Fransmart is a global leader in franchise development. For over 20 years, they’ve excelled at turning emerging concepts into national and global brands. Led by company founder Dan Rowe, Fransmart is known throughout the franchising community for spotting and growing brands like Five Guys Burgers & Fries and Qdoba Mexican Grill, from single unit businesses to the powerhouse chains they are today. Fransmart has built restaurants in all of the top 150 media markets in North America. Fransmart’s success stories include Five Guys, Qdoba Mexican Grill and Halal Guys – a franchise that started from a success food cart in New York City. Today, Halal Guys is the most successful Middle Eastern restaurant in America. Dan’s success stems from his knowledge of each market and the potential franchisees in each market. With that knowledge, he can often predict whether a restaurant will find franchisees and be successful. The biggest mistake a lot of franchisees make is picking the wrong brand to invest in. Another mistake franchisees make is not following the system put in place by the brand they’re investing in. QUOTES “A good franchisee wants to follow somebody else’s system. A bad franchisee buys a franchise and tries to do everything different.” (Dan) “In every market, we know where the best operators are, we know where the best intersections are, where the best projects are, the best architects, contractors, food distributors, so we just sort of developed this knack for understanding the best way to do everything in these markets.” (Dan) “I want to be relentless about getting the right site (for a new restaurant). For any concept, there’s 10 or 15 or 20 potential sites. But there’s really only three or four first sites. You have to be very careful when you’re building a brand in a brand new market. There’s something very strategic about using real estate and real estate’s role in marketing.” (Dan) “You have to be really good at knowing exactly where your bullseye’s are and coming up with some logic around what order you should be growing.” (Dan) “You have staff for the sales you want and you have to staff for the company you’re trying to build.” (Dan) “I’ve never seen a concept that I can’t figure out how to drive sales and lower costs.” (Dan) TRANSCRIPT 00:00.00vigorbrandingHello if you’re a restaurant looking to become an an international restaurant chain or if you’re um, you know I’m gonna start over I’m sorry it’s kind of fumble that all just yeah, hello if you’re a restaurant looking to become an international restaurant chain or if you’re an entrepreneur who wants to own a franchise today’s episode is for you. My guest is Dan Rowe he’s the Ceo and founder of fransmart and he takes emerging restaurant concepts and turns them into national and international franchises. He’s been called the chainmakerr and we’re gonna talk to him today about his process. Dan. Thank you so much for joining us. 00:32.74dan_fransmart_comUm, yeah, thanks, thanks for having me. 00:36.52vigorbrandingWell let’s just jump right in. Let’s start with Fransmart tell me a little bit about it How you started maybe a little bit about your history and where you got your start. 00:44.96dan_fransmart_comsure sure I I started washing dishes and cooking got into technology if id never went to college so barelegged out of high school. So I but I was lucky enough when I was like nineteen eighteen and a half nineteen for about 5 years I got into technology. Worked for a guy that grew software companies made some money and what do I do go right back in the restaurant business I bought a franchise of a bagel bakery and it was a 6 unit bagel chain in Washington d c I lived in California the idea originally was to bring the franchise to California ah, because there’s no bagel shops near me. And I went into business with a buddy mine and his wife and they wanted to move to Denver so we opened up our first franchise in Denver I had negotiated a deal I said hey if we’re successful with this I want to also do your franchising and because I’m proving you outside of Dc where all your stores are. We were very successful and I was 23 I think he was 25 enty five or 26 and we were more successful than most of the stores that they had in Dc so we did their franchise development and we grew them from 6 stores to around 200 in about 4 years sold the company. 01:51.64vigorbrandingWow. 01:57.90dan_fransmart_com1 of my shops in Denver was across from the first Chipotle we tried to get him to franchise. He wasn’t interest in he did just fine without us but somebody who copied him was ah Kudoba Kudoba mexican so we approached Kudoba we got involved with Kedoba when they were only open a couple months. 01:59.35vigorbrandingI. 02:13.86dan_fransmart_comHelped him put together the whole franchise program grew that to think about 100 open and few hundred in ...
