Product Overview

Carla Thomas, the owner of Boulevard Sandwiches, is preparing to meet with Alan Philips, the new manager of Boulevard Sandwiches, Inc., Unit No. 2, in mid-December 2017. The primary purpose of this meeting is to finalize the 2018 operating plan for the location, as well as to conduct sensitivity analysis related to the assumptions included in the budget. Thomas has decided that, due to the growth of her business, she can no longer continue to manage the operation as she did when there were only a couple of locations, so she is in the process of implementing a more formal and extensive planning and budgeting process. This case may be used as a stand-alone case on budgeting, or it may be paired with “Boulevard Sandwiches, Inc. (B)” (UVA-C-2434) in a module on budgeting and strategic profitability analysis or flexible budgeting.

Learning Objectives

This case is intended to give students exposure to the process of creating an operating plan, and it introduces the concept of flexible expense budgeting. Along with the related case, “Boulevard Sandwiches, Inc. (B)” (UVA-C-2434), this case provides comprehensive coverage of forecasting sales, identifying expense behaviors and expense drivers, preparing and analyzing flexible expense budgets, reconciling and analyzing the difference between budgeted profit and actual profit, and assessing both business and individual performance.