The Marshalls distribute the books through drop-offs to hotels, businesses, and subway stations, and through mailings -- their customer database includes 12,000 names. Earlier this year, when paper prices began skyrocketing, the Marshalls switched from slick paper to newspaper-type stock. "We were nervous," says Karen. "But I guess it didn't matter, because sales went up 20%."
Even so, this is not cheap marketing. It consumes some 3% to 5% of revenues, a big bite out of what Marshall describes as "an already slim margin." The results are so strong, though, that the menu booklets have been adopted systemwide. Any advantage helps, the franchisor reasons, what with an estimated 1,000 competitors out there.
Sometimes competitors aren't the problem; a tricky-to-sell product is. For example, when John Maxwell steps into a restaurant, he wants a strategically located table: the one closest to the kitchen drain. That's because Maxwell isn't looking to stuff his face. He's hoping to demonstrate the appetite of the fat-eating bacteria he carries with him.
Maxwell is a franchisee of Environmental Biotech, a company based in Sarasota, Fla., that manufactures and markets various strains of environmentally safe bacteria capable of converting fatty compounds into such harmless by-products as water and carbon dioxide to prevent drains from clogging. Bill Hadley, a former Century 21 franchisee, founded the company in 1990. For Hadley, the hard part hasn't been coming up with the bacteria, but figuring out how to sell them. Maxwell, whose territory consists of eastern Tennessee, tried peddling the bacteria out of his Volvo, making as many as 50 cold calls a week. But prospects were not wildly enthusiastic. How did they know the product worked? It was, after all, microscopic.
Then Maxwell hit upon an idea that has worked for generations of vacuum-cleaner salespeople before him: a trial offer. Prospective customers get a 28-day no-obligation test run. For a trial, Maxwell installs $300 worth of pumps, tubes, and containers that feed the solution to trouble spots -- drain-line intervention, he calls it. It's a financial gamble, Maxwell admits, but nearly 90% of the prospects sign up for the regular $95 monthly service.
The sales-closure rate so impressed Hadley that the free trials have become a systemwide marketing staple. "We thought we needed engineers as franchisees, but we were wrong," he notes.
With the fast-food segment about as clogged with competitors as the average restaurant drain is with grease, Hardee's franchisee Bob Faeth turned to the only fellow he knew would not let him down: Elvis.
In June 1993 Faeth opened a rock and roll Hardee's in Springfield, Ill., complete with a Wurlitzer juke box, neon lighting, a "Fat Boy" motorcycle, and an old gas pump in the dining room. The walls are festooned with pictures of James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, and of course, the King. On weekends Faeth features live entertainment on a $30,000 covered stage built in the parking lot. "Once you get into the rock business, you've got to keep at it," he says. "We bring in bands, Elvis impersonators, dancers. We have amateur nights, a karaoke machine -- a lot of things don't cost us anything. It's an entertainment center with a Hardee's inside."
Faeth has 14 Hardee's stores, but this is his largest, a $2-million number with seating for 200 and parking for 180 cars. The "rock" portion of the restaurant added about $200,000 to the cost, he says, but the increased volume makes it worthwhile. He declines to give sales figures but says, "We built it to be unusual, and it pulls in a lot of traffic."
Upstate, in Chicago, Royce Simpson tried nothing so dramatic. He owns four Wendy's restaurants, each averaging $900,000 a year, but he's seen sales soften in the face of Burger King's Pocahontas marketing blitz and Taco Bell's Batman Forever campaign.
He fights back by harping on the basics. "If I can provide what we call a share-stealing experience -- maybe the fries are a little hotter, the people a little friendlier -- customers will come back," he says. Neighborhood marketing also helps him through tough patches. "I get out into the community and build relationships," he says. "I donate to block clubs and civic groups. Last summer we did something called Cool Summer Jam with a local radio station. The station went around to 18 Wendy's restaurants, including one of mine, and broadcast live from the parking lot. The message was to have a safe, violence-free summer. No matter what kind of merchandising someone else does, these things will always have their place, and they're remembered in the community."
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Business Operations
In retrospect, it's clear that Sir Speedy needed a franchisee like Bill Tallent. Just four years into the business, he's been instrumental in transforming the conventional quick-print and copy operation into an electronics-based business, capable of providing so-called print on demand. "I didn't get into this business," Tallent says, "to get ink under my fingernails."
Tallent had big ambitions in 1991, when he set up shop in Nashville. He computerized all design work, a sharp departure from the Sir Speedy norm, and soon topped the chain's growth charts, posting sales increases greater than 30% for 21 straight months.
In Laguna Hills, Calif., Sir Speedy's high command couldn't help taking notice. "They saw we'd positioned ourselves as a high-tech leader," Tallent says. "Using electronic bulletin boards, we'd built a digital network to communicate with customers. We put our software right on their computers, so when they have a job ready to go, they just go to their PC screen and double-click on our icon, and it's automatically transmitted to our store. We print the job and deliver it to their desktop."
