High-quality, fast and casual dining is all the rage these days. Consumers are no longer satisfied with mediocre food prepared quickly. However, many still experience the dreaded time crunch when it comes to choosing a restaurant. That’s why so many restaurants offering expertly and efficiently prepared food have begun to take off.

Consider these statistics from Franchise Help: Between 2006 and 2010, the fast casual food service industry grew by over 30%, reaching the $23 billion sales mark.

For those with an entrepreneurial spirit, it would seem that we are in a golden window for opening a fast, casual franchise. That leads to the obvious question: What are the best restaurants to franchise?

We believe your best choice is to open a Giordano’s franchise. But we get that we may be a little biased! That’s why we’re putting together this guide on the benefits of opening a franchise with Giordano’s. We’re not only leading the pizzeria franchise pack, but we’re also raising the fast casual bar as one of the best restaurant franchises in the country.

Why Open a Franchise?

But why should you open a casual dining franchise in the first place? Let’s take a look!

Franchising offers you a number of benefits that are not available for those who open an independent restaurant. Franchises, regardless of the company, are built on proven concepts, have already established cash flows and offer a level of support that takes much of the risk out of the very risky food service industry.

Proven Concepts

Franchises are possible because they come packaged with already proven concepts and brands. One of the highest hurdles for new restaurants is the building of brand recognition and loyalty. But when you open a franchise, that hurdle has already been crossed.

Most franchise restaurants were not established with franchising in mind. Instead, they were founded as independent eateries. However, as these restaurant brands grew along with their customer base, they were presented with the opportunity to expand. Franchising allowed them to continue to regulate their brand while also bringing in new investors and stakeholders.

But a great franchise concept is more than just a brand. These restaurants also come with established and proven menus. These menus are extensive and help you understand and anticipate ingredient sourcing, personnel training and target customers before you even open your doors.

While you do want to make sure you’ve done your research when considering which are best companies to franchise, you can at least be confident that you’re starting with an established brand, menu and concept that has been proven to be successful elsewhere.

Established Cash Flows

Opening any business, including a franchise, will require investment — not just of time, but of money, as well. But when you open a franchise, those outgoing cash flows have been established. Additionally, while the success of an individual franchise is contingent upon effective management, you will also be able to peruse data on incoming cash flows in other franchises, helping you to better prepare for your own restaurant.

If you were to open your own independent restaurant, you would of course need to purchase property, invest in training staff and spend significant capital in designing your concept. Franchising takes a lot of the guesswork out of this process. While you still need to purchase property — the price of which is dictated by your local real estate market — much of the rest of your startup costs will be known quantities.

Many independent restaurant owners, unprepared for the unknown costs of opening their business, doom themselves before they even serve their first customer. Franchise owners have to deal with far fewer unseen costs.

Additionally, when opening a franchise, you can have a better sense of when you will begin turning a profit, allowing you to be better prepared for weathering the time spent in the red when you first open. Others before you will have opened a restaurant using the same menu and concept, thus giving you a blueprint for what the process will likely look like for you. Of course, any data reflects not just the profitability of the franchised brand, but also the effectiveness of each franchise’s owners and managers. Simultaneously, the franchise brand itself is strongly invested in seeing you succeed, and therefore will be upfront about what is needed in order to be successful.

A Support Community

That being said, company support for your franchise will exceed just profitability data. Franchises thrive because they don’t just offer proven concepts — they provide frameworks and support for effectively implementing those concepts.

While many restauranteurs start out because of their love of the art of food, effective food service is a highly technical operation. Complex government regulations, narrow profit margins and staff management responsibilities all require precise attention to detail. Many of the best practices for managing such a delicate system need to be learned.

When opening a franchise, you get access to training that enables you to continue the franchise’s previous successes. This will allow you to avoid some of the pitfalls of learning on the job.

Additionally, you will be given access to built-in marketing support. Official branding will be consistent across the franchise. Furthermore, effective approaches to customer outreach will already be established. Social media networks and advertising campaigns will already have been in place, giving you access to a preexisting level of brand recognition and loyalty.

Finally, equipment lists remove the risk of purchasing high-end equipment. You won’t have to worry about making a large investment in an unproven appliance, since the franchise will come with established equipment requirements. Furthermore, getting those appliances serviced when needed will also be much easier, as franchises come with established relationships with suppliers and service contractors.

