Notes

External Environment
Issues and Problems that can affect The Rolling Ice:
The Economic Forces in the External Environment: According to the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), inflation has been on the rise in 2016. Inflation has increased from 0.4% in January to 1% in May (a total of 0.6% increase). In accordance to what we have learnt in Macroeconomics, the increase in prices of goods and services in Singapore would mean that our company’s cost of production will increase. It would take our company more money to purchase ice-cream and other furniture we need. In addition, the unemployment rate in Singapore in Q1 is 1.9%. This unemployment rate is not very high which suggests that Singaporeans on average should have enough disposable income to purchase our products if we sell our ice-cream at a higher price and adopt a high price strategy.

The Social Forces in the General Environment: The social trend with Singaporeans nowadays is to consume dessert after a meal. This is evident from the successful dessert outlets in Singapore such as Llaollao and Wimbly Lu. With consumer’s preference of local flavours and alcoholic ice-cream (as researched under Udders), The Rolling Ice will be able to draw crowds with our one-of-a-kind and original Singaporean-Styled ice-cream flavors.

The Technological Forces in the General Environment: They will help The Rolling Ice save on the costs of labour. For example, the restaurant pagers will help to cut down on manpower needed to serve the ice-cream. Customers can just take a pager and collect their own food when the buzzer sounds. This eliminates the need for our workers to serve the ice-cream to the customers. However, we may need to take into consideration the maintenance cost for such high quality machinery that may reduce the expected savings on the cost of labor.

The Customers in the Task Environment: In order to be well-received by customers,the The Rolling Ice must first understand what appeals to them. Hence, we have done our secondary research on the most popular flavours among local customers and foreign customers. From there, we have implemented them in our menu (for example: chocolate and cookies and cream). In addition, through our research about the successful local ice cream shop Udders, we have discovered that many locals found a liking towards dining in a distinctive and light hearted environment.

The Competitors in the Task Environment: Our competitors are ice-cream cafes such as Sunday Folks, Udders, Häagen-Dazs, Creamier and Island Creamery. They have their own loyal customers and it will be difficult to win them over as we have just launched our business. Hence, in order to attract more customers to visit our cafe instead of theirs, we have to set our prices correctly as some customers might be attracted by our lower prices and choose to visit us instead. We could also learn from the promotions our competitors did and use them in our own cafe. For example, Udders offers waffles and ice-cream at half price from 7pm-9pm. Baskin-Robbins also have this promotion whereby if customers can turn up wearing pink on Wednesdays, they would get a free junior scoop. These promotions would draw the crowd. Similarly, The Rolling Ice could also use these marketing strategies to gain more customers.

The Suppliers in the Task environment: We need several suppliers to supply us with the raw materials as we have over 10 ice-cream flavours. We have to seek for suppliers who is able to supply our shop in bulk for a cheaper rate. Also, sticking to one or two reliable suppliers will facilitate our purchasing process by minimising any miscommunication or confusion due to the numerous different suppliers for different flavours which makes it confusing and complicated for our staff to manage. Besides the price, we must not forget to focus on the quality of the products from the suppliers so as to produce the supreme quality of ice-cream for the customers.

The Financial Institutions in the Task Environment: Our company need to loan from the bank as we need capital to start up our business and keep the business operating. However, not all businesses are eligible for loans and most of the times, we have to earn a certain revenue before we can apply for a loan. This is because banks are not sure if they can get their money back as the business may not be successful. Therefore, we have to source for a bank that offers start up business loan and are willing to loan to us. We also need insurance for the property and our employees, which is included in our company’s expenses. If the cost of insurance is too high, we would have to increase the price of our ice-cream to make up for the increased amount we have to pay.