Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The restaurant industry is one of the largest in the United States, and employees within this industry deal with poor working conditions on a daily basis. Despite this, there has been a surprising dearth of research to understand the mental health needs of these workers. The aims of this study were to establish a prevalence of burnout and depression, and understand the relationships between these two outcomes with the constructs of bullying, perfectionism, and social support. To do so, restaurant workers (N=453) were recruited to complete an on-line survey. Results revealed a high prevalence of depressive symptoms and an overextended profile of burnout. Both bullying and perfectionism displayed significant positive relationships with depression and burnout, while social support demonstrated significant negative relationships with burnout and depression. When analyzed in a three-way interaction, social support failed to significantly moderate the effects of bullying and perfectionism on depression and burnout. Results indicate that depression and burnout are serious concerns among restaurant workers. Additionally, bullying and perfectionism are promising targets to consider in future research as mechanisms leading to depression and burnout among restaurant workers.

Abstract With China's rapid economic growth, the turnover of restaurants also will correspondingly. In 2005, for example, the Chinese restaurant industry retail sales to $RMB 888.68 billion, a net increase of $RMB 133.6 billion over the previous year, the annual operating revenue 48.88 billion yuan, annual sales for 15 years to maintain 10% growth at least. Domestic retaurant sales of catering industry in 2009 was about $RMB 1.8 trillion, representing an increase of 16.8% than year 2008. In the highly competitive environment, business model of restaurants are going to be more flexible and diversified.Under the large number of impacts of foreign cultures, thelocal consumers of China have more alternatives such Japanese food or Western cusines in addition to the traditional Chinese rice. Foreign entrepreneurs (especially Taiwan's business) not only positively encounter with local restaurants, but also face the same competitive situation against other outsiders. Based on this, as Taiwan's restaurant operators, how to how to effectively control the local consumer demand, taste preferences and build up the customer loyalty is coming to be an important subject of running local restaurants. The study purpose is to understand the service quality and customer satisfaction of Y restaurant which is lacatedin Chengdu City, Sichuan Province, of China. In this study, the questionnaires were delivered by the proportion of meal-time of cluster sampling, and issued from April 25 to May 9.A total of 201 questionnaires are got back, 170 valid samples were gathered at the 95% confidence level with the sampling error of 3.3%.After the questionnaire data of statistically testing analysis, conclusions are followed as below, 1. In aspects of positive customer satisfactory, A. The objective dimensions of satisfaction, the both of "message" and "convenience" are significantly lower than the overall average value of objective satisfaction. In the construct of "message", the Y restaurant is recommended to reinforce the message sufficiency, such as the way of consumption and prices, website information, external signs and so on. In the construct of "convenience", the study recommends that the Y restaurant be more easily found, such as clearer web map instructions and more obvious signs. B. the "objective satisfaction,"(X value) "customer loyalty" (Y value) showed in a linear regression model, the significant linear relationship exsists (R square = 23.5%). Similarly, the subjective satisfaction and customer loyalty are also represented as positive linear relationship. C. satisfaction of all objective dimensions, the "price" construct has the highest correlation (Pearson's correlation coefficient = 0.562) with subjective satisfaction. And that means higher prices of satisfaction, the subjective satisfaction will be higher accordingly. 2. In aspects of demographics and consumer behavior, A. in the frequency of consumption, 2nd consumption satisfaction, is significantly better than the "2-5 times" consumption customers. (B) in the meal-time aspect, customer satisfaction of the weekday hours is better than holiday time satisfaction. 3. Other fators, A.The holiday dinner customer emphasize significantly higher than "weekday lunch" customers¡¦ in aspects of tastes of food. (B) Of "The provision of parking spaces", the "income", and "age", there is a significant difference. The degree of emphasis of the consumers with more than $RMB 2000 of monthly income is significantly more than that of less than %RMB 2,000 of monthly income.; The degree of emphasis of consumers at the age of above 35 customers is significantly more than that at the age of below 35 years. Key words: Consumer Satisfaction, Restaurant Industry, Cheng-du City

