A Case Study On The Famous ‘Grange’

By - Shamlee Ramteke.

RESTAURANT PROFILE:

NAME – The Grange

STARTED IN -1995.

SERVICE- Fine Dining.

LOCATION - Hilton, Adelaide (South Australia).

CHEF - Cheong Liew (A

celebrity chef with a Malaysian origin,
also known as father of fusion cuisine and has been titled as the ‘10
hottest chefs alive’ by US magazine Food & wine).

SIGNATURE DISH - Four Dances Of The Sea (A dish

including four different islands of seafood).

COVERS - 45.

ACHIEVEMENTS – Winner of many prestigious awards

(including the prestigious Remy Martin/Australian Gourmet Traveler
“restaurant of the year” award).

CLOSED ON – 19th December, 2009.

 INDEX
• INTRODUCTION- 5.

• STRATEGIC FOCUS OF THE HILTON- 6-

7.

• PROBLEMS WITH THE GRANGE

RESTAURANT- 7-9.

• ‘VALUE’ IN THE VALUE-FOR- MONEY

EQUATION- 9-10.

• MANAGER’S OPERATIONAL ACTIONS

FOR THE ‘GRANGE’ RESTAURANT- 11-
12.
 • PERSUASION FOR MASTER CHEF
CHONG LIEW-13.

• REFERENCES-14.

INTRODUCTION

The report gives us an insight of the prestigious Hilton Hotel

in Adelaide. It brings out some serious aspects of the hotel
which had some problems last year with the Grange
restaurant. The report limelights on the strategic focus of the
hotel and the implication of ‘value’ in the value-for-money
equation, according to the standards set by the Hilton group
of hotels. The major emphasis of the report is on the ‘Grange
‘ restaurant , which was headed by renowned celebrity chef
Chong Liew, once rated amongst the top five restaurants in
Australia, but unfortunately closed down on 19th December ,
2009 due to its low operational functionality. The main
objective of the restaurant is to highlight the circumstances
faced by the restaurant and were overlooked by the
management even though the finanacial reports of each
year showed a subsequent decline.
In conclusion, the report is a elaborated view of what
operational actions would have been taken, if assigned me
as the Manager on July 28th,2009 to overcome the
conundrum faced by the hotel. Even after the stingy article
on Chef Chong Liew’s Restaurant by the famous Australian
journalist John Lethlean which endangered Chong’s position
and reputation, suggestions as to what Chef Chong should
continue his excellent culinary journey.

WHAT IS THE STRATEGIC FOCUS OF THE

HILTON HOTEL, ADELAIDE ?

The Hilton group of hotels is one of the leading hotel chains

in the world and the five star rated hotels are franchised
members of Hilton Worldwide Corporation. Hilton Brand
owns around 9 hotels in all parts of the island continent of
Australia. The Hilton Hotel, Adelaide is located in the heart of
the city, overlooking the magnificent Victoria Square in the
Capital City of the state of South Australia. Due to it being
located at the centre and easy access to the Airport and
Financial Institutions, it has always attracted business class
people. The Strategic focus of the Hilton Adelaide is
therefore the Frequent Business traveler market and this has
been highly looked after over the years, it is for this very
reason that Hilton was named the number one brand in
Australia in 2009.
The Hilton, Adelaide caters to mainly the business class
people and looks after all the needs and comforts of this
elite class of guests which are a never ending source of
income for the hotel. The hotel has 17 meeting rooms which
can accommodate up to 800 people, a Business centre and
an Executive lounge, which are only second to the facilities
provided by the Adelaide Convention Centre. Along with
these facilities, all guest rooms are provided with high speed
internet services and a separate working area in each and
every room which definitely reflects the high level of focus
on the business class guest.
(www1.Hilton.com). This has made Hilton the most trusted
and reliable brand delivering hospitality to the business class
and elite class not only in Australia all round the world as
their mission says:

Mission: We will be the preeminent global hospitality

company – the first choice of guests, team members and
owners alike.
 What are the problems with the Grange
Restaurant?

