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How Freshii has built a healthy brand in a high-growth environment

How Freshii has built a healthy brand in a high-growth environment

by | May 1, 2019 | Foodservice, Operations

Freshii, a Canadian-based ‘health casual’ restaurant chain, was founded in 2005 with the simple mission of making it convenient for people to eat healthy food. Today, they’re bringing that mission to life across the globe, with over 300 locations in over 20 countries.

We had a chance to speak with Melissa Gallagher, their VP of Marketing, about how they have built a consistent brand and guest experience while going through explosive growth. How quickly have they grown? To put it in perspective, Freshii opened their first 200 restaurants faster than global brands like McDonald’s, Subway, and Domino’s – and they plan on continuing that momentum.

When we asked Gallagher the secret to their success, her answer was clear: “we’re executing faster than anyone. At Freshii we launch fast, we fail fast, then we iterate faster. I think that’s really important to the success of any high growth brand,” she added.

To view the full interview, listen to the podcast below or read on!

 

Establishing a brand full of energy

Since being founded, Freshii has grown from being a go-to spot for quick, healthy meals, to a truly wholesome health and wellness brand – extending far beyond the physical restaurant. Their brand has been built on serving fresh ingredients, offering great service, and helping guests build towards a healthier lifestyle. They’ve even taken to nutritionists, rather than chefs, to develop their menu offering around the world. “Rather than working with in-house chefs to develop menu items, our in-house nutritionist scours the globe to find health and wellness trends that we can bring to the market quickly and at an affordable price,” explained Gallagher.

In order to grow its offering and keep in line with consumer tastes and preferences, Freshii constantly works on staying on top of emerging health and wellness trends. As Gallagher put it, “We consider ourselves the Zara of the health casual restaurant industry. We’re able to take a trend and bring it to the market quite quickly, versus some of the other large players.” By offering bold, diverse, and customizable meals – from a Teriyaki Twist bowl to Spicy Lemongrass soup – they’ve been able to continuously entice and excite their customer base.

As Gallagher reflected on how they’ve built their brand, she noted that “We’re always inspired by the way in which our product resonates all over the globe.” Part of that success, she added, can be attributed to the passion of their employee base. ”We’ve got team members who started as frontline workers, who are now multi-unit owners of some of the highest volume locations in North America.”

 

Growing a strong franchise network

One of the keys to Freshii’s success has been building on their brand values and identity with the direct involvement of key stakeholders, such as guests, employees, and franchise partners. As they’ve grown their franchise network, they’ve made an effort to scale with like-minded individuals who are energized by their brand. As Gallagher put it, “a lot of people join the Freshii brand out of passion – for health and wellness, and for entrepreneurship.”

They’re really taking a fresh look at building franchise networks—seeking out motivated entrepreneurs who will take ownership and pride of their restaurants. “We’re inspired by the entrepreneurial spirit, so being able to award citizens to help bring our mission to their regions has been something that’s driven our passion and helped us scale so quickly,” Gallagher added.

While some restaurant brands provide a lot of flexibility to their franchise partners in customizing the product and marketing strategy, Freshii is taking a more focused approach. As Gallagher explained, they focus on getting feedback from all internal stakeholders on the brand, their values, and menu items, then work hard at headquarters to produce products and campaigns that really resonate with their customer base.

By centralizing marketing and product development in-office, Freshii has been able to keep a truly consistent brand during its rapid growth. The key element they look for in franchise partners is a dedication to operational excellence and a passion for service. “We look for strong operations within our franchise partners, and then provide them with all of the resources they need to market and bring the brand to life within their region,” said Gallagher.

 

Working out future growth

While maintaining focus on brand consistency, building a solid franchise network and engaging employees will be critical to the future success of Freshii, Gallagher acknowledges the importance of ongoing innovation: “From my past experiences, I learned not to spend too long celebrating successes and to constantly look for ways to innovate and iterate.”

What’s next? Over the next couple of years, the company’s goal is to expand to 800 locations. Fulfilling their core brand mission also means looking at new ways to make healthy food more convenient, including making Freshii meals available on airline menus. As Gallagher concluded, “5 years ago, we were a salad chain bringing health and wellness to our guests in many different ways—but even a year ago we wouldn’t have imagined we’d be serving avocados in the air.”