0 / SPK / specialcollections@tulane.edu

The restaurant industry is often described as a hard and tough working environment. The restaurant industry is the industry that are most subjected to sexual harassment witch can affect the occupational health both physically and psychologically. The aim of this study was to explore the experience of sexual harassment among staff in the restaurant industry. To get a view and understanding of earlier research a systematic literature review was conducted. To get an understanding of restaurant staffs experience of sexual harassment a qualitative interview study with a phenomenology approach was performed. The main results showed that the informants experienced sexual harassment as a process of acclimatization. It starts with a sexual jargon that is customary and the informant describes a fear of reporting. The jargon and fear becomes a part of everyday life and informants describes that they don’t define it to be sexual harassment anymore. The informants describe it as the borders have moved or become blurred when it comes to sexual harassment witch can defines like a normalization of sexual harassment. / Restaurangbranschen beskrivs ofta som en bransch med hårt och otrivsamt klimat. Av alla branscher är restaurangbranschen den bransch där minst är nöjda med sitt arbete samt utsätts de för flest sexuella trakasserier. Sexuella trakasserier inom arbetslivet är ett uppträdande av sexuell natur som kränker en annan arbetstagare. Sexuella trakasserier kan påverka arbetshälsan både fysiskt och psykiskt och kan yttra sig genom ångest, rädsla, trötthet, huvudvärk och depression. Tidigare forskning kring sexuella trakasserier mellan arbetstagare och chefer var begränsat vilket tyder på att det behövs ökad kunskap och forskning kring det. Tidigare forsknings resultat påvisar att sexuella trakasserier inom restaurangbranschen beror på makt, att det är en form av maktutövande. För att få förståelse om problematiken och restaurangpersonalen upplevelse om sexuella trakasserier genomfördes en kvalitativ intervjustudie med en fenomenologisk ansats. Syftet var att undersöka upplevelsen av sexuella trakasserier bland anställda i restaurangbranschen. Resultatets essens kan beskrivas som en acklimatiseringsprocess där sexuella trakasserier upplevs som en skämtsam jargong med sexuella kommentarer, essensen utrycks samt genom en rädsla när det kommer till att anmäla sexuella trakasserier. Rädslan kring att anmäla utrycks som att informanterna är rädda för ryktesspridning, att mista gemenskapen eller att bli utfryst från kollegor/restaurangbranschen. Jargongen och rädslan blir tillslut en del av vardagen och informanterna beskriver sig att inte tänka på det längre, sexuella trakasserier blir efter en tid normalt. En normalisering sker utav sexuella trakasserier där informanterna beskriver att de inte uppmärksammar sexuella trakasserier på samma sätt längre. Informanterna beskriver det som att gränserna har flyttats eller suddats ut när det kommer till sexuella trakasserier, det har blivit en självklar del av arbetsmiljön och restaurangbranschen. Jargongen, rädslan och normaliseringen av sexuella trakasserier kan beskrivas som en acklimatiseringsprocess. Informanterna har acklimatiserat sig till en arbetsmiljö som inkluderar sexuella trakasserier.

Master of Science / Department of Hospitality Management / Kevin Roberts / Restaurant managers are responsible for the daily operation, coordination of staff, and profitability in the one million plus restaurants in the United States. However, the restaurant industry has a high management turnover rate and the identification of any process that may help restaurant owners identify, hire, and retain qualified managers is vital to the success of any operation, and the industry as a whole. Clearly identifying competencies that are needed for a manager to be successful might help in lowering the turnover rate and ensure that operations are successful. Not only will the identification of competencies benefit operators, it will also provide information for faculty in hospitality programs to build and adapt curriculum to meet the demands of industry. Few studies have focused on restaurant manager competencies and most are over 20 years old, and no studies have explored future competencies. Thus, the purpose of this study is to determine present and future restaurant management competencies. Specific questions include: 1. Which competencies are necessary for entry-level restaurant managers? 2. How will entry-level management competencies change in the next 10 years? 3. What is the magnitude of change between current and future restaurant manager competencies? The sample for this study included 123 restaurant managers in the United States, and yielded a 21.9% response rate. Most of the highest ranked competencies are soft skills. Managers ranked leadership skills as the most important competency, while education was ranked lowest. Interestingly, when exploring individual competencies, results of present compared to future competencies showed a slight decrease in mean score. Paired Samples T-tests were used to explore differences between present and future competencies and between the different domains. Few significant differences were found, though education was the only competency with a significantly higher future mean. Managerial implications, limitations, and directions for future studies are discussed.

