Kamps Food Retail-owned Nordsee, Germany's leading seafood restaurant chain, is to operate six stores as franchises from the beginning of 2011 as part of a pilot programme. "If the test proves successful, which we firmly believe, we will roll out the franchise system nationwide,” said Jürgen Glaser, CEO of Nordsee.
The company has already experienced success with the franchise system. In Germany, it has its successful Tank & Rast forecourt store franchise partner (in approximately 40 outlets) and in 11 other countries in Europe and the Middle East the company operates 28 Nordsee franchise stores.
According to Glaser, one of the reasons for trialling the franchise system in Germany was that all major competitors in the German quick service restaurant market work on the basis of the franchising. Nordsee currently operates 362 stores in Germany, 40 in Austria and 28 mainly in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
Kamps Foods and especially Kamps Bakeries GmbH is a market leader in brand bakeries with a network of over 900 shops managed mostly through franchises. It operates five production plants and employs over 1,200 people.
The sale of Kamps bakeries may not involve Kamps Brot und Backwaren which with its top-selling brands Golden Toast, Lieken Urkorn and other products is involved in industrial bread production.