Next up, avocados on the moon? Only time will tell.

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Nudge rewards raises $5 million in series a funding

Nudge rewards raises $5 million in series a funding

by | May 1, 2019 | Life at Nudge

New financing enables the company to expand its position as a market leader in providing mobile technology that improves the performance of frontline employees in retail, foodservice, and hospitality.

TORONTO – November 15, 2017 – Nudge Rewards today announced that it has raised $5 million in Series A funding. The financing will enable the company to further fuel the expansion of its business across North America. The round was led by Generation Ventures, with participation from the BDC Capital Women in Tech Fund, Brightspark Ventures, StandUp Ventures, as well as new and returning angels.

 

Funding reinforces growing support for women in tech

This Nudge Rewards funding round is a significant milestone for both the company and women in technology. The company, led by CEO Lindsey Goodchild and CTO Dessy Daskalov, has captured one of the largest Series A investments raised by female founders in Canada to date. In addition, each of the firms that participated in this round has female partners committed to supporting exceptional founders driving the development of innovative technology.

Nudge Rewards is one of the first growth investments for BDC Capital’s Women in Tech Investment Fund. “Lindsey and Dessy are great examples of female founders that have identified a gap in growing markets, are using technology to solve an important problem, and building a business with massive potential to scale,” said Michelle Scarborough, Managing Director, Strategic Investments and Women in Tech at BDC Capital, the investment arm of BDC.

 

Market opportunity for mobile technology to engage non-desk employees

An estimated 80% of the global workforce is ‘non-desk’ or field employees, who typically do not have access to corporate email. Nudge Rewards helps such companies engage their employees to facilitate measurable improvements in individual and company performance.

“There is a massive opportunity for our innovative solution within markets that have large, non-desk workforces,” said Lindsey Goodchild, CEO, and co-founder of Nudge Rewards. “We’re fortunate to have built a team of industry experts and partners to propel our growth. This new financing will allow us to further serve our customer base and expand our presence in select Canadian and US markets. We are very well positioned to expand our leadership role in this space.”

Nudge Rewards has a growing customer base that includes global brands such as communications and media company, Rogers Communications; golf superstore, Golf Town; global information technology leader, Samsung; and Choice Hotels, one of the world’s largest and most successful lodging companies.

Concurrent with the funding, Alistair Mitchell, President of Generation Ventures, will join the Nudge Rewards Board of Directors. According to Mitchell, “We look for high-growth businesses, solving big problems by leveraging known technologies – in an innovative fashion. Serving large consumer-facing companies, Nudge Rewards continuously optimizes the performance of its clients’ large mobile-centric workforces. Providing timely, concise, and motivating information is more easily said than done – and Nudge Rewards is nailing it with the numbers to prove it.”

About Nudge Rewards

Nudge Rewards provides a mobile solution for retail, foodservice, and hospitality brands looking to measurably impact frontline team performance. With an employee app and content management system, brands can leverage Nudge Rewards to engage, educate, and ultimately reward frontline managers and employees to drive company performance. Headquartered in Toronto, Canada, their customers include global brands such as Rogers Communications, Golf Town, Samsung, and Choice Hotels.

 

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To engage the next generation of employees, choose mobile

To engage the next generation of employees, choose mobile

by | Apr 30, 2019 | Employee Communication, Employee Engagement

Many industries rely on younger generations as their frontline employees, particularly retail and hospitality. In the past, that meant managers were tasked with the challenge of effectively reaching them. “We don’t even speak the same language, and they don’t care,” was a common lament, true or not.

But, we have the tools we need now. The emergence of mobile as a workplace tool has completely disrupted this generation gap. Employee apps, internal social networks, or mobile-first portals offer an effective bridge between management and frontline employees. Still, there’s always a how to the what; crafting a mobile use (BYOD) policy without compromising your organization’s need for security and compliance, will be key to success in this new reality.

