Franchise Leadership and Development Conference Profile: Richard Leveille

By BRIAN DIGGELMANN For three days in October, some of the best and brightest minds in the franchising community will assemble in Atlanta for the 14^th Annual Franchise Leadership and Development Conference. Experts from over 40 industries will gather to discuss the current state of franchising and how to take their businesses to the next level. We asked five franchise development professionals from attendee brands to share their wisdom and insights into how development strategy has evolved over the past twelve months and where their companies are headed. For 20 years, Smoothie King grew almost exclusively through word of mouth. The strategy may have been simple, but the nutritious drink concept’s 520 stores in 32 states show it doesn’t take much with a great product. Today, however, things are moving in a new direction. After the recent acquisition of Smoothie King by Smoothies Korea, CEO Wan Kim is driving the brand towards a period of explosive growth with a goal of 1,000 new locations within five years. The man who will make that happen is Executive Vice President of Franchise Development Richard Leveille. What led up to the recent acquisition of Smoothie King? About 10 years ago we began a venture with a corporation formed in Korea called Smoothies Korea with a gentleman named Wan Kim. Wan was a lover of the Smoothie King brand, and he came to us and said ‘I can make this brand a national name in Korea.’ Ten years later he had 115 stores, some very high-volume stores and Smoothie King is now considered the No. 1 QSR beverage brand in the country of Korea. They’re a step above Starbucks in that area. The Koreans love their brand so much they want to expand in a lot of different countries. They actually came to the U.S. and bought us out, so we’re now owned by Smoothies Korea. How is the new ownership impacting development strategy? This company has been growing organically and conservatively over the last 20 years. We franchised as leads came to us, 99 percent of which came from our stores. Now things are changing. Our new owner wants Smoothie King to be the No. 1 beverage brand in the United States, and he’s dedicating the resources to make that happen. We’re not looking to just grow organically from within as it comes to us--we’re going to go out and get it. You’re going to see Smoothie King get very aggressive over the next six months in the lead generation game and franchise marketing and advertising processes. In some sense, we’re really just going to start franchising now. What steps are you taking to kick start that growth? We’re talking to consultants, trying to make budgeting decisions and starting to look at where we’re going to put those dollars and resources. The Franchise Leadership and Development Conference is very important to us because we’re looking and learning. We’ve been observing these things for years and we read all the trade publications, but now we’re going to start doing a lot of these things. Do multi-unit operators factor into your new strategy? About 35 percent of our store owners have multiple stores and about 60 percent of our franchises are single owner/operators that are trying to expand. We feel strongly that if you want to open multiple stores, prove to us that you can operate that one store well and then we will look at awarding you multiple stores. With that said, with a different strategy toward growth we are now certainly looking at targeting multi-store operators in certain states and focusing on multi-store development agreements. It’s not something we do today, but we’ll probably add that to our offering next year. You mentioned the conference will be very important this year. What makes it a must-attend? It’s being able to talk to people who sit in the same seat we do with other brands to find out what’s working, gaining from their experience and then sharing our experiences as well. We have great respect for a lot of people that are going to be there--not only other franchisors but vendors as well. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we’ll come away with five or ten things that we want to implement in our system and as part of our strategy moving forward. We’re looking for additional seeds for our garden.