白云汉莎航食地面市场战略研究

1. Introduction

1.1 Research background

From  the  year  of  2012,  influenced  by  the  slowdown  of  the  economic  growth  of China  and  the  increasing demand  of  the  aviation  industry,  the  dramatic  rise  of  oil price and the depreciation of Chinese yuan to American dollar, the net profit of the aviation  industry  begins  to  experience  a  sharp  decline.  In  the  meantime,  with  the lifting  control  of  the  relevant  national  policies  of  China,  there  are  great  market potentials in Chinese civil aviation, which brings the birth of Chinese civil aviation. In the early period, the low-cost operation method is the basic orientation of Chinese civil airline enterprises. In order to reduce the marketing and management cost, most of cheap airline enterprises choose to provide no free in-flight food. In addition, the plane  is  not  near  the  covered  bridge,  the  luggage  every passenger  takes  with  them should be less than 15 kilometers and the ticketing system doesn’t connect with the Travel Sky system. On June 21 of the year of 2005, Air Asia—the biggest low-cost airline enterprises in the Asia Pacific area, began to land in Xiamen, China, marking the low-price trend in China. The entry of Air Asia in China marked that the globally increasing  low-cost  aviation  operation  mode  began  to  enter  into  Chinese  market. Confronting  with  the competitive  foreign  airline  enterprises,  Chinese  airline enterprises  must  embrace  the  challenge.  If  Chinese  airline enterprises  don't  follow the low-cost principle, the foreign low-cost airline enterprises will pose great impact on Chinese civil aviation. In the low-cost operation, the in-flight food enterprises try to  lower  the  cost  of  the  in-flight  food,  lower  the food  standard  and  cancel  the in-flight  food,  and  improve  the  service  quality  through  increasing  the  change frequency.

Since its birth, Chinese in-flight catering industry has established a close connection with  the  aviation  industry.  With  the flourishing  development  of  Chinese  aviation industry, Chinese in-flight catering industry has made great progress in those several tens of years. But it still has a lot of problems, such as the prominent problem of the high dependency. The increasing operation pressure of the airline enterprises and the demand  of  the  service  improvement  and internationalization  put  forward  new requirement on the in-flight catering enterprises. Their relation has changed from the past coordination and support to the competition and control.

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1.2 Research objective

In  respect  to  the  difficulties  in  the  process  of  development,  the  author  made  a thorough analysis on the challenges, the chances as well as the disadvantages and the advantages of the enterprise. On the basis of the theory, the author made an analysis and studied the development direction and put forward the development strategy and suggestion as well as provided the implementation plan. The author tried to see the theoretical supplement and the support in reality.

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2. Literature review

2.1 Introduction to in-flight food and in-flight catering industry

The in-flight food is the food provided for the passengers in the plans of the airline enterprises.  It  can  be  defined  from the  narrow  sense  and  the  broad  sense.  In  the narrow  sense,  the  in-flight  food  is  the  food  provided  for passengers  in  the  plane, including the breakfast, the dinner and snacks. In the broad sense, the in-flight food also includes water, drinks, wine and tea, even all the raw materials and seasonings besides the conventional food.

With the development of the aviation industry, the in-flight food has developed into a mature  period  with  its owncharacteristics.  It  mainly  includes  the  following characteristics:

The first one is the hygiene standard of the in-flight food. As the food safety is very important  for  the  flight  safety, any  kind  of  food  poisoning  incident  will  pose  a serious  result.  Thus,  the  hygiene  requirement  of  the  in-flight food  is  much  stricter than that of other daily food. For example, it has a nearly strict requirement in the micro biology indicators and physical and chemical indicators.

The second one is the production process of the in-flight food. Its production process is of a distinct characteristic. The hot in-flight food will be served after a series of process including cooking, cooling, freezing, distribution and the second heating. As the result, the in-flight food should be kept its delicious taste after the second heating, which  is  the  technical difficult  problem  of  the  in-flight  food  different  from  other daily food.

The  third  one  is  the  raw  material  of  the  in-flight  food.  The  in-flight  food  has  a special  requirement  on  the raw  material.  All  the  raw  materials  must  be  the  high quality material of the same products. The output rate is very low. The unqualified parts in the qualified raw material will be removed. The best parts will be processed to ensure the high quality of the food. In addition, the raw materials with bones and thorns can't be chosen as the in-flight food for fear that passengers may be choked in the bumpiness of planes in the flight process.

The fourth one is the taste of the in-flight food. Due to the limited choice of food in each flight, especially the economy class, there are only two choices. Thus, the food should  not  be  too  sweet,  too  salty  and  too  spicy.  That  is  to say,  the  taste  of  the in-flight food shall be of the popular taste.

The  fifth  one  is  the  size  of  the  in-flight  food.  The  in-flight  food  has  a  very  strict requirement on the size of the food. If it is too large, it will be hard to heat. If it is too small, the taste and color will be affected. The size requirement of the in-flight food is different according to the raw materials of the in-flight food.

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2.2 Origin of in-flight food

2.2.1 The in-flight catering has become the civil mode from the military mode with the development civil aviation.

In  the  early  period,  the  planes  are  firstly  used  in  the  military  affair.  With  the economic development and the actual needs after the ending of the First World War, the civil aviation was born in the western countries. Through inheriting the military aviation  and  drawing  on  the  experience  of  military  aviation,  the  civil  aviation  has developed mature. The in-flight catering industry is one of these cases. In the earliest period, the in-flight food is to provide enough physical power for the pilots to keep their energy. After the birth of the civil aviation, the airline enterprises still maintain the  traditional  method  of  taking  food  to  planes  and  giving  them  to  passengers  for supplementing physical strength. With increasing severe competition in the aviation industry, the in-flight food has developed into quite a lot of more types.