Advertising is an important mechanism by which firms are able to communicate with their current and potential consumers. An advertising campaign may satisfy a multitude of objectives for a firm. Namely, advertising can be used to create awareness for a product or brand. It may be used to inform consumers about the usage features and benefits specific to a brand or a given product, or generate favorable attitudes and preferences amongst customers. Additionally, advertising may aim to persuade consumers towards trial or purchase. All these objectives enhance e consumers’ response towards the firm and its products/brands, and in turn, advertising helps to achieve sales for the advertised firm in the long run. This dissertation examined the relationship between advertising expenditures and sales revenue at the aggregate and brand level for the Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) industry in the United States from 1986 to 2007. Two main objectives of this study were to: 1) analyze the relationship between advertising expenditures and sales revenue within the QSR industry; and 2) provide analysis of the relationship between advertising and sales revenues for leading QSR firms, in the United States during the observed period. Thus, the current study provides the most comprehensive analysis of the relationships between advertising and sales in the QSR industry to date. Hypotheses were tested by time series analysis. Specifically, a stepwise regression analysis with backwards elimination of non-significant predicators was utilized to select a set of statistically significant predictor variables. This study controlled for factors expected to affect sales revenues such as population size, price and inflationary effects. Findings from this study indicate that aggregate advertising expenditures and aggregate sales for the QSR industry in the United States were significantly and positively related from 1986 to 2007. This is the first study to examine this relationship over such an extended period of time—twenty-two years. Results from brand level show a positive and significant relationship between advertising expenditures and sales revenues for certain QSR brands. Additional analysis, explored the relationship between advertising expenditures and another measure of consumption, market share, for QSR firms in the United States during 1986 to 2007. Results from this set of analysis, demonstrated a positive and significant relationship between electronic advertising expenditures and market share for several QSR brands. A Chow test (Chow, 1960) was also conducted on the brand level models to test for the presence of structural breaks in the data. Other means of analysis are also offered, and the implications of the results to research and theory are drawn. The study also identified future directions for research. / text

Background – The franchising industry in Sweden has experienced a vast growth in the recent years, and it makes up a significant part of the Swedish economy. The restaurant industry accounts for a large amount of the Swedish franchises. Due to the dynamic business environment today, companies need to increasingly strive for improvement in order to sustain their competitive advantage and to enhance their performance. Innovation may be required, and franchises are no exceptions. However, due to the nature of the franchise systems, with the franchisor imposing particular policies on the individual franchisees, the position of innovation in this context is not clear. On one hand, a franchise should act innovatively in order to remain competitive in the marketplace, but on the other hand, the franchisor limits the activities of the franchisee to ensure system uniformity through brand and quality management. The position of innovation in the franchise context is ambiguous, since very little research has been conducted on the topic. Purpose – The purpose of this thesis is to examine Swedish franchises within the restaurant industry and to determine the position of innovation in the franchise context from the perspective of the franchisee. Method – A case study with semi-structured interviews with five franchisees in a specific region in Sweden were conducted to gain empirical material on the topic of innovation within restaurant franchises. The obtained data was then analyzed with the help of existing literature on innovation and franchise systems. Conclusion – It was discovered that Swedish franchises within the restaurant industry pursue product and marketing innovation. The innovation is mostly incremental, rather than radical. Several different factors contribute to why franchisees pursue innovation. It was also identified that some Swedish franchisors take an active role in encouraging innovation in the franchises, while other franchisors have a more passive, or even discouraging stance towards franchise innovation.

The main research objective of this study was to determine whether Wi-Fi affects customer's loyalty and how its impact differs depending on the type of restaurants: coffee shops, fast food restaurants, and casual dining restaurants. For the study I designed a primary field survey to collect data and performed multiple linear regression analysis to test the study hypotheses. Findings show that Wi-Fi service factors turned out to be significant for all types of restaurants for both attitudinal and behavioral loyalty. Wi-Fi service factors were more important for coffee shop loyalty than fast-food restaurants or casual dining restaurants. However, not all of the Wi-Fi usage factors were significant consistently. Furthermore, Wi-Fi service factors were much more important for coffee shop loyalty than fast food restaurants or casual dining restaurants. Findings are expected to assist hospitality marketers to utilize Wi-Fi service as a point of service towards their customers.

