Monday, December 21, 2020 — the Denver, Colo.-based, 75-unit fast-casual teriyaki brand — used the unusually challenging time of the pandemic to launch a solution for a common operator issue: managing absentee franchisees. In June, Teriyaki Madness launched their Restaurant Sherpas program: an affiliate restaurant management company that provides management services for absentee or semi-absentee franchise owners.
Since launching, Teriyaki Madness has opened up nearly a dozen Restaurant Sherpas-managed stores. In two of the company’s Sherpas locations, year-over-year sales were up 42% and orders were up 15%.
“We set out to create a turnkey system and we found ourselves t the end of day handing [franchisees] the keys and then off they went, and we thought, ‘what if we just managed the store for them?’” CEO Michael Haith said. “It was amazing how many people raised their hands and said, ‘we’re in the perfect position for this.’ […] it allowed our investors to start expanding even faster because now they’re developers instead of operators.”
LISTEN to Michael's interview on the podcast.