Table of Contents

1. Executive Summary. 2
2. Introduction.. 3
3. Operations system and Supply Chain in Pret... 3
3.1 Operations System.. 3
3.2 Supply Chain5
3.3 Information Communication Technology... 6
4. Conclusions 8
5. References.. 9
6. Appendix 10

1. Executive Summary
Smooth flow of accurate information through out the organization gives more control on
the organizational operations and objectives. If it is a small organization, it is easy to
maintain but if the structure is huge it is very difficult to maintain the flow of information
accurately and effectively. So, emphasis is given on to Information Communication
Technology (ICT) and E-commerce in the organizations. These technologies help to
communicate within and outside the organization easily and effectively as it is concerned
as competitive advantage in the current business world. Pret A Manger is a fast food retail
store mainly based in UK. A brief information about this organization is attached in the
appendix. The emphasis given in this report is to identify operations system of Pret A
Manger and also on their supply chain management. Pret A Mangers operation is A
system to produce natural, fresh foods in store and serve these foods to as many
customers as quickly possible in a very friendly manner. Pret gives importance on their
food and ingredients as they are well known for natural, fresh foods. They are also very
focused on reducing waste. As they use only fresh and natural ingredients, it is important
for them to receive delivery from their suppliers more often. If there is any mistake in
predicting the right demand there will be a lot of waste or lack of products. Both are not
very good indication of their business performance. So, the accurate flow of information
towards the right place is very important to avoid any disturbance in Pret. Pret A manger
use a very effective software to make communication easier and effective in the
organization. Through this system, every Pret shop keeps close relation with the head
office. Head office also has access to every pret shop through that software. So, it is very
easy to monitor the performances of each shop, which lead towards better control on the
information system, in fact the whole operations system. Pret has a very strong supply
chain management system to provide them fresh, natural ingredients all the time. They
always prefer the best for their customers. They have to have a close relation to their
suppliers as they had to deliver more frequently then the other organizations. Another
important difference is Pret has their own kitchen in the store to make fresh foods.

2. Introduction
According to Luc (2006) more and more firms are making use of supply chain
management and electronic collaboration tools to improve their performance. In this
report the focus will be on Pret A Mangers organizational operations, the supply chain
management and how they are influenced by the ICT they use. Pret A Manger is a
growing fast food out let and they are heavily dependent on the technology to maintain a
smooth flow of information between and outside the organization. It is very important to
have control over the operations of the organization and also their supply chain
management.

3. Operations System & Supply Chain in Pret

Pret A Manger is mainly an UK based food retail shop. This organization is different from
the other fast food retailers in a sense that, they do not use any artificial ingredients and
all off their foods are made fresh every day. In the next few paragraph, emphasis will be
given on some of the very important aspect of Prets operations system, supply chain
management and their information communication technology (ICT).

3.1 Operations System

Pret A Mangers operation is A system to produce natural, fresh foods in store and serve
these foods to as many customers as quickly possible in a very friendly manner. Every
Pret shop has their own kitchen to make fresh foods for their customers. Service is also a
very important aspect of their business. They maintain a standard that- they have to serve
their customer within 60 seconds from joining the Que. Figure 1 is an inputtransformation-output diagram of the operations system of a Pret A Manger Shop. As Pret
A Manger is a food retail shop, ingredients for the foods, packages, stickers are
3

considered as their primary inputs in their operations system (figure 1). Secondary inputs
are their staffs, equipments and machines. Tertiary inputs will be- recipes for the foods
they make, time table of when to make how much products, daily plans like- how many
staff should be there to make the whole process efficient, target sales for a day, the
amount of ingredients needed for a particular day etc. Health and safety is another tertiary
input. The main transformation process of Pret is to make estimated amount of quality
food products in a particular time. Primary out put after transformation process is the
food product in the store- which are ready to sell. Another important output is the waste
from making those foods. Secondary outputs are the used machines, equipment and staffs
who helped in the transformation process. Tertiary output is the customer satisfaction by
having a quality meal from pret.

Inputs
Primary Inputs: Food
ingredients, Packages,
Stickers.
Secondary Inputs: Staff,
Equipment, machines.
Kitchen, Services.
Tertiary Inputs: Recipes,
Schedule of making
sandwiches, Daily plan,
Health and safety.

Outputs
Transformation

Making foods
according to daily
requirement.

Primary Outputs: Ready to

sell food products, Waste.
Secondary Outputs: Used
equipment, machines,
Services.
Tertiary Outputs: Quality
foods an service for the
customers, which leads to
satisfaction.

Figure 1

3.2

Supply Chain
Supply chain management is the management of the interconnection of
organizations that relate to each other through upstream and downstream linkages
between the different processes that produce value in the form of products and
services to the ultimate consumer (Ian, 2007).
Supply Chain Management (SCM) has been growing in importance since the
early 1990s, although the approach, or rather the concept, was
introduced back in the early 1980s(Hans, 2008).

In supply chain management, both buy-side and sell-side needs to be concerned very care
fully. It is very important to make balanced coordination between these two. Buy-side of
this chain is concerned as upstream supply chain and sell-side as down stream. In Pret A
Manger, fresh and natural ingredients are very important to satisfy their customers. So,
they have to be very careful about their supply chain management. As they use fresh
ingredients, they need deliveries from their suppliers more often, which is very hard to
maintain and also if they have poor demand forecast- there will be a huge waste or lack
of raw materials. Figure 2 illustrates the supply chain network for Pret A Manger.

