The oatmeal chronicles -- Part 3

#IHI Just when you thought it was safe to have breakfast, the oatmeal chronicle offers another chapter.

In the post below, Joe Wright offered the following suggestion:

Two fixes that require no extra labor, and no new equipment:
1. don't serve oatmeal
2. do serve oatmeal, but use tapered soup bowls instead of those vertical-side breakfast bowls.

The problem as you laid it out previously was the bowls being too small for the ladle, right?--so you can change the ladle size or the bowl size. Easier to change the bowl size, because the hotel should have tapered-side bowls for soup or salad already without having to purchase, store, and maintain new bowls, new ladles or a new oatmeal dispensing system. In fact, if they can be washed quickly between breakfast and lunch services it means that the inventory is being used more efficiently as the bowls will be used 2x-3x/day rather than once, as with these breakfast bowls.

Given the low cost of oatmeal relative to other breakfast options, even if this might lead to guests taking a slightly larger quantity of oatmeal on average, it would still likely be worth it.

So imagine my surprise when, this morning, I see a waiter bringing a tray of larger bowls for use by the oatmeal servers. I say, "Those will be easier." He says, "Those are the backups, in case we run out of the smaller ones."

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The solution was not only evident, but actually presenting itself.