The more branches you open, the more the brand has to live on paper, not just in the founder's head.
Customers expect the same quality and the same feeling at every branch they walk into. Sinh Vũ writes your brand down as standards, so new branches and new staff get it right on their own.
Three things: an identity you recognize from the sign to the cup, a menu that sells, and guidelines clear enough for a new branch. A chain sells consistency, so whatever isn't written down will drift.
Customers see the same face at every branch and on every object.
Helps customers choose quickly and choose dishes worth the money.
Sign sizes, paint colors, menus and uniforms, clear enough for a contractor elsewhere.
Restaurants, café chains and delivery central kitchens expand in very different ways.
Their customersDiners who come for the food, the space and the occasion, and often book from photos and reviews.
Brand challengeOne consistent face from the name and sign to the menu and the booking page.
Their customersCustomers who return out of habit and pick whichever branch is nearest.
Brand challengeThe same feeling at every branch, from the sign to the cups and takeaway bags.
Their customersCustomers who meet the brand only through an app, a food box and a cup, with no storefront.
Brand challengeGive the brand a face through the ordering app and the packaging, when there is no shop for customers to walk into.
These are the places chains lose customers that the food can't rescue.
A new branch makes the sign at a different size, paints the wrong color, and every place does its own thing.
Guidelines with standards for signs, counters and paint colors, enough for a contractor elsewhere to get it right.
Start from this problemNew hires don't yet know how to greet, how to display or how to pack, and everyone does it differently.
Write the standard as a short document with pictures, usable right away in training.
Start from this problemEach branch prints its own menu, with different prices, dishes and wording.
One master menu held by the brand, with each branch only adding what is its own.
Start from this problemA beautiful venue, yet the cups, bags and takeaway boxes look like another house's.
Take the identity down to cups, bags, boxes and uniforms as one set.
Start from this problemAt the Use stage. Customers visit a second branch, find it different from the one they know, and start to doubt the quality.
Touchpoints are the places where customers see, touch or hear about the venue. These five decide whether every branch matches.
Customers recognize a branch from a distance.
It is a sales tool and must be the same everywhere.
They travel the streets, get photographed and posted online.
The part customers meet directly.
For a delivery kitchen, this is the storefront.
In the order Sinh Vũ suggests doing them. A new venue can stop at step two; a chain goes through all four steps.
Name, mark, colors and type: the foundation for every branch.
Guidelines with standards for signs, counters, menus and print.
Signage, cups, takeaway bags and uniforms.
How the brand is run: who holds the standard, who approves, how it is checked.
Monthly support while the chain is expanding.
Sinh Vũ has done two projects close to this segment: a delivery central kitchen and a delivery café.
Hàng Xóm Tốt is a central kitchen cooking family meals for residents of premium apartment complexes, in the spirit of a good neighbour who cooks well and brings a plate over…
Name, identity, ordering app and packaging for a central kitchen: a brand that lives through the app and the food box.
Moon Coffee Bean delivers coffee, the person pulling the shots is a fourteen-year-old learning to run a real business, and the customer has never met her…
A brand mark, takeaway packaging and a menu for a delivery café: recognizable on every takeaway cup.
The principles behind it
At minimum: a name, a logo, colors, type, signage, a menu and food photography. If you plan to open a chain, you also need brand guidelines.
Standards for signs, counters, paint colors, menus, cups and uniforms, clear enough for a contractor elsewhere to get right. It helps to include reference images to compare against.
Choose what must be the same, write it as standards, and assign someone at each branch to hold the standard. A new branch should be inspected against the guidelines before it opens.
In the ordering app, the food box, the cup and the note that comes with the order. Those are the places customers meet the brand.
Guidelines clear enough for a franchisee to get it right without asking about every task. The standard has to be written in a document, not kept in the founder's head.
A few lines about the venue, the number of branches and what is holding you back is enough. Sinh Vũ reads it and replies within one working day.