One of the keys for restaurant managers in conducting a proper assessment of their business opportunities is through understanding the level of risk these opportunities bear. This can be achieved by analyzing the causal relationships between external environmental forces and internal capabilities of the firm, and then make a strategic choice in what opportunities to invest. The purpose of this study was to investigate the concept of risk and its underlying dimensions that influence the restaurant industry's cash flows and stock returns. This study proposed a contemporary framework that enables restaurant industry executives to develop a better understanding of the risk factors (macroeconomic and industry) that influence their firms' cash flows and stock returns. The primary unit of analysis was at industry (portfolio) level. In addition, as a second step, three restaurant firms were selected to demonstrate the practical application of the model. Exploratory factor analysis indicated that the restaurant industry risk is represented by three dimensions: "Output," "PPI Meats," and "IP Restaurants." The macroeconomic risk construct was represented by the five variables of Arbitrage Pricing Theory of Chen et al. (1986). Time series-analysis regression of the portfolio of 75 restaurant firms, for the 1993-2004 period, revealed that macroeconomic variables explained a significant portion of restaurant stock returns. On the other hand, both macroeconomic and industry models explained a significant level of variation in operating cash flows. The addition of September 11 "dummy" variable improved the explained variation in stock returns for both equations (macroeconomic and industry). At a firm level, the industry model accounted for a significant variation in internal value drivers (operating cash flows, food cost, and labor cost) for all three restaurant companies. The industry risk model survived after controlling for the effect of macroeconomic variables on operating cash flows. The results indicate that the industry model provides a parsimonious solution in estimating variation in operating cash flows by capturing macroeconomic effects. / Ph. D.

The essential characteristic of the future is uncertainty. A basic feature of the economy, and life in general, is that decisions are made under conditions of uncertainty-the future is unknowable. Having reliable guidelines or indicators that provide discipline and signposts to the future is required for the process of successful investing. Conditions are constantly changing, and there are no rewards for replaying the same old game over and over. To answer for this demand, continued from the previous studies (Choi, 1996; Choi et al., 1997a; Choi et al., 1997b; Choi et al., 1999), this study developed the restaurant industry business cycle models and examined financial practices of the high and low performing firms over the industry cycles. The U.S. restaurant industry demonstrated three cycles (peak to peak or trough to trough) for the period of 1970 through 1998. The restaurant industry peaked in 1973, 1979, and 1989. The industry troughed in 1970, 1974, 1980, and 1991. The mean duration of the restaurant industry cycles is 8 years (SD: 2) calculated by peak to peak and 6.5 years (SD: 2.08) calculated by trough to trough. Expansion takes an average of 6 years in the restaurant industry but declines sharply after it reaches the peak taking average 1.33 years. The restaurant industry experienced high growth (boom) every five years on average. The troughs of the growth cycles, contrasted to the peaks of the growth cycles, coincided with those of the restaurant industry business cycles in each case except one (1985). During that year a low growth phase interrupted industry business expansion but did not terminate it. Restaurant industry growth cycles, then, tend to be relatively symmetrical: since 1970 the average duration was about 2.25 years for both expansion (L-H) and contraction (H-L). In contrast, the restaurant industry business cycles in the same period show a strong asymmetry: the expansions lasted on the average 6 years; the contractions, 1.33 years. The expansions have varied in duration much more than the high growth phases have (the respective standard deviations are 2.58 and 0.95 years). This study supports the view that the cyclical fluctuations of the growth of the restaurant industry can be projected by measuring and analyzing series of economic indicators and each economic indicator has specific characteristics in terms of time lags, and thus can be classified into leading, coincident, and lagging indicators. This study formed a set of composite indices with twelve indicators classified in the leading category, six as coincident, and twenty as lagging. The high performing firms' financial practices regarding investment decisions measured by capital spending, and price earning ratio, and part of financing and dividend decisions measured by market value of common share outstanding are independent of the cyclical fluctuations of the industry cycles. But, their practices regarding dividend decisions measured by the earning per share, investment decision measured by cash flow per share, and financing decisions measured by asset value per share and long term debt level are dependent on the events (Expansion/Contractions) in the Restaurant Industry Cycles. Conclusively, high performers exercise their capital investment (reflected by capital spending) and equity management (reflected by common share outstanding and P/E ratio) independently while being less influenced by the industry swings. They exercise, however, their working capital management (reflected by cash flow per share), earning management (reflected by EPS), asset management, and long term debt management quite dependently while being more influenced by the industry swings. The financial practices exercised by the low performing firms are independent from the events in the industry cycle. Although some financial practices are related to the events in the industry cycle, the directions are opposite to the events in the industry cycle. Specifically, for all of the selected financial strategies except common share outstanding and long-term debt, the low performers practice them independently from the cyclical fluctuations of the industry cycles. Even for common share outstanding and long-term debt strategies, they practiced their strategies in opposite directions to the events (Expansion/Contractions) in the Restaurant Industry Cycles. It is expected that the above results can be used for improving investment performance through understanding the cyclical behavior of the economy and the restaurant industry. With that model, investors should be able to take part in the upswings while avoiding the cyclical downturns, and to structure a portfolio that keeps risk to a minimum. This should then presumably result in competitive investment decisions of firms, thereby improving the effectiveness of resource allocation. / Ph. D.