Pancho's Burritos

Abstract

Pancho's Burritos is a high-end fast-food restaurant located in Charlottesville, Virginia. Due to a recent surge in customers, the lines at the restaurant during peak hours are becoming very long and causing excessive customer waiting. To improve current customer wait times and plan for future growth requirements, Francisco “Pancho” Escoba, the proprietor, wants to get a better understanding of the current operational capacity. The key decision Escoba must make is how to redesign his burrito-making process to increase the capacity and reduce customer wait time.Suitable for an undergraduate or MBA course, the case can be used in an introductory operations course to teach capacity analysis and queuing. The case provides a relatable and understandable setting for students without an operations background to gain a better grasp of basic course concepts and illustrates how interactions between capacity and queuing affect one another. As an exam or review case it works well because it contains standard process calculations that all students should know how to perform. Excerpt UVA-OM-1539 Rev. May 24, 2017 Pancho's Burritos It was Friday night, and Francisco “Pancho” Escoba, manager and owner of high-end fast-food restaurant Pancho's Burritos, was performing his regular restocking order when he noticed something odd. As he walked into the restaurant, he saw a number of customers walking out, frustrated with the long line that spread all the way across the restaurant. Customers leaving at the sight of a long line during peak demand hours was a recent trend that worried Escoba. In order to put an end to the fleeing customers and to improve the customer experience, Escoba decided to analyze his operations by taking some time studies of the burrito-making process. The Arrival of Pancho's Burritos Escoba was born an entrepreneur. At age 12, he started his first business, a home movie theater that served his friends and family. By age 16, he owned and operated a number of small businesses in his hometown of Guadalajara, Mexico, including a lawn-care service, a neighborhood food-delivery service, and an airport-ride service. Due in part to the stable income he received from his businesses, he was able to attend and pay for college at Universidad Panamericana. Following graduation, he returned to Guadalajara where he started a furniture design, manufacturing, and retail store. After laboring for several years just to break even, he decided to return to school for his MBA at the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business. During his first year at Darden, Escoba would regularly have friends over for dinner. He would always make them burritos using his grandmother's secret recipe. His friends could not get enough of the burritos. After seeing his friends' reactions, Escoba realized he might have the makings of another entrepreneurial venture. He knew that there had been a recent boom in the fast-food industry, but most of the establishments were serving unhealthy, overprocessed food. Escoba believed there was an opportunity to provide high-end fast food for price- and health-conscious consumers. In 2011, Escoba founded Pancho's Burritos in Charlottesville, Virginia. Since its opening, Pancho's Burritos had become a local mainstay, growing immensely popular, especially with students at the University of Virginia. Analyzing the Operations . . .