Faculty of Food Science and Nutrition

Semester 1 2020/2021
NE40602 Food Service

Dr Adilah Md Ramli

Individual Assignment
Changes of Foodservice Operation in times of MCO due to COVID-19
MyBurgerLab

Name Matrix No
Pang Jing Yi BN17110080

Submission Date: 29/12/2020

1.0 Introduction

The COVID-19 pandemic has upended many industries – and the F&B industry is no
exception. Dining-in was never the option throughout the Movement Control Order (MCO).
Even with the current Conditional MCO (CMCO), some eateries are reluctant to provide the
now allowed dine-in options but, with guidelines, amid safety and hygiene issues.

As a result, F&B operators are relying mostly on takeaway and delivery services. At
the same time, operating and material costs remain high or may increase. Hence, how are
they adapting to stay afloat in these trying times? And are they innovating to stay ahead of
the game? MyBurgerLab for instance has been rolling out do-it-yourself burger kits for those
staying at home, among the few new measures they adopted.

Although there may be government provisions to support SMEs in the short term, it
will require a great deal of customers' credence for restaurants to stay afloat. A restaurant
typically depends on many factors to maintain business viability. According to SME Corp
(2016), SMEs restaurants are categorised as businesses that employ less than 75 employees or
have a turnover of less than RM 20 million per annum. Before the COVID-9 outbreak, Ernst
and Young (2020) reported that SME restaurants in Malaysia have been facing aggressive
competition against established foodservice brands. 30.7% of Malaysian service-based SMEs
operate within Klang Valley, which constitutes a very high concentration (CIMB Bank,
2019). Despite that, restaurants were able to implement strategies to retain a loyal customer
base by providing quality food and timely service in a comfortable ambience (Jain, 2020).

Ensuing this pandemic, restaurant consumption behaviour is expected to change

tremendously as social distancing and hygiene precautions discourage the urge to visit
crowded establishments. While large chain and franchise restaurants may thrive because of
their brand confidence and consistency in hygiene control that is involved in preparing the
food, it is the small to mid-scale SME restaurants that will suffer (Mah, 2020). As reported by
Surendran (2020), micro SMEs have even resorted to raising funds through peer-to-peer
lending platforms to keep their businesses afloat. For that reason, it is worth reviewing the
consequences of the COVID-19 crisis and portrays the best practices done by SME
restaurants to sustain business viability.

According to Bae et al., (2018), there are many attributes, such as the service, food
quality, and ambience, that define a good restaurant that yields a satisfactory dining
experience. However, from a business perspective, a profitable restaurant needs to generate a
reasonable return by providing sufficient value towards diners considering both the internal
and external business environment (Osterwalder & Pigneur, 2010). Internally, restaurants are
required to restructure their strategy, rethink their offerings, and (re)optimise their resources.
Externally, restaurants need to be consistently responsive to changes in political,
environmental, social, and technological factors (Aguilar, 1967; Porter, 1998).

This reflects being effective in monitoring costs and consistently implementing a

pricing strategy to ensure that the business stays afloat (Uman, 1983). Furthermore,
restaurants must be agile and creative in making quick decisions to adapt to the latest trends
and consumer behaviour (Aguilera, 2017). Finally, restaurants should define a clear
positioning within their locality or industry to create returning and loyal customers through
exceptional goodwill and brand value (Andersson & Mossberg, 2004).

1.1 Background History

MyBurgerLab, a brand famous with handmade burger patties and homemade charcoal buns
that makes Malaysia feel glorious. Chin Ren Yi, 31 is founder of myBurgerLab where Teoh
Wee Kiat, 23 and Cheah Chang Min, 28 are his partners. Their beginning plan is to open a
cafe and sells foods in the cafe. But none of them knows how to cook well so at last, they
decide to make burgers. They though that make a burger depends on its ingredients and not
the cooking skill. The origin idea of myBurgerLab business came to Ren Yi when he was
working in the United States. He took notice of the trend of fast-food giants like McDonald’s
and Burger King are not as popular as like before. As it turns out, Americans have taken a
liking towards indie burger places like In-N-Out and Shake Shack’s which is native to places
like the west coast of Texas. These burger retailers use fresh ingredients to prepare food
instead of bulk manufacturing as the fast-food giants did. This concept is known as ‘made-to-
order’.

