The Company: Zoup, a soup, sandwich and salad franchise. Don and Pat Hoag became the third franchise owners when they opened a Solon location in 2006. They have 10 employees.
The Mistake: Don and I had never been entrepreneurs, but after he was laid off as a marketing manager at National City Bank, the thought of seeking another job and possibly moving again was out of the question. A franchise with systems that include constant performance reports was attractive to us. It turned out to be way more work than I ever expected. I got so caught up with trying to be the best that I was always at the restaurant, and we lost sight of our initial goal to expand.
I tend to be a control freak anyway. Everything I do has to be 100 percent or 150 percent. It has to be right or I don't want to do it. When we lived in Michigan I was a full-time nurse in management for 15 years until I became a mother. After I became a mother, I tried to work part-time, but when I didn't feel like I was performing in either role to the best of my ability, I decided to raise my kids full-time until they were teens. So it's no surprise that when we bought a franchise, I put everything I had into the business.
We believe in the company philosophy "Everything matters." And we worked hard to be recognized by the company as the best in sales and customer service. I tried to make everything perfect and I got caught up with minutia because I even wanted to be recognized by secret shoppers and the corporation for having the cleanest store.
My biggest mistake was not delegating and putting people in place who could run the business. After two years, we made the decision for Don to spend more time at home, but I was still spending way too many hours here. I wanted to be in control of inventory, hiring, and ordering. I was even checking every customers' to-go orders. I listened to my husband and the franchise founder, who both told me to spend less time at the restaurant. I knew they were right, but I had a hard time letting go.
The Fix: I finally realized we had to train and build some depth in management. Don convinced me that we need to get a life and work on opening a second store.
The impact of my actions wasn't just affecting the business, but also at home. The bottom line is I had to learn to let people do their jobs, and slowly but surely I started letting others have some control.
The truth is, I hadn't found a good manager because I wasn't really looking. A year ago, our assistant manager acted more as a line manager. That meant we could leave in a pinch but not for an extended amount of time because we hadn't taught him how to order nor had we focused on building his personnel skills.
We offer about 100 soups and feature 12 rotating varieties each day, with the exception of our two most popular items -- chicken pot pie and lobster bisque. In the restaurant business you have to pay close attention to what sells and how often, so we can keep costs down and ensure we have the freshest produce.
It paid off. In December, we started looking for a location and our Warrensville Heights location is expected to open in November at Harvard Park. I was missing balance, and I'm working on it. Balance helps with clarity and your ability to focus on expansion.
Being an all or nothing kind of girl has a cost. You get burned out. Now I'm trying to play a supportive role to managers
See original story: http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/when_youre_caught_up_in_detail.html
