Business Analysis of Mystic Monk Coffee: Strategy and Recommendations

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Mystic Monk Coffee, a business run by Carmelite monks specializing in gourmet coffee. It examines their business practices, including their strategy of targeting the Catholic population in the United States through online sales and direct marketing. The report identifies the company's strengths, such as high-quality products and a loyal customer base, as well as challenges like high expenses and limited production capacity. The analysis includes a review of the company's expansion plans, challenges faced, and recommendations for improved performance, such as better financial management, strategic planning for resource allocation, and market expansion strategies. The report also includes a career planning section, and concludes with recommendations for the firm to undertake to enjoy better performance.

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Executive summary
This reports focuses on the analysis of the business practices carried out at the Carmelite monks.
It explains their popularity and overall practices. The company is under investigation is
renowned for selling and roasting gourmet coffee using a brand name as Mystic Monk Coffee.
The report identifies and provides analysis of the Strategy used by the company to attain the
success that it enjoys. The report provides a detailed analysis of the organizational strategy and
how its major target are the catholic population in the United States of America. The report also
explains the various problems and challenges which face the Mystic Monk coffee firm. It also
explains the strengths and privileges which the firm enjoys in the process of production and
marketing of its coffee products. The reports concludes by providing recommendations for the
firm to undertake to enjoy better performance.

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Table Contents
Section 2: Mystic Monk Coffee and Profit sharing within the coffee industry...............................4
Background of the Company and area.............................................................................................4
Strategy............................................................................................................................................5
SECTION 3. Issues/ Problems that are analyzed............................................................................5
The challenges which are faced by Mystic Monk Coffee firm.......................................................6
Section 4: Analysis of the identified issues.....................................................................................7
Section 5: Some of the Recommendations......................................................................................8
Section 6: Career Planning..............................................................................................................9
Some of the factors considered when expanding the Business.....................................................10

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Section 2: Mystic Monk Coffee and Profit sharing within the coffee industry.
Background of the Company and area.
The Carmelite monks are popular for selling and roasting gourmet coffee using a brand
name as Mystic Monk Coffee (Carmelite Monks, 2017). The Production Company and brand is
physically located in Powell, Wyoming on 31 Road Afw, Powell, WY 82435, USA. They can as
well as be contacted on [phone]. In Wyoming (mountain valley), a group of Carmelite
Monks decided to find a way of benefitting and supporting their community which was growing.
Through prayer and discernment this small group were inspired to start selling coffee beans
online as well as roasting it. Mystic coffee was founded in the year of 2007, this was after the
first some samples were roasted in the monastery Kitchen using cast-iron skillet. The company
had small beginnings, it produces better quality coffee products that are sold online so as to
increase market potential. There are currently over 13 Carmelite monks who are residing in that
place and these are prayerful, worshippers, and have dedicated themselves to silence life. There
were inquires which were made by different groups of individuals requesting to join them as
monks and also participate in the production of coffee but space was a limiting factor. Because
of requests made other people, there rose a need for expansion and shifting to a larger area. The
need for expansion was suggested by Father Daniel Mary a leader of these Monks (Dale, 2008).
This decision was to be implemented through purchasing 496 acre of land that has a ranch and
some buildings. The cost of purchasing the land was approximated to $8.9 million dollars which
become an obstacle to the monks and their production plant. Therefore the money for obtaining

