Hungry for variety? Whether you’re in the mood for Tandoori Chicken or Chop Suey, keen for a slice of stone-baked Gourmet Veggie pizza or Prawn Green Curry, or craving Beef Teriyaki, Dubai-based Hot Brands International has the recipe for success with their range of quick service, casual and fine dining ethnic food restaurants.
“We are in a unique situation,” states Paul Merrifield, President and CEO
of Hot Brands International, “to be able to provide customers and
franchisees with the number of brands and variety of ethnic food concepts
that we do. You could eat at our restaurants every day for a year and never
have the same meal twice!”
The original company began as a single food court restaurant in 1992; since
then they have transformed to a multi-brand company operating restaurant
concepts throughout the Middle East and India, which currently include
Indian/Tandoori, Chinese, Italian, Thai, Japanese and Mongolian.
The company’s early “foot-in-the-door” entrance into the UAE’s food court
and restaurant industry has allowed them to grow along with the
developments in the Middle East, especially Dubai. Hot Brands International
now serves well over a million meals per year and is keen to spread the
flavour by further development in the emerging markets around the world.
They are in a high-growth phase and have restructured the company to
facilitate the development of franchise operations internationally,
including bringing in key members of the executive and management team who
collectively have dozens of years of franchise experience. They are
forecasting rapid expansion through single- and multi-unit franchisees,
with a goal of 500 corporate and franchise locations committed to by the
end of 2008.
“We just opened another Shamiana and Santino’s along with our first Sugoi
in the fabulous Ibn Battuta Mall in Dubai, UAE and have broken our previous
sales records,” Merrifield says. “Another step towards our vision to be the
recognized world leader in the multi-brand, ethnic food restaurant
industry, utilizing the highest levels of corporate and franchise business
practices with dedicated employees and franchisees.”
