Stone Payton
Welcome to Franchise Marketing Radio. This is Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you this morning. Today's episode brought to you in part by the Business RadioX® Studio Partner Program, helping franchisees dominate their local market. To learn more about serving your market and growing your business go to mybrxstudio.com. Lee, there's going to be a fantastic segment. Please join me in welcoming to the broadcast, CEO with the Coffee Peddlers LLC. Mr. Larry Curell. Good morning, sir.
Larry Curell
Good morning, gentlemen.
Lee Kantor
Hey, Larry, before we get too far into things, tell us about The Coffee Peddlers. How are you serving folks?
Larry Curell
So, The Coffee Peddlers was founded the last year in 2018 by a couple of disabled veterans here in Arizona, we own a coffee roastery we love coffee, so we decided to take the coffee and take it to the consumer. We started selling in approximately 3300 stores nationwide. Then we jumped into the private label division and now we're in the Bruin serve, go to the consumer market with our new coffee bikes.
Lee Kantor
And a coffee bike is kind of a cart but it's a bike. So, if some combination of the two.
Larry Curell
Yeah, it's a fully self-contained business on wheels. Basically, what it is a tricycle frame with a sink, hot water heater, freshwater. It's got the espresso maker, brewed coffee, cold brew tap, nitrogen brew. It's all self-contained eco-friendly, solar powered in one unit, you roll it off a trailer, you can actually ride the bike for up to 25 miles. Otherwise, you can park it and Bruins serve coffee right there.
Lee Kantor
So now, did you create this to be a franchise? Or did it start out as Hey, this will be fun, let's do this?
Larry Curell
We created it as a franchise opportunity with a focus on veterans. Being veterans ourselves, we decided that there's an additional opportunity. So, it's a very low-cost entry point. And it was really focused on franchising from the start.
Lee Kantor
Now the person that has one of these bikes? Do you call them bikes? What do you call?
Larry Curell
Coffee bikes?
Lee Kantor
When they have a coffee bike? Is it something that they have a place that they go a corner that they go or a festival? Or is it flexed to any environment like I can ride it up to a festival, I'll be there all day, or I can ride it to the park or the office park or the office building? Like have is the kind of the selling part when they have to stop somewhere and sell it. It's not like the ice cream truck where you wave the person down, right and they bring you coffee?
Larry Curell
Absolutely. I remember those days, I think those are few and far between anymore.
Lee Kantor
They still have that
Larry Curell
So, what we've done is we've done a lot of time research effort, we've done events, we've done a lot of case studies, and a lot of feasibility studies to figure out what works best. So that we can make sure that our franchisees have the best product with the best process going out the door that's going to positively impact their wallet. So, what we've done is designed it as part-time work with the potential for full-time income. So, I know that sounds too good to be true. And we all know the old adage if it is it probably is, but it's not. So, we've proven our point. We take these bikes to our downtown tourist area, we can park them on a corner or in any public street, or any public parking space or on private property.
Or we can take them to special events. So here we're out with our company on bikes, we took them to an air show last weekend, and in four hours serve 307 cups of coffee. Now let you do the math on the dollars and cents. But the weekend prior to that we did another air show in a different city for four hours. And we exceeded that we did over 500 cups of coffee in four hours. So, we take them to events, but we also put them in our downtown tourist district when they have art fairs, music festivals, etc. parades, so you can get all the traffic that's walking by you at a parade. Or we have one gentleman who takes his to a lobby of an office building every morning that has no cafe near it and he gets about 6000 employees walking past him twice a day to buy coffee. So, it's really up to the franchisee and how much they want to work
Stone Payton
And so the franchisee to This negotiates that with the office building or like do they have to if they go to like that airshow is that you have to get a permit, or is that something that anybody can just show up and kind of sell out of their trunk kind of environment if you're in a spot,
Larry Curell
It really depends on the municipality here in Arizona, in our county, we have to have a special events permit, it's valid for a year cost less than $200. And it's very, very cost-effective, very affordable. And that allows us access to any and all special events in the county. On top of that, we have another license that allows us to park it in any public space or private property and serve daily if we choose to. So, it's really flexible. It's really driven by the municipality and the health department in those counties. But we've researched that as well. And we conform to the tightest standard in the country. And that's how we build our bikes so that they conform to the toughest standard in the country so that they don't have any issues anywhere else.
