Maintaining Brand Standard Consistency During Expansion

As any multi-unit operator can tell you, one of the biggest challenges in running a multi-location franchise group is maintaining the delivery of a product and service that is consistent with brand standards. Brett Lewis, a Jersey Mike’s franchisee overseeing seven stores was no different.

“What makes consistency difficult over multiple stores is that you can’t be in the store everyday, and there’s only so many hours.”

Brett felt that when he only had three stores, that he could visit them all each day and it wasn’t too difficult to manage. After that, he began to really feel the stress.

“Once I opened that fourth store, that’s when I found myself stressing more and more because I couldn’t do it all on my own.”

Other Challenges

One thing that is very important to Brett, which heavily influenced his decision to team up with Jersey Mike’s and open up a franchise, is their aligned emphasis on employee development. He really makes it a priority to mold the younger demographic that makes up his workforce into tomorrow’s leaders. That too was becoming more of a challenge as his business grew.

“As I looked at employee progress, it was clear that I wasn’t able to dedicate enough time to that process, where it’s most useful to employees, developing them as leaders.”

Each day, Brett would go into a store with an agenda on what he would want to cover with his team along with goals he would want to work on with individual team members. He found though, that he would spend the majority of his time trying to figure out things like what wasn’t completed during the closing shift the night prior. Before he knew it, he would be out of time and have to leave to get to the next store. Brett had the help of great managers but there was still something missing that caused him headache at night.

A Better Process

Hearing about Jolt from other franchisees, Brett’s initial thought was that it sounded too good to be true.

“When I first heard about Jolt, I thought it sounded like the tool I had always dreamed somebody would make.”

After Brett logged in to his Jolt account, he remembers thinking how simple it was to get started. He quickly imported a few date code labels and a closing checklist before handing over his iPad to his employees.

“It was so intuitive. Touch the label you need on the tablet and the printer spits it out. Need to ensure the drop-in cooler is cleaned correctly? Touch the item, the camera pops up and you capture a photo to complete. I didn’t have to explain any of it to the team.”

Brett has learned to optimize so many aspects of his business by incorporating Jolt, yet he still knows that he hasn’t even scratched the surface on all that Jolt can do. He finds comfort, though, in knowing one thing in reference to Jolt.

“It’s a better process. It allows us to be better at what we are currently doing.”