 2018?

Record the payment of the merchandise in Requirement (c) in a horizontal statements. In the Cash Flow column, use OA to designate operating activity, IA for investment activity, FA for financing activity, NC for net change in cash and NA to indicate the element is not affected by the event.

What is the amount that Home Furnishings must pay Una's Imports on April 15?

Record the events in a horizontal statements model. In the Cash Flow column, use OA to designate operating activity, IA for investment activity, FA for financing activity, NC for net change in cash and NA to indicate the element is not affected by the event. (Enter any decreases to account balances and cash outflows with a minus sign.

On April 6, 2018, Home Furnishings purchased $37,000 of merchandise from Una's Imports, terms 2/10 n/45. On April 8, Home Furnishings returned $7,800 of the merchandise to Una's Imports for credit. Home Furnishings paid cash for the merchandise on April 15, 2018.

Required

What is the amount that Home Furnishings must pay Una's Imports on April 15?

Record the events in a horizontal statements model. In the Cash Flow column, use OA to designate operating activity, IA for investment activity, FA for financing activity, NC for net change in cash and NA to indicate the element is not affected by the event.

How much must Home Furnishings pay for the merchandise purchased if the payment is not made until April 20, 2018?

Record the payment of the merchandise in Requirement (c) in a horizontal statements. In the Cash Flow column, use OA to designate operating activity, IA for investment activity, FA for financing activity, NC for net change in cash and NA to indicate the element is not affected by the event.

Typewritten answers only, please, no handwritten answers. Thank you.

The second half of the 1940s was a period of A. recession. B. no economic growth. C. very slow economic growth. D. fairly high economic growth.