St Elmo’s slices its way into Africa

St Elmo's, founded by pioneering restaurateur, MD Ian Halfon, is a household name particularly in the Western Cape where it has led the pizza market for the past 18 years through constant innovation and cutting edge technology. It currently has outlets in greater Cape Town, Port Elizabeth, Bloemfontein and Gauteng and is set to grow to 100 franchised stores over the next two years. In Gauteng, St Elmo's now boasts nine stores including the Halaal-certified Pizzaways in Fordsburg and Rosebank and its newest store has just opened in Montana, Pretoria.

"We are on full scale alert in the Gauteng market and having secured some of the best sites, are excited about our expansion course into this virgin territory," says Halfon whose group of companies includes St Elmo's, the fashionable Balducci's restaurant and the trendy new Belthazar Wine Bar & Restaurant in Cape Town's V & A Waterfront.

"The fact that the St Elmo's experience is new and fresh in Gauteng gives us a comparative advantage in what has become a hyper-competitive and price-conscious market," he added.

St Elmo's expansion trail has taken it beyond the borders of South Africa. With franchises already established successfully over the past three years in Nigeria and Zimbabwe, further growth is on the cards, with additional outlets in Nigeria and entry into Ghana, Tanzania and Kenya.

"Instead of breaking into the competitive and expensive European and US fast food markets, we have our sights set on Africa. With start-up costs similar to South Africa's, we consider Africa as a huge untapped market with unlimited potential and very little competition," Halfon said.

The success of St Elmo's roll out into Africa is based largely on its strong strategic alliance with Food Concepts and Entertainment Ltd, which has seen the establishment of food courts on prime sites, offering consumers diverse fast food products under one roof. Through a deliberate policy of making high quality products accessible to a wider, growing market, these two entities hope to increase their specialised food courts particularly in Nigeria, Ghana and the Ivory Coast.

"The major ingredient in being successful in the franchise business is to be flexible and have your ears close to the consumer. By simply tweaking our taste profile and operating manuals to suit our target market, we have found that our brand is the preferred pizza choice in Zimbabwe and Nigeria. In Nigeria the demand was for hotter, spicier and more ethnic food and we changed... fast," said Halfon who has built his pizza empire on meeting the needs of his consumers since 1987.

Known for his flair for innovation, Halfon has served up a number of firsts that have become standard practice in the pizza/pasta industry, including home deliveries, family combo meals, bottomless sodas and safety seals. The authentic woodfired taste derived from the woodfired clay ovens at all St Elmo's outlets, guarantees a premium product that differentiates St Elmo's from its major competitors.

In keeping with its acknowledged reputation for innovation and commitment to service excellence towards both the consumer and its franchisees, St Elmo's has recently reduced the size of its take-out outlets from 150m² to 80-100m², to put forward a more profitable store that adds to the franchisees' bottom line.
"Our aim as franchisor is to open up more profitable stores for our franchisees with lower set up costs, as well as streamline systems that are easy to operate. This makes the franchisee's life a lot easier, while ensuring consistency and adherence to our strict quality control and standards," said Halfon.