You can never completely remove risk when opening a restaurant. But opening a franchise removes a large share of the risks that come with the food service business. By providing you with proven concepts, established and predictable cash flows and a network of support, franchises set you up to succeed in a market crowded with stories of failure.

Why Open a Giordano’s Franchise?

Up to this point, we have discussed the benefits of opening a restaurant franchise generally. However, while there are many fast casual franchises proving that such an approach to food service is a recipe for success, we also think that Giordano’s, as a proven and leading Italian restaurant franchise, is especially well-suited for this expanding market.

With that in mind, we want to spell out the various ways that opening a Giordano’s franchise is not just a sound investment, but also an opportunity for a lucrative and rewarding career.

An Established Reputation

When food critics construct their “best of” lists, it’s often assumed that local, independent restaurants will prevail. Independent restaurants are seen as more authentic, with a great attention to detail. However, when it comes to the city of Chicago and its signature food — deep dish pizza — Giordano’s truly tops the list. Critics agree: If you want an authentic taste of Chicago, Giordano’s is the place to find it.

Increasingly, customers are looking for consistent quality while also searching for something special. By opening a restaurant that can confidently say it serves the best Chicago deep dish in CHICAGO, while also offering you with the kind of quality control support that ensures your customers are having the same experience they would have in one of our flagship restaurants, you’re starting with a recipe for success from day one.

Because our restaurants are committed to only offering the highest quality products, our restaurants are built on high-quality, fresh ingredients. When you take on our menu, you’re also taking on the superior ingredients that make our menu what it is. All of our pizzas begin with fresh tomatoes, grown for us exclusively in California. Similarly, our pizzas are only topped with fresh Wisconsin mozzarella, made with the same care we put into all of our pies.

We are committed to maintaining our reputation because our brand is an extension of our foundational values. Our approach to pizza can trace its lineage back to Mama Giordano’s famous Torino Easter Pies. We introduced her recipe to Chicago in 1974. We wouldn’t be selling Mama’s signature pies if we weren’t committed to honoring her and her long history of excellent Italian cuisine.

When we hand our reputation to a franchisee, we do so because we are confident that franchise will continue in the same tradition and continue to honor Mama Giordano and her Italian heritage.

Superior Customer Experiences

Over the years, our brand has taken great care to establish well-appointed dining room standards. Our restaurants represent the cutting edge of both exterior and interior restaurant design. This is the heart of the fast casual dining experience. Unlike fast food restaurants, which make significant sacrifices when it comes to their dining room experiences, our restaurants provide customers with beautifully appointed places to eat.

Furthermore, our decor is a representation of who we are: A Chicago deep dish pizza brand. Designs are painstakingly installed to give customers a sense of our history within our native city while also being on-trend.

But we take our interior and exterior design support even further. We are firmly committed to ensuring your success, and we believe that success starts with sound real estate investments. That’s why we provide site selection consultation and support, restaurant design support and kitchen design consultations. Beyond that, we also have well-established leasing best practices that we’re eager to pass on to our franchisees. With so many established restaurants as part of the Giordano’s family, we have an eye for leasing and real estate transactions that are going to set you up to succeed.

Simultaneously, we have earned a reputation for superior service. Whether you’re dining in, taking advantage of our bar service or ordering a pizza for pick-up or delivery, our service staff are known for being friendly while completing their tasks efficiently and effectively.

When you open a Giordano’s franchise, not only will you be reaping the benefits of all of those years of success, but you’ll also being getting access to the design and training support that have ensured our previous successes. Because we have worked so hard over the years to earn our reputation, we don’t just hope you to succeed — we work hard to make sure you do. We like to think of this as a mutually beneficial relationship.

Diverse Customer Service Approaches

Fast casual dining is built on the idea that customers want efficient service, but they don’t want to be treated poorly. Instead, while they may not need or even want full table service, they want the service they do receive to be friendly.

Furthermore, a significant subset of customers factor in the method by which they engage with restaurants when choosing a place to eat. Specifically, according to Technomic, 30% of customers prefer restaurants that offer delivery service.

While a majority of customers may not be swayed by delivery availability either way, 30% is a sizable number of potential customers that would be lost by not offering delivery.

Giordano’s takes their dining room seriously, and diner experience is an important part of our brand, but we also offer delivery service. This opens up another significant customer base that you can engage with. In fact, when it comes to pizza franchises, delivery is often assumed by customers, meaning you had better have a delivery option if you want to approach 100% customer satisfaction.

