In the midst of what many are calling the flexible workspace revolution, franchisees are looking towards the serviced office market for lucrative new opportunities. Projections show that three in ten buildings on every high street could offer a new franchise opportunity, with flexible working, or coworking as it’s often called, emerging as a booming industry.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="684" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069-1024x684.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-40993" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0069.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a></figure>



A booming industry With businesses and individuals increasingly using flexible working spaces, the co-working industry is estimated to be growing by 24% each year. A recent study of 18,000 business leaders in 96 countries by IWG, the parent company of leading workspace providers including Regus and Spaces, revealed that the majority of business leaders (89%) believe flexible working is helping their businesses to grow and stay competitive. In addition, 80% felt that adopting co-working, and enabling their employees to work anywhere, has helped them recruit and retain top talent.



 Likewise, with a huge 50% of workers predicted to be working remotely for most of their working week, by 2022, forecasts suggest that the global mobile workforce will reach 1.87 billion people. This presents a unique opportunity for those in the franchise industry to jump on what is a rapidly growing trend.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow"> Partnering with IWG gives business owners the ability to participate in this growth story and take advantage of the huge demand for flexible, contemporary workspaces – one of the most exciting growth markets in the country.<cite> Mo Nanabhay, Franchising Director &#8211; Africa </cite></blockquote>



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<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="684" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029-1024x684.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-40983" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/City-Point-029.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a></figure>



<div class="wp-block-button"><a class="wp-block-button__link has-background has-vivid-red-background-color" href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1">Find out how you can take advantage of the work-space revolution</a></div>



 As more people look to work flexibly, the demand for places for them to do so is growing; and as the corporate real estate market continues to grow, global real estate giant JLL estimates that up to 30% of corporate real estate could be flexible workspace by 2030. 



 The growing franchise opportunity This makes the serviced office market one of the most exciting growth markets in the world. Simply put, it is the next franchise frontier. And the industry founder, IWG, with its thirty years of experience in the, serviced office market and brands to match every requirement and style like Regus and Spaces, is now offering people a chance to get involved. In September 2018, the company announced they would be leading the UK’s first serviced office franchise partnership with franchising experts, ACCA Office Ltd. Since then, four more businesses have partnered with IWG, including Kash Office Limited, AMA Workspaces, SME Properties Limited, and Q-Boid Limited. These franchise partnerships will see sites opened across the country over the next couple of years. In Asia, the company has agreed to sell its Japanese business to Tokyo-based TKP Corporation for the whole of Japan. 



<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="684" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025-1024x684.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-40982" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025-600x401.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/St-Marys-Axe-025.jpg 1766w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a></figure>



 IWG is present in almost 3,300 locations, 120 countries and 1,100 town and cities across the world – and it’s this experience that makes IWG the ideal franchise partner for those wanting to take advantage of the booming demand for serviced offices worldwide.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow"> “Our years of experience in the industry and our well-established global network has taught us that building a quality flexible workspace offering requires trust and support. We work closely with our franchisees to ensure that they have a framework to find the right location and design, backed by the strength of our operational and marketing support and the best customer service that IWG is known for.”<cite> Mo Nanabhay, Franchising Director &#8211; Africa</cite></blockquote>



<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="481" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002-1024x481.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-40981" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002-1024x481.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002-300x141.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002-600x282.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002-768x360.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Ldn-Br-0002.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a></figure>



 To find out how you can take advantage of the workspace revolution, contact IWG’s franchise team via <a href="mailto:franchise.africa@iwgplc.com">franchise.africa@iwgplc.com</a> or visit <a href="https://franchise.iwgplc.com/?utm_source=Forbes_Africa&amp;utm_campaign=EN_Franchise_Brand&amp;utm_medium=Display&amp;utm_content=Article_1">franchise.iwgplc.com</a>.

