Problem: COMPANY: HOW DO YOU ROLL?
Business idea: Create a sushi restaurant that allows customers to "build their own sushi" by allowing them to select their own kind of wrap, rice, veggies, proteins, and toppings. pitch: People who like sushi have two choices. They can go to a fancy sushi restaurant and pay a fancy bill. or they can go to a grocery store and buy sushi that is supposedly made daily. now there is a third option. How Do you Roll? is a fast-casual sushi restaurant that combines the quality of a high-end restaurant with the convenience of a grocery store. How Do you Roll? is the brainchild of two brothers, yuen yung and Peter yung. Both grew up in the restaurant industry. Their parents had several Chinese restaurants, and at the tender age of eight or nine they both started working in their parents' restaurants. How Do you Roll? launched with a single store in Austin, Texas. It lets the customer be the chef by allowing customers to pick their own ingredients. The customer approaches a counter and is led through four steps:
Step 1 Choose your Wrap: Traditional (seaweed) or modern (soy)
Step 2 Eat your Veggies: Choose up to three healthy vegetables
Step 3 Stuff your Roll: Choose one or more of our fresh meats
Step 4 Top It off: Indulge in one or more of our specialty toppings or sides
Through this process customers personalize their sushi rolls. The meal, which consists of a six-piece sushi roll and a fountain drink, costs an average of $8 to $11. How Do you Roll's business model is also designed to make sushi accessible to people who won't touch raw ingredients or even fish. There is cooked chicken and beef available as substitutes. Along with sushi, each restaurant also sells miso soup, seaweed salad, and green tea ice cream. It is an experience that is totally unique in the sushi industry. It also provides fast-casual food patrons an alternative to the standard fare of burgers and chicken sandwiches. How Do you Roll? is growing via franchising. It currently has eight franchise units and two company-owned stores. It has penned several development agreements, which may add up to 70 additional franchise units over the next 10 years. According to the company, it costs between $304,295 and $508,780 to open a How Do you Roll? restaurant. The initial franchise fee is $30,000, and the ongoing royalty is 7 percent of gross sales. In spring 2013, yuen yung and Peter yung pitched the business on the popular ABC show Shark tank. Along with a $1 million investment from shark Kevin o'Leary, yung said restaurant sales jumped 30 percent. In addition, he and his brother received more than 600 inquiries from potential franchisees interested in opening How Do you Roll? restaurants.
1. Based on the material covered in this chapter, what questions would you ask the firm's founders before making your funding decision? What answers would satisfy you?
2. If you had to make your decision on just the information provided in the pitch and on the company's website, would you fund this firm? Why or why not?