Mrs. Field Inc Case Study

The concept for Mrs. Fields, Inc. was born in Palo Alto, California in 1977 when Mr. and Mrs. Fields opened the first of what would later turn into a 600 store organization across 25 states, five countries and four continents. One of the unique aspects of this case is the relationship between Debbi Fields, a cookie “expert” that began developing recipes at age 16, and her husband, Stanford University Economist Randy Fields.

In the period between 1977 to 1981 the company had established 14 stores and the dual partnership of developing the daily operations from concept to product that Debbi created met with the management and information system models that Randy developed and that supported their explosive growth.

The company had a hybrid organizational structure leaning toward a flat organization mainly because of the centralized decision making attained with the information system models they operated. Hierarchy positions were narrow in scope and had a primarily supervisory capacity of the human factor that could not be controlled by computers. In 1987 Mrs. Fields, Inc. acquired from PepsiCo. La Petit Boulangerie, a 116 store concept that integrated baked frozen goods, hot soups and sandwiches. It was considered an upscale sit down café. The rationale behind this acquisition as expressed by Mr. Randy Fieds was “based on Mrs. Fields, Inc. operational experience and extensive market and consumer research”

In order for this acquisition to be successful Mrs. Fields, Inc. needs to take decisive strategic, management and IT decisions while maintaining the company’s vision and business philosophy.

1. Strategic Activities- should be handled by top level management of both companies and establish goals and major issues during the transition.

a. Identify Optimal Strategic direction by conducting a SWOT Analysis of the acquisition model. The Strength and Weaknesses are influenced by internal factors and relate directly to business operations. Opportunity and Threats are related to external industry factors including business environment and industry practices and developments.

Strengths

1. Mrs. Fields Brand Name

2. IT -Ability to develop, in mid/long term, information system models to make operations