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Franchise’s newest target: the flexible workspace revolution

He appears to be soft-hearted behind his infectious smile, but this is a steely franchise mogul who has survived being stripped of all his assets.
On a gloomy day, as gloomy as his worst day, we arrive in Mamelodi, Pretoria, South Africa’s capital, to meet Itumeleng Mpatlanyana.
At the corner of Shabangu and Maake Street in Mamelodi West, is a shisa nyama (township braai restaurant) made with a shipping container painted shocking red. This is Nkukhu-Box, one of his many businesses.
The atmosphere is vibrant. There is deafening house music playing at the restaurant – we had to ask people to turn it down. The street buzzes with taxis and hooting cars.
Finally, 40 minutes late, a white BMW sports car pulls up. It looks out of place, as well as tardy.
A short and soft-spoken gentleman, in a white shirt, emerges. Mpatlanyana, the food man, is ready to speak about his worst day.
For someone seen as successful, it comes as a surprise that seven years ago Mpatlanyana found himself sitting on the floor of his near empty house. The only thing he was able to save from the repossessors was a painting on the wall.
“There was one painting that I bought when I was a student. I actually begged the guys not to take it and I still have it today,” he says.
“It is a happy colorful painting. When you look at that painting in the mornings, it gives new life and meaning. So that is why I begged the guys not to take it. They took everything, but that painting was the only survivor that day.”
This was how bankruptcy felt.
It all began when he was 14 years old, growing up in the township of Embalenhle, in Mpumalanga. He had started a lawn-mowing business in his neighborhood at weekends. His motivation was money for a nice packed lunch.
“Having a tastier lunch meant that I could hang out and trade my lunch with more privileged pupils who were perceived as being cool at school.”
<div id="attachment_31360" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31360" class="wp-image-31360 size-large" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Itumeleng-MWD-001-1024x686.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="686" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Itumeleng-MWD-001.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Itumeleng-MWD-001-300x201.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Itumeleng-MWD-001-600x402.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Itumeleng-MWD-001-768x515.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />From rock bottom to rolling in cash</div>
While his fancy lunchbox brought him a sense of belonging, his business brought a sense of wealth. He branched out into the food business selling cheese, polony and bacon throughout high school.
With a taste for business, Mpatlanyana then studied a BCom in entrepreneurship at the University of Pretoria.
As a student he sold beanbag furniture to students. He also bought his first car – a 1979 VW Beetle – that he used to transport students.
“The business was successful. At one point I had 20 apartments under my portfolio, but none were owned by me,” he says.
The money rolled in and the friends came with ideas.
In 2008, he and his friend bought Fashion TV Café, a French television channel franchise. He thought it was gold for the grandchildren.
“When we became Fashion TV Café’s first young black franchisees in the world, we were in our twenties and it was a hell of an achievement,” says Mpatlanyana.
It all seemed plain sailing; but the exorbitant rent and overhead costs were to make a meal of them. Mpatlanyana lost his R3.3 million ($252,000) investment. The thought of losing everything was always his biggest fear.
Soon he was to experience his worst nightmare.
“That day I thought, colorful s*** just hit the fan, and it is looking beautiful. I was accepting defeat, because I knew it was coming and I knew I could do it again.”
First, the repossessors came.
“Those guys park their truck and they knock at your door, thereafter they just walk in and they just start taking stuff without negotiating, because it’s a done deal, the courts have given them the order,” says Mpatlanyana.
“I actually helped them to move the furniture, because I tried to make the experience as comfortable as I could. I was not fighting them, I wasn’t crying. I was like, ‘It went bad sharp-sharp, moja (fine), take it.’”
