Move over McDonald’s! SumoSalad Expands into UAE

SumoSalad says “Move over McDonald’s!” Concept salad store, SumoSalad, has entered into a master franchise agreement to expand into seven countries in the United Arab Emirates. SumoSalad currently has twelve stores in New South Wales and Victoria, the UAE deal is their first step into launching as an international enterprise.

Joint Managing Directors and founders, James Miller (30) and Luke Baylis (28) see the expansion into the Middle East as the gateway into further expansion into Europe and Asia. With a large ex-pat business community, Miller and Baylis see their international debut in Dubai as a lucrative opportunity to begin international brand awareness of the SumoSalad brand.

The move to the UAE comes after tremendous interest from international businesses looking to help take the SumoSalad brand offshore. After months of investigation and research SumoSalad believe the UAE to be a safe market to begin the initial stages of international expansion, coming only two and a half years after their first store opening on Sydney’s Liverpool St in February 2003.

SumoSalad has chosen to expand via Master Franchising within the UAE region, as it will offer the support of an extremely strong partner who has extensive experience in the Food & Beverage sector along with essential knowledge of the local market.

The UAE expansion will begin with the launch of the first SumoSalad store in Dubai. Miller and Baylis will both be on hand to assist heavily in the development of the first store.

“We believe that if the business is successfully developed in this region, the branding will carry strong value in some of the other developed surrounding regions,” said James Miller. “We have done research on the acceptance of our product in the region and feel very confident that the product will be embraced as wholeheartedly as it has been in Australia.”

SumoSalad also believes that the high number of vegetarians and the heated climate of the UAE makes for a perfect fit for the “design-your-own” salad concept that SumoSalad has developed.

Although national development of the brand in Australia is still a major objective for SumoSalad, Miller and Baylis believe that the majority of SumoSalad’s growth will come via the continuing development of international markets. SumoSalad projects that the potential number of SumoSalad outlets could springboard into the 1000s with further international development being tabled currently.

SumoSalad’s thriving success in the most competitive franchise market in the world (Australia has the highest number of franchise systems per capita in the world) makes their chances of succeeding internationally extremely positive.

Luke Baylis says that strong but controlled growth will continue in Australia “We are on track to open 25 stores nationally by December 2005,” said Baylis.

http://www.sumosalad.com

Alexis Wilson is a Sydney based media consultant