Case Summary
A. Company Description
Abou Shakra is one of the famous restaurants in Egypt and specialized in traditional
Egyptian dishes. It was first founded by Ahmed Abou Shakra. At first, he was a humble
employee who was looking for an extra job, but finally he resigned from his job and ran his
business. (Adapted from: http://www.aboushakra.net/index.php?
option=com_content&view=article&id=6&Itemid=107). He opened his first Abou Shakra
restaurant in El Kasr El Einy, a well-known district in Cairo. Actually, the restaurant’s menu is
very simple. Why? Because the restaurant avoids the risks associated with offering unfamiliar
dishes to consumers.
B. Successing in a Competitive Market
It was not an easy thing for Abou Shakra restaurant to conduct a business when it opened its
first restaurant. Because most of restaurants in Egypt provided Egyptian food. We rarely found a
restaurant that provided other cuisines besides Egyptian, such as Indian, Chinese, and Italian.
However, it could offer something that would give an advantage over its competitors and
became the great customer value, which was not offered by the majority of his competitors. To
Abou Shakra restaurant, it is very important to provide elegant dishes, preparing with passion,
and providing a memorable experience to their guests and this becomes its philosophy.
We can see that Abou Shakra restaurant focus on customer well-being and satisfaction that
originally gave them an advantage over their competitors. This can be proved through some
things. First, Abou Shakra has its own factory, which supplies all branches and outlets with
fresh meat and poultry as their daily requirements. Second, the fruits and vegetables are also
delivered daily and are specially stored to maintain freshness up to the time of serving and keep
its high-quality. Third, it keeps the menu simple to encourage customer loyalty besides
decreases the costs of purchasing. Fourth, Abou Shakra’s managers pay attention to every detail,
especially cleanliness.
C. Focusing on Customer Service
As for Abou Shakra restaurants, well-trained employees who deliver extraordinary
customer service is also important besides the quality of the food. To fulfill this, they have their
own training center. They do continuous training in order to make the employees become
confident and have good skills. This will satisfy customers. The company believes that their
employees are their biggest assets. One of the core principles of the company is that by taking
good care of the employees, the employees will take good care of the customers.
D. International Expansion
It needed a long time, 56 years, for Abou Shakra restaurants to open their new branches
outside Cairo. Its first branch outside Cairo was in Alexandria in 2003. It was also not an easy
thing to do. They needed to find suppliers who could distribute fresh ingredients on a daily
basis. Besides, employees also needed to be recruited and trained in the same manner as the
employees in Egypt, to make sure that they provide their customers with the same outstanding
service.
Although Abou Shakra restaurants are success, but they do not spend much money on
advertising. This is because they believe that word-of-mouth recommendations are much more
effective and efficient compare to promotional advertisements. Abou Shakra restaurants are
successfully in running their businesses because of the correctly-managed strategies and
objectives.
Case Analysis
We will discuss about Abou Shakra restaurant case and also the relation with this chapter.
In this case, Abou Shakra restaurant focus on offering good services, healthy, tasty and well-
marinated food to create value for customers and build customer relationship. The food are
always fresh, Abou Shakra ensure that people that eats in their restaurant have a high-quality of
meat on their dish. Here, they apply product concept, which holds that consumers favor products
that offer the most in quality, performance, and innovative features. They also focus on details
about hygiene, safety, health, they want to keep the high standard for those things, which the
society is looking for. So, Abou Shakra already understand what people wants, and need which
is the first step in marketing process. By having employees who are friendly, energetic, and
passionate employees they are successful to make the customer comfortable with the service in
that place.
Their first restaurant didn’t have a good location, also didn’t use any advertisement because
they provide elegant dishes, prepare with passion, and provide memorable experience to their
guest. By serving that high-quality of dishes to people with the best services, people will
promote their restaurants just by telling their positive experiences at Abou Shakra to their
friends and family. We agree with that because people usually think that something in
advertisement sometimes is not like what they advertise. Maybe in the advertisement looks good
but not in the real. So, words-of-mouth recommendations will be a great way to make people
believe that Abou Shakra restaurant is really a high-quality restaurant. This shows that Abou
Shakra restaurants build customer relationship. Building a relation between a company and a
customer is an important thing in marketing. To manage and develop the customer relationship,
customer value and customer satisfaction are needed as they are the main elements.
Furthermore, customers who are happy and satisfied with the quality will promote the
restaurant because of the quality and services of the restaurant satisfy the customer so the
customer that satisfied will tell their family, their friends or other as the return. Here, Abou
Shakra restaurants are successful to capture value from customers to get profits.
This is the marketing process of Abou Shakra restaurants
Understand the Make a strategy to Customers are
customers wants fulfill the customers satisfied and get
and needs wants profits
Opinion
We agree with what Abou Shakra restaurants have done to make their business success.
Although, they do not spend much money on advertising, they can still keep the business run.
We think that it is better for them to allocate their money on increasing the quality of the food
and service provided rather than allocating it to advertising expenses.