Reality kicked in when he was alone and bereft.
“The tears came later, after they left, when I was sitting on the floor.”
“The remote control is gone, the TV is gone and the ironing board is gone. I was just sitting there asking myself, what was I going to do next? But I knew then, that I could do it again bigger and better,” recalls Mpatlanyana.
“That was the lowest moment of my life. I would sit on the floor with no furniture or anything, wondering where did it all go wrong? At one point you were rolling in cash and all of a sudden, you have hit rock bottom,” he says.
The fear of people was stronger than the fear of loss.
“It’s was not even about the money, it was about the people that knew me and how they would look at me. A few weeks ago, you had this upmarket restaurant and the ladies love you, then all of a sudden, you have zero.”
“How do you even get your friends to come visit you again, if you have no furniture in the house? Your bank accounts are all cleaned up,” says Mpatlanyana
A phone call changed his fortunes four months later.
“I don’t know whether to call it luck or whether it was just my work ethic that came through for me because a customer who happened to be a coalmine owner who was looking for a BEE partner decided to call me. Instantly, I became part of a small mine operation,” Mpatlanyana says with relief in his voice.
<div id="attachment_31398" style="width: 696px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31398" class="wp-image-31398 size-large" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048-686x1024.jpg" alt="" width="686" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048.jpg 686w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048-300x448.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048-600x896.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048-201x300.jpg 201w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Itumeleng-MWD-048-768x1147.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 686px) 100vw, 686px" />&#8221;A few weeks ago, you had this upmarket restaurant and the ladies were loving you, then all of a sudden, you have zero.&#8221;</div>
“He could have called any other black man, but he called me, because he saw my work ethic and the amount of hard work I had put into FTV Café.”
His journey with the mining company was not long. Four years later, the coalmine was sold. He went back into the food business; his first love.
But this time, he was to do things differently. He would become the franchiser instead of the franchisee.
Spykos Foods was born in 2011, with R1 million ($76,000).
He founded a franchise that was about taking traditional township shisa nyama, fish and chips and bunny chow, into major malls and shopping centers in South Africa.
“You have to have a strong character to try again. I didn’t allow that to discourage me. I got up and I tried again.”
“I still went back into the food industry, the experience and what I learned out of the situation helped me to come up with the next brand. I decided to start my own brand, where I make my own rules and I don’t have to be dictated to by any franchise or international person that is in Paris,” says Mpatlanyana.
Forty Spykos Foods franchises were established around the country, but some collapsed.
“The stores started to close down due to several factors, but the main [reasons] were the escalating shopping center rentals, increase in food prices, especially fresh potatoes as this was our main product line.”
“There were also major competitors dominating the market… Some not so well-skilled franchisees and the lack of adequate infrastructure,” says Mpatlanyana.
Even with the punches that he took, he is adamant he’ll become a franchise mogul.
He launched his first Nkukhu-Box, selling chicken, in August 2016. It is a business that mitigates the rent and overheads of Spykos Foods with a red shipping container that doesn’t cost much.
To date, he has three stores in South Africa and plans to expand to Zambia, Namibia, Lesotho and Swaziland this year.
Mpatlanyana claims that his business is worth R6.5 million ($497,000).
“Being a young black entrepreneur has immense challenges in the private sector. I realized that in business you need to find a business model that doesn’t rely on too many external sources,” he says.
Seven years on from an empty house and empty bank account, his worst day, in many ways, made him.

