How Pokeworks’ first employee became a multi-unit franchisee for the brand

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 Lelin Kandel, who immigrated from Nepal to the United States. He originally started his hospitality career as the first general manager of Pokeworks, and gradually moved up the ranks. Now, Kandel is becoming a multi-unit franchisee in partnership with current franchisee Rong Cong, as well as entrepreneurs Nijjwol Lamsal and Roshan Gauchan.

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We spoke with Kandel about his entrepreneurship journey, why he wanted to become a franchisee, and his long-term goals.

Moving up the ladder

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I'm originally from Nepal. I moved to United States back in 2008 for school. I graduated in 2015 and knew that being in the restaurant industry was something that I always wanted to do. So when this opportunity came in 2015 [to work for Pokeworks], I moved from Boston to New York, started the management training, and worked there until 2020. I moved my way up from GM to regional manager, to regional franchise manager, up to senior operations manager, where I was working with the founders on restaurant openings, training the franchisees, and then overseeing both the franchised and corporate-owned stores to make sure they were up to the standard and profitable.

Finding Pokeworks

The founders were some of the first people I met when I came to the United States. Back in 2008 during the holidays, we met through common friends. I knew they were opening a new restaurant in New York, which is not too far from Boston. So, I figured I would just give it a shot.

Putting in the hard work

It was a lot of hard work initially, especially when a Food Insider video went viral [of Pokeworks] and suddenly there were a lot of inquiries for new restaurants. Being able to adapt to the long working hours and making the move from having a corporate store to franchised stores and build up that system, I definitely put in the hours with the founders. A restaurant is 24/7, it’s not Monday through Friday. Even after the store is closed, you still have to be there if needed. It’s a combination of putting in the hours, being creative, listening to your customers and staff, as well as the founders and all the stakeholders. You just have to be able to adapt to all of those needs.

Why become a franchisee

I’ve always been in love with the concept. I’m a fan of healthy food with a more premium feel. It’s also not a corporate style of work environment; it’s more like family. We’re very close. Plus the trend in the market I see for poke, of people trying to eat healthy and slowly, tells me there’s a lot of room for growth and profit margin if done properly…. It’s not something you just go out to eat once or twice a month. There are so many options, you can go three or four times a week…. Being with the company from the very beginning, it was all about the culture and the vision they had that I was a fan of.

Meeting his business partners

My [business partners] are also from Nepal, so we've known each other for many years. Rong was actually one of our first franchisees when we expanded to Boston, and I trained him, so I knew he was the right partner for me. …I've always wanted to open a restaurant in Boston. Boston is very close to my heart. With our years combined, we have close to 20 years of Pokeworks experience.

Franchising plans

We are opening seven locations over the next four years in Boston. We just signed our first lease. I think we're definitely on the path to open two in 2025. There is potential in the market to open more than seven in Boston. So we're not going to stop, but we want to be very careful on how we want to scale our growth there. We want to make sure the store locations are being chosen carefully, and. before we move on to the next projects, we want to make sure the existing stores are operating the best that we want to.

Long-term goals

The suburbs around Boston have a lot of potential for Pokeworks. We are probably also looking to grow outside Boston, but eventually we want to open 10-12 in the area. We do think the Boston population prefers healthy food, with having all of these universities with young people around, like Boston University, Harvard, and MIT.

Contact Joanna at [email protected]