Restaurant Franchising & Innovation Summit
On the upcoming Restaurant Franchising & Innovation Summit, high restaurant executives will share how they’re scaling smarter and rising quicker via daring innovation.
Photograph: Willie Lawless/Networld Media Group
January 21, 2026 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
On the upcoming Restaurant Franchising & Innovation Summit, happening March 16-18, 2026, in San Diego, California, high restaurant executives will share how they’re scaling smarter and rising quicker via daring innovation.
One panel, “Constructing a Replicable Model Expertise Throughout Each Storefront,” will deal with the subject of constructing a replicable model expertise throughout each storefront — a crucial facet as a model’s promise hinges on a constant expertise.
The session will equip each franchisors and franchisees with the instruments and frameworks to standardize operational finest practices, preserve product high quality, guarantee model messaging resonates uniformly and handle localized advertising efforts with out diluting the core model identification, regardless of the zip code. Register right here for RFIS.
Panelists embody Erin Amadeo, chief advertising officer at R&R Manufacturers, Seth Larsen, chief relationship officer at Cheba Hut and James Roussos, franchise enterprise advisor at Hen Salad Chick.
FastCasual reached out to Amadeo, Larsen and Roussos to get a preview of the knowledgeable perception they are going to be sharing throughout the panel speak.
Q. What’s step one in creating commonplace working procedures which might be simply implementable and scalable throughout all places?
Larsen: I feel the primary query you must ask is that if the franchisees are even asking for it. If they don’t seem to be asking for it, they most likely do not want it, and subsequently it is going to be actually tough to get buy-in and adoption. For bigger, systemwide updates we begin with our advisory council that’s made up of seven franchise teams. If we get purchase in and suggestions there first, it tends to be a better rollout course of throughout the system. Our LMS platform has improved yearly and we are going to proceed to spend money on that.
All the time function and make selections with the crew member in thoughts. It isn’t us sitting in an workplace that must roll sop’s out to 35 crew members. It is our house owners, GM’s, and different key folks on the retailer degree.
Roussos: I would must say the primary focus in creating SOPs, could be that they can be simply taught and applied. We have to clarify the imaginative and prescient and outcomes, not the precise duties — that is for later. Earlier than documenting how issues are completed, we’ve got to be clear concerning the international imaginative and prescient, at each location, no matter measurement, market, or operator. SOPs typically fail as a result of they deal with present habits as a substitute of desired requirements and long-term visions.
Scalability requires readability on outcomes that may be reproduced, measured, and coached globally.
If operators, trainers, and subject leaders do not agree on the usual, the SOP won’t ever scale. You’ll naturally must ask your self, and management might a brand-new operator, in a brand new market, be taught, perceive and execute the usual SOP’s with out tribal (exterior shortcut) information? If the reply is not any, it (the SOP) is not clear sufficient but
SOPs are about help, not “model mandates” or “you musts.” When expectations are clear, taught nicely and the imaginative and prescient is defined, groups really feel a way of confidence, they belief the system, and execute with consistency.
Excessive-performing corporations have a look at SOP as shared possession outcomes with steady enchancment and training.
Amadeo: Truthfully, step one is not writing something down. It is beginning with the why. Earlier than you doc a course of, groups want to know why it exists and what drawback it is fixing. That readability drives alignment and buy-in.
From there, you get very clear on what really must be standardized versus the place groups can have flexibility. For instance, how a steak is cooked, plated, and timed completely must be constant. How a GM motivates their staff earlier than a shift doesn’t.
One of many largest errors I see is manufacturers making an attempt to doc every little thing as a substitute of specializing in the few non-negotiables that actually shield the visitor expertise, the model, and the margins. When SOPs are constructed round these priorities and defined in plain language, they’re simpler to coach, simpler to bolster and much more prone to scale.
The strongest SOPs are constructed with operators, pressure-tested in actual eating places and designed to work on a busy Friday evening, not simply look good in a binder.
Q. Who ought to be concerned throughout the enterprise in terms of efficient high quality management and audit mechanisms to make sure constant product and repair supply?
Larsen: QC and audits are firmly within the Ops division, though you’ll be able to be taught a lot a couple of specific location by reviewing visitor sentiment. It is about sincere, open and clear suggestions between HQ and the outlets.
Amadeo: High quality management works finest when it is clear and developmental, not punitive. Operations owns execution. Advertising protects how the model exhibits up for the visitor. Culinary safeguards product integrity. Finance ensures requirements are being met in a means that protects the underside line.
Simply as vital, subject management and retailer groups want visibility into the method, even when components of it sit outdoors their direct scope. That visibility builds context, sharper decision-making, {and professional} maturity throughout the group.
Audits ought to perform as teaching instruments. For instance, if an audit surfaces inconsistent portioning, the purpose is not only a rating. It is understanding the foundation trigger, retraining the place wanted, and reinforcing why the usual issues within the first place. When groups perceive the why and see audits as help, consistency follows.
The most effective techniques are easy and shared: clear expectations, easy-to-read scorecards, common teaching and actual accountability.
Roussos: Efficient processes solely work when they’re owned system broad — not delegated to a single division.
Consistency is a system, a “tradition” that’s developed, if you’ll. It shouldn’t be a results of an inspection or “audit.” It ought to come from training and help.
