The breakfast and lunch concept believes the time is ripe to sell franchises and open new restaurants despite the tough economic climate.
At a time when many restaurant companies are halting expansion and looking inward, First Watch, the Bradenton, Fla.-based chain serving breakfast and lunch in 76 restaurants in 11 states, announced in May that it would begin franchising. That’s on top of the 5 company stores it plans to open this year. Chain Leader caught up with Chris Tomasso, chief marketing officer at First Watch, to talk about timing.
It’s a tricky time to begin franchising, with credit problems and such. Why now?
We’ve been on our own timeline for this. We wanted to make sure it was a time that we were ready to franchise. We think that even with the economic climate that’s out there now, our offering is very appealing.
The target that we’re going for for a franchisee is not a mom and pop. It’s not someone who’s going to be as crunched in these economic times as others. We’re looking for multirestaurant deals, not single units. We’re really looking for more of an industrial franchise, if you will, somebody who probably has a portfolio of other restaurants right now and would like to add a complementary brand to that portfolio.
We have had a lot of inquiries from our customers, who love our concept, who want to have one restaurant. And that’s just not that path we’re going down right now. We’re looking for experienced operators with a solid balance sheet and some infrastructure in place to help them pull this off.
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