1. Yamato has been in the business of designing and manufacturing professional commercial-purpose Ramen noodle machines for more than 4 decades specializing on – but not limiting oneself to – equipment for small-mid scale production.

But what do we mean when we say “small” in the context of a noodle machine for a noodle restaurant?

Even if the shop serves 100 portions a day at most, what may be the optimal production capacity of a noodle machine for such business if it decides to make its noodles in-house?

The answer to this question may not be that obvious, at least at the first glance.

To figure out the required number of portions a noodle machine for a restaurant should be able to produce, it may be convenient to paraphrase the question this way: how many work-hours would a restaurant want to spend each day… just on noodle making alone?

With a more or less substantial demand, a noodle shop that has a noodle machine which is of only limited production capacity would need to spend very much time – a lot of it! Perhaps, even have a dedicated staff member specifically tasked to make noodles all day long.

Is that feasible? May be, depending on the country, and market conditions. But having a special personnel only for this particular function can seriously damage the bottom line in areas with high labor costs.

This is what people who may think that they do not need a noodle machine capable of making 100 portions an hour should understand.

2. Though it is true that many customers that purchase Yamato noodle machines are dine-in type food serving businesses, on many occasions once they acquire their own means of production such businesses (at times unexpectedly to themselves!) start using them to evolve and grow along the lines of making ready to eat packaged meals or meal-kits, or a retail of raw noodles through various distribution channels to end consumers or other businesses. 

Yes, on average you would only need 1 hour in total to produce 100 portions of fresh craft noodles using the smallest Yamato Ramen machine (like Richmen I), but what if you make more?

Leaving for now the issue of far better quality of home-made noodles aside, the economy of scale will certainly allow you to reduce your price per portion, thus increasing the demand. And if you choose to make more noodles to expand or diversify your business you may indeed have a dedicated staff whose sole function would be noodle making (a single unit of Richmen I machine can produce close to 1000 portions per day).

Obviously, a machine with higher production capacity such as Richmen II or Richmen Gold II can satisfy needs of a larger business (e.g. a restaurant chain) even if used only on a limited scale to cover immediate direct needs of that business.

But with a certain margin of excessive capacity a business will always be able to expand production for purposes other than internal consumption within its standard operation model.

Ultimately, it is up to that particular business how it would use its production potential:

a) whether to produce just enough portions to cover the existing demand (thus, spending only limited time and labor resources on the task of noodle making)

b) or employ a dedicated staff to use the machine to its full potential, and produce more noodle portions than are necessary for the needs of standard operation, using the excessive volume for other purposes (e.g. lunch box deliveries, retail of fresh raw noodles)

3. But sometimes the ‘collateral’ business that has emerged from utilizing the excessive production capacity made available by introducing a noodle machine, ends up exceeding the legacy format in terms of revenue, which brings about a question of whether to expand or diversify further in that direction, and if yes, then how exactly.