Lee Kantor
Is it seen as a food truck, or is it different?
Larry Curell
Yes and no. Again, that depends on the municipality here in Arizona until a year ago, August of last year, Governor Ducey signed into law the new law that said that we can have food carts, food bikes, mobile food units. Prior to that, you had to be in a self-contained kitchen, if you will, or a food truck. So, it's considered a peddler’s cart or a food service cart similar to like a hotdog stand on a city corner in New York or Chicago.
Lee Kantor
Like here in Atlanta, they have they sell popsicles in like a little cart, where it's just like kind of a freezer, and they just have boxes of popsicles, they just hand you a popsicle. Is it the same type of permitting as opposed to or is this more like you're actually creating the beverage for their custom? So, then it's treated differently.
Larry Curell
It's basically the same permitting, as long as it's a prepackaged food with the popsicle carts, they're good to go with ours, because it's a brewed product, it's not an issue, you can actually brew and serve with the same type of permit. Again, it's really driven by the state, the county at the city level. But we found that by conforming to the toughest standards in the country, which happens to be on the west coast, we're able to go into pretty much any market without any issues.
Lee Kantor
So, if somebody approaches you and are interested in the franchise, you help them research you know what to expect, permit wise in their municipality.
Larry Curell
Yep, exactly. It'll be their responsibility to actually go out, fill out that paperwork submitted, pay their permit fees, and then provide a copy back to us to make sure they've done it prior to releasing their bike after training here at corporate headquarters in Arizona. But yes, that's a service that we do offer for them as part of the initial franchise fee and their initial offering.
Lee Kantor
Now, do they have to be kind of a barista in order to pull this off? Or are they like what kind of skill set Do you need to be a successful franchisee?
Larry Curell
No skill set at all. We actually just had a 73-year-old gentleman that picked up his last week. And he went through our two-day training course we have professional baristas here on staff and a full training environment here at corporate. So, what we do is we bring them here for two days of training they're taught by a professional barista, by the time they leave they're ready to go so this 73-year-old man picked his up and just as a part-time because it behind his motorhome and goes from city to city and just kind of does this thing that he's only doing special events. So again, very flexible setup for different types of events or sales. But no, you don't have to be a professional barista whatsoever. I mean, I figured out how to use the thing on my own in about a day.
Lee Kantor
Now said that if somebody was in a market and they said OKAY, this is something I was thinking of doing a franchise. I like biking and coffee; this seems like the perfect fit. So that the next step is to contact you and then you there's and what's the onboarding look like?
Larry Curell
The onboarding process is pretty simple. As with any franchisors and onboarding process, so we ask people to go to the coffee peddlers’ calm that's within s and then click on the franchise tab. And there's a couple of buttons or they can they can watch the video they can read about the processes and about the bike and why we did this, how we did it, and what they can expect. Once they click on the take me to my future button. It'll take them to our form, they fill out their information, send it to us, and then we send them a complete franchise information package with our options which we have three basic packages, or they can custom make one so we send them a package with options, pricing terms conditions, etc.
And then once they're serious about moving forward, they can also apply for 100% financing with up to 90 days deferred payments. For qualified folks right there on our website. So, we make it as easy as possible so they don't have to go out look for financing and we're not talking a lot of money. We're talking between $9000 and $18000 on the high end, and that includes the franchise fee. So, it's very affordable. The onboarding process is very simple.
Lee Kantor
And then, so for that fee, they get the bike, they get the know-how, and then then they're off to the races.
Larry Curell
Exactly, we've designed it to where, when they pick a package, we put that package together over a couple of weeks while they're doing their paperwork in their city, their business license, their ends, their health department paperwork, etc., which we help them with. But while they're doing that, we put their bike together with all the equipment and other accouterments that are necessary. The espresso maker, the cups, cupholders, napkins, everything that they need, and if they've chosen, so when they come here for their two days of trading, when they leave, they could literally sit up in our parking lot and start selling coffee right.
