Competitive Strategies of Croatian Small Familyrun Hospitality and Catering Enterprises

The subject of this paper is examining ways of creating strategic competitiveness in Croatian small family-run catering enterprises. Competitive advantage is necessary if the enterprise wants to survive on the market. Selection of a business strategy is an important factor because a company’s positioning is determined by profitability that can be above or below the industry average. Economic reality of the largest number of the world’s economies is characterized by domination of family-run businesses. This is followed by the growing interest in determining the importance of family-run businesses to national economies, the ways of their participation, and finding problems which they have to deal with. Family entrepreneurship represents a special area of small entrepreneurship in Croatia. This work presents core characteristics of entrepreneurship in Croatia, defined as family-run enterprise, along with its features, with special interest on some of the more important characteristics of family entrepreneurship. The main goal of this paper is to examine and analyze all the features of business strategies that generate a competitive advantage. An empirical online survey was conducted in 2015 among sixty Croatian small family-run catering enterprises. Over 40% of respondents believe that the government should facilitate an easier and more long-term administration for entrepreneurs. Research has also shown that the sustainability of competitive advantage lies in adapting to guest wishes.