You Me Sushi looking to treble its estate through franchising

The predominantly London-based business has ramped up expansion in the past few months with the opening of four venues in the past six weeks, including its first site outside of London in Reading, which opened in July.

You Me Sushi was founded in Marylebone in 2008 and currently operates 16 stores – seven of which are run under franchise - with a number of additional openings planned before the year end.

The business says that the majority of new openings will be with franchise partners although it will open around four of five corporate stores, most likely to be in its London heartland, in the next 12 months.

“Franchising is going to be a big part of the growth,” says franchise director Martin Hawthorne. “It makes sense to keep corporate stores within reach of each other in London and then if we want to expand out of that then the quickest route to growth is through good franchisees.”

Working with MUMBOs

The company says it is working with multi-unit, multi-brand operators (MUMBOs) that already have experience with food franchises to open new venues, with some signing multi-unit agreements to speed up the pace of expansion.

The sushi business, of which delivery makes up 60% of sales, is looking to open sites of around 650sq ft to 1,200sq ft in secondary locations within towns in locations where there is already a big delivery presence. “We want to be close to the big delivery restaurants so we can cut the distance for the [delivery] bikes to collect,” says Hawthorne.

It says it currently has around 20 franchise agreements in the development stage with sites in Cheltenham and Greenwich expected to launch before December. Other locations it is in negotiations on include Streatham, Uxbridge, St Albans, and Enfield as well as further afield from London in places such as Bristol and Swindon.

“We have a list of 13 or 14 areas that we have asked our partners to target. The struggle is finding the properties,” says Hawthorne.

While the current energy crisis is impacting heavily on the hospitality sector, Hawthorne believes the nature of sushi makes it a more appealing investment than other parts of the sector.

“The number of franchise enquiries are increasing as franchisees are looking to diversify their portfolio,” he says. “They have an interest in sushi because it is perceived to be a low energy food compared to having a pizza oven all day, for example.”

The company believes its relatively high order value – an average You Me Sushi box costs between £11 and £12 – also means it will be less vulnerable to the cut in people’s discretionary incomes and the possibility of a recession.

“Our market is a little more protected from sharp shocks of change in the economy,” says Hawthorne. “We will still see some effects, but we will be able to ride it out because of our demographics and the fact that we don’t operate at the cheaper end of the sector.”