Lee Kantor
Now, so how does it get? Because it seemed like a pretty big thing, how does it get from you to wherever they are.
Larry Curell
So, we can either create it and ship it to them. Or, if they have a trailer, they can pick it up on a trailer, most people have this crate and ship it to them. And then they, it's already assembled. And then we already box and package coffee and the espresso maker and earns and everything else they need crafts, etc. So, they basically open it up like Christmas. And they just put all their stuff on their bike. And of course, we give them detailed drawings and pictures on how best to set it up for Fung Shui, if you will, or the ease of use for ergonomics. So, it's very simple, we thought that one through two, and they can either pick it up and go, or we can create and ship.
Lee Kantor
Now, once they have it, then you recommend them having some sort of a trailer as well.
Larry Curell
Correct. We have a couple of people who don't, they leave them parked like the one gentleman leaves it parked in the lobby every day of an office building. He doesn't move it, he does have a trailer with our corporate own units, we put two in a trailer. And then we can go to two different events, drop them off with the staff. And that's how we transport hours. You could write it but it's not really designed to be on the road for that long. The battery on the motor, which of course is optional, will only last you up to about 25 miles at 20 miles per hour. So, it's kind of limited on the distance you want to ride it.
Lee Kantor
And it's solar that controls the cooking of everything, it's through solar power.
Larry Curell
So, we have an electric power pack that's eco-friendly, that's recharged with solar. So, we have a solar panel on top of the canopy that trickle charges, the batteries. And we also have an external power unit that's electric. That's also charged via solar via trickle charge. So, it's completely self-contained eco-friendly, you can use it indoors, you don't have to have extension cords. If you do that's preferred, but you don't have to. And you don't have to have gas generators, you don't have to comply with the fire department rules. When you go to events. You don't have gasoline; you don't have the fumes. You don't have the hassle, the noise the problem. So, it's fully self-contained and eco-friendly.
Lee Kantor
Now you mentioned that you were a veteran and the veteran community was more important to you. Can you talk a little bit about that and how that how you serve the veteran community through this?
Larry Curell
Absolutely. So, for veterans, for disabled veterans, we offer 10% off or $1,000, whichever is higher on their package. So as veterans ourselves, we support the veteran community, we want to make sure that our fellow Veteran Business we know and understand that veterans make great franchisees they're not afraid to risk their hard-working, they understand the importance of working hard, and has been proven nationally that veterans make very good entrepreneurs.
So, we're focused on helping our fellow vets get into business. And we're doing that with a low-cost entry point with something that could promote very high-profit margins for the long term. So, with the focus on Veterans, they say we offer 10% off or $1,000 off the package whichever is higher depending on the package they purchase. So, our focus is truly to just employ more vets disabled vets. We love giving them opportunities that they may not otherwise have.
Stone Payton
If you're just joining us, you're listening to franchise marketing radio stone Payton, Lee Kantor here with you. We are visiting with the CEO of the Coffee Peddlers LLC, Mr. Larry Curell. Larry Stone here with a couple of questions around the sales and marketing aspect of things from the franchisor point of view, your point of view, what marketing vehicles, if any, are you finding the most effective to get the word out about this opportunity in and get viable candidates engaged in meaningful conversation? Is it being it direct mail? Is it pay per click is it I don't know what's working for you in that regard?
Larry Curell
We've just launched our massive marketing effort about 29 days ago. So, what we've done is really relied on word of mouth and social media currently, that's the quickest, least expensive way to advertise it to keep costs low. We also rely on word of mouth. And we've also had some email blasts, as well as a little bit of direct mail. But we found the best, honestly, is pay per click and social media engagement as well as like with you, gentlemen, radio, TV, and get the word out to the masses. So, the biggest bang for your buck, if you will.
