When Jeanne Hansen sells a Skool Lunch franchise, it's more than the recipe for a successful restaurant.
"This is 10 years of my family's life," said Hansen, patting the restaurant's operating manual. The book is thicker than the Salt Lake City Yellow Pages and describes in detail the way Skool Lunch does business - everything from its bookkeeping practices to its recipe for chicken cashew salad."We teach you the way to run the store just the way we do it," Hansen said during an interview at their ZCMI Center location.
The Hansens make everything from scratch. They bake their own bread, cookies and muffins. They cook roast beef and turkey for sandwiches and prepare noodles for soup. Everything on Skool Lunch's menu is prepared on the premises according to Hansen's own recipes. No compromises, she says.
"We manage to do it the old fashioned way and we've become efficient in a very labor-intensive business," she said.
The business is decorated in bright colors, neon lights and uniforms sporting hot pink and green colors. Murals depicting a high school of the 1950s, including a school lunch line, splash the restaurant walls.
"The '50s theme came right out of my high school yearbook. We drew the pictures on the wall from the Granite High School year book."
After five years in the food-service business (4 years as Skool Lunch), the Hansens are prepared to share their trial and error expertise in the restaurant business. The family began offering the franchises about four months ago and thus far have received inquiries from California, Washington, Arizona and several people locally.
"We have been gearing up for this. We've been thinking about this for about three years," Hansen said. Meanwhile, the family plans to open a second location in University of Utah Research Park this spring.
How Skool Lunch got its name is a story in itself. "We had to come up with something you'd never forget." Hansen's husband, Merrill, came up with the name during an informal brainstorming session in the family's living room.
Doubtless, it's an attention getter. And customers often ask "Don't you know how to spell school?" But the restaurant has developed a reputation for serving fresh wholesome food and few people associate it with school lunch they ate as children, Hansen said.
Hansen said she is admittedly nervous about selling franchises of a business she, her husband and sons Mike, Perry and Jeff have nurtured from a small family-owned operation.
But the interest in the franchise offer is an affirmation the business is a success, she said. "You just have an idea and it takes a lot of work and commitment. We hope we're around for a long time."