Entrepreneurship in Action Bean-to-Bar Chocolate Ingredients that typify the South-including buttermilk and pure brown sugar-are added to create southern flavors. The choco- late is molded and packaged in the company's factory. In the few years Olive&Sinclair has been in business, it has learned to excel at the operations process. Even though it makes the chocolate in small batches, it has gone from producing Olive&Sinclair Founder: Scott Witherow Founded: 2009, in Nashville, Tennessee Success: Olive&Sinclair's innovative "bean-to-bar Southern chocolate expanded internationally within four years after it first started making chocolate Former pastry chef Scott Witherow decided to create artisanal chocolate witha southern flair-and the entire process would be done in-house He founded Olive&Sinclair in 2009 with the idea to make chocolate in small batches using stone mills to ground the COCoa beans. Only a few years later, Olive&Sinclair chocolate bars could be found in select Whole Foods stores, retailers, cof- fee shops, and internationally at the department store Selfridges London and FRESCA, Japan's online marketplace for fine foods. The inputs at Olive&Sinclair are single-origin cocoa beans that are organic and fair-trade certified. During the transforma- tion process, the beans are sorted, slow-roasted, and ground. 250 bars a day in 2009 to 2,000 today.2 Discussion Questions I. What are the inputs used in Olive &Sinclair products? What are the outputs? 2. Describe some ways Olive&Sinclair uses the operations process to create competitive advantages. 3. Why do you think Olive & Sinclair chooses to make ite chocolate in small batches? Would it be a good ideo to increase the size of the batches to enhance productivity2 Why or why not? Entrepreneurship in Action Bean-to-Bar Chocolate Ingredients that typify the South-including buttermilk and pure brown sugar-are added to create southern flavors. The choco- late is molded and packaged in the company's factory. In the few years Olive&Sinclair has been in business, it has learned to excel at the operations process. Even though it makes the chocolate in small batches, it has gone from producing Olive&Sinclair Founder: Scott Witherow Founded: 2009, in Nashville, Tennessee Success: Olive&Sinclair's innovative "bean-to-bar Southern chocolate expanded internationally within four years after it first started making chocolate Former pastry chef Scott Witherow decided to create artisanal chocolate witha southern flair-and the entire process would be done in-house He founded Olive&Sinclair in 2009 with the idea to make chocolate in small batches using stone mills to ground the COCoa beans. Only a few years later, Olive&Sinclair chocolate bars could be found in select Whole Foods stores, retailers, cof- fee shops, and internationally at the department store Selfridges London and FRESCA, Japan's online marketplace for fine foods. The inputs at Olive&Sinclair are single-origin cocoa beans that are organic and fair-trade certified. During the transforma- tion process, the beans are sorted, slow-roasted, and ground. 250 bars a day in 2009 to 2,000 today.2 Discussion Questions I. What are the inputs used in Olive &Sinclair products? What are the outputs? 2. Describe some ways Olive&Sinclair uses the operations process to create competitive advantages. 3. Why do you think Olive & Sinclair chooses to make ite chocolate in small batches? Would it be a good ideo to increase the size of the batches to enhance productivity2 Why or why not