Stone Payton
And then from the franchisee’s perspective, I mean, a piece of me thinks maybe the best thing I can do is show up because it's a really cool looking card and his coffee, who doesn't like coffee but are there some things that you're finding are working better for the individual franchisee to get the word out about what you know what they're doing, providing the coffee at these events. And then what
Larry Curell
we're helping them with is the advertising and marketing piece. So, if people go to our website, they can see upcoming events. So, let's say we have an event in Atlanta, for example, we'll post that on our website, folks, and go to the website and see where the coffee peddlers’ locations are going to be or franchisees. So, we are finding that the bike itself turns a lot of heads and grabs a lot of attention. We have a lot of good comments on our Facebook page about how cool it looks, how people want to be involved with it, how they absolutely love the look of it.
So, we've really designed it to catch attention. And once we've caught your attention, then you see it's coffee or espresso. We’re there 83% of Americans drink coffee daily. So that's 83% of the people that walk by our potential customers. So, once you show them the bike and draw them in. The rest is plain and simple. It's fresh coffee, we roasted here in house and green to go in 48 hours, so to green bean to roasted and gone in 48 hours.
Stone Payton
Wow. Well, and I absolutely love that. First of all, you're providing me with something tangible that just by being out in the marketplace, I've got probably one of the best marketing vehicles there is in this coffee bike that people can see and touch and taste and feel. But then you add corporate, you've created this place for this growing community of mine to go in very quickly and easily see where I'm going to be next weekend and the weekend after that.
Larry Curell
Correct.
Stone Payton
I love it
Larry Curell
So, we, we want to support those franchisees we want to drive traffic to them, we've designed the processes on this end, and that's what they get in training is how to identify where to sell. And that's primary events where there's a lot of consumers a lot of traffic, brick and mortar locations, those are great, but they're expensive. And the consumer doesn't want to be inconvenienced by having to go to those. Therefore, when they go to the consumer market. So, my daughter and I went to a taco festival a couple of weeks ago in Scottsdale, and it was great. There were over 30,000 people 83% a 30,000 by my math are a lot of people, potential customers. So, it's really identifying the biggest bang for the buck for the franchisee and making sure they're prepared for that.
Lee Kantor
So now if somebody wants to really max out their market, is it a combination of you know, having a spot every day or maybe one for early in the day and one for the afternoon and then go to an event every weekend? Like is there a recommended, you know, kind of way to attack your week?
Larry Curell
Yep, exactly. And again, it depends on the package they pick we've designed our packages and equipment based on volume. And based on the potential that that franchisee sees. In other words, our base packages, our QuickStart package, you can be in business in 15 days, it's really designed just to take out one or two days a week to an event. The next package is our cruiser package, it's a little bit more robust, has some more equipment, and it's made to go out four or five times a week, three, four times a week mainly do events and sort of coffee, and they've got our pro peddler package. And the pro peddler package has all the bells and whistles on the bike comes with coffee cups, k cups that we make here now, so everything that they would need to sell packaged and brewed coffee.
And they can take that out for up to seven days a week if they choose. But we've really designed it to maximize the sales through our processes. And again, those are proprietary processes that they'll learn in training and how we do that. But yes, you could take it out one day a week and just make some money or you could take it out seven days a week or five days a week, completely up to their choosing. And we'll help them figure that out as well depending on what their goals are at the end of the day.
Lee Kantor
And what's the personal best that someone's ever done at an event.
Larry Curell
Item 19 of an FTD says we can't really disclose dollars, but I can tell you from personal experience. We did $145 in the net at the airshow. Two weeks ago, that was really, really good. And that's about what we see on average somewhere between 120, 140 net profit per hour after all expenses. So that's it a good event. So, it just really depends.
Lee Kantor
And then this is a turnkey operation, right? They don't have to go and source coffee or cups or napkins or anything this is they get the whole shebang.
Larry Curell
100% turnkey when they walk out of our door after training, they could, like you said, literally take the bike, set it up in the parking lot. start selling coffee.
Lee Kantor
Good stuff. Larry, thank you so much for sharing your story. If somebody wanted to learn more website one more time.
Larry Curell
https://thecoffeepeddlers.com/
Lee Kantor
All right, this is Lee Kantor and Stone Payton, our guest today Larry Curell with the coffee peddlers. We will see you all next time on franchise marketing radio.
