Thursday, November 26, 2009. Ashoka Hotel, New Delhi. Day 1 of Franchise India 2009. Continued from Franchise India – Entrepreneurship Summit 2009 – Specialty Retail.

Another interesting session was “Business Opportunities in Food & Beverage Sector”. The speakers were:

• Mahmood Khan, Hospitality Expert Virginia Tech, USA
• Pavan Gandhok, CEO, Litebite Foods
• Gary Moore, MD,The Pizza Co., Thailand
• Rakhee Nagpal, MD & Chairperson of DVS (Moderator)
• Luis Daniel, General Manager, KRR International
• Ankur Sharma, General Manager Business Development , Yo China

Mahmood Khan shared how more than 200 fast food franchise brands have been in developed in USA – a critical factor being ubiquitous Highways (necessitating “quick bites”). He claimed that F&B is a recession-proof business because people will NOT stop eating. His another observation was that today’s customer does not have patience. Technology plays a big role in dealing with customer’s “instant needs”. So, you need to know “real needs of the customer” and continually watch “where the technology is going”.

Pavan Gandhok, CEO, Litebite Foods, opined that the challenge is to present local cuisines in an interesting manner – these items (like vada paav, paav bhaaji, samosa) account for 70-80% of the market and whosoever cracks this code is likely to make lot of money.

Gary Moore, MD, The Pizza Co., was excited about India and said that India is the biggest potential market we have seen in a long time. He emphasized on having “systems in place”. He said, “Brand is a promise of consistency” and successful entrepreneurs achieve that by engineering opportunities for the long-term. Apart from adequate capital, an entrepreneur needs to ask him/herself:

• What have I developed?
• What have I grown?
• What is my passion?

Luis Daniel, General Manager, KRR International, (who started his career as a McDonald crew 25 years ago) shared that after about 3-5 years when operational systems of a business have been set (facilitating smooth expansion), an entrepreneur can “work less and make more”.

Ankur Sharma, General Manager Business Development , Yo China shared that capital needs of a franchise business range from Rs. 3 lakhs to Rs. 1.5 crores. At the smallest level, Kiosk models can yield 100% ROI in one year. A full-fledged restaurant model  can yield 30-35% ROI in one year.