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the property is obtained through donations where approximately $250 thousands was collected.
Also some money is to be collected through coffee roasting were over $75 thousand is saved.
Though there is a progress in the coffee roasting, there is still a long way for the Monks to go
with their production.
There is improvement in the quality of coffee produced where by the current coffee is
characterized by high quality and fair trade. The major brand of coffee which is dealt in is
Arabica coffee, this type of coffee is bought from different suppliers from different regions. The
major market for the products is in United States Catholics though there are some other
individuals who are interested in these healthy products. The products are sold through the use of
the internet and oral advertisement. Oral advertisement was the first applied method of
advertisement but because of need for further expansion (Paul Timers, 2000), the use of internet
to meet a wider market base was advised and used. The average estimated sales in a month for
the coffee products is $56 thousand with expenses of over 89% of the revenue. Therefore the
profits from the production occupy 11% of the revenue which means the firm spends much on
expenses. These high expenses therefore lead to a need of them being minimized so as to cause
maximization of profits and expansion of the roasting business. The vision set by Father Daniel
Mary is to set up a new Monastery to accommodate a total of thirty monks; setting up a Gothic
church, retreat center specifically for the lay visitors, and also setting up the Carmelite nuns'
convent as well as a large portion of land hermitage which is Irma Lake Ranch. The total
expenditure for all of these is $8.9 million. The mission of the Monks in Wyoming is living a life
of prayer and solitude while working so as to earn profits to make Father Daniel Mary's vision a
reality (Carmelite Monks, 2017). The Mystic monk coffee vision is to cause an expansion in its

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operations by purchasing new breweries capable of producing more and more coffee so as to
generate funds for the new Monastery vision.
For quite a long time, more and more coffee drinker are enjoying this brand of coffee.
They are characterizing this coffee as smooth and delicious, most of them became regulars
immediately after taking their first sip and around 85% of the coffee orders to the company are
repetitive which means are from same consumers. The reason for repetitive customers is because
of the perfection strived by the monks to come up with better products. The brand has won a
number of a wards from different and famous reviewers of coffee, one of them is Kenneth
Davids who has highly rated the brand on his site known as coffeeReview.com. More than
twenty-five of the gourmet coffee brands and blends from these monks are rated 90 points and
above because of their perfection. The company uses a symbol of Monk taking coffee at the New
Mount Carmel where there are establishments of the permanent monastery by the monks. The
monks have also adjusted their production from just producing bagged coffee, they also producer
the monastic double-handled mugs, single-serve monk-shots, premium Mystica teas, as well as
offering the month subscription club. Some of the brand and blended categories sold by the
company are: Paradiso Blend at 15 dollars, Colombian sold at 11 dollars, white Chocolate
Macadamia Nut at 11 dollars, and Finals week Blend at 11 dollars (Miletsky & Smith, 2009).
The Catholic monasteries should work hard in order to support themselves, most of them sell
created gifts in order to support their monastic community. These Carmelites monks decided to
give support to their monastery through providing the communities with fine cups of coffee.
Laboring is the daily life of these monks and each day they rise up after 4 a.m. They spend the
days through first taking prayers and contemplation, then later they start their laboring so as to
earn what to eat. So as to successfully support themselves, they decided to carefully roast and

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make fine coffee beans. These fine beans are sold in a number of countries inorder to raise a
good sum of money; some of these countries are form Asia, Africa, South America as well as the
United States of America. The most African countries where these beans are sold are Rwanda
and Kenya.
Strategy.
The Mystic Monk coffee firm has a strategy, this strategy targets the catholic population
in the united states of America as well as countries so as to make profits. The strategy also
consists of offering and selling the products online especially using their website. The marketing
and advertisement of the products is conducted using affiliating online companies and social
media platforms such as Facebook so as to expand the market of the product (Gottschalk-
Mazouz, 2008). The firm also has a strategy of further expansions through buying land worth
$8.9 million, this would be achieved through accepting donations and carrying out sales on the
product so as to fundraise. Recently the firm expanded its model of business through conducting
whole sales to the Catholic Church members and coffee shops. They have a strategy of reaching
out to their customers through provision of quality products, this has been useful in expanding
the market potential of the firm. They are also targeting the niche market therefore the firm is
profit-oriented so as to support the different members within the community. So as to raise more
and more profits, the firm invested in purchasing a new roaster so as to increase on quantity and
quality of production to attract more customers.
SECTION 3. Issues/ Problems that are analyzed.
Before looking at the different problems and challenges which face the Mystic Monk
coffee firm, there are also strengths and privileges that are enjoyed by the firm during the

