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Fast-food franchise Ogalo launches national model

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While Sydney-siders know Portuguese chicken chain Ogalo well, outside of its home state, the fast-food franchise is far from a household name. But that now looks destined to change.

Earlier this year, Ogalo unveiled plans to take its brand of flavoursome, flame-grilled chicken outside of New South Wales for the first time, opening new franchise territories across the country.

For over 30 years, the chain had remained a family-owned operation, focusing predominantly on the New South Wales region.

“We always concentrated on establishing ourselves in Sydney. We have had control of production of our product as we believe that in doing so, we could keep our quality at the highest level possible,” Nelson Lima, Ogalo operations manager said.

As the result, the business employs a centralised kitchen that produces and delivers to all Sydney restaurants. However, with Ogalo’s plans to enter the fast-food franchise sector on a national scale, new arrangements needed to be implemented.

“We really had to work on a system that would allow our product quality and consistency to be the same whether you had a meal in one of our Sydney locations, or interstate,” Lima said.

Interstate growth

The interstate expansion kicked off earlier this year, with Ogalo launching its inaugural fast-food franchise outlet in Darwin.

Lima explained that while the new restaurant marked a significant step in the chain’s franchise growth strategy, it wasn’t without challenge.

“Darwin in particular was always going to logistically be a difficult place to open a new site,” he said.

“Sourcing of fresh poultry is an issue due to low availability. Add to this the fact that we were to be trialling a new system and the distance from Sydney proved to be a good learning experience for all involved.”

The distance meant turnaround times for delivery, stock and machinery had to be efficiently controlled, but Lima and Ogalo were able to secure new supplier deals in conjunction with the new franchisee.

“Building up relationships with local suppliers proved to be the most beneficial factor in overcoming any obstacles in regard to products, deliveries and fitout progress,” Lima said.

“Having current partnerships with large national companies such as Schweppes and McCains was of great assistance and teaming up with one of the Territory’s largest food distributors meant that so far as products and services was concerned, our opening was as seamless as possible.”

Ogalo’s fast-food franchise future

With the Darwin store now officially open to the public, Lima said the brand was ready for anything the fast-food franchise sector could throw at it.

“We have perfected the system and it has been proven to work,” he said. “We feel that we can now open in any location Australia wide and still deliver the product our customers expect.”

The fast-food franchise is now ramping up its national expansion strategy. Lima revealed that opportunities are available across the country.

“Ogalo is concentrating on expansion, in particular outside of the Sydney metropolitan area,” he said.

“We expect our Darwin store to be the first of many and expect to see the opening of stores in Melbourne, Brisbane and the Gold Coast to begin with, whilst continuing to build on the great relationship we have with our existing franchisees.”

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