Multi-Unit Franchisee Magazine Issue II, 2014 | Page 32

MULTI-BR A N D 50 MANAGEMENT Business philosophy: Again, I am a little OCD about what the stores are doing and what they look like. Management method or style: I’m a combination of tough and easygoing. When I see things I like, I’m the nicest guy in the world. Greatest challenge: In my position, it’s finding locations that work right for our company and meet our criteria. You have to do a lot of fishing and throwing them back before you catch the right one. How do others describe you? They tell me I work too hard, that I’ll never quit working. I have worked since I was 11 years old, and between working, the military, college, and this company, I’ve never stopped. One thing I’m looking to do better: I always try to improve what we do as a company. There’s always room for improvement in how we do our jobs. How I give my team room to innovate and experiment: I don’t micromanage people. I’m a quiet manager as long as everything is okay. I give them a lot of rope to do what they want. If I see something that’s a problem, I will get involved. How close are you to operations? I keep up by reading reports. If I see something I don’t like or understand, I get the VP of operations up to talk about it. What are the two most important things you rely on from your franchisors? It’s important that they keep our products fresh and on the cutting edge, and we depend on them to do inspections to ensure our personnel are preparing the food right. What I need from vendors: We need products to come in on time. Have you changed your marketing strategy in response to the economy? How? We don’t do much marketing because most of our locations are in what we call non-traditional environments, like airports and outlet malls. We don’t go after people—they’re generated to us. How is social media affecting your business? We don’t use it much for the same reason we don’t do much marketing. Some airports have websites, and it’s helpful to see positive comments. How do you hire and fire? Each location does its own hiring and firing. How do you train and retain? Each of our unit managers is trained by the franchise concepts they operate. Our operations team is constantly visiting the units and conducting staff training. How do you deal with problem employees? Generally, communication is the best approach. If you deal with people out of respect, you can resolve most problems head-on. Fastest way into my doghouse: If someone doesn’t do what they told me they would. BOTTOM LINE Annual revenue: $30 million to $40 million. do the best we can. 2014 goals: We like to get one or two new locations each year. That’s how we grow, although that’s not always under our control because of the environments in which we work. Is capital getting easier to access? Why/why not? It’s about the same. Growth meter: How do you measure your growth? We look at growth on two levels. First, did we add new units to our portfolio? Second, and just as important, we closely track same-unit sales against the previous year. Vision meter: Where do you want to be in 5 years? 10 years? Slowed down. In 5 years, I’d like to be involved in the day-to-day business, but in 10 I’d like a more passive role. How is the current economy affecting you, your employees, your customers? The current economy is better than 2008 in every location we have. Now we’re getting back to pre-2008 numbers. Are you experiencing economic growth in your market? Yes. What did you change or do differently during the economic downturn that you are continuing to do? We right-sized where we needed to. When volume drops, we have to adjust our labor force. We’re computerized and sophisticated in our labor and food cost management. We watch them constantly, daily. How do you forecast for your business? We do budgets each year in November and December. We go to each location, get out our crystal ball, and 30 MULTI-UNIT FRANCHISEE IS S UE II, 2014 Where do you find capital for expansion? Historically, we’ve used private investors. Have you used private equity, local banks, national banks, other institutions? Why/why not? For 20 years, we’ve had a network of private investors we use. I have borrowed from local banks on a personal basis, but the majority of our funds comes from our investors. What are you doing to take care of your employees? We offer a comprehensive benefit package, including insurance, paid vacation, and retention bonuses. We also have a bonus system for all of our management team members. Our key people share in ownership, which is something you have to do to retain good people. How are you handling rising employee costs (payroll, healthcare, etc.)? It’s a constant work in process, a constant challenge. We try to project ahead of ourselves and make adjustments as needed. How do you reward/recognize top-performing employees? Bonuses, monetary awards, and company-wide recognition. What kind of exit strategy do you have in place? I realize that in the next few years I have to bring in someone younger who knows how I think and shares the same goals and objectives.