The Grange restaurant was opened in the year 1995

carefully managed under the master Chef Chong Liew. Its
was the Chef’s creativity of fusion cuisine which was a
concoction of Indian, Greek, Asian and modern culinary art,
which brought the restaurant into limelight and fascinated all
connoisseurs to come and visit the restaurant and get
delighted by the food being ‘created’ and not just produced.
Initially, the restaurant performed very well gathering
awards for the restaurant, as they say nothing is permanent,
the restaurant to subsequently saw degeneration over the
years and finally it closed down on 19th December,2009.
According to the review and its evaluation some of the
problems are outlined below:
1. The Décor and Atmosphere:
An outcome of the Quality assurance evaluation conducted
by the hotel in 2009 showed that degraded condition of the
equipment was the serious reason for the restaurants
setback to deliver quality service to its guests. The vital
factor which emerged from the evaluation process was that
the management showed an interest on the improvement
of equipments, facilities and cleanliness only a few weeks
prior to the scheduled visit of the quality assurance
inspector. John Lethlean (The Australian) in his article has
indicated to the ambience and décor looks unchanged and
also the architectural limitations of the restaurant.
2. Unskilled And Temporary Staff:
The staff of the restaurant delivered a disappointing service
to its guests which might have been due to lack of training,
low wages, unhealthy work environment etc. Another
important aspect pointed out by John Lethlean in his article
for the Australian was that the staff were not given specific
tables to serve at, as a result of which a guest would find
many waiters serving at one table, which was irritating to
the guest.
Another notable reason was that there was a huge staff
turnover at the Grange and therefore did not even
remember and identify the regular guests. This could be due
to policies of Job rotation at the restaurant.
A strong reason was the absence of a Sommelier which was
unacceptable in a restaurant which was located at a state
which has a wine rich culture, which meant none of the staff
had the proper knowledge of wines and its accompaniments.
These problems arose because the Chef had very little
control over the staff, which might be due to lack of
authority or inter personal relations between the chef and
the staff under him.
3. Food
The restaurant failed to maintain its food quality for which it
had been known in the past. The head chef Chong Liew
would spend less time in the kitchen, guiding the staff under
him and enjoy most of his time outside the kitchen, or with
friends at the hotel bar. As a result the food quality failed
miserably over the years.
There were no changing of the menus, neither inclusion of
new dishes from
the kitchen department and the same dishes were being
served for the past 12 years unlike at the Vue de Monde
where the chef, Shannon Bennet keeps coming with different
and innovative ideas in his dishes and creates an
‘Experience’ for the guests. (www.vuedemonde.com.au). Of
course the dishes were innovative but the food failed to keep
up with the changing times and the guests longed for some
new dishes to be served to them.
Thus, it can be said that the Restaurant in whole could not
create a “WOW FACTOR” for the guest which they would
expect out of a five star restaurant. Guests therefore started
hesitating to spend a huge amount of money on dinner at
the Grange which was really expensive, costing around
$150-$165Per head for food excluding the accompanying
wine.

WHAT COMPRISES THE MEANING OF THE

TERM ‘VALUE’ IN VALUE-FOR-MONEY AT
THE HILTON HOTEL, ADELAIDE ?

Following are the values which are set by the Hilton Hotels in
order to create an extraordinary service delivery giving them
a moment for lifetime:

Values:

H HOSPITALITY – We are passionate about delivering

exceptional guest experiences.
I INTEGRITY – We do the right thing, all the time.
L LEADERSHIP – We are leaders in our industry and in our
communities.
T TEAMWORK – We are team players in everything we do.
O OWNERSHIP – We are the owners of our actions and
decisions.
N NOW – We operate with a sense of urgency and discipline
(www1.hilton.com)
“Customers expect consumption experiences to be fair
and judge their relationships with institutions using fairness
as a fundamental base” (Namkung,Shawn, Almanza and
Ismail,2008 in reporting Martinez,2006). It is therefore this
customer fairness that one can say form an integral part of
the value for money equation. Furthermore one should be
able to properly deliver pleasant , caring service so as the
guests gets their value for money.
Guests are the ones who decide the quality of service (Berry
and Parasuraman, 1991). It is therefore necessary for the
hotel staff to attend to every guest need and make sure they
are fulfilled to the best of their ability because it is the level
of satisfaction of the guests which will determine the quality
of service being offered by the hotel.
A commitment to service should be made by each and every
staff member of an organization which means that every
individual in the organization must have the power to look
after the needs and solve problems of the guest during their
stay in the hotel. (Kirwin, 1922).
Oliver (1981, p.27) defines satisfaction as “the emotional
reaction following a disconfirmation experience”. It is
therefore very necessary for an organization to satisfy its
guests with its services.
Thus, the Hilton hotel worldwide delivers impeccable service
to the guests and whoever relished the service of the Hilton
would always stay in the Hilton.

WHAT WOULD BE YOUR COURSE OF ACTION IF YOU

WERE APPOINTED AS THE MANAGER OF THE HILTON,
ADELAIDE ON 28TH JULY,2009 ?

