Journal of Japan Industrial Management Association
Online ISSN : 2187-9079
Print ISSN : 1342-2618
ISSN-L : 1342-2618
Management Models for Home Laundry Enterprises in Japan : Strategies to Avoid Excessive Competition
Fumiko KOGAHeihachiro FUKUDATetsuko MATSUO
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2004 Volume 54 Issue 6 Pages 365-372

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Abstract

In recent years, service industries have been developing. The authors have developed a quality evaluation technique for service enterprises through the laundry business as the service business that is closest to manufacturing businesses. This paper applies this technique to the home laundry business in Japan. A home laundry business consists of a concentrate processing factory, its direct management store and its agency. The acquired competition of markets among service enterprises grows in intensity, and excessive competition, such as low price competition, has developed. In this paper, the authors have conducted the following trial steps for the purpose of constructing fundamental management models to improve the marketable quality of enterprise on the relationship between a cleaning enterprise with a processing factory and an agency. By developing Koga's technique, we seek, theoretically, the formation of a system of commission rates to decide each other's relation, and investigate its actuality. By considering the results, on the case of utilizing and reducing available capacity, we construct and analyze models for improvement in marketable quality conformed to a company's management ability. The principal results are the following four models. (1) The theoretical standard value of a laundry commission rate is calculated, and the results are correlated to the real value of large and "medium and small" enterprises. (2) From the standpoint that laundry enterprises utilize available capacity, an enterprise selected model was derived for an agency to maintain and improve marketable quality. (3) By raising the operation rate and decreasing the capacity cost directly to reduce capacity, the scope to maintain and improve marketable quality was clarified. (4) When we think of enterprises and agencies as one system from a utilizing available capacity standpoint, regions to improve marketable quality through a practical low price strategy have been offered.

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© 2004 Japan Industrial Management Association
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