The founders of myBurgerLab took this as inspiration and feel that it is time for
Malaysia to have its version of the fresh-to-table burger place. They felt like it was the time
to change the Food and Beverages industry in Malaysia through this concept. Initially, they
tried to imitate the success of these independent burger joints and put some Malaysian twist
in it. Hence, the creation of the ever so popular “Nasi Lemak Burger” and “Salted Egg
Burger” that so many Malaysians are so familiar with now.

Researching online on various types of burger recipes for a while and they finally
came across something that would be uniquely myBurgerLab. Thus, the Black Charcoal bun
is born. After some tweaking and experimenting, they decided to do testing of the bun in a
restaurant before the opening of myBurgerLab to grasp the perception of the public on this
type of bun as it is an unfamiliar product in the market at this point. Red Bean Bag in Solaris
Dutamas took a chance and sold the bun in their restaurant in collaborative with them. Once
they got countless positive comments and almost zero pushbacks, they finally decided it is
time to open their restaurant.

MyBurgerLab was born at Seapark, Petaling Jaya on July 10, 2012. With the dreams
of these three people with a knack of innovation and creativity, the burger joint attracted
attention from food lovers all around Malaysia. With its trademark black charcoal bun and
the unique Malaysian taste, it is no wonder that people flock to have a taste. It came to a peak
around 2014 where almost every day, the shopfront would be filled with people queuing for a
chance to taste their delicious creations. Since then, myBurgerLab had evolved beyond just a
physical store and through the new norm of living with COVID-19 in our communities, it is a
sight to be seen how they evolved with time.
2.0 Changes in foodservice operation and production

COVID-19 outbreak is threatening the foodservice industry that caused the foodservice
operators to shoulder the double burden of fixed cost and zero footfall during the pandemics
episode. Foodservice in nature involves extensive human interaction as consumers explore
various touchpoints along the dining journey. Hence, it severely affected the marketing
activities as the footfall downturns to zero, and it is more important than ever to have a
business continuity plan to overcome this critical period. While the pharmaceutical and
healthcare industry interventions to narrow the spread of COVID-19, business management
can provide remarkable insights for managing customers' expectations, and it influences.
Therefore, this editorial could help in generating ideas for making improvements and
developing new ways of foodservice operation to alleviate the spread of COVID-19.

The social-distancing order enforced to flatten the COVID-19 curve has

disproportionally impacted Malaysia's restaurant sector. This has triggered the rapid
shutdown of restaurants and hotels (Karim & Haque, 2020). According to Marcus (2020)
from UiTM's Faculty of Business and Management, small and medium-sized businesses
(SMEs) were speculated to suffer bankruptcy, and larger businesses will be hesitant to
employ more people due to this pandemic depriving the economy. That said, Bernama (2020)
reported that food and beverage businesses had suffered a 90% loss in revenue throughout the
Malaysian Movement Control Order (MCO) period as compared to the previous year.
Malaysia's government have since cooperated with the Malaysian Rating Corporation Berhad
(MARC) to provide a "stimulus package" for SME businesses to ward off the economic
disaster in the face of this outbreak, which includes: SMEs receive a six-month moratorium
on some government loans, RM5 billion worth of guarantees for SMEs that face difficulties
in obtaining loans, RM4.5 billion of additional funds coming through three facilities targeted
at micro-credit schemes, all-sector facilities, and a special relief facility, employers are also
entitled to deferred payments, restructuring, and rescheduling of employer contributions to
the employees' provident fund and a moratorium on Human Resources Development Fund
(HDRF) payments for six months (Whitehead, 2020).

2.1 The Steps or SOP Use in Maintaining Clean Safety on Staff and Consumer

Against the backdrop of COVID-19, foodservice in Malaysia granted the green light to
operate under the particular conditions and regulations imposed as it recognized as an
essential sector. During the critical period, the foodservice sector beyond providing essential
for living its need new approaches to oversees the risk balance and business continuity by
surplus consumers’ safety expectations.

