If founders, chefs and other creatives are the beating heart of the restaurant industry, then franchisees are the veins delivering their ideas to all corners of the globe. Franchising is critical to the success of the industry, allowing brands to quickly scale their big ideas using other people’s capital. And whether it’s a mom-and-pop restaurant owner with one or two franchised restaurants or a seasoned veteran whose influence in the industry is well-known, franchisees — with all their individual attributes, styles and personalities — make a huge impact on the success of a business.
In this week’s installment of Franchisee Spotlight, we spoke with Ron Chadwick, a multi-concept franchisee who just opened his sixth L&L Hawaiian Barbecue Restaurant in Colorado Springs, Colo. —further spreading regional Hawaiian cuisine throughout the mainland. We spoke with Chadwick about the keys to success and how he gets creative as a franchise owner with L&L.
Store count:
10: Six L&L Hawaiian Barbecue locations (four in Reno, Nev. And two in Colorado), as well as a couple of Round Table Pizzas and Pizza Factory locations. In October, Chadwick is opening his 11th restaurant, which will be located in Reno.
History with L&L Hawaiian
L&L is the first franchise I bought. I was actually on vacation there [on Hawaii] and ate at an L&L on the big island, and when I got home, I’m on BizBuySell looking around for businesses and I read a description of a listing, and by the description of local island food, I knew it was an L&L, so I messaged the person and told her I would take it, and I went down the next day and put a deposit on it. That was in 2014.
Why L&L Hawaiian Barbecue
I love the food. When I was there, I tried the food, and it was something different. Everybody these days has tacos and hamburgers and chicken, so it was just something totally different. I also liked the culture of Hawaii — I married my wife over on the island of Maui, and I have a condo on Maui. This was an attraction to the brand itself. Then, when I met the owners of the location here and we met corporate in Hawaii, I just had this connection with them. So, I decided that it was a brand I would like to grow.
Secrets to success
I think what we look for is a good location. I do a lot of my homework before I build anything out, as far as checking how many rooftops are in the area, and which provide dinner, and which provide lunch. We also have good employees. We incentivize our employees and especially our managers to run a good system for us, to keep our costs as low as possible, and our cost of goods in line. It’s important to have good general oversight. You really have to be on top of your business and know what's going on with it. I know a lot of owners when I talk to them about their cost of goods or labor, they have no idea what their numbers are.
Expansion
They were already in the Reno area when I got here. I bought the only location and just expanded it to four, and then in Colorado there was one and we started growing in the area and have already added a second one.
Menu creativity
They allow us the availability to be creative with the menus. So, if we wanted to do Kalua pork nachos, that’s something different that we can add to our menu. We’ve experimented with a few different things like pineapple upside down cakes, it's been a few different things here and there that we try and run specials on for a while. It makes the menu new and exciting that every restaurant has new items.
Why flexibility works for him
I think with the other [brands I own], I am limited to whatever they send us: like, here are the ingredients and this is how it's made. There’s no flexibility there. We have flexibility with our menu options with L&L. They’re not as rigid as in some other franchises. The whole operation of the system is pretty open. I don’t buy all of my ingredients where everybody else does. Some of the stuff is proprietary that comes from Hawaii, but I source all my own local ingredients, like getting Tyson chicken from one place and other ingredients from different vendors.
Spreading the word of Hawaiian barbecue food
Introducing people to cuisine they haven't tasted before or tried before, and having people come and tell us that it’s really good. They ask us lots of questions, which leads into a lot of good talks about Hawaiian culture. The concept lends itself to a lot of conversations. If somebody comes into one of my pizza places, they don't ask me, ‘Where does pizza come from?’ But a lot of people have questions about Hawaiian cuisine.