2.2.2 In-flight food is to balance the human internal pressure

Flying  in  the  high  sky,  passengers  may  have  the  uncomfortable  feeling  due  to  the decreasing  air  pressure. Thus,  the  cabin  is  the  air-tight  pressure  cabin.  Extracting high-temperature  and  high-pressure  air  from  the engine  and  releasing  them  to  the cabin  after  the  adjustment  of  air-conditioner  system.  In  the  meantime,  the outflow valve  controls  the  emission  of  the  fresh  air  in  the  cabin.  Control  the  pressure  and ensure the adequate ventilation.  To  better  balance  the  internal  pressure  in  the  body and avoid the discomfort in the high sky, the airline enterprise provides the in-flight food  for  passengers  to  chew  and  swallow,  with  a  view  to  balancing  the  pressure within the body.

2.2.3 The in-flight catering enterprise is formed to enhance the service quality and  competitiveness  of  airline enterprises,  and  is  improved  with  the development of aviation industry.

The  airline  enterprise  which  firstly  provided  in-flight  food  is  KLM  Royal  Dutch Airlines.  In  the  year  of  1919, KLM Royal  Dutch  Airlines  began  to  provide  the prepackaged food for passengers. With the influence of the air flow in the low sky, the  development  of  more  complicated  food  service  is  restricted.  Owing  to  the innovation of the plane manufacturing technology, the in-flight food service has been improved.

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3. Case description .................... 12

3.1 Introduction to the enterprise ................ 12

3.2 Cold-chain operation in-flight food .............. 15

3.3 Difficult situation of the enterprise ................... 18

4. Case analysis ........................... 21

4.1 Situation analysis on Chinese in-flight catering industry ..............22

4.1.1 In-flight catering has developed from the "workshop" to "factory" ..... 21

4.1.2 In-flight food has numerous types .............. 21

5. The strategy of the ground food market ................. 36

5.1 Market entry point .................... 36

5.2 Policy implementation ....................... 37

5. The strategy of the ground food market

5.1 Market entry point

As  a  food  manufacturer  depending  on  the  aviation  industry,  Baiyun  LSG experienced  a  difficult  period  due  to the  slow  development  of  aviation  industry. Reduction  and  cancellation  of  the  flights  with  international  in-flight food  service; drastic decrease of passenger load rate in domestic flights in-flight food service, so airline enterprises lower the in-flight food price to lessen the operation cost, which drives the enterprises to the difficulty in confronting with the business slowdown. Restricted  by  industry,  aviation  food  enterprise  has  an  unusually  close  relationship with airlines.At  present,  the  domestic  aviation  meal  comes  mainly  from  the following three: catering company of airline catering company, the airport's catering company  and  exist  independently  without  relying  on  airlines  and  airports catering company.At  present,  the  domestic  four  airlines  in-flight  meal  usually  go  their company  catering,  return order  landing  station  provide  in-flight  meal.In  order  to prevent the outflow of profit or to solve the problem of the employment the airline staff  or  family  members,  Most  local  airlines  have  catering  company themselves.Segmentation  of  catering  market  unceasingly,  makes  more  and  more competitive.

In  the  year  of  2010,  the  ground  food  business with  the  biggest  market  share  is  the Pazhou  food.  The enterprise  should  tighten  the  control  of  the  Pazhou  food  and ensure  the  product  quality.  In  the  meantime, the enterprise  should  follow  up  the tender  process  of  the  Pazhou  Exhibition  Hall  to  strengthen  the  partnership  and coordinate the smooth implementation of the tendering work. 

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6. Conclusion and further discussion

With  the  development  of  the  globalization  and  the  progress  of  the  science  and technology,  the  food  safety issue  has  drawn  the  attention  of  the  whole  world.  The food safety problem is the common issue of the world. It cares the social existence and the development. It needs to renew the concept to solve the food safety problem. All governments  should  have  a  deep  understanding  and  recognition  of  the  food safety on the basis of reviewing traditional food safety laws and supervision system. In the international catering industry, the cold chain production guarantees the food safety.  The  cold  chain  production  will  be  the  trend  of  the  overall  food  distribution business. It  has  the  obvious  advantage.  How  to  adopt  the  cold  chain  production  in the in-flight food distribution to the ground market? This is an important issue. The successful adoption of the cold chain mode is good for cultivating good brand image. When the production mode succeeds, the hot chain mode will be phased out in the ground food market. The first enterprise which tries this production mode will have an important status. At present, the in-flight food enterprise of Baiyun LSG has only one customer of ground food market, i.e. "Hexie" motor train unit from Guangzhou to Shenzhen. The  daily  demand  and  the  number  of  passengers  are  very  small.  In addition,  the  railway  system  has  the independent  department,  so  the  in-flight  food enterprise  has  no  advantage  in  food  safety  control  system.  The advantage  of  cold chain  can't  be  published  and  implemented  without  the  help  of  the  governmental health department.  The  large-scale  international  food  supply  project  is  the breakthrough  point  for  the  in-flight  food enterprise  of  the  Baiyun  LSG  to successfully  enter  into  the  ground  market.  As  this  kind  of  project  features  a large number  of  people  and  quite  a  lot  of  media,  the  government  plays  a  much  more important role. Thus, the enterprise with the advantage in food safety will get more opportunities in food market.

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