Fast Food Restaurants

The Power of the Upside Fast Food Restaurant Franchise Approach

Growing a Fast Food Franchise Empire

After over 20 years of consulting hundreds of quick service restaurant (QSR) franchises on their expansion journeys, Upside Franchise Consulting Group gleaned invaluable insights we now impart to aspiring franchisees. While each brand has unique operational logistics, common threads weave between those poised for greatness.

It Starts With the Customer Experience

Step one with any franchise is zooming out above granular business model details to define your target customers and craft an exceptional experience around them. Outline demographics, ordering preferences, and price sensitivity first. Develop storefronts that really resonate with customers and implement interfaces that smooth out their online journey. Regularly survey customers to measure satisfaction ratings across factors like speed, quality, hospitality, accuracy, and atmosphere to make data-backed improvements.

Optimizing Operational Efficiency is Key

Work with a trusted franchise consultant to document every inventory, food prep, staffing, cleaning, financial, and management procedure imaginable, accounting for nuances between individual and multi-unit franchises. Getting new locations off the ground efficiently and error-free is no easy feat. By standardizing our systems, we sidestep common pitfalls, and voilà –accurate orders, rapid turnaround, and serious profit growth.

Meticulously Plan Your Supply Chain

Pinpoint rock-solid suppliers and distributors to stock ingredients and materials for franchises nationally. Negotiate rates for bulk discounts. Craft contingency plans outlining backup vendors if shortages arise. Store non-perishable surplus items in regional distribution centers to mitigate inventory issues. The stronger your supply chain, the higher and more consistent unit volumes, even through external shocks.

Enforce Brand Standards

Create stringent protocols around cleanliness, food safety, service times, hospitality, etc., and enforce them through mystery shoppers, customer surveys, and store visits. Catch issues early and coach underperforming locations to protect quality. For more serious cases, build clauses into franchise agreements allowing termination for consistent non-compliance. One bad apple can rapidly deteriorate a brand’s reputation. Vigilance prevents this.

Grow in Phases

When initially launching, restrict franchising to local markets only. This allows for the close support of new owners during the delicate opening months. Once the model proves profitable over 12-18 months, expand regionally, using success stories and metrics to attract area developers to open multiple units. Finally, once the demand is proven, court multi-unit operators selectively fill the remaining key geographies. Be patient when scaling to properly vet partners, even amidst intense interest.

Franchise owners who team up with an expert consultant to optimize their strategy will find their business thriving for years to come, weathering any storms the market may bring. Kick-start your growth strategy and make real headway by getting in touch today.

FAQs

How are fast food franchises structured?

Brands either franchise individual units to sole owners or sell area development rights to operators, opening multiple locations in defined territories. Some use a mix of both structures.

What support does the franchisor provide?

Franchisors supply new owners with real estate selection assistance, floorplan and kitchen layouts, equipment sourcing, initial inventory and food orders, operations manuals, opening marketing plans, hiring and onboarding systems, multi-week training programs, POS systems, and ongoing support answering franchisee questions.

What experience is required to own a franchise?

While many major QSR brands vet candidates based on net worth and liquid assets rather than direct industry experience, proven leadership skills, including managing diverse teams, following detailed systems, and analytical thinking, are vital.

What support is offered if a franchisee struggles?

Franchisors have a vested interest in each unit’s profitability and offer customized consulting, solving issues around marketing, operations, inventory, staffing, or financial tracking as needed. However, poor performance ultimately results in default proceedings if they are not corrected.

Ready to Learn More?

Call or email our team to explore launching your service franchise brand. Two decades and countless late-night problem-solving sessions have given us a hard-won perspective that lights the way for companies scaling up. Let our attested frameworks pave a secure path to development.

So, if you are struggling to sell franchises it is likely a case of poor leads, absence of a quality system, or lack of experience of your development team. Or a combination of all three.

But even more damaging to a franchise system is not the lack of sales but selling franchises improperly. Most franchisors who have issues with their franchisees years after they have completed the sales process, never track the issues back to the steps of the sales process—what expectations were set and what screening processes were utilized.

A good development process includes identifying where to advertise to attract prospects and those who would excel in your system. It is essential to identify key traits and transferable skills necessary when choosing quality franchisee partners. And further, have a development system in place that ensures you represent your culture, franchisee role, expected expenses, key staffing, marketing responsibilities, keys to success, training, and timelines.

Selling franchises is not a one-off transaction; you are selling an ongoing relationship. You don’t just move ahead with an interested party when they are “ready to go.” You must set proper expectations, not just to guarantee legal compliance and completion of the sale, but to set up your franchise partners for long-term success. Think of the development process as the first key step in operations success.

Franchisors are feverishly attempting to find the best franchisees to join their system in the hopes they will excel, be successful and profitable and pay royalties for years to come. Creating a network of successful franchisees who pay a reasonable royalty for the benefits they receive allows franchisors to build a dynamic, valuable annuity. So, it is essential that the start of the process be managed and executed with extreme thoughtfulness, skill and care.

If you want to attract, sell and launch franchisees properly into your franchise system and need guidance, USG can assist you in developing the key steps and procedures and train your staff in executing properly. USG also offers complete sales outsourcing where our experienced staff takes potential prospects from interest, through screening, due diligence, legal documentation release and preparation, finishing in signing documents and collecting franchise fees.

Whether you manage your franchise development in-house or outsource all or parts of the process, it is important to understand the dynamic effect the development process will have on your entire franchise system.