Pokemoto, Muscle Maker, Inc.’s expanding Hawaiian poke bowl restaurant concept, today announced the signing of a new Pokemoto franchise agreement for the Gallatin, Tennessee market. This new franchise agreement marks the first entry for Pokemoto into the Tennessee market.
Gallatin is a prominent suburb of the Nashville, Tennessee market and was ranked as “The Nicest Place in America” by Reader’s Digest in 2017 and is home to Volunteer State Community College.
Pokemoto has now signed 40 new franchise agreements and continues to focus its growth strategy on franchising while also opening company owned “seed” locations in select markets. The Hawaiian poke chain currently has eight locations in the development and construction stages along with multiple LOIs submitted for lease negotiations.
The Pokemoto franchise model allows for an initial franchise fee of $25,000, per unit, when the agreement is signed while also providing 6% of net sales as an ongoing monthly royalty rate once each location is opened. The company does allow, in certain instances, for discounted fees for multi-unit or special agreements including the newly announced veterans program. The veteran appreciation program offers a $15k discount on the initial $25k franchise fee bringing the total cost per agreement to $10k and is in place as a “thank you” to the men and women who have served in the United States military.
Pokemoto recently announced it has partnered with FranFund, a one-stop funding solution that has pioneered offering multiple funding options under one roof in the franchise space for those interested in a financial lending service. FranFund works directly with VetFran, a strategic initiative of the international franchise association, and offers a discounted pricing structure for veterans.
Michael Roper, CEO of Pokemoto comments “We’re excited to bring Pokemoto to Tennessee with a great franchise partner. We love bringing new franchisees into our Pokemoto Ohana (family)! Over the last few weeks we announced new franchise agreements in Pennsylvania and Texas, now we are adding Tennessee to our expanding portfolio. Pokemoto is in growth mode and our franchise sales team continues to expand the brand via digital targeted marketing efforts, tradeshows, virtual discovery days and more. Once the aforementioned locations open, Pokemoto will have locations operating across 12 states, including Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Mississippi, Florida, Texas and now Tennessee.”
Roper continues “The team continues to execute against our growth strategy. We not only have 40 new franchise agreements in the pipeline, we’ve also recently graduated our first three franchisee groups through their initial hands-on training. We expect these locations should open soon, and we’ll see the “sales to opening” cycle come to fruition. Add in the various corporate owned locations and we expect it will be a busy second half of the year!”
