In United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand, “fish and chips” is a treat that most families love. Even with the advance of fast food brands over the last 20-25 years, fish and chips is still as popular as ever.

Tefal has recently invented a new technology called the Tefal ActiFry that makes reduced fat, home style chips, at about 3% of the fat of regular fries. Its new fry cooker uses fans and motions to coat 4 potatoes in approximately 1 tablespoon of oil.

Although the ActiFry has been developed as a home market product, there is an opportunity to use similar technology to provide a healthier version of the chip to the public through fish and chip shops. It appears that the ActiFry technology could become a franchisable opportunity for this segment of the take-away industry. A business opportunity still to be developed.

Watch the Tefal ActiFry promotional video.

To learn more about the components of buying a traditional fish and chip shop, click here.

It goes without saying that unless you plan what your business is going to achieve it is difficult, if not impossible, to manage it effectively.

As the head or manager of the business, you will appreciate the need to stand back once in a while and review your business performance, and the factors affecting your business. To succeed against ever changing performance, you will need to be clear about where the business is heading as well as some way of measuring your business performance. If you don’t know where you want to go, getting there will only be a matter of luck and you probably won’t even recognize it if you do get there.

Key aspects of planning are:

• An overall aim or purpose
• A business plan
• Review of goals and purpose
• Regular review of achievements

Aim and Purpose
Your purpose or aim for the business (sometimes called a vision or mission) is not just about creating a slogan. A good purpose statement is your dream for the business, and will convey why you are in business and what you want your business to become. It articulates a credible yet ambitious future for your business which is better in some important ways to what now exists.

Why do you need a statement of purpose?

It sets your business apart from everyone else and tells your staff and customers what is different about your business.

It acts as a key motivational and confidence element to spur both you and your staff to grater heights:  We know where we are going.

Make sure you discuss the aims or purpose for your business with your staff and other interested parties. To go in the same direction, everyone involved in your business must know what that direction is.

A Business Plan
To move towards your overall aim or purpose, you need a business plan. A business plan is normally a short written document that sets out your business’ goals (steps towards your overall aim) and shows how you plan to achieve your goals through specific actions.

Many businesses don’t realize that they carry out, almost on a daily basis, the majority of activities associated with business planning. The information gathered and plans made are simply not put together in what is traditionally called a business plan.

Why should you have business plan?

• Putting all the signposts in place and following them lets you see the way forward clearly and guards against detours
• You can reduce business risk
• You can focus the effort of your staff towards specific actions
• A business plan serves as part of a loan or finance application.

A good business plan needs to look to the future. One approach is to determine short and long-term goals. They are the means by which your business will achieve its overall aim.

Short-term goals are achievable in one or two years and might include: expanding your customer base, refinancing and reducing debt, bringing in a partner, relocating premises, or paying your tax bill at the end of the year.

Other goals might be longer term (i.e. three to five years). Long-term goals might include having the best reputation in your particular sector, or reaching a certain level of income in five years. Why should you look to the longer term? Because it is highly unlikely that you can achieve everything you want from your business in one or two years, and often your investment will involve premises and equipment that have a payback period over three years or more, requiring you to think and plan beyond the short term.

Your goals should be achievable, specific, measurable and carry a deadline.

Once you have your goals worked out, you need to think about specific actions to achieve these goals. This lets you know if your plan if being implemented and if your actions are effective in achieving your goals.

In addition to goals and actions, your business plan should cover:

• What your customers have told you they want
• How you keep track of the market, including competitors
• What risks you face
• What strengths your business has (your core competencies)
• What your suppliers/partners can offer

Effective communication
Getting all the information needed to prepare a business plan requires effective communication with everyone involved, both inside and outside your business (staff, customers, suppliers) to make sure you are all pulling in the same direction.

As can be readily observed in business, sport and education, leadership is the essential ingredient to motivate your staff for top performance.

Leadership is different to management (although both are equally important). Leadership is about setting direction and motivating and inspiring your staff to move in that direction. Management is about organizing resources and problem solving. If you are in a small business, often you have the task of being both a leader and manager.

What are the key elements of good leadership in business?