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From Rock Bottom To Rolling In cash

If you are a foodie and live in South Africa, you know the name Tashas. Regardless of which Tashas you visit it’s always busy and people don’t mind waiting. I certainly don’t so long as there’s a glass of Turkish Delight or Goats Do Roam Red to keep me company.
After years of surprise birthday parties, dates, family get-togethers and business meetings at Tashas, an interview with the woman that started it all was long overdue.
Natasha Sideris is one busy woman and passionate about what she has built. Dedicated to maintaining standards, the interview was peppered with Sideris getting up to seat customers, hand them menus and tell the odd waiter to tuck in their shirt.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-30130 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/086-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/086.jpg 682w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
Given her jovial mood it was hard to believe it when Sideris described the day before as one of the worst she’s ever had. Her advice is to wake up the next day and get back to work.
Sideris’ journey into the food business began more than two decades ago. She worked part-time at her dad’s Fishmonger restaurant, while studying psychology at the University of the Witwatersrand. You could say this is where it all began.
Sideris spent years working in the fast food industry, but it wasn’t for her. She worked at Nino’s, an Italian-style restaurant franchise, helping the company open 12 new restaurants. In 2001, the 24-year-old bought her own branch with help from the bank and her family.
In 2005, Sideris realized that all the market had to offer were themed restaurants and big chains; this is where she saw the gap.
“It was because of my experience at Nino’s that I realized there was such a gap in the South African market for this style of restaurant.”
There was a place for something niche and Sideris planned on being the first one to fill it.
The vision was clear, “authentic, old school, with good fresh food”. Sideris just needed the money to kick it off. Financing the first Tashas in Sandton in 2005 wasn’t easy. She found herself in front of a loan shark, leaving with less than she needed but more in debt than she was ready for. One can only guess what would have happened had the eatery not been a hit. Sideris didn’t draw a salary for almost two-and-a-half years.
Drawing on the success of the business, Sideris turned the Nino’s in Bedfordview, east of Johannesburg, into another Tashas. This meant another trip to a loan shark. Banks weren’t paying her much attention since all she had was an asset in debt.
“It was long, hard work but I knew I was on to something good and I persevered,” she says.
When Sideris went into business with Famous Brands, a food services company that stables some of South Africa’s best known fast food franchises, it seemed an unlikely relationship, but not to her.
“I was very, very cautious in the beginning when I did the deal with them [Famous Brands].”
What would happen to the niche, unique café style restaurants she had created if she got into bed with a mass producer, the fast food business she ran from? Looking at how it has all turned out, both parties have come out ahead.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-30127 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-214x300.jpg" alt="" width="214" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-214x300.jpg 214w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-300x420.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-600x840.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-768x1075.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13-732x1024.jpg 732w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-bread-13.jpg 731w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 214px) 100vw, 214px" />
Famous Brands may own 51% of the business but Sideris still maintains creative control. She gained valuable skills and Famous Brands in return has a unique product for its stable.
Famous Brands, as of its last annual report, has 2,378 franchised restaurants. The report also states that the group’s ‘premium offering’, Tashas, delivered 20% like-on-like growth for the period.
The franchise fee for Tashas is broken up into three segments: an initial $18,600 (R223,000) payment, 6% of the monthly turnover and an advertising fee of 2%. The company puts set-up costs at around $500,000 (R6 million), with $12,500 (R150,000)–$16,700 (R200,000) working capital required.
The trick is to have owner-operated franchises. Each possible franchisee needs to have a minimum amount of experience in the restaurant business, go through pre-screening, interviews and three months of training.
The variants in deco and menu choices give each branch a sense of individuality, allowing the customers to have a different experience in each store. The distinct décor and signature menus are determined by the area and customer base, from the Dutch look and feel in Pretoria to the Parisian-style Le Parc in Hyde Park.
The plan is to have no more than 15 stores in South Africa – there are currently 12 – in order to maintain control and not saturate the market. Sideris is looking for slow and steady growth.
Right now the plans include a line of cookbooks, an online retail store with Tashas products and international expansion. Released in November, the first cookbook has made it to the top 10 list at Exclusive Books. The secret is out, but Sideris says it’s not about holding onto the recipes because Tashas is more than just the food.
Sideris had some help in the form of her brother Savva. Sideris calls him her rock, a doer and true restaurateur, a dying breed in South Africa according her.
“We are not chefs, we are restaurateurs.”
Savva has been there since 2007 and set up the new operation in Dubai.
It is the success of the Tashas brand that led to Dubai. It was an intense three-year process that led to the opening of the maiden international restaurant in Jumeirah’s The Galleria Mall. The franchise was drawn to the country by its similarity to the South African landscape back in 2005 – Sideris wanted to take advantage of another gap further from home. The best South African staff members have been taken to the Jumeirah store for a year, with the option of staying longer.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-30128 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-214x300.jpg" alt="" width="214" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-214x300.jpg 214w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-300x420.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-600x840.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-768x1075.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2-732x1024.jpg 732w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Hyde-cakes-2.jpg 731w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 214px) 100vw, 214px" />
Keeping with the strategy of slow and steady growth, Saderis wants to open three or four restaurants in Dubai and explore places like Doha, Kuwait and Oman.
“We’re not going anywhere until we’ve got it absolutely right in South Africa and Dubai.”
Sideris was surprised by how well things took off in Dubai, admitting that although she was nervous she had no expectations.
Jeremy Sampson, the founder of brand consultancy firm Interbrand Sampson de Villiers, calls Tashas a fantastic success story. He says people tend to forget that a brand is about experience and that the challenge lies with making sure all the touch points are aligned.
How well will Tashas do beyond South Africa’s shores? Sampson says one of its strengths is its ability to tweak its offering and cater to the local culture; this he adds is not unlike the strategy global fast food giant McDonalds uses.
According to Sideris, “Hard work equals good luck”. You can argue she’s got plenty of both.

