Judie Byrd, the woman behind Super Suppers, estimates that 85 percent of moms hate to cook. A well-trained cook herself, she started noticing a demand for no-sweat cooking while teaching her class, titled “20 Minutes from Grocery Bag to Dinner Table.” Students loved the class but wanted something even simpler. So she took out the shopping element and started offering a class where everything except the meal assembly was done. Class after class filled with eager participants. “That first month, we filled 12 classes,” recalls Judie.Answering the demand, Judie started Super Suppers in 2003 and, later that same year, her husband, Bill, joined on to help her franchise the business.
And although business is great–Bill estimates they’ll have 350 franchises by the end of 2006–Judie questions whether the same concept would have been popular a decade ago. “[Back then], moms and empty nesters weren’t sick and tired of eating out yet, we didn’t have the child obesity problem we have now, and it seems with every generation, there’s more and more of a need to bring the family back around the table,” she says. One thing is for sure: The timing certainly couldn’t have been better–for hungry consumers and potential franchisees alike.
Photo by etsai.
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