Moreover, we have also established a reputation for superior catering. This not only gives you opportunities to work with individual customers with large orders, but it also gives you the chance to establish long-lasting partnerships with area businesses. These relationships can flower into lucrative partnerships, allowing you to bring joy and superior service to corporate events and business get-togethers.

Proven Staff Training and Support

While we are most famous because of our reputation for making the best deep dish pizza in Chicago, we’re also quietly earning praise for our ability to prepare our franchises to succeed.

Our training support program begins with established and proven manuals and tools, both for restaurant operation and management. These guides help spell out not only our expectations for our franchisees, but also the best practices that have enabled us to succeed for over 40 years.

However, we also provide you with additional support and consultation as you open your franchise. New franchisees and general managers will go through our seven-week training program, giving you hands-on experience with the specifics that make our brand so well-regarded.

Finally, we will also provide you with a well-trained restaurant opening support team that will guide you through the intricacies of launching your franchise. This team will remain onsite for at least 15 days before and after you open, making it easy for you to transition into running your restaurant on your own.

Superior Marketing

We didn’t get to where we are without taking marketing seriously. We have invested countless hours into creating an instantly recognizable brand with broad reach across various mediums.

Generally, this ensures new customers who have had previous experience with our various restaurants will already have positive opinions of your specific restaurant before they walk in the door. Our brand presence in the city of Chicago is extensive, and we have established many exciting partnerships with other quintessential Chicago brands, firmly rooting ourselves as a representative of the Midwest’s most important commercial and cultural hub.

While your restaurant may be a long way from Chicago, this branding work will still pay dividends. For example, those who have recently traveled to the city will recognize your franchise as representing a little slice of a city with which they have had good experiences. Furthermore, our brand presence among the city’s large market sports teams will also help customers associate your restaurant with an authentic Chicago experience.

Furthermore, our extensive presence among social networks will give your potential customers access to millions of other satisfied customers across our many restaurants. Even though your restaurant will be new, your customers will associate it with many years of experience and an established reputation for quality. It takes years to build this kind of brand presence and loyalty, so having it built-in gives you a sizable advantage over your competition.

However, your association with our superior marketing is not passive. We also build marketing support into our established relationships with our franchisees. This includes targeted marketing strategies specifically aimed towards a successful restaurant launch. These programs are designed to help you firmly establish your restaurant (and our brand) within your local communities.

Finally, we make branding easy for you by providing graphic design and media and advertising support. We are firmly invested in supporting you because we also know that, as a franchisee, you represent us.

Data-Driven Financial Support

Lastly, we offer data-driven financial support. While we understand that restaurants succeed on the quality of the food and the story that that food tells, we also know the line that separates success from failure can be dangerously thin. That’s why we want to equip you with the data to navigate the tumultuous waters of the food service industry.

We begin by preparing you with the best data for planning the establishment of your franchise. This will ensure that you’re in the best possible place before you even begin. We will give you a clear picture of required liquid assets, the expected start-up costs and the kinds of equipment lists that will ensure you can maintain our exacting standards for quality while also ensuring the best possible return on investment.

However, even after you establish your franchise, we will continue to support you and provide you with effective tools for analyzing your finances and evaluating your operational procedures and costs. While you may have years of restaurant management experience, we have data and support tools catered to our specific restaurants, and we want to make sure we pass our tools and expertise on to you. We don’t just want to you succeed — we want you to succeed soaringly!

Finally, we will assist you in further strategic planning. Just as we aspire to grow our brand and expand our reach through partnerships with franchisees, we want to facilitate you in expanding your personal vision as a part of the Giordano’s family. As we see you succeed, we want to help you explore the different areas where you can expand, allowing you to reach more customers while enfolding your successes into our story of brining one Italian woman’s approach to tomato pie to the rest of the world.

In the end, we understand what a franchisee is: The newest member of the Giordano’s family! That’s why we’re committed to working with you every step of the way. Your success is our success, just as our hard work benefits you in countless ways.

If you are interested in further exploring how a potential franchise partnership could grow, along with the specific requirements for establishing a Giordano’s franchise, we encourage you to reach out to us. We will get back to you quickly, because we’re just as excited about bringing our pizzas to new locales as you. We truly believe that we have hit upon the ultimate recipe for pizza franchise success within an increasingly challenging market. So contact us today. We look forward to adding you to our growing Giordano’s Chicago deep dish pizza family!