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production of coffee. Some of these privileges are; the MMC is characterized with production of
high quality, organic and fair Arabica coffee beans and therefore this give it a privilege of ready
market. It only takes a consumer to take once of their coffee and will keep daring for more. They
are also in position of offering variety of brands, roasts, flavors, and blends therefore appealing
to larger range of preferences for different coffee takers. Coffee drinkers who are not necessarily
Catholics are also enjoying the coffee claiming that their coffee is healthy, because of socialism
factor and need to support the monks these also keep buying the coffee which is advantageous to
the monks. The other privilege is that the company has a ready market for the products within the
United States of America Catholics and also other Catholics within other locations.
The challenges which are faced by Mystic Monk Coffee firm
Though the monks are enjoying privileges from there production such as great support
from the public, they are faced by a number of issues or challenges some of which are arising
from there locality while others distant. Some of the problems that are affecting the monks when
carrying purchasing and finning coffee are,
There is a problem of many expenses; these expenses are incurred on different activities
and some of these activities are online advertisements since it is the major platform for selling
the product, expenses on finning the coffee beans so as to make them ready for market, expenses
on purchasing these Arabica coffee beans from the Seattle to process and distribute them under
Mystic Monk coffee. These expenses are further increasing because there is a vision by Father
Daniel Mary to expand the brotherhood to over 496 acres to improve production. The expenses
cover almost 85% of the collected revenue which means the company gains only 11% from the
revenue collected.

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The other problem is capacity within the company, the current monastery produces only
540Ibs in a day. This capacity cannot necessarily meet the required market potential; the low
capacities are assumed to be rising from the high expenses that are incurred when buying the
coffee beans from sellers so as to process them into finished products, the other cause is the
limited resources within the area which also could be the major cause of failure raising enough
money so as to achieve the goal of expansion to increase on capacity.
The other issue or challenge affecting the monks and the coffee production is lack of
proper tactics and planning strategies for evaluating their vision of diversification in production
(Gamble, 2013). Though the resource are few in the area, it may not be the core problem; the
core problem may be failure for the existing monks to strategically plan how to manage these
resources for better production (Beynon, 2004). The goals of achieving the vision are not
accurate and clear enough for leading a better course. It’s always significant to people to
implement clarified ideas only if they are sure of what is to be done; the reverse is true, idea
clarified may be hard to be implemented because people are not aware of what to be done and
therefore there are high chances of failing to meet the visions and goal set forth.
Given the fact that the company focuses and is specialized in the coffee industry, there
are many other companies that are stronger and deal in the sale of the same commodity. This
gives competition to the Mystic Monk Coffee. Some of these companies may include Maxwell,
Newman's own, and Folgers, to mention but a few. These companies may not directly deal in
coffee industry as a specialty but still they cause a threat to the company since thy are capable of
producing the same quantity of coffee produced by Mystic Monk coffee company. Additionally
the market of coffee is shrinking, taking early coffee is fading in this current generation. The
older generation used to take coffee before rushing for work but currently individuals are

