"The Most Franchisee-Friendly Business Around"—The Secret of Salsarita's One-Year Growth From 5 to 13 Stores Open

Finally, a Restaurant Franchise whose goal is to maximize revenue and decrease hassle for franchisees—and not to wring every last possible dollar from the operators onto the corporate sponge. Said one franchisee, Dempsey Roberts, from Myrtle Beach , SC , "I did a lot of research and I chose Salsarita's because it's the most franchisee-friendly business around. Not only is it easy to set up, but the company really cares about me and my success. It's obvious that the corporate leaders have done their time in the franchise trenches—and it's so refreshing to work with a company that understands that my success is their success."

Salsarita's Executive Team have all been intimately involved with Franchises of other restaurants. Bruce Willette, Thang Nguyen and Vas Lahanas have all been owners and operators of numerous concepts; the CFO, Angelo Kyriacou, was CFO of Atlanta Bread Company as it grew from 10 stores to more than 160; Bruce Holzman is a 20 year franchise veteran from Berkshire Hathaway owned “Dairy Queen”. And this experience shows in franchisee-friendly attitudes:

• Protected territories: when you invest in a franchise, you own a radius around the store
• The benefits of ALL supplier rebates are passed to franchisees, as a matter of policy
• 100% o local advertising dollars actually buy advertising; corporate does not charge a percentage of ad dollars
• ALL promotions are designed with franchisee input; they don't cut franchisee profits just to drive short-term traffic
• Rapid growth across many markets, and a powerful affiliation with the Compass Group (providing market penetration in airports and on college campuses), allows a major national marketing campaign that will rapidly increase visibility and sales chain-wide
• Systems-oriented business model that provides a step-by-step roadmap for success
• Speed of service: typically, 40 guests can be served in 7 minutes
• Clear market differentiation: choice of portion sizes, a design-your-own-meal system that not only empowers customers, but is carefully structured to reduce decision time (and thus keep the wait short); where space permits, a circular bar where patrons can relax, design their orders, sip margaritas as they watch their meal being created; family-friendly policies; a commitment to quality (as one example, Romaine lettuce instead of tasteless Iceberg)
• Startup costs are far lower than for comparably sized chains