Stephen Shiring, IUP Department of Management, and his daughter, Elizabeth Shiring, Department of Professional Studies in Education, published the textbook Professional Catering: The Modern Caterer's Guide to Success.
The textbook on professional catering structurally applies by design key essential and emerging management, marketing, strategic management, and supply chain concepts empowering the student, practitioner, event planner, chef, or aspiring entrepreneur with the appropriate knowledge, tools, and tips from the trade to start and position within the marketplace a competitive catering business.
The book can be purchased online from the publisher, Kendall Hunt.
Stephen Shiring, EdD, MBA, CHIA, is a professor in the Hotel, Restaurant, Tourism, and Event Management program. Elizabeth Shiring is a second-grade teacher at Pritchardville Elementary School in Bluffton, South Carolina, and works as an instructor at IUP teaching undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral-level courses.
Updated, Fully Revised, And Expanded Content
- Empowers students to grasp the complexities of planning, organizing, leading, and controlling a successful, profitable, catering business in an easy-to-read hands-on approach supported by “lessons learned” from key industry, professional experts, and everyday catering practitioners, whose real-world experiences reinforce and bring to life the fundamental concepts learned in the book.
- Captures the challenges confronted by caterers and provides the reader with concrete solutions to grow a long-term profitable catering operation.
New Features
- Updated, fully revised and expanded content added to each of the 18 chapters from invited industry experts adapting standard operating procedures from their discipline, including culinary arts, chemical process engineering, entrepreneurship, special event/wedding planning, alcoholic beverage service, client service management, beverage management, accounting, return on investment (ROI) and audits, supply chain management, safety sciences, legal issues, insurance, human resources management, arbitration, mediation, and conflict resolution, social marketing, sanitation management and HACCP, industry consultants to equipment and commercial kitchen design, attorney and legal issues, equipment manufacturer’s representatives, and equipment, food and beverage system consultants, sport stadium/arena catering, school food service catering, contract management accounts, catering in self-operations, catering in higher education, catering in cultural institutions, catering in private clubs, catering within casino and gaming operations, healthcare, sourcing and sustainability, hotel catering and sales, all contributing to the management of catering operations.
- Completely new Tips from the Trade segments on the accounting audit, supply chain management, catering and banquet equipment, client pricing, contracts, wedding events, private club catering, hotel banquets and events, sustainable practices, independent restaurant catering, sous vide, and client services, dynamic pricing model and a focus on catering sales. Tips from the Trade, found throughout the text, apply real-life situations to the topic being discussed. These Tips present critical problem-solving skills demonstrated by leading professionals in the market today.
- New chapter content adapted from process chemical engineering and its application in the step-by-step design process required to effectively plan a catering event.
- Completely new section drawn from data obtained through interviews with successful caters which identifies their common traits and characteristics. So, you want to be a caterer?
- Completely new section contributed by industry consultants on sous vide technology and its adaptation by caterers.
- Completely new section covering the aspects of private club catering highlighting contributions from Club Management Association of America food and beverage managers.
- A completely new section explaining the features of mobile catering operations supplied by a mobile caterer.
- “Through the Eyes” shares a Culinary Institute of America student’s externship experience at the Hotel Hershey providing a glimpse of real-on-the-job adaption by students transitioning into the world of professional food and beverage services.
- Linking operational strategic concepts and catering tactics with real-world application by featuring the exciting story of entrepreneurial caterers Mindi and Corey Corcco, owner, Flair of Country Catering and Event Planning, LLC, the Willow Wedding and Event Venue, co-owner of the Fifty Local Eatery and Ale House, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, whose unique story, woven throughout the book, begins with the creation of their catering concept and business plan launch from inception to sustainable controlled growth and emergence as the dominate caterer in their region, following the same tactics as outlined in the book.
- Revised section on the unique challenges of catering in cultural institutions by industry professionals.
- Updated section on insurance for caterers from industry professionals.
- Completely new discussion on supply chain management, and the caterer’s role to monitor the supply chain and maintain real-time communication with vendors, purveyors, suppliers, and clients to ensure required products specified for the event are available at the right time, right form, right price, right location, and right quantities.
- Bonus feature – real-world experienced caterers and industry professionals connect textbook concepts to reveal and share with the student-reader how they used these to manage their daily operations. Students gain valuable on-the-job lessons from real-life stories to help avoid making a “similar” mistake or how to exceed client satisfaction.
- Updated Hazard Analysis Critical Control Plan and fundamental food handling procedures based on the US Food and Drug Administration's most recent 2022 Model Food Code.
- Completely new additions explain the creative process of dessert recipe design and implementation by corporate chefs and registered dietitians.
- Completely overhauled all 18-chapter PowerPoint lecture presentation slides. Invites the instructor to customize their lectures based on the content they desire to emphasize. The lecture content is enhanced through emphasizing catering industry standard operating procedures and practices as portrayed in professional pictures. This eases the effort, preparation time, or the need to be a “caterer” to confidently instruct this course. Eberly College of Business graduate students Richa Sharma, MBA (STEM Supply Chain Management) and Shehrin Anjum, MBA, BBA, (Marketing) assisted in the development in the PowerPoint Lecture slides.
Retained Features
- Key Terms: Introduce each chapter with a list of Key Terms based on need-to-know industry-specific terminology.
- General Objectives: Explain what should be accomplished before proceeding to the next chapter.
- Glossary: Explains and defines each catering term.
- Easy-to-read format of the text complements the author’s direct approach to the subject matter.
- Industry-specific forms and checklists are interspersed throughout the text to aid comprehension of processes.
- Review Questions are presented at the end of each chapter, along with Putting It All Together exercises for students to apply what they have learned.
- Ingredients for Success listed in most chapters, emphasize fundamental catering rules, and reinforce general standard operating procedures necessary to build a successful catering career.