To many foodservice executives, late 2008—when the country and the industry were being pulled deeper into the recession—hardly seemed the right time for a big career move. But for Jeff O’Neill, late last year was the right time, and Einstein Noah Restaurant Group was the right place.
O’Neill was hired as the company’s president and chief executive after years as a marketing executive with Quaker Oats and PepsiCo, and most recently as head of Priszm Income Fund, a large Canadian franchisee of Yum! Brands Inc. He says his marketing and franchising expertise should be crucial to what he identified as Einstein Noah’s major initiative for the next several years: robust franchise growth.
How does your marketing experience factor into your role at Einstein Noah?
Einstein’s had a really strong brand identity. It certainly has fresh-baked food, but in an energized environment. Panera is a lot more sit-down, and we’re a lot more grab-and-go,…and I thought this was an intriguing brand positioning.
FAST FACTS EDUCATION: bachelor’s degree, University of OttawaEXPERIENCE: marketing vice president, The Quaker Oats Co.; president, PepsiCo; president, chief operating officer, Priszm Income FundPERSONAL: married, three childrenHOBBIES: running, hockey
I view marketing as four walls, four blocks and four miles. When you look inside our four walls, they’d done a good job of merchandising, the stores were in good shape, and the hospitality was very unique, quirky and fun. The four blocks and four miles really were, quite frankly, zero. That’s where the opportunity as a marketer came in. There was latent brand potential, and we just needed to get out there and get the presence known. I knew people would come back to us, and we could build from there.
How about your franchising experience?
From a franchise point of view, the opportunity is that we’ve got what I call a capital-light model, where $500,000 can get you into this business. With our average unit volumes of about $900,000, you can certainly open two or three locations. That’s where our potential lies.
The No. 1 reason people don’t come to Einstein’s more often, they say, is because there isn’t one near them. That doesn’t say anything about, “I don’t like the brand.” It really says, “You guys need to get more of these.”… If we’re going to expand rapidly, franchisees will want to go where Einstein’s is well known.
So as a franchisor, how much could and should you help franchisees get into your system when credit is still harder to come by?
It’s the definitive question. We’re not in the banking business, so we don’t make loans. But what responsibility do we have with our partners to grow the business together? We decided that we do share the responsibility of helping our partners find funding. We put on a lenders summit and pitched them on our business on behalf of our franchisees. We said that it’s our job to convince these lenders that we’re viable and uniquely positioned to grow and have a great return. We brought some of our franchisees in, toured some stores and pitched our business, and it went over tremendously well. Our franchisees were thrilled that we took the initiative to help them clear some of the roadblocks to investing in us.
