A word on consistency

As much as people love surprises in life, in business it is important to be consistent. People want to know what they are getting is the same from day to day or week to week, and not enter your shop to find the menu has changed completely one week to the next. Even if your business runs off a model like Costco's where the products you offer rotate in and out, it is then important to consistently have in new products, or as I joke, be consistently inconsistent.

In the food and beverage industry, consistency is exceptionally important. Let's look at 3 possible scenarios for the same person.

Scenario One:
Frank is a master baker able to make the worlds finest cakes. He decides to open up shop because his cakes are of such fine work, only to find he is slammed with orders. Frank is now unable to take the time it takes to make his cakes of such high quality, so on occasion some of them are not. For sake of argument, let us say that 75% of Frank's cakes are of worthy of being called high quality, and the rest are all over the board. Now imagine being one of Frank's customers, when you enter his shop you have a 1/4 chance of paying for a high end cake and getting something that tastes like it was made from a box.

Scenario Two:
Now lets look at this business if it was set up another way. Frank is still the same high end baker again, only this time he decide to open up a bakery that makes above average cakes. He is still know for being of high skill, and thus his reputation leads to a high volume of initial orders. Frank is pretty apt at making cakes of above average quality, so he only makes mistakes about 5% of the time. Now when you enter Frank's shop, you are paying for an above average cake made by an artisan baker and you have a 95% chance of getting what you payed for and a 5% chance of finding a flaw in your product. You maybe able to even get Frank to take a special request and have him make a very high end cake for you at extra cost, which leads us to scenario 3.

Scenario Three:
Frank knows he can make cakes better than almost anyone else, so he decides to open up shop. Making cakes of this high end will take him time and money, so his prices are higher than his competition from the start and as such his initial client base is not as high as in the other two scenarios. Frank makes sure each cake is thoroughly inspected before it leaves his shop, and makes less than 1% mistakes in any given year. Now when you enter Frank's shop you know you are VERY LIKELY to get what you paid for, however you are paying more.

Of these 3 scenarios we just looked at, which do you think will be most successful as a business? I would argue that Scenario One would be destined to fail, and struggle at best, Scenario Two would have the highest customer base (volume), and Scenario Three could be successful depending on how large the niche market in Franks area is.

I chose these three scenarios as they tend to mimic what I see in many specialty coffee shops. The shops I most often come across have a well trained manager who cannot keep up with the demand/has not trained his or her staff strictly enough. As a result, drinks are only great in this place when a certain barista is on duty and I usually will not go there if he or she is not. Imagine if you were to enter your own shop, would you feel this same way?...

I want to make a point here clear. I am not suggesting that all small coffee shops give up on quality and water themselves down for the sake of consistency (we have plenty of that as it is). What I am suggesting is that shops train their staff and themselves a bit stricter and maintain the discipline of making better drinks. Doing anything short of this, and claiming to serve quality specialty coffee, is destined to lead to hard times.


Here is a short little video on consistency in business on a meta scale:

Consistency of Vision

and a quote

"To do a common thing, uncommonly well, brings success" -Henry Heinz