Focus Brands International Announces Unparalleled Virtual Coaching Capabilities

— The new Customer Experience Center of Excellence provides continuous operational review, coaching and analytical support to franchisees across the globe

The International division of Focus Brands LLC (Focus Brands International), a leading developer of iconic global, multi-channel foodservice brands, has teamed up with Auxis, a well-respected consulting and outsourcing firm, to inaugurate its first international franchise operations support center. The company’s new Customer Experience Center of Excellence (CECE), located in Heredia, Costa Rica, aligns with its mission to serve people and potential. The CECE provides an affordable and effective means to deliver world-class operations support to enhance the customer experience and improve the performance of franchisees’ restaurants.

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“Our job is to help our franchisees amplify their success. The CECE allows us to have eyes and ears into their operations, greatly enhancing our ability to achieve this goal” says Beto Guajardo, President of Focus Brands International. “Never before have we had the employee bandwidth or the resources to visit over 1,850 stores in 63 countries on a regular basis,” adds Jim Holthouser, CEO of Focus Brands LLC. “The CECE is an incredible advancement in operations and training that came together at the perfect time. These new virtual capabilities will undoubtably shape the future of global franchising.”

When a customer experience coach delivers an Operations Excellence Review (OER), the software powering the virtual visit is a software solution developed in partnership with RizePoint, a leading software services provider. The software houses brand standards and guidelines, training materials, and business solutions such as data analysis and performance dashboards in a convenient application that can be accessed from any mobile operating system. “RizePoint’s Quality Management Platform automates OER tasks, the operational data collection for each coaching session and provides the built-in business intelligence needed to perform the analysis and quickly execute recommendations,” says Kari Hensien, President and CEO of RizePoint. “Focus Brands International’s innovative approach to conducting OERs will enable quality assurance and global consistency in meaningful and measurable ways at every location.”

Focus Brands International partnered with Auxis to create an international shared services model and organize a team of extensively trained multi-lingual customer experience coaches. The coaches will virtually visit every store four to six times per year to deliver an OER with the store operators in their native language during their normal business hours. “We couldn’t be more excited to partner with Focus Brands to help execute on their innovative vision for delivering world-class operations support,” says Raul Vega, Founder and CEO of Auxis. “The CECE will enable the ability to collect the facts and figures that contribute to operational success in a way that is affordable, achievable and a game changer in the industry. We now have the unique ability to provide analytical insights that will help correlate store improvements to financial performance, from one central location.”

About Focus Brands LLC
Atlanta-based Focus Brands(R) is a leading developer of global multi-channel foodservice brands. Focus Brands, through its affiliate brands, is the franchisor and operator of more than 6,400 restaurants, cafes, ice cream shoppes, and bakeries in the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam and over 55 foreign countries under the Auntie Anne’s(R), Carvel(R), Cinnabon(R), Jamba(R), Moe’s Southwest Grill(R), McAlister’s Deli(R), and Schlotzsky’s(R) brand names, as well as the Seattle’s Best Coffee(R) brand on certain military bases and in certain international markets. Please visit www.focusbrands.com to learn more.

SOURCE: Focus Brands International

CONTACT: Loryn Franco, Focus Brands International, 917-371-0007, lfranco@focusbrands.com