Speaker Q&A: Richard Franks, Chilango
Meet Richard Franks, operations director for Mexican restaurant chain Chilango. An experienced operator, with a strong people-focus, he boasts nearly two decades of service in food retail. He’ll be appearing in lunch!’s opening day ‘Operations Director panel’, and is looking forward to sharing strategies for “strengthening operations” and highlighting just how “crucial operations is to ongoing business growth and innovation”.
Other panellists include LEON’s Shereen Ritchie, Tortilla’s Matt Chapman, Ole & Steen’s Natasha Wilmans, and (chair) Simon Stenning (2.45pm, Thursday 19 September).
Which food-to-go operators / retailers do you particularly admire and why?
I admire Pure for their culture and ethos. The work they are doing across people and sustainability is amazing. It is definitely a good thing to educate people on sustainability in a food-to-go business, with the increase in conversations about packaging and it is all about doing the right thing rather than the perceived right thing.
Leon, who continue to focus on people, as well as continually nailing a slick operation and interesting innovation.
What do you think is the key for operators to successfully compete against their competitors?
I feel innovation has really stepped up across the industry in the last year, with plant-based innovation being a huge focus for all. What is key is ensuring that any innovation does not over complicate the operations and ensures you are delivering the best experience for the guest at the same time as protecting the efficiency and speed of service.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of your job?
People are by far the biggest and most rewarding aspect of my role. In my four years at Chilango, I have seen so many of my team progress from crew members to now amazing managers. 100% of our managers at Chilango are internally grown and developed through the internal MIT Programme. Both my operations managers are internally grown and are both now managing 50% of the estate each.
I also absolutely love how we continue to place emphasis on celebrating success at Chilango, with our amazing quarterly celebrations which recognise the great work happening in our restaurants from crew member to team leader to general manager. We truly get to see the passion and enthusiasm across the business, as well as celebrating service leader, team leader and manager graduations.
And the most challenging?
The strength and open mindedness of our operations team means that we are confident that we can execute flawlessly, meaning we have to be strict with ourselves on what realistically we can do. Making sure take a ‘fewer, bigger better’ approach.
What does the next 12 months have in store for your business?
Innovation of plant-based products — we have seen a phenomenal performance on our THIS Isn’t Chicken launch, from 23 July, and we have seen LFL sales on our vegan range increase by +5% on last year.
We are also continuing to work on our new Kiosk trial, which we launched in our London Wall restaurant back in May. We have seen some amazing numbers here with weekly participation of the kiosks being +17% and the restaurant sales being +20% LFL.
Can you give us an example of what your business is doing to be even more sustainable?
We work with First Mile Recycling to ensure the waste in our restaurants is disposed of in a way that generates energy for the national grid and food waste is sent for anaerobic digestion to make sure zero waste goes to landfill.
We continue to keep exploring further opportunities for developing partnerships and efficiencies to make Chilango a more sustainable restaurant company – and will start making sure our guests are aware of how we are already working towards becoming more sustainable.
What do you see as the key food-to-go trends to watch?
Plant-based is the way forward. We have given this our main focus as a business for the last six months and given the success we definitely do not want to stand still, with further innovation in the coming months.
What’s your current best selling product?
Chicken Burrito (The Chilango).
We have also recently seen a massive uptake on our THIS Isn’t Chicken range since its launch in July, which is now at around 11% of weekly sales.
Why is innovation so vital to the food-to-go sector?
Our guests look first and foremost for great quality and value for money. However, given our latest LTO performance is our best performing ever, innovation and variety can help us to sustain growth, keeping our regular guests interested and coming back for more.
What innovative products are you hoping to find at lunch! show this year?
Delivery packaging is a big opportunity for Chilango. So I would really like to be inspired by how we can make the guest home experience even better and more vibrant than it currently is.
How important is lunch! to the food-to-go sector?
lunch! is such a great event with the opportunity to hear from industry leading speakers and gain new insights that help us all keep moving forward and continues innovation in the sector for the year ahead. It’s also a fantastic opportunity to catch up with industry colleagues both old and new.
Describe the lunch! show in 3 words:
Exciting. Inspiring. Fun.
Can you tell us a bit about your much-anticipated session at lunch! 2019?
I’m looking forward to being on a panel, with industry leading experts, where we can share how strengthening operations unlocks endless opportunities, highlighting how crucial operations is to ongoing business growth and innovation as well as customer retention.
Who or what inspires you to be even better?
My team in all the roles that I do. Our culture at Chilango is inspiring and I am really keen to help the people grow and see the results that they can achieve. Knowing that I have a team of people that are keen to grow and learn, inspires me to help them achieve their goals and career aspirations.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever been given?
At the end of every day take some time to identify what you achieved that day. Then take some time and write down the one thing you would like to achieve the next day. In the crazy industry we are in, if you know that you can achieve at least one thing a day that is going to help drive and change the business, that’s five things achieved a week. And 20 things a month, 240 achievements a year etc…
What advice would you give to someone starting out in the industry?
Ask questions. Never stop learning. Be determined and never give up.
See Richard at lunch! 2019
The Operations Director Panel: 2.45pm on Thursday 19 September in Keynote Theatre 3
The session features:
- Matt Chapman, Operations Director, Tortilla
- Richard Franks, Operations Director, Chilango
- Shereen Ritchie, Operations Director, LEON
- Natasha Wilmans, UK Operations Director, Ole & Steen
- Simon Stenning, Founder, Futureoffoodservice.com (session chair)