 

Leveraging the new status quo

There’s no question that the digital generation is used to accessing everything and everyone in the palm of their hand: 92% of adults age 18-29 have a smartphone, according to recent Pew Research. In a research study conducted by Nudge Rewards, it was found that Millennials spend an average of 100 minutes of every workday on their smartphones. They’re not just checking Instagram during that time, they’re accessing information and engaging with their work. That kind of productive behavior needs to be encouraged and leveraged through transparent policies and guidelines.

Millennial employees want to be aware of what their brand is striving for and what headquarters expect of them. Yet, only 19% believe that customer service is key to company success, according to Deloitte’s 2016 Millennial survey. For retail and hospitality industries, in which frontline employees often come from younger generations, there’s a huge problem with that statistic.

Your frontline employees need to be knowledgeable about your brand vision, organizational goals, and tactical items like in-market promotions or new product launches. If you were to take a quick poll across your frontline teams, you may soon discover that there’s a huge disconnect—and that they may not be as well informed as they need to be. The quickest and easiest way to fix that? Communicating critical information to them through their own devices.

If you want to build trust and engagement in a workforce that’s used to functioning via mobile, it’s a smart strategy to craft a clear BYOD policy. Engagement and behavior are close cousins, and leveraging your employees’ attachment to their own device enables them to stay fast, stay connected, have easy access to information, and communicate the way they’re used to—which in your workplace, means they’ll be able to do a better job.

 

Getting started with BYOD

The specific processes and policies around BYOD need to match the needs and functions of your organization. Mobile has an immediacy that facilitates high-touch communication and responsive management as it engages, motivates, and unites frontline employees. To ensure your employees are using mobile to the best of their advantage while at work, you’ll want to include the following in your BYOD policy:

  • Acceptable use: Outline times and use cases that are acceptable for using personal devices while at work.
  • Devices and support: Provide details on accepted devices, and any support that will be given (e.g. connectivity and WiFi)
  • Reimbursement: Will you or will you not be providing reimbursement for usage, cost of the device, plan overages, etc.? This factor is completely dependent on your company culture, incentive programs, and the extent to which your frontline will be using mobile at work.
  • Security: Outline any extra security and privacy precautions that will need to be taken by employees who are using personal devices for work purposes.
  • Risk & liability: Explain any disclaimers or risks that employees will assume full responsibility for in using their own devices at work.

Craft a BYOD policy that’s based on risk, security, management, IT and legal all working together, and you’ve got a way to enable your younger employees to perform even better as well as supporting the myriad needs of your company.

 

BYOD, check. Now what?

Your BYOD policy is in place and now you have the channel to effectively reach the next generation of employees – but what about the strategies for communicating with them effectively? Here are three tips for building effective strategies to engage your younger workforce:

1. Make communications brief

 No matter whose device they’re using, frontline employees spend a mere 2 minutes a day on corporate communications—they’re busy. Be sure to fit communications within that short window and into that brief attention span. To do so, try to keep critical messages short, interactive, and actionable.

2. Make it personal

Communicating with your frontline employees should be a two-way dialogue. There’s incredible value in sourcing ideas and feedback from your frontline teams – going the extra mile and recognizing them for their contribution and hard work will pay off in the long run. By treating your teams as groups of individuals, and not a collective unit, you will be able to effectively engage your teams to act on behalf of the brand.

3. Tailor it to your brand

Frontline means front line: the employees who deal with your products and your customers are your brand ambassadors. Optimize that position, and make their job easier, by empowering them to easily convey company brand, values, and message. That way, they don’t have to adlib or improvise in a pinch, and can confidently represent the company culture. With a mobile workplace tool, they can quickly message a manager to find out the answer a customer’s question, or look it up themselves.

Next steps? Make sure you solicit feedback from your frontline employees on how both your BYOD policy and your communications are working from their perspective. Bringing them into the process is another way to drive their engagement. Don’t be surprised when they’ll translate that sense of alignment back to the floor and your customers.

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5 reasons mobile is the best way to reach your employees

5 reasons mobile is the best way to reach your employees

by | Apr 30, 2019 | Employee Communication

Imagine, just for fun, that you work in the head office of an outdoors outfitter company. A new line of daypacks is set to ship to your 153 stores spread out across the U.S. and Canada. Many store employees are recent hires and hardly know each other, and few are familiar with this product line. Also, you’ve got a mix of generations on the floor: the sage older adventurers alongside the younger gear enthusiasts. But there’s a lot riding on each store’s frontline team to get these packs sold.