Downstream Flow

Supplier

Head office

Regional
warehouse

Distribution

Pret Shop

Consumer

Upstream Flow

Figure 2

As shown in figure 2, head office of Pret A Manger should have direct communication
with the suppliers. It will be very helpful in terms of their quality control. They have
deliveries for each of their shop al most every day, so it is very important to have a
regional warehouse. From the regional warehouse, the products then distributed to
individual Pret shops and then each shop make their final products in the store for the
customers. So, this is downstream flow or the flow of the products from the supplier to
the customers. On the other hand there is upstream flow, which are the feedback or
demand information from the customers. Pret A Manger has different suppliers for
different items, like for their breads and salad leafs; they have separate suppliers for
them. They try to provide the best products to their customers, so they are very conscious
about their suppliers, actually they have dedicated people in the organization who are
looking for quality ingredients, products all the time. As a result their price of products
are higher then the other food retailers, therefore customers have very high expectations
from Prets sandwiches. That is why customers feed back is very important for them.
From that feedback, each shop decides their ordering for the next week, which goes back
to the suppliers end and it is a continuous process.

3.3 Information Communication Technology (ICT)

According to David (2003), Internet has created the potential for almost unlimited
information flows within and between organizations and their supply chain partners. Ecommerce is there to make the operations system easy for the organizations but it also has
its draw backs like- maintenance of the technology, communication barriers (Kenneth,
2001). Pret A Manger has their own ICT and according to them it is a very updated one.
Pret uses software named Star kiss. They use this software to make order, maintain
inventories, keep records of the daily accounts, daily wastes etc. This system also keeps
records of the daily weather forecast and any occasion, which has impact on sales in a
particular day. This software has made operations of the organization very effective. In
every Pret shop, they place order once a week for next seven days. Star kiss also helps
them to forecast expected sales for next seven days as it already recorded performance of
the previous years. So, every week after checking their inventory of the shop and

calculating demand for next week- they place order through Star kiss. Head office
receives the order and sends it to the regional warehouses for distribution in the retail
stores. As the number of Pret shop is increasing, without ICT it could be very difficult for
them to maintain their supply chain. In fact the whole organizational operation is highly
depended on it. This software is very easy to use and quick but proper training is also
important to make it effective. ICT, E-commerce is there to make operations easy and
quick but they dont have intelligence. Pret provides proper training to their managers to
make sure they are applying their knowledge, expertise to make Star kiss useful. All the
tills in the shop are connected to Star kiss to keep records of the sales but if some one
makes mistake to press the right button or give wrong changes; it is not possible for it to
sort out. It will only show that, there are problems in a certain till. If the manager fails to
predict demand properly, there will be a lack of raw materials or it could also be a lot of
waste. But as the managers are highly trained and experts, its not a very big problem for
Pret. If there is any problem, it is very easy for the head office to detect that and they can
sort it out very quickly. Pert A Manger is using a very useful system to maintain their
operations of the organization and also the supply chain. Also it reduces their office space
for the shop. A very small office with a computer is all they need. They do not need huge
cabinets to keep their files. They also have saved a lot of time because of this internal
system they use. Managing inventory and waste has become much easier for them. But
they are now heavily depended on the distribution. All most every day they have to wait
for the delivery in the morning. If the delivery is late, it changes their whole day plan.
ICT could not sort this out, but their system should deliver the orders day before- other
wise they will be in a risk. These are all from the shops point of view. The head office
ICT sector also needs to be very careful to run the organizational operations very
smoothly. As the IT department of the head office has access to all the Pret shop, they
also can monitor shops performance. To receive customers feedback, they have help line
and also they have emails to receive any comments. It is also possible for the end
customers to place an order through pret.com web page.

4. Conclusions
As it is described earlier, Pret A Manger have a very strong ICT department of their own.
Their operations and supply chain is very much depended on that. In 1980s they started
with only one shop in London, but now they have over 150 shops around the world. The
system they are using is called Star kiss and this software is very useful for them to
maintain such a huge supply chain very efficiently. All the Pret shop has Star kiss in the
shop, which made their office rooms very small in store. Head office IT teams can
monitor and also maintain this software. As a growing organization effective use of
information between and out side the organization is very important. Smooth flow of
accurate information is very important to maintain a huge organization like Pret A
Manger. Pret can easily check the performance of a shop, the shop can easily predict the
demand for next couple of days, head office can maintain and repair if there is any
problem in the software; all of them means better control on the operation of the
organization. Time is another important factor to consider as ICT and e- commerce is
there to make things easy and effective. Pret A Manger is using a very updated and user
friendly ICT right now but they also give importance on using them properly.

5. References
David, Matthew(2003), Competitive advantage through e- operations, TQM &
businessexcellence, vo14, p 660.

Goran, Hans (2008), Supply chain management ethics: conceptual framework and
illustration.
Ian,Robert(2007), Operations and Information Systems: An Introduction, London,
Pearson.
Kenneth (2001), E- operations: A guide to streaming with the Internet, Business horizons,
p 50.
Luc (2006), Collaboration planning in a supply chain.

6. Appendix
Pret opened in London in 1986. College friends, Sinclair and Julian, made proper
sandwiches using natural, preservative-free ingredients. The two of them had woefully
little experience in the world of business. They created the sort of food they craved but
couldnt find anywhere else.
Because Pret is private they dont face the same pressure to grow that a public company
does. They will develop slowly, one shop at a time. There are about 150 Pret shops at the
moment. Most of them are in the UK. We turn over roughly 150 million pounds a year
and would like to make 9% profits but havent yet.
(Source- www.pret.com)

10