During the COVID-19 outbreak, the only survival opportunity is to embrace

“change,” the term change recognized as the ability to react to the internal or external needs
in the present or future (Todnem By, 2005). Foodservice operators mitigate the risk of disease
infection. All these changes are the new beginnings to acquire new substantial survival skills
in fostering business continuity through the extra precautionary measure in border aspects.
Foodservice operators putting efforts in ensuring human capital well protected in executing
change. The changes not merely imposed on internal employees; it involves the
transformation of consumers’ behaviour in dealing with food service. The mindset needs to
change from the conventional touchpoints based business to touchless practices.

Precisely the implementation of contactless narrowed to self-collection areas that pre-

fixed in the eateries compound; for instance, the foodservice delivers partners Deliveroo in
the United Kingdom where riders leave food at customers’ doors instead of handling to them
in person. Some pieces of evidence suggested COVID-19 disseminated through the airborne
route (Xiao & Torok, 2020). Rigorous personal hygiene is equally essential with regular hand
washing with an alcohol-based hand sanitizer and an infectious agent’s remover. The
persistent use of hand sanitizer would be able to reduce the risk of inter-transfer of infectious
(Bondurant et al., 2019). Edmonds et al. (2012) study in foodservice hand hygiene regimes
revealed that the use of alcohol-based hand rub adjunct with a wash-sanitize regimen could
reduce the risk of infection transmission in foodservice facilities. Furthermore, food operators
imposing responsibility to individual staffs align with the high-quality prospects in safety; for
instance, Grab food Philippine is insuring the delivery employees to sanitize and disinfect
their delivery tools regularly.

Strengthen the gate by examining employees' body temperature to ensure employees

are in good condition before start work where fever is a clinical symptom that easy to
administer by using a digital body thermometer. Clinical shreds of evidence suggest that 98%
of the infected patients notably presented with body temperature more than 38℃ (Huang et
al., 2020). Therefore, this easy administered preventive measure received significant attention
for judging the employees' well-being where the body temperature should below 38℃
thresholds before carrying on his duty of the day.
 Beyond the social distancing advocacy by the healthcare professional, self-protection
with a medical mask is an essential external protective shed. Hence, making it happen by
equipping surgical masks in work for all the employees that required working in the food
premises. Although, according to WHO recommendation person who needs surgical mask are
those who are taking care of suspected COVID-19 infected person. Besides, according to
Feng et al. (2020), a different country has a different recommendation for medical mask-
wearing. For instance, Hong Kong advocate mask-wearing in crowded public places such as
riding public transportation. Singapore promotes surgical mask-wearing based on the
symptomatic recommendation. However, from the risk management perspective, foodservice
operators have the responsibility to determine what their industry has to contribute to
mitigating the risk of disease exposure. Some good practices in foodservice demonstrated
more prudent precautionary action such as myBugerLab that making mask-wearing is a
necessary preventive measure. The objective is to foster the goodness of employees and
customer's well-being at the same time, reinforce the consumer confidence toward the food
service providers.
3.0 New Creative Way of Marketing to Obtain New Customer and Way to Promote

Before the implementation of the MCO, only 21% of the food and beverage businesses are
available to be ordered online. Within 30 days of the MCO implementation which sees
businesses restricted to only providing takeaway and delivery options, the number of
businesses that expanded their operations online almost doubled up to 46% to deal with the
increased demand for food delivery services.

The change in sales channels from table to home is prominent. It is inevitable to

change the operating model to prevent cross-infection during human interaction. The
suggestive evidence that COVID-19 transmitted through human touchpoints (Singhal, 2020;
Huang et al, 2020; Lillie et al., 2020) supports the change of contactless model. Therefore,
the advocacy of appropriate social distancing is paramount important. A study revealed by
Baker et al. (2020) on consumer spending in the United States shown that food delivery
service is increasing during the coronavirus pandemic period. Globally, food delivery service
estimated worth more than US$ 35 billion annually and forecasted future outlook to reach
US$365 billion by 2030 (The ASEAN Post Team, 2020).