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A Recipe For Success

When you look at the man, you wonder how Peter ‘Fats’ Lazarides ever acquired his nickname. He has plenty to be pleased about after having started the South African Ocean Basket seafood franchise from scratch. Aside from power cuts, Lazarides says the biggest challenge is managing queues, the waiters and kitchen staff.
“The turnover has been there. I always say people have to eat.”
Another worry is the Fish and Chips outlets that try to tempt weekend diners away from his tables. It’s just one of the many trials he’s experienced during his 18 years in the business.
Lazarides, his brother, George, and a third partner, George Nichas, opened their first Ocean Basket restaurant in Pretoria, sitting a mere 30 people.
Lazarides worked at a supermarket, while he was looking for a place to set up shop. A phone call from his wife alerted him that she had found a place. The only problem was 40 other people were after the lease.
With the simple idea of serving seafood in a pan, in his head, Lazarides set out to talk to the leaser, whom he convinced of the unheard-of idea.
Five months later, on April 12, 1995, the first store opened at Menlyn Park Shopping Center, in Pretoria, but with strict limitations on their five-year lease. The contract stated that the restaurant could only sell one type of wine and two types of cold drinks. No desserts or salads were allowed and the store had shorter opening hours. With the odds stacked against them, the restaurant became a surprise hit. People queued for the fresh seafood and brought along with them their own bread, salads and cold drinks.
“I think it’s just a drive, basically for me it was a drive to do something very successful in my life and it doesn’t mean the first thing I did, turned out to be successful,” says Lazarides.
Their business model was to sell inexpensive seafood in shopping centers surrounded by large numbers of homes.
The knowledge to run this fast-growing franchise didn’t come overnight. Lazarides dropped out of school in grade eight, then tried to return to complete grade 10, but says it was a disaster. He thought he’d be lucky on the third attempt at college to finish grades 11 and 12 but he simply wasn’t interested enough in his studies. Instead, in 1977, he went to sea to his compulsory national service.
This was during South Africa’s apartheid-era conscription, when young men would do their national service and then have around 10 years of call-ups. While with the Navy, he talked his way out of the call-ups and managed to get an exemption to allow a short service of only three years.
Back on land, Lazarides drew on his Grecian roots of running cafés, coffee shops and corner shops.
He dabbled with the idea of running a restaurant, in 1981, while working at an establishment at Sun City holiday resort, in the North West province. He returned to Pretoria to learn two trades—one from his father, who was a carpenter, and the other on how to be a plumber and shop fitter. But he was still confused about what he wanted to do with his life.
Then came the epiphany in Menlyn Park. Ocean Basket was to become an international success story with 165 stores worldwide. He attributes the restaurants’ success to their strict focus on seafood.
The seafood franchise has opened restaurants in Lesotho, Swaziland, Zambia and Mauritius. In late 2012, Nigeria saw its first Ocean Basket open in the upmarket area of Victoria Island, in Lagos.
The partners returned to their Mediterranean roots on the island of Cyprus in 2008, where six stores  and a distribution center were opened.
There’s even a high-speed sushi bar at Africa’s biggest international airport in Johannesburg—O.R. Tambo.
There are plans to expand to petrol stations across South Africa. The experiment has begun in Middleburg, south west of Johannesburg, as well as Cyprus. Lazarides hopes to expand the project.
The partners plan to open at least 200 stores by the end of 2014 and another 200 during the following 10 years, by expanding into Ghana, Botswana and Zimbabwe.
The group’s global turnover is around R2 billion ($224.1 million) for the stores and the four warehouses. An Ocean Basket establishment makes, on average, nearly R8.5 million ($952,000) a year, while the setup costs are about R2.5 million ($270,500). Lazarides wants more people to buy into his franchise; he is encouraging them to do so by cutting the setup cost by 20%.
As the seafood retail space gets more competitive with the popping up of many over-the-counter fish-and-chips outlets and other seafood restaurants, Lazarides says this will not put a damper on his expansion plans.
He believes his three-step recipe to success: good food, good service and good price will keep customers returning to Ocean Basket. At least now they don’t need to bring their own salads.

