Cutey Barber Salon is a trendy barber salon that is located in a densely populated city called Maple. Demand for the services offered by the salon is fairly high. It offers services such as haircuts, hair styling, scalp massaging and conditioning treatment, straight razor and wet shave, beard sculpting, facials and hair colouring. In addition to these services provided, the salon sells premium hair products to customers. The salon has the ability to produce a maximum of 20,000 haircuts and hairstyling per year.

Although the business does not have a written vision and mission statement, it is clear in the minds of management what they want to achieve and what they would like to be in the future. Currently, customers can walk in at anytime to be served. At times, customers have to wait in line for a long time. This is creating some challenges for the operations manager. He needs to overcome this challenge in order to utilize his resources more efficiently. Competition in the hair salon business is intensifying. New firms are rising up and existing firms are expanding their operations. Increasing competition is gradually eating away profit margins since costs are increasing and customers are demanding lower prices for services. Management has to find some efficient way to add value to their products and to overcome the competition.