Food Franchise

Posts Tagged ‘Busy Street’

Working at McDonald’s is something you have either done, or something someone you know has done. Informal estimates from the McDonald’s corporation put the number of Americans who have worked at one of the many corporate or franchise stores at roughly 20% of the total population.

That’s 60 million people.

That might seem like a lot, until you consider there seems to be a set of McDonald’s golden arches every mile along any busy street, and at every interstate highway exit you come upon. With more than 30,000 outlets, and 52 million people served every single day, it is easy to see how it takes hundreds of thousands working at McDonald’s to keep this massive company going.

McDonald’s celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2005, opening what it calls its “flagship” restaurant in Chicago, just a few miles from the very first corporate McDonald’s restaurant in Des Plaines, Illinois.

When I worked at McDonald’s way back in the 1970s, the founder of McDonald’s, Ray Kroc, was still alive, still living in Chicagoland, and still doing unannounced, personal inspections of the restaurants. He actually fired the entire staff at one restaurant in the area I was working, and I and two of my co-workers were assigned to “get that mess cleaned up” along with one of the assistant managers. Overnight. Staff members from the restaurant where I worked were called in to hire and train an entire new staff.

McDonald’s once took incredible pride in its customer service and its cleanliness. That was when Ray Kroc was still around, and shutting down any place that did meet the stringent guidelines that every single employee had to learn before being allowed to step foot on the service line or in the cooking area.

Some of that care for customer service and quality seems to have been reinstated, but it was obvious during the 1990s that McDonald’s became more concerned with growth, than with customer service or quality control. It used to make me sad, remembering how the restaurants in which I worked (three different ones) had been run.

No smile on your face? Fired. Your counter a mess? Fired. No “please” or “thank you?” Fired. Of course, this was during the era of the Baby Boom, when corporations that hired teenagers and young adults had their pick of teens and young 20-somethings to work for them.

Kroc took the business personally. Very personally. Every employee was expected to reflect his values for the business, which were (as I recall) friendly customer service, high quality product, and cleanliness. In that order.

Perhaps McDonald’s should get back to those basics, now that there are so many of us who remember what it used to be like to go to McDonald’s with the family, after a football game, or while shopping for a quick and tasty meal, served with a smile.

Pizza Hut has been around since 1958 and is the industry leader in pizza. It all started when two young men decided to open a pizza place with $600 borrowed from their mother. They didn’t do it by throwing all kinds of money into the deal; they did it by purchasing second hand equipment and renting a property on a busy street in their neighborhood. A year after they opened their doors they began embarking on the franchising world.

There are many aspects of getting into the Yum brand of franchises, and many things that are expected of you before you can begin.

Unfortunately, not just anyone with some cash can own a franchise. There is much more to it than having the capital to open a business. The franchisor has strict guidelines on who can open one, for reasons that if you don’t have certain skills, it won’t work for you and in turn won’t work for them.

You must first have money. You need to have at least $360,000 cash at hand and a net worth of at least $1 million. If you don’t have this then they won’t even look at you. You need to have certain reserves in order to make any business work, and this is no exception.

The initial investment that you will need to make in a business like this is between $1.1 and 1.7 million. It seems like a lot to sell pizza, but you are going to need a building, equipment and all the other things it takes to get a business off the ground.

The franchisor of Pizza Hut will not finance anything, so you will need to ensure that you obtain proper financing for anything you may need it for. If you don’t have financial backing from a bank and/or a bank in mind, Yum Brand will help refer you to the proper bank that will help you obtain what you are looking for.

Franchises charge a franchise fee and a royalty fee, and Pizza Hut is no different. The franchise fee for Pizza Hut is $25,000 and the royalty fee is 6.5% of gross profits per year.

The process of getting accepted for a Pizza Hut franchise is quite long and can take anywhere between 1 to 2 years before you are up and running. Compared to the statistics that more than 50% of new businesses fail within the first year, this is a small price to pay for the assurance and peace of mind that you business will be successful once it is up and running.

They also stringently interview you to make sure that you are a strong candidate for this type of business. You also have to have experience in the pizza business and general business experience.

There is a lot that goes into running a franchise; there are certain things that need to be done certain ways in order to stay in compliance with your franchise agreement. Of course, they won’t send you out there without any idea how to do things; they will give you the time and information you need to make your business a success.

Franchises offer very little freedom of choice. Everything from menus, decor, furniture and fixtures need to be uniform. If you like to have flexibility when running a business, a franchise might not be for you. But if you like a plan that is set in stone, as has been a proven success, a franchise is the right choice.

Franchising isn’t for everyone; you need to take a close look at any franchise before you get too far into it. Take the time to review any material so you have a good look at the big picture and whether or not this is something that you are willing to do.