What-Franchise-Issue-20.1

RICHARD HERBERT Chopstix, Haven Holidays Richard Herbert isn’t your typical franchisee. The food and beverage manager oversees F&B operations at all 39 Haven Holidays locations across the UK. This includes acting as franchise principle for its five Chopstix kiosks – a relatively new addition to five of its parks which aims to fill the Pan-Asian cuisine gap. Franchising works for Haven and so far the brand has invested in Papa Johns, Burger King, Slim Chickens, Costa Coffee, and Millie’s, alongside its own in-house business concepts. But it was when Richard was leaving his previous role developing the franchise model for Pizza Express that he stumbled across what would become the holiday resort’s next opportunity. “I spent some time with John Lake, the MD of Chopstix and Menashe Sadik, one of the founders,” he says. “It was really apparent that the complexity had been lifted out of the franchise option and put into the supply chain, that really resonated.” The brand’s QSR concept chimed with consumer surveys which indicated an appetite for Asian flavours. But for the franchise to be successful, it had to work with Haven’s big investment in its adventure village – an outdoor space with interconnecting activities with emphasis on being around nature and the coast. A kiosk (which Haven calls a modular build) lent itself to offering adventurous holidaymakers a quick bite without imposing on the landscape like a bricks and mortar store would. “During the daytime, when it’s sunny outside, and that does happen on the coast, holidaymakers want to be outside. They want to have a drink outside. They want to have their food outside,” explains Richard. The ‘modular builds’ at Haven have been purpose made for Chopstix unlike a lot of kiosks which take up pre-existing spaces. In this case, Richard says the investment in modular wasn’t the cheaper option in comparison to a bricks and mortar store. The first trial location was opened in Craig Tara in Scotland, where there had been strong indication punters were looking for Asian cuisine. “The modular is movable. It has full power, full drainage, all the prep kitchens are inside,” he says. “All the processes happen here, and we even do deliver from them.” It was here, Richard and his team encountered the challenges that would feed back into future Chopstix kiosk locations. “The original modular that we were building for Craig Tara was 12 metres long and we ended up making it 14 and a half metres long due to the cookline,” says Richard. “We have to do the volumes that we wanted to be able to do and serve up to 6000 people a day.” Another challenge was maximising storage with limited space, which Haven have now resolved by incorporating a chilled walkthrough. “A lot of that learning went into Presthaven and Haggerston Castle and Devon Cliffs.” Support has also come from Chopstix head office, which conducted training on the site, in turn, avoiding a drain on Haven’s internal resources. Chopstix have also been amenable to Haven diverging from its usual operating hours, on account that the holiday resort only trades between March and the end of the November, with some parks open over Christmas. However, this is mitigated by the 28,000 holidaymakers that descend upon Haven’s parks each week. “The reality is that Chopstix operating in Haven Park is not like it operating on a high street. We have a captive market,” explains Richard. So far, reception fromHaven has been positive and Richard is open to seeing more modular builds in the future. “We’re massively expanding out estate as we’ve been doing more and more activities outside,” he says. “We have 39 parks, we have six Chopstix – there is clearly potential there.” Chopstix is a quick service Pan Asian restaurant. It allows customers to build their own meal, choosing from a selection of bases such as chowmein or egg fried rice, as well as toppings including Thai chicken curry and pumpkin katsu. The kiosks sit in Haven’s outdoor areas which enable customers to grab food on the move, in between doing holiday activities. 62 WHAT FRANCHISE Issue 20.1