One of Australian’s fastest growing quick service restaurants, Soul Origin, has reached yet another impressive milestone with the opening of its 75th Australian store today, located in Melbourne Central, Victoria.
Soul Origin Chief Operating Officer, Chris Mavris, said Soul Origin was showing no signs of slowing down with plans to reach 100 stores before the end of the 2018 financial year.
“Soul Origin’s growth plans have stepped up a notch this financial year as we continue to expand in our existing markets of Queensland, News South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. We will also open our first store in Western Australia later this financial year which will mark a significant step for us in truly being a national business,” Mr Mavris said.
In the past 12 months alone, Soul Origin has opened 30 new stores, expanding from New South Wales into the Australian Capital Territory, Queensland, Victoria and South Australia.
Mr Mavris said the rapid growth was on the back of strong double digit same store sales growth across the network, highlighting high customer demand for Soul Origin’s offering.
“Over the past 12 months Soul Origin has achieved 12% same store sales growth, an impressive result given the overall retail market at the moment. We have also continued to achieved double digital growth in our coffee sales,” Mr Mavris said.
“In addition, we have strengthened our corporate support team, which has doubled in size in the past six months, to assist with our store expansion and continue to provide our high level of support to our franchisees and their stores.
“We have boosted our capabilities in both store and coffee training, property, recruitment, marketing as well as our store opening teams. We have no plans of slowing down!”
Originating from humble beginnings, Soul Origin’s founders fled Vietnam in 1981. After operating several successful food retail businesses in Australia, a gap in the market for freshly prepared nutritious options was identified, leading to the opening of the first Soul Origin in 2011.
Mr Mavris said he is was very proud to see the brand open its 75th store but was eager to hit the golden ‘100 stores’ mark over the coming months.
“We are building a solid foundation that will help expand the Soul Origin brand into more communities and new territories. It’s very rewarding to see the business continuing to go from strength to strength,” Mr Mavris said.“We began franchising in 2014 and now have 70 stores owned and operated by franchisees – a huge achievement for a business that is still relatively young in the market. I’m very proud of our commitment to our customers, the environment and our franchise partners,”
Mr Mavris said the business was experiencing high franchisee demand with more than 70 new enquires each month and more than 30 perspective franchisees currently going through the Soul Origin selection process.