The case study—why your company is like the "Lemonade Stand"
The purpose of the case study is to provide an easy-to-understand example for the new techniques that are presented in each chapter. In order to challenge the simple aspect of SAP Business ONE, which is advertised as simple yet powerful, I choose what is commonly known as The Lemonade Stand as our case study. During the course of the case study implementation, this simple example reveals surprising challenges that are similar to those that most small- and mid-sized businesses are facing on a daily basis. Basically, your business may have surprising parallels with The Lemonade Stand.
Here are the main characteristics of the Lemonade Stand that may also be a driving factor for your business:
- Ad-hoc operation – The Lemonade Stand is characterized by its ad-hoc concept, where the key players gather some money and invest in the basic ingredients to sell the product for immediate profit.
- Local coverage – The ad-hoc concept is further enhanced with the local coverage, where a good location for sales is selected based on local expertise.
- Growth is virtually impossible – The concept does not allow for growth. The Lemonade Stand makes a profit, but has no growth plan. Basically, it incorporates the challenge to run it professionally, because it seems advantageous to run it on a let's-get-things-done basis, while any professional approach appears to be nothing more than a burden.
- Short-term focus – The concept is based on a short-term focus only. There is no long-term growth plan.
If you think about it, many of the above factors can be found with small- and mid-sized businesses. After all, you need to make money and cannot focus on long-term strategies.
It is interesting to note that in today's economy, short-term profitability and seasonal flexibility are important success factors. However, short-term profits need to be made not only today, but also in a year, and maybe in five years.
Therefore, we will use the case study to overcome these issues. We will essentially implement the SAP Business ONE system for the Lemonade Stand and wrap the entire thing into a long-term strategy.