When our guests walk into a Smoothie King store, they expect a superior level of service and smoothie. Whether they visit one of our stores in Chicago or Las Vegas, our guests deserve the same Smoothie King experience.
Achieving this consistency starts with our franchisees and their employees. Our operations are strong and reliable through our detailed, hands-on training and support programs. From our basic in-store employee training to our new Certified Manager Training Program, we take active steps in developing our franchise system.
Our goal as a franchisor is to strive for operational excellence and to control expenses. We want to keep our franchisees’ costs low and profits high, and the best way to do that is franchisee training and support.
Here’s how we’ve kept our training fresh and essential to success at Smoothie King:
Adapting to Change
The key to a strong franchise system isn’t just training and support, but more specifically, adaptable training and support. A stagnant, stale training program does nothing to help prepare new franchisees and employees for success. It only hinders them.
Businesses are constantly changing. Whether it’s a change in their services, products or culture, companies evolve over time, and it’s important for the training and support they provide to adapt to those new developments.
At Smoothie King, we’ve undergone a number of changes within our company.
In March, 2019, we launched a new branding initiative, “Rule the Day™,” to better communicate our vision of becoming an integral part of our guests’ health and wellness journey. After finding that our previous branding, “Smoothies With a Purpose™,” wasn’t getting our intention across to guests, we decided it was time for a new direction. In addition to these cultural changes, more mechanical developments, such as an updated menu and new POS system, are also in the works.
We know that adapting our training and support to account for these new developments, big or small, is essential in preserving a clear line of communication with and expectations for new and future franchisees.
Our training for new franchisees consists of a two-week visit to our Dallas headquarters, where franchisees are given an orientation and in-depth training. Here, they learn the ins and outs of being a Smoothie King franchisee.
Typically, at least one manager from each franchise must also attend the training to become a Certified Manager. By requiring every franchise have a minimum of one Certified Manager in-store, we can better ensure every Smoothie King maintains strong operations, knowing a manager at that location has received corporate training.
With our new Certified Manager Training Program, however, managers can test out of the Dallas training and complete the course online, given their store meets certain operational qualifications. This program is designed to sharpen our operations and allow our franchisees to rest easy with managers they trust running their business.
Listening to Feedback
Part of developing a proper franchise training and support system is listening to your franchisees. As a Smoothie King franchisee, your opinion matters.
We continue to adapt and mold our training program with feedback from our training classes and forums within our internal social network. This allows new franchisees to communicate concerns and questions, as well as all franchisees to offer ways to improve our corporate training and support.
At Smoothie King, we know the key to our operational excellence and profitability starts with our extensive training and ongoing support.