Fats Fishing For A Fortune

He was young, ambitious, eager… and bored most of the time. At the age of 24, Allen Ambor had held a few corporate jobs here and there but hated every minute of it.
“I was bored out of my wits,” he recalls.
The last time he had fun working was when he waited tables in a steak house to finance his studies. That’s when he decided that he was going to open his own restaurant.
It started with many challenges. Ambor had saved $215, a fair amount of cash back in 1967, but it wasn’t even a tenth of what he needed. Fresh out of university, he struggled to get a loan or lease for the premises he had found in Cape Town.
“Nobody was willing to sign surety for me,” he says.
It took 18 tough months until his persistence paid off. Ambor was ready to open the first Spur steak ranch, a business that would grow into one of Africa’s top restaurant chains.
The obstacles didn’t end there. Ambor had planned to open a franchise of the Johannesburg steak house he used to work at, but the owners let him down just a few days before the launch. They didn’t send the nine employees they had promised to train or any of the kitchen supplies.
“They didn’t have the faintest clue about how to franchise,” he remembers.
Ambor quickly had to come up with a Plan B. Between his girlfriend, who was a good cook, his mother’s food chemist friend and himself, he whipped up various sauces and dressings, which were later to become signature condiments of the business.
To top it all off, Ambor did not receive the promised décor, either. Within days, he had to design his own decoration and logo. In line with the cowboy and crooks theme of most steak houses at that time, he decided on the image of a cowboy boot’s golden spur, which also became the restaurant’s name.
Ambor only changed the logo to the brand’s current Red Indian insignia in the mid-1980s, at the height of apartheid.
“I wanted to give a signal to people of color that they were welcome in our businesses. The Red Indian is spiritual, highly respected and had also been wronged,” he says.
Even though redesigning a company logo bears high risk of losing brand recognition, Ambor felt it was a good move: “It was a gut feel and it turned out to be the right thing at the right time”.
For more than four decades, he would trust his instincts as much as his business acumen and thus grow Spur into a $35.9 million global brand with 240 local and 29 international restaurants, including in the United Kingdom, Australia and a range of African countries: Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, Nigeria, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
“I don’t just work with a calculator. In the restaurant business, it’s gotta come from the heart. If you are only worried about the back pocket, it’s not going to work,” he says.
Ambor understood right from the start that making customers happy is the most important aspect of any restaurant business.
“Consistency, delivery and caring are the key things it comes down to,” he says.
That meant giving customers value for money, even if profit margins were not as high as they could have been. For three years after opening his first Spur, Ambor didn’t increase the menu prices.
“It was a signal that we weren’t just out for profit. I wanted to let my customers know that I was loyal to them, hoping they would also be loyal to me.”
The model worked. Spur Corporation set out on a fast-paced expansion strategy. Ambor sold his first franchise four years after opening the first steak house. Today, a franchise license for Spur costs R100,000 ($10,800). In the late 1980s, he added two more family restaurants to the mix: Panarottis pizza pasta and John Dory’s fish and grill. A year ago, Spur Corporation entered the fast food sector when it acquired DoRego’s, which has 75 outlets across South Africa, for R30 million.
“We are constantly innovating,” says Ambor.
But most of all, it was a lot of hard work, says Ambor. He never shied away from getting his own hands dirty and was known for running a tight ship. For years, he worked 20-hour days, setting an example for his employees while training them on the job. Not everyone was pleased to have an employer constantly breathing down their necks.
“People who didn’t like it, left. But those who bought into what we were doing stayed and became pillars of the organization,” says Ambor.
Many of Spur Corporations’ managers started out as waiters in one of the restaurants. One of them is Pierre van Tonder, who began as junior store manager in 1982 and took over the reins last year, when Ambor, at the age of 70, stepped down as CEO.
“You’ve got to be responsible and make sure there is succession,” explains Ambor, who has taken on the role of executive chair.
He now starts his days with yoga and spends only an average of five hours a day at the office. But whoever thinks Ambor is taking it easy couldn’t be more wrong: “I might only be at my desk for a few hours each day, but my head is going all the time”.