Assigning the task of becoming the manager of Hilton,

Adelaide on 28thJuly, 2009 my course of action would be as
follows:

a. the Hotel and its Food & Beverage

Provision:
Firstly, a Corporate meeting should to be taken in order
to discuss the expenses to change the infrastructure
and the equipments that are to be purchased by the
Franchise for the refurbishment of the hotel, it is
important as a Hotel manager to point out these
architectural and temporal entities are becoming
barriers for the business and the owners.
 Food & Beverage are an important aspect of any
hotel and in the case of Hilton Adelaide, it is the second
largest revenue generating department. The hotel has 5 food
outlets plus room service which accounts to almost 25-35%
of the hotel’s total revenue. It is therefore very necessary
that enough resources are available to the kitchen staff to
prepare meals and every outlet has enough number of staff
to look after all guest needs.
Updation and elaboration of the Wines and liquors for the
guests as per the popular brands shall be included in the
bar, as the hotel is present in the Australia’s Largest wine
producing region.
Would conduct a thorough survey and research on the
present market share that my F&B department has got,
especially with regard to the restaurants. The menus need to
be redesigned and also need to accommodate the best of
dishes and wine. The current clientele requirements have to
kept in mind while redesigning the menu. Also the pricing of
dishes have to be revised and priced according to present
market standards.

b. The Grange Restaurant:

The Grange is a award winning restaurant therefore it has

to flawless and perfect in every way. Firstly, its
investment are on the equipments that are going to be
used in the grange kitchen applying the standardization
 and also changing the ambience, cutlery, glassware,
crockery, linen etc. and keep a regular check on its
maintainence where a meetings can be conducted twice a
month with the restaurant manager and the chef
regarding the sales and maintainence required and the
guest complaints to be taken into consideration.

A Restaurant manager should be appointed who

should concentrate only on the floor, so that the chef can
dedicate himself to the quality production of the food
served to the guests.

The guests always wishes to see something new and

exiting as they are paying so high to dine-in in the grange
restaurant. . At the Grange, the staff has to be permanent
and really skillful since no one would like to take chances
with such an expensive commodity. A Permanent and skilled
team would benefit in realising guest needs and recognizing
frequent guests and remembering their preferences etc. The
Guests love going to a place where the staff recognizes them
and offers a warm welcome (Brown, 2003).
Since, the restaurant is only open on 4 days rather it
should be pen all 7 days as it will be convenient for all the
guests to come and dine-in in the restaurant which can in
turn increase the revenue profitability. Menus should be
timely altered and new culinary innovations and creations
should be brought up in order to keep the standards and
meet the competition, clientele demands and anchor as the
‘best’ position.

PERSUASION FOR MASTER CHEF CHONG LIEW

Chef Chong Liew had a great career the day he landed in

Australia in 1965 leaving behind his home country Malaysia.
He mastered culinary arts and had experience of working in
different restaurants. The Grange Restaurant was a
benchmark in chef Chong life and it had a great start when
people just used to visit because of him. However, Success is
hard to maintain, he is a human being after all there are ups
and downs in persons life.
Just to add on to it was John Lethlean,s article on the
Grange which became the reason to close down the
restaurant on 19th December,2009.
Definitely chef Chong Liew’s position or reputation in not in
danger due to this article, he has accepted the criticism and
he also said that he was just the caretaker of the place and
not the owner which shows he has not made himself solely
responsible for the situation.
 It is suggested that Chef Chong should continue
experimenting with the culinary art he masters so well. He
should keep on researching on the fusion cuisine which is
famous for and gain knowledge about different cuisines in
the world. He should look ahead in life and take it up as a
new challenge. The Grange was a learning experience for
the master chef and he who learns from his mistakes is
considered a wise person. He does not need to worry about
his reputation and the perfect way to support this is he was
honored by the Restaurant and Catering SA with a lifetime
achievement award for his contribution to South Australia’s
culinary culture for over 3 decades. Such was his influence
on the cuisine that he created an “east-west fusion” style
cooking that inspired and now known popularly as “modern
Australian cuisine”(Tony Love, The Advertiser,2009)

REFERENCES

1) Berry, L.L & Parasuraman, A (1991) cited in ‘Service

Quality Management in hospitality tourism and leisure’,
Pre Publications. Pg.51.
2) Brown, R.D (2003), ‘The Restaurnat manager’s
handbook : how to set up, operate and manage a
restaurant’, Atlantic Publishing Group Inc., pg. 5-15.
3) Kirwin, P. (1922). Quality management: A ten point
model. Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration
Quarterly, 33(5), pg 50-60.

4) Lethlean, John, Rstaurant review: The Grange Adelaide,

‘The weekend Australian Magazine’, Sunday, July 26,
2009.

5) Oliver, R (1993). A conceptual model of service quality

and service satisfaction: Compatible goals, cited in
‘Service quality mangement in hospitality, tourism and
leisure’, Pg. 27.

6) Rowe, M, Lower, G, ‘Chef shrugs off criticism, but quits

to tend veggie patch’, ‘The Australian’, Friday,
November 13, 2009

7) Tony Love, Cheong Liew Given ‘lifetime’ honor, ‘The

Advertiser’, July 28, 2009.