Popeyes CEO celebrates GTA milestone MISSISSAUGA — While Cheryl Bachelder may have been a “terrible waitress” at 16, the concept of serving is a key component in the Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen chief executive officer’s leadership strategy. Bachelder penned the book Dare to Serve: How to Drive Superior Results by Serving Others, which focuses on the concept of servant leaders. “The idea is a great leader has a combination of courage and humility that creates the conditions for people to perform their best work,” said Bachelder. “The purpose that we use to guide us at the home office is to inspire servant leaders to achieve superior results. We’re in the business of serving our franchise owners and we want to give them our best possible support,” she said. Bachelder recently visited the Greater Toronto Area to celebrate the brand’s 100th store opening in the region, but the brand chose not to highlight a particular location. There are about 40 franchisees in the market with many store managers having part ownership. “We just wanted to celebrate the market and not a restaurant; we have such a good group of owners in this market, they work together as team so we wanted this to be a celebration of their collective success,” said Bachelder. The chain’s first international location opened in 1984, and in the last 18 months, Popeyes has opened 30 stores in the Toronto area. “When I joined the company in 2007 we had 37 units in the GTA and today, 100 and their sales are up, their profitability is up and they are committed to continuing to expand this market,” Bachelder said. Popeyes recently opened locations in Ottawa and plans to head into the Windsor market
Cheryl Bachelder. next. Outside of Ontario, Bachelder said plans include moving west, including Calgary and Edmonton in 2016 with eyes on Vancouver and Winnipeg as well. “Canada could be several hundred restaurants for Popeyes if we have the success we’ve had in Toronto,” said Bachelder. Popeyes has been building about 20 restaurants a year in Ontario over the last two years, and Bachelder said plans include continuing at that rate of growth in 2016. She thinks of the Popeyes concept as a melting pot of the cultures that landed in the brand’s birthplace. “Louisiana is where nine nations came together from all over the world and they brought their food and put it in a pot and it all stirred together,” she said.
Menu items include chicken marinated in Louisiana spices for 12 hours, seafood options, and sides including Cajun fries and red beans and rice. “I think our multicultural food is perfect for the Canadian customer, it appeals to so many from so many different places,” Bachelder, noting Popeyes uses limited time offerings such as spicy garlic butterfly shrimp to keep the brand exciting. “In our business the brand has to be strong and healthy and the profitability of your restaurants has to be strong so the owners are excited to build more,” she said. “So our challenge at Popeyes across the world was to make sure we presented our brand in the most effective way and that our owners were making good money.” Over her eight years at the helm, Bachelder
said the Toronto market has grown seven to 10 per cent annually in sales. “This is an entrepreneur’s business, it’s not a corporation, and so our success hinges on [the franchisee’s] success,” said Bachelder. “One of our principles is listen carefully and learn continuously. We come to the market, we have roundtables — we ask what’s going right, what’s going wrong, how can we improve,” said Bachelder. She said Popeyes’ executive team is also willing to admit when it has made a mistake. “So for an owner to hear us say I’m sorry, we won’t do that again, means a lot to them — they have their whole livelihood invested and we try to have a very open, transparent relationship,” Bachelder said. Servant leadership — what Robert K. Greenleaf describes as servant-first in a 1970 essay on the concept — is about having deep care and concern for your people. “Part of good care for your people is to go to a daring destination, to take them somewhere they would not otherwise go and to support,” Bachelder said. “The way you serve people well is to help them reach their potential and help them reach goals.” Bachelder was inspired by research demonstrating those who participate in extreme sports become more courageous and more humble. “I thought that was very provocative. The courage part made sense because they’re jumping off a cliff, but the humble part is they don’t control the outcome and neither do we as leaders. We give it our boldest vision, we come alongside the people, but we’re not in control of everything and we’re not certain of the outcome and that’s both brave and humble.”
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