Carl Tjandra, the general manager of franchising at multi-brand QSR business, Craveable Brands, has just one non-negotiable when he is recruiting franchisees.
“I only have one absolute rule for recruiting franchisees for any one of our brands; they must be owner-operators,” Tjandra says.
“There’s no criteria of how much money you need to have in the bank, because every store has a different requirement. We have so many restaurants across our brands, that we can cater for different budgets,” he explains.
The franchisee’s choice of brand (Chargrill Charlie’s, Chicken Treat, Oporto and Red Rooster) often follows regional strengths, but it does allow Craveable to offer an alternative to a favoured brand in areas where there are no locations available.
A half-day in-store trial is a good candidate filter
It’s critical that franchisees are aligned with a brand’s expectations and ambitions from the outset, so after the initial interview, franchise buyers have the opportunity to spend a half-day in store.
The experience brings candidates face-to-face with chicken shop operations. For some, discovering they have to stand on the feet for five hours, serve customers, and touch chicken, is a jolt of reality. This filters about 20 per cent of the applicants out of the process, Tjandra says.
“I like to equip them with as much as information as possible, there is no hiding anything – we want to give them the good, the bad and the ugly, so they feel confident going into the business. We find this approach sets them, and the business up, for a more successful future.”
He prioritises operational experience, leadership and commercial acumen when assessing potential buyers. Which makes existing restaurant managers with any QSR chain an ideal candidate to own their own chicken chain with Craveable Brands.
“They can come in and bring their professionalism and ambition and turn around an underperforming store. And they build up their equity at the same time,” Tjandra says.
And while brand advocacy is crucial, Craveable is seeing the potential for multi-brand growth – a Red Rooster franchisee adding an Oporto, for instance. This would work particularly well in regional towns, Tjandra says.
“We want our franchisees to love their own brand, to think it is the best chicken operator in the world. They are the local face of the brand. But now we are slowly opening up to cross-brand portfolios – on a case-by-case basis.”