This isn’t reality television, it’s the reality of the retail industry. Business cycles are tighter than ever, products roll out faster than ever before, and social media means products can go viral in a heartbeat. To compete, brick and mortar retail has to offer the access and information of online, but with the added benefit of personable, friendly customer service. It’s not a given that people walk in your doors. They need to feel welcome.

Your challenge in this scenario: get all of your frontline employees up to speed on the new packs, enable them to answer any question, give great customer service—and be motivated to sell. The solution is in your hand: the smartphone. For retail today, mobile is the best way to empower and motivate your frontline. Here are five reasons why:

 

1. Broad reach

People live and work on their smartphones — and not just the younger generations. Pew research discovered that not only do 92% of American adults age 18–29 own a smartphone, but 74% of adults age 50–64 do too.

2. Clear message

The mobile platform is designed for simple, effective, consistent messaging. With the message right in the palm of their hand, no one on your frontline team has to improvise or worse, get it wrong. And everyone is on board.

3. Flexible communication 

Mobile means you can reach people all at once, in teams, in groups, individually. You can check in discretely with a new hire to make sure they’re on board, make sure the team is ready, or make announcements to the whole sales crew. No one feels out of the loop: everyone is invited to be a part of the effort.

4. Instant support

Instant support and mobile tools work both ways. When a customer asks your employee how long it would take to ship to her daughter in Dubai, the answer needs to be fast, not a shrug or an “I’ll get back to you.” When frontline employees know all they have to do is text to get an informed answer, they can project confidence, and ease, when dealing with customers.

5. Powerful incentives

A study discussed in the Harvard Business review found that even the smallest rewards motivate people to go the extra mile. In retail, going that extra mile is critical. You can craft all the strategy you want, but without employee execution, you won’t reach your goals. From pulses to shout-outs to gamification, mobile gives you creative and effective ways to catalyze employee performance where and when it counts the most.

No matter how amazing a product may be, your success rests on your frontline employees — and the bottom line is that you need their hearts as well as their minds. Mobile gives you the tools to convey knowledge, spark enthusiasm, and deepen engagement and motivation, and use innovative, meaningful ways to spur performance that fit into the way we communicate, live, and work. What’s especially compelling here is that digital technology is what’s giving brick and mortar its power back — by celebrating its most important asset, people.

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Golf Town launches Nudge to empower store employees

Golf Town launches Nudge to empower store employees

by | Apr 30, 2019 | Brand Stories, Retail

Golf Town, Canada’s golf superstore has partnered with Nudge Rewards to reinvent the way they drive team performance across their Canadian retail operations. Watch the customer story here:

With a vision of delivering an exceptional customer experience, Golf Town recognized the importance of ensuring their frontline associates are well trained, knowledgeable and passionate about delivering on their brand promise. In order to facilitate the delivery of such an experience, Golf Town placed priority on the role of communication to empower the team with the right information to drive the right outcomes.

In June, Golf Town launched Nudge Rewards to engage, educate and reward frontline managers and team members. Their results to date are unprecedented. Within five days of launch, Golf Town achieved 78% adoption across their entire frontline workforce, and more impressive, have achieved a 75% response rate using the Nudge app.

“Nudge has achieved positive traction for our associates Canada-wide, and we’re happy to see our teams engaging and sharing ideas. We want to be ahead of the curve, and Nudge will help us achieve that and be recognized as a retailer who’s looking at mobile device technology as a means for accomplishing more as a company,” says Sue Gilpin, Director of HR at Golf Town Ltd. 

“We’re thrilled to have the opportunity to work with our partners at Golf Town to help improve the way they support their frontline staff in delivering an exceptional experience. We now live in a world of the ‘knowledgeable consumer,’ and brands that are able to empower their staff to meet the expectations of their customers are going to be category leaders” says Jordan Ekers, Chief Customer Officer at Nudge Rewards.

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