What additional information should you gather to support or not support the decision to implement the Burned N Turned food trailer in Watford City, North Dakota?

Question 2:

Imagine it is three years in the future from the end of the case. Consider the possible situation that the food trailer business Burned N Turned has not succeeded. What might help explain the possible future failure of this business that the partners were so enthusiastic about as they began? Think about the reasons this business failure might have happened and list them.

Question 3.

Make a list of the resources and capabilities available to Burned N' Turned. Also list the SWOT components you see for Burned N Turned as presented in the mini-case.(Bullet points are fine for this part of the assignment, but include enough detail so the reader can follow your thinking.)

Include the following components in your analysis:

2. Resources
4. Capabilities
6. Strengths
8. Weaknesses
10. Opportunities
12. Threats

Question 4:

2. What is your decision for Burned N Turned? Go, or No-go?
4. What were the most important considerations in making your decision?

Burned N Turned: Feeding the Fracking Boom By Beauvais R. Anderson, Joseph S. Anderson, & Susan K. Williams

"There's not a business you can start in North Dakota right now that wouldn't make it."[1] That's what Blair and his prospective business partners had been hearing. It was mid-summer 2011 and for three months the partners had been discussing and planning a business to exploit this "no-fail" environment. Blair was home, reviewing their recent trip to Watford City, ND, 500 miles away. They were anxious to start implementing their idea, a food truck/trailer business that might eventually become a restaurant. What additional analysis was needed before moving ahead?

Watford City, North Dakota

When five partners visited Watford City (WC), North Dakota everything they observed encouraged them. WC was in the middle of the Bakken oil fields. Fracking technology had become effective and oil production had doubled between 2007 and mid-2010. As a result, the population increased by 22% from 2000 to 2010. By mid-2011, hundreds of mostly men had taken new oil-field-related jobs. WC, a town of only 1,750, had no surplus housing. "Man camps," temporary housing largely made up of trailers, had grown up around the area. The people were there to work, generally they weren't interested in becoming part of the community. Many had homes and families elsewhere that they visited when possible and that they planned to return to eventually. Traffic flow was clogged with long lines of large trucks interspersed with many pick-up trucks and cars. This influx of workers needed to eat and due to their long, hard hours and good pay, they cooked very rarely.

Burned N Turned

The business idea began to evolve at an outside barbeque that Blair attended with his friend Sara and her family. Evan, her dad, who previously owned a construction business, had become excited about looking for opportunity in WC. He heard many stories from his stepson, who was driving trucks through WC and watching the fracking boom at ground zero. Evan had two daughters, Sara and Renee, one with a degree in business and both with experience in services, who were excited about finding a business opportunity.

The family learned about Blair's reputation as an excellent cook among his friends and family and his years of experience in catering. During winters, he had worked for a company serving meals at Phoenix, Arizona area events including the world-renowned Barrett-Jackson auto auction. Summers found him feeding large numbers of wildland fire fighters across the American West.

Blair's primary contribution to the partners' efforts was his catering management experience. The business would start as a food truck or trailer and could potentially expand to a restaurant. The concept they focused on was "good food fast" to serve those who worked in the local oil fields. Their goal was to have an attractive and variable take-out menu of mainly burgers, sandwiches and Mexican food items, made to order, and in the customer's hand within three minutes, at eleven dollars average cost. They planned to eventually be open from breakfast until 11 PM, longer than competitors, and open seven days a week - as the oil fields were operating at all hours every day.

The name, Burned N Turned, was truckers' slang: to get the delivery out quickly, pick up another load and turn around for home. It was meant to appeal to truckers and oil rig workers, the core target market.

When the partners visited WC, none of them thought that it would be a wonderful place to live since there was little community and North Dakota winter weather. But there was clearly opportunity. When they walked around town looking at restaurants, all seemed packed. One of the nicer restaurants had a 45-minute wait during supper. The few restaurants in WC had limited hours and some were closed Sundays, a practice from when it was a sleepier little town.

Six of the seven partners would move to WC to staff the food truck/trailer. They decided there would be no additional employees for at least six months. They would work in shifts so that each person would work two weeks and then have two weeks off. This would make WC more tolerable.

They created a brief business plan for the food truck/trailer, written by Evan's daughter, Renee. Start-up funding was offered by Evan's sister, Pam, to the tune of $75,000. Evan's stepson connected them to the owner of a truck maintenance shop in WC who agreed to lease them a very desirable roadside lot next door, an ideal location with quick and convenient access, especially for large trucks.

Time to implement, or is it?

As Blair said later, "When we went to see it, it was proof. The competition was at its limits, they couldn't serve all the potential customers they could have had. They were doing the best they could, but it wasn't enough. This town needed us. We had our proof, we could see it. We saw a 'can't lose' situation. We could see by the traffic, it was a boom. We all knew it was going to work - there was no doubt we were going to succeed."

After returning home to Bozeman, Montana, the partners' enthusiasm was even higher. They were wrapped up in what Blair called a "boom mentality." Everything they observed on their visit, the news items they had been seeing for several years, and the data Renee included in the business plan pointed to a solid opportunity. Further, Evan and another of the partners, Matt, had just advised the partners that in Texas they had found the ideal food trailer for Burned N Turned. It was in very good condition and had all the tools and equipment they would need to serve their potential customers with high-quality food fast. This news only added to their boom mentality. They assured themselves that their endeavor would be a success - even if they ran into setbacks, they would be able to overcome them. Blair's enthusiasm continued to grow, and his excitement for the new business was bubbling over. But was there anything about the decision they had overlooked?

 

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