Promoting Shared Goals and Values
Your staff cannot give their best if you keep them in the dark, or they don’t know or understand how you’re trying to grow the business or the behaviors you expect. Let your staff know why they are doing something – if your staff’s goals (what they are to achieve) become the same as yours, they will hard to achieve them. And if they share your values (how you want work to be done, for example – a commitment to quality, loyalty, taking risks, being ‘green’), they will be clear about what is expected of them to achieve those goals.

Involving And Supporting Others
You do not work in isolation. It’s important that your staff stay informed and know what’s going on. Enlist the support and assistance of all who are going to make your business work – your staff, customers, suppliers, advisers and others will be willing and able to help you. At the same time, give support to others, particularly your staff. Staff respond to a leader who provides support for them – explaining, showing, encouraging and acknowledging contribution, providing resources and smoothing the way.

Foster Communication
It is essential to keep the communication channels open if you want new ideas for improved products, processes and services. Customers are the obvious source of information for better products and services. Staff – those doing the work – will be an excellent source of information for improving the way you do business.

Provide opportunities for your staff, customers and suppliers to associate and interact both in a work and social sense. Lead by walking around – see what your staff are doing and listen to what they have to say. Give your staff an opportunity to offer their opinions and suggestions without fear of ridicule or reprisal.

Setting The Example
How you act – whether you are the first to arrive to work, the last to leave, your positive attitude, how you react to stress, reward achievement, keep your promises, provide feedback – sets the standard in your business. You must demonstrate enthusiasm and commitment through your leadership to everyone else in the business. If your behavior is not consistent with the values you promote and the goals you want to achieve, your staff and customers will lose respect for them.

Your business will not survive unless you have the sills to lead…
Assess your leadership ability, motivation, communication and the adaptability to change. Strengthen any area in which you lack expertise through retraining, buying in expertise, or by having a mentor or person with whom you can discuss your business challenges.

I was driving to the office the other day and saw a truck with a sign on the back “How’s my driving?” displayed with a specific number associated with the vehicle. I promptly jumped online when I got to work to check out www.howsmy.co.nz, however was disappointed that the site was “under construction”.

Despite not being able to get more information about this particular company, we can make some assumptions about this business type.

Business owners in the transport industry are responsible for their drivers’ behavior on the road. They have concerns over fleet safety, finding ways of reducing accidents and costs as a result. The company’s brand and reputation is also at risk of any bad driving from their branded fleet.

The “How’s My Driving” program enables the public to provide feedback on any reckless driving on the road by specific vehicles to allow the company to build risk profiles of their drivers.

As a result, drivers are more aware of their on road behavior and driving incidents are reduced.

The business model could possibly work as a subscription model on a per driver, per vehicle or per company basis. Likely target markets include trucks, taxis, buses, rental vehicles and corporate fleets.

As reported by Britannia Encyclopedia, in 2002 New Zealanders were driving 380,297 trucks and buses. If you captured 5% of that market and charged $5 per truck or bus per month to be part of the how’s my driving program, the business would be generating $95,074 per month. A small business generating over a million dollars worth of annual business is quite significant. Imagine what the market reach and potential would be in the other vertical transportation markets!

The main costs would include sales, marketing, a call center and the up keep of the website management application.

In my opinion, this is an excellent start up business opportunity.

A German business called MyMuesli.com recently started an online business selling “made-to-order” muesli allowing you to mix and match up to 70 different ingredients.

This business concept is proving quite popular with Europeans as less than two weeks into starting the website, they had run out of packaging of which they estimated would last 8 weeks.

Customers are able to firstly select the base mix (oats and other grains), secondly, add fruit, nuts and seeds and then finish the cereal customization with added goodies such as organic gummi bears, banana chocs and alfalfa.

Each ingredient adds additional cost to the overall price depending on what you select, plus extra for shipping. All ingredients are organic which adds to the total cost.

The muesli mix is then given an ID and a name by the customer, which allows for easy reordering and recommending to friends, family and colleagues.

Components of this business would entail:

• Relationships with ingredient suppliers
• Commercial kitchen to prepare orders
• Design and build of an e-commerce website
• Promotion of the website through offline and online channels
• Shipping partner to deliver orders
• Setup of a credit card merchant account to take order payment

International shipping laws of this type of product will also need to be investigated.