Whitley

The Company
Whitley?s Deli was started in Sydney in 1992 as a small gourmet retail food store. In 1994 the company branched
out into the mail-order gourmet food business to serve customers who were unable to get to the retail store. The
success of this venture resulted in the company establishing itself as a franchise business in 2000. Whitley?s
offered financing to potential owners coupled with a very high visibility and high quality marketing program.
Eventually Whitley?s Deli evolved into a 100 location business across Australia by the end of 2010 and a corporate
headquarters operation located in Port Macquarie, NSW.
Deli-Online
Due to the success of its franchise operation, Whitley?s Deli now wish to create ?Deli-Online?, using web based
technology to improve business to business and business to customer processes and relationships. A ?Deli-Online?
website will be developed to provide online order entry, enquiry and account payment facilities to existing and
new customers. Web-based applications will replace the existing inventory and supplier management systems.
By creating ?Deli-Online?, Whitley?s aim to attract an additional 25 new franchise stores and secure a 50%
increase in customer numbers by the end of 2014.
The goals or objectives of the project are to:
? Improve customer satisfaction and hence customer retention,
? Obtain cost savings from more efficient order entry, enquiry and account payment processes
? Obtain cost savings from improved inventory, warehouse and supplier management processes
? Achieve significant staff productivity improvements
The Whitley?s Deli franchise operators are worried about the impact ?Deli-Online? may have on their individual
businesses and have formed a committee to put forward their concerns about the project and their ideas about how
they can work with and benefit from ?Deli-Online?. The franchise operators committee has also proposed that they
should have an involvement in the ?Deli-Online? project.
?Deli-Online? will provide customers with access to password-protected billing information, electronic payment
options and account history data. Non-customers will have a user-friendly point-of-entry and, in addition to
company information, will be able to view information designed to support their purchasing decisions, including
product catalogues, real-time quotes and consumer safety information.
As an independent system with its own database, ?Deli-Online? will interface with the company’s ageing back office
applications and database. The back office applications comprise an integrated group of core legacy systems.
2.0 Assumptions
The following assumptions are in place at the start of the project:
1. All software to be developed for the project will be outsourced to Prospect Software who undertake all software
development work for Whitley?s Deli.
2. The new hardware, network infrastructure and security solutions required to run ?Deli-Online? will be purchased
under a Request for Proposal process.
3. For testing purposes a pilot version of the new system will be run with 150 randomly selected customers (a mix
of Deli operators and individual customers).
4. The project has been approved and has full support of the board and other senior executives of Whitley?s Deli.
5. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Whitley?s Deli will be the project sponsor.
6. The required project team members and resources (office space, project team equipment needs etc.) will be
available when the project starts.
7. All required existing business data will be migrated to the ?Deli-Online? facility.
3.0 Requirements
Whitley?s Deli has decided that ?Deli-Online? will be the number 1 project for 2012/2013 in an attempt to improve
customer service. To achieve this, a new internet based facility will be developed. To ensure that they get it
right this time the following high level requirements have been agreed.
Business Requirements:
1. The ?Deli-Online? facility will be built from scratch (it will not use any current processes, software or
hardware etc)
2. The system will be functionally simple so that customers will find it easy to use
3. Enhancement / update of the products offered through ?Deli-Online? should be quickly and easily undertaken by
Whitley?s Deli staff.
4. A secure system is essential but ease of use must not be sacrificed.
5. Whitley?s Deli staff must be trained to use the new system
6. Whitley?s Deli want to be able offer all business functions via the new ?Deli-Online? facility Whitley Online
(for example, customer payments, customer order enquiries, product enquiries, new product marketing campaigns,
store locators, etc)
7. Each of the existing 100 franchised deli?s in the Whitley chain must be able to access the new ?Deli-Online?
facility
8. The ?Deli-Online? facility will interface with the company’s ageing back office applications and database
Technical Requirements:
1. An IT architecture plan must be developed.
2. All new hardware, network infrastructure and security solutions will be purchased under a Request for Proposal
process.
3. A pilot version of the new services system must be built, tested and evaluated
4. The system must be able to handle a 50% increase in customer numbers at twice today?s transaction rate within
18 months of implementation.
5. A new database is required for the ?Deli-Online? facility.
Software Requirements:
To be determined by staff from Whitley?s Deli and Prospect Software.
4.0 Lessons Learnt from the Current Online System.
Before embarking on this project Whitley?s Deli undertook a thorough review of its current systems and the
following issues surfaced:
1. Staff issues ? many of the current problems can be attributed to staff issues involving dissatisfaction with
working conditions and poor management leading to high staff turnaround. This exacerbated many technical problems
because of the loss of corporate knowledge.
2. Lack of skills ? Whitley?s Deli Online did not hire enough staff with appropriate skills and expected current
employees to learn on the job. This has been unsatisfactory and has contributed to both staff issues and the
unreliable service of the current IT systems.
3. Poor architectural planning – this is probably the most important lesson learnt. The overall hardware and
software architecture and design was not good enough. This lead to technical problems with the web based
software/database response, infrastructure not capable of the required through-put or at least not able to handle
the increased throughput and finally the web based front-end was not integrated well enough with the back end
mainframe system.
4. The high cost of maintenance.
5.0 Stakeholders
The ?Deli-Online? stakeholders are:
? Whitley?s Deli Franchise Owners via the committee (paragraph 5 of Overview Section
? The Whitley?s Deli corporate business units of
o IT Operations,
o Logistics,
o Customer Service,
o Marketing, and
o Finance
6.0 Budget
A budget of $A9 million has been allocated to the project. The suggested budget components are:

Suggested Component $A
(millions)
Outsourced ?Deli-Online? Software Development
Deli-Online Software Implementation
Hardware, network infrastructure and security components (RFP, purchase & implementation)
Database (purchase & implementation)
Migration of the required existing Business Data
Project staff costs (Whitley Corporate staff only)
Whitley staff training (Whitley Corporate and Franchised Deli staff)
Contingency
Total

7.0 Time Estimate
Rough time estimates for the project range from an optimistic 8 months, to a pessimistic 15 months. IT staff and
business analysts think that the most likely timeframe is 10 months. The project must be completed by the end of
June 2013.

8.0 People Resources
A rough, initial estimate has also been done in terms of the full-time staff required for the project is as
follows:
? Project Manager (1) – Full-time
? Business Analysts (2) – Full-time
? Hardware engineer (2) – Full-time
? Security engineer (1) – Full-time
? Network engineer (1) – Full-time
? Accountant (1) ? Part-time

 
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