SPUR-ed  On By Boredom

Nando’s founder Robert Brozin, 53, looks, speaks, and swears, more like a surfer than the head of a food industry giant.
Dressed in a pair of jeans, a button-down shirt, a ‘united against malaria’ bracelet and loafers, he could easily be dismissed as an old man suffering from a midlife crisis. It’s all part of his plan to disarm anyone who has preconceived ideas about how a company chairman should look and act.
The reality is that Brozin is a very smart businessman. At the FNB Franchising Leadership Summit held in Sandton, Johannesburg last year, he told the gathered crowd:
“Our basic vision, when we started twenty five years ago, was to have fun. If you are not going to have fun, do not do it. This is not a dress rehearsal; this is life, boet [brother in Afrikaans]. We are trying to keep that balance while at the same time changing how the world thinks about chicken,” he says.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-1729" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Pic3-217x300.jpg" alt="" width="217" height="300" />
Nando’s has certainly changed the way the world thinks about chicken, not only through the spicy meals they dish up but through their infamous, sometimes political, advertising campaigns.
But where did it all start?
Brozin was born in the small town of Middelburg, in South Africa’s Mpumalanga province, but finished high school at Johannesburg’s King David High School.
He did a BComm degree at the University of the Witwaters-rand, after which he joined accounting giant, Price Waterhouse before they became PricewaterhouseCoopers.
He did two years of articles before joining his father’s business Teltron as a marketing manager.
While working at Teltron, he met his future business partner Fernando Duarte, who introduced him to a shop in the small suburb of Rosettenville called Chickenland that sold Portuguese chicken. They later bought the shop.
FORBES AFRICA had an opportunity to speak to him after the summit.
“Fernando and I used to go eat in Rosettenville and I liked the chicken. I wanted to be an investor. I thought I would put money in and Fernando would be there and I would just come to check how things were. But this was not the case. I soon found out I had to be full-time,” says Brozin.
Brozin wanted to take the brand global and enlisted the services of various advertising agencies to help him market the brand.
They finally found the right match in HuntLascaris, which was also just starting out. The two companies created some of the most talked about advertisements in South African television.
“We met Reg and John, who became our first proper agency. We were so aligned, whereas before we were running around like chickens without heads. I remember Hunt presenting adverts to us that I thought were terrible that went on to win awards, which I will now take credit for,” says Brozin.
One of the HuntLascaris founders, Reg Lascaris, remembers those early days for both companies that have since grown to become world beaters.
“I met Robbie in the very early ‘90s, when he was looking for an advertising agency to handle his business. He came to see us and we then presented some ideas back to him, which he liked. Our biggest achievement was in creating breakthrough and controversial advertising that helped create the personality of the brand,” he says.
Today, Nando’s can be found in more than 25 countries around the world, across five continents. But it hasn’t been plain sailing for Brozin, and his partner, to get it to this level.
“When we started out everyone knew about the other brands like Chicken Licken and KFC […] but we were passionate about chicken. The front line people are the real heroes at Nando’s. You can’t have a great organization without having good people at that level,” he says.
He also gives credit to his father, Max, and his partner for keeping him going when times were tough.
“There were times when I was ready to throw in the towel. My personal success has been surrounding myself with people who pull you up when you are down. My dad has been a huge influence in my life. He is a Jewish accountant. Everything is about cost. Fernando has been fantastic for me. We disagree many times but he has gotten me out of [trouble] many times. It’s not how you get into [trouble] but how you get out of [trouble],” he says.
Brozin has stepped down as CEO of Nando’s and has appointed David Niven, previously head of the American and European Nando’s divisions, in his place. Brozin says it was time to get some “adult supervision” but admits that he is busier than he has ever been.
“It needed the right time and right guy to come in and thicken the Nando’s brand globally. I gave the new CEO a watch. I said, ‘You might have the watch but Africa has the time. As you get bigger you get tighter and you squeeze people. That is not the way to do it.’”
It is clear that the married father of three is not only driven by profits; he is passionate about his efforts to curb the spread of malaria in Africa.
Nando’s sells ‘united against malaria’ bracelets in all of its restaurants to raise awareness. The proceeds go to buying mosquito nets for people in affected regions.
However, it is in business where Brozin is an expert. He offers some advice to those wishing to follow in his footsteps.
“When Reg and John started they had no cash, no office… they started at the back of a car. Who starts one of the best agencies in the world in the back of a car? You have got to start with nothing. If you start with too much and you have the biggest offices in the world you are not going to achieve much. Entrepreneurs come to me and ask for cash. Cash is the last thing. Money has four legs, man has two legs. Money will always catch up to man.”
Sound advice, indeed, from a Jewish boy from the northern suburbs, who started selling Portugese chicken in the south; and now sells Nando’s to the world.
<h4>CONTROVERSIAL</h4>
<h4>NANDO’S ADVERTS</h4>
<h4>(MOSTLY CREATED BY BLACK RIVER F.C. ADVERTISING AGENCY)</h4>
<h4>LAST DICTATOR ADVERT</h4>
The advert shows a sad Robert Mugabe dining alone at Christmas in a mansion, while he reminisces about “the good old days” with former controversial leaders. Times when he played water tag with Muammar Gaddafi; made angels in the sand with Saddam Hussein; pushed P. W. Botha on a children’s swing and drove a tank with Idi Amin, while Those Were the Days is being played.
<h4>XENOPHOBIA ADVERT</h4>
In this 60 seconds advert Nando’s aims to ridicule Xenophobia. A xenophobe says that he wishes that all foreigners would disappear from South Africa. Frame by frame South Africans from ethnic and tribal groups start disappearing until only a Khoisan remains on screen. He says, “I am not going anywhere, you found us here”.
<h4>NANDO’S CHICKEN BREAST ADVERT</h4>
A customer orders a Nando’s burger and chips, which are delivered while she is on the phone. Her breasts are so big they cover the plate. At the end of her telephone conversation she asks the waiter where her chips are. They waiter says, “Right in front of you”. She only sees the chips when the waiter pulls the plate to the center of the table.