In an uncertain business environment, the speed of change is the main survival key to
safeguard the business where changes involve from human to non-human change also the
collaboration with a third party. For instance, during the pandemic period, many foodservice
operators leverage on the food delivery service providers to retain the business operation and
reduce the financial burden by temporary converting the brick-and-mortar premises to the e-
commerce platform.

An excellent practice by Starbuck China, switching from the traditional B2C model
with the complement of digitalization. Where consumers able to order through the Starbuck
application with the incorporation of contactless delivery service to enable customers to
continue to enjoy coffee. Aforesaid implies that digitalizing business operations allow
foodservice providers to continue business during a tough time under the pressure of
pandemic. Enormous contribution then merely supplies hygienic food during the pandemic
outbreak, particularly Halal foodservice, indeed amplifying the sound Halal practices that
include personal hygiene, attire, and hardware in foods and drink processing and (Ambali &
Bakar, 2014).

MyBurgerLab realised early that everyone would be spending most of their time
online during this MCO period, so they decided to leverage digital marketing. They took
social media engagement to a new level by creating a virtual pop-up stall on the popular
Nintendo Switch game, Animal Crossing, which is coincidentally trending because many
people are confined to their homes. Customers are invited to join in the fun by playing games
with them, building their myBurgerLab stalls and sharing their creations on Instagram.

This way, by engaging with customers in their area of interest, rather than on their
brand’s social media accounts or website, myBurgerLab makes this interaction fun and subtly
reminds customers of their delicious burgers. As players build their virtual myBurgerLab
stalls, they indirectly expose the brand to new customers (other players) and remind players
familiar with the brand about their products. At a time where so many businesses are
advertising on Facebook and Instagram, this kind of subtle advertising is invaluable. 

The founder, RenYi also realised that one way to increase his restaurant’s profits is to
rely less on food delivery apps, which take 30- 35% of the price of each order. He began
actively encouraging customers to order directly from myBurgerLab and to do takeaways
instead of using GrabFood or Foodpanda, on the interviews he has participated in and on their
social media channels. Other F&B outlets in Malaysia and Singapore have similarly
encouraged takeaways instead of ordering through delivery apps, with some offering
discounts of up to 20% when customers self-collect their food. While having a discount
encourages customers to buy when they previously were not considering it, a 20% discount
on the takeaway is still 10% more profit for the business than when the order comes in
through a delivery platform. This way, both the customer and the F&B business win. 

There were hundreds of viral “memes” during the times of MCO due to people
staying at home and avidly using social media platform to spend their time. One of it was a
viral post on this customer complaining about the unfair division of the bill where he was
charged outrageously for a burger at RM460 while his fellow patrons splurged on luxury
items. Thus, it became a viral drama on the internet, various businesses have inserted
themselves into the equation to boost their viewership. MyBurgerLab also employs the use of
viral marketing to earn more attention and attract younger consumers to their businesses.
Anytime anything goes viral, you can expect myBurgerLab to be one of the quickest to adapt
it to their benefit. For this, they decided to market their burgers via an “anniversary offer”.
Not only do they get consumers to spend RM88 on 4 sets of burgers (buy 3, get 1 free), but it
is also a smart way to get more users to their app, as the offer is only available there.
4.0 Conclusion

In the short-term behaviour change from foodservice operators and consumers is inevitable.
To date still, minimal numeric parameters to justify the best preventive measures and
scientific evidence to ensure the best precautionary action to get rid of this pandemic
dissemination. Foodservice providers strongly recommended to practices more preventive
measure to safeguard the consumers and employee’s well-being and continue to change, to
improve it and make it better precautionary measure in foodservice.

Well, each approach could be implemented independently and jointly as the

preventive measure rarely cannibalizing in favour of foodservice types. The ultimate survival
is implementing agile change and continue to embrace change in the aspect of food safety
beyond the general daily principal, also spontaneous incidents like an epidemic outbreak. To
Summarise, precautionary plan and incorporating life science approach allows food operators
to put the best foot forward of what consumers want in the future, and what is inevitable to
provide for profit.
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