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focusing so much on energy drinks and caffeinated drinks. Therefore the company should look
for ways of expanding its self because it is small and can be easily replaced by other bigger
companies with a higher production capacity (Graham et al., 2000).
Section 4: Analysis of the identified issues.
Every Business is run and started through strategic management and planning. Currently
the Mystic Monks are trying to raise $8.9 million so as to buy a ranch so as to promote diversity.
This plan is spear headed by their vision bearer father Daniel Mary. A number of individuals
think that the reason why the visions have failed is because of few resources. The truth is that it’s
not about resources, it’s about improper tactics and strategies applied by the monks while
applying their vision for example making an expansion and how to diversify their production,
poor follow-up on visions makes the coffee plant to lag behind and face stiff competition from
others. A good strategic plan of a business contains different elements which are very helpful in
attracting potential business managers and financers for the company to meet its objectives. A
good vision or goal is always formulated in line with the desire of meeting the company’s market
place. Although a business plan does not consist of goals which are useful in defining the
company, it defines the different elements that are similar to the goals and can be advantageous
to the existing Business opportunities. The coffee company needs funds for expansion but there
are inferior and improper fund extrapolation methods. It’s only through well-organized ideas that
firms achieve and attains goals easily and quickly.
Father Mary is always compared to Schultz because both of them are vision bearers in
places where business is not expected. For the case of Howard Schultz's, he had a clear vision, it
was accurate and clear with inclusions of the evaluation mechanisms as well as the course to be
taken. The ideas where classified, significant, and easy to implement since the different

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individuals are aware of what steps were to be taken. Therefore there are needs for change by the
mystic so as to prevent them from lagging behind. Some of the reasons why they are lagging
behind are; concentration on one type of business as well as serving a single population of
Catholics intensively. Secondly the monks have made use of the land opportunities therefore
yielding less profits (Armstrong & Kotler, 2014). Lastly the Monks are too conservative such
that they donot include other parties in their business.
Some of the internal factors that influence the Mystic Monk's coffee company are the
organization structure, company image, brand awareness, financial resources, and operational
capacity and efficiency (Spitz, 2003). This coffee company has a good public Image because of
E-commerce where it advertises and carryout trade of goods and services through the use of the
internet. Their Image is too appealing to the United States coffee taker Catholics and other
Catholics from other regions of the world for example Africa. Given the fact that the company
only specializes in production of coffee, it would hardly meet its production visions. This is
because there are a number of other companies which produce coffee and not under specialized
basis. These are large companies and as said earlier they cause a great threat to the monks
because they are capital intensive and can easily shadow the coffee company by either buying it
out or producing quantities of product higher than that of a company. Specialization is not a best
form of production though it is very essential in the production of quality products; the habit of
taking coffee is quite fading a lot in the current generation therefore there is a need for diversity
as suggested by Father Daniel Mary who wanted to purchase another land at $8.9 million to run a
ranch farm, this would be useful in fighting specialization and causing diversity.
The monks who are dealing in the coffee production devote little time for production
since some of the time is devoted to silent meditation, worship, and prayer. This gives little

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dedicated to work by the monks which is approximately six hours in a day and this becomes a
key factor in causing limited production of approximately 540 pounds in a day. This daily
production is a major problem since on current sales, it creates an 11% profits margin on net,
therefore there is no possible way this could generate the needed $8.9 million dollars through
earnings. And of this rises through lack of a clear business plan by the coffee group.
The Company has failed to utilize its resources and capabilities. Resource of the company
refers to those assets that are owned by the organization and these are categorized under three
major types which are tangible, human, and physical resources (Moskowitz, 2006). The
capabilities of a company refers to the complex skill patterns that are useful in the utilization of
the available resources so as to obtain the needed end results within the organization. The
capabilities and resources are too essential to the organization for the case of competitive
advantage. A business capability can also be viewed as what is needed to be done by the
company so as to be in position of executing it business strategy. Similarly, capabilities can refer
to process, people, and technology gathering as well as their collection for a given specific
purpose (Lamont & Christopher, 2001). Mystic Monk coffee company has a number of
capabilities and resources, these are very useful in the smooth running of the business and
company activities. The resources of the company include the presence of monks who provide
labor for the company, the availability of market where these products are being sold, the
availability of space in the mountains of Wyoming, and other resource for the business. The
different capabilities that the company enjoys are extension of the market to the different parts of
the world including parts of Africa, Asia, and South America. The monks are also whiling to
offer labor to the business which facilitates production, the advantage of advertisements
especially through the use of the internet is also a capability of the business (Spicar, 2014), the