Nando’s: Not A Headless Chicken

Emilia de Sousa is small, but tough. She’s had to be. Founding “Old Fashioned” Fish And Chips, South Africa’s biggest fish &amp; chips franchise, has been a struggle every step of the way. It has been a long and painful road from a tiny corner shop in the east of Johannesburg to 350 stores in South Africa and millions of rands.
It all began when the South American-born de Sousa started helping her uncle in his corner shop as a teenager. De Sousa was from a family of immigrants who came to South Africa from Curaçao Island, on the coast of Venezuela.
The little fish and chips shop taught de Sousa the basics: discipline and hard work. She worked behind the till, mixed the batter, peeled the potatoes, fried the fish and fed her dreams.
“You know when I had this shop, every single day people used to ask me ‘Why don’t you franchise? Can I buy this one?’ and I had this thing in my mind, [that one day] I will franchise because there were so many people [asking for it]”.
She began franchising the business in 2005, after opening her first store 10 years earlier; shortly after the release of Nelson Mandela, when many people were packing up and leaving, fearing new leadership under a new government, de Sousa embraced the change and even attended Madiba’s first birthday in freedom, following his release from Robben Island.
“…When Nelson Mandela came out [of prison] I actually met [him]. I met him at Sacred Heart College… Now I think I should have taken a photo,” she laughs.
At the time when many were skeptical about the incoming government and scared for their safety, she stuck to her adopted country.
“I was never frightened. I have got this thing that ‘when it’s your time, it’s your time. It doesn’t matter where you are’. And this is such a beautiful country we’ve got, I’ve travelled a lot and this country is still the most beautiful country to me,” says de Sousa.
It is a beautiful country, but it was also harsh on young de Sousa. To complicate matters she was a mother at 16.
“As a single mom for 27 years, I [have] also started my life tough. I had to bring up three kids on my own. I never got a cent from maintenance or anything like that. I’m the type of person [who says] ‘Don’t just sit down and cry about it. Do something’.
“I’ll never forget I went to court for maintenance and the [female] prosecutor turned around and told me, ‘You must pay your husband maintenance, he says he is not working’. I turned around and said ‘What a lie… Cheers my friend. Never see me again’. The tears were running down my face I couldn’t believe what she had said to me,” says de Sousa.
Following her divorce, the young mother had begun selling second-hand clothes to make ends meet and it worked out well. Soon she was back to the original plan, opening up her own fish and chips shop like she had once done with her uncle, selling quality food at low prices.
“I don’t believe in ripping people off, if you look around [in a mall], say they are selling their handbags for three or 2,000 [but] nobody is in the shop. But if they had cheaper bags, that are still good [quality], there would be more people in the shop… It’s the same with food, but some people just want to make money.”
One of her problems in the early days was making money.
“I did have very hard times [starting] the business and I used to work hard [trying] to put money together… I remember I went and borrowed money and these people charged me about five times more and I paid them back… I paid them all that money,” says de Sousa.
As the money problems were solved, grim, violent, reality visited her business. A gang of robbers sneaked into her shop and attacked her.
“When I got to work the door was closed, they were waiting inside for me because I had the money. There were three of them, the first one pulled out the gun, the second one ran with the money and the third one stabbed me in the back and just missed my heart,” says De Sousa.
De Sousa almost bled to death, but somehow survived. Through it all, she vowed that there was no time for tears.
When it comes to business, she claims she has the magic touch. A food lover, she says she has never failed in any business that she has started.
Her son Nicholas, Operations and Marketing Director, agrees.
“She might not have our degrees and all that but she can do everything that we do and she does it much better than we do. And I’ve met the likes of the Gordon Ramseys and Richard Bransons, but still, when I look at men like that, and I look at my mom I swear they’ve got nothing on her,” he says.
The next step is to make her business a world-wide brand. Surely, a woman who survived poverty, cheated death, negotiated loan sharks and loneliness would be odds on favorite to do anything.

Tag: Franchise

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

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Fats Fishing For A Fortune

SPUR-ed On By Boredom

Nando’s: Not A Headless Chicken

No Time For Tears When You’re Fishing For Dreams