Using L&D to Set Franchisees Up for Success with Salata

Using L&D to Set Franchisees Up for Success

Salata is a group of health-food franchise restaurants. At every Salata location, your meal is what you make it – with completely customizable salads and wraps. Since their founding in 2005, they have opened over 92 locations nationwide and attribute their success to the love and support of their guests, which keeps the guest experience at the forefront of what they do.

The Challenge

Inefficient, Tedious, and Wasteful L&D Strategies

Salata’s learning and development strategy for franchise leadership teams was outdated, tedious, and wasteful. They provided upskilling opportunities for franchise leadership when they could host an in-person training at their headquarters in Houston, Texas, delivering learning materials through binders and paper; sometimes, this meant having up to 15 versions of the same single piece of training information.

The Solution

Meeting Learners Where They Are

To continue to support the rapid growth and success of their franchise stores, Salata’s leadership team identified the importance of making all learning and development materials easily accessible. They needed to deliver learning content to franchise leadership teams in a virtual way, create administrative efficiencies for themselves, and have the ability to constantly update materials. They needed to give staff the tools to enhance the guest experience and improve staff’s confidence. To meet learners where they are, Salata implemented a central communications hub and leveraged technology-based solutions to propel their organizational efficiency, franchise success, and team career growth forward.

Delivering Franchise Leadership Training Virtually

Salata eliminated the need to train franchise owners and managers strictly at in-person gatherings by going virtual. This involved implementing a learning management system – aptly named The Root – where they could upload, store, and manage all of their training materials. Franchise leadership could also complete training materials at their own pace, allowing for them to better absorb the information.

Making Learning Content Accessible in Every Language

Salata implemented a multi-language tool on The Root for all franchise teams to access. Now, learning materials are available in a multitude of languages, but they primarily enable Spanish for their teams. Worksheets, certifications, and processes are presented in both English and Spanish. Any video training is in English with Spanish captions.

Upskilling Franchise Teams = Confidence in the Guest Experience

In addition to the multi-language tool, Salata enabled learning paths for franchise leaders to implement with employees at different stages of their training. Learning paths allow users to enroll in multiple courses at once and advance through the courses at their own pace.

The Benefits

Accessible Learning = Busier Restaurants

Since Salata has changed their L&D approach, 98.8% of their users login into The Root on a daily basis. Within the last year, module completions have jumped 38%. Their franchise leadership team now spends less time ensuring outdated learning materials are discarded and fewer resources printing learning materials onto paper. Salata has eliminated their need for franchise leadership travel expenses. Since implementing the multi-language tool and learning paths, franchise staff are more engaged. They see their preferred language on learning materials – meeting them where they are in their Salata franchise learning journey and empowering them to own their pace. They have boosted the participation in onboarding materials and enhanced the training experience for staff, thus resulting in an improved experience for guests and higher scoring reviews and busier restaurants.

• ​98.8% Users Login Every Day
• ​38% Increase in Module Completions