From Cinnabon to Private Equity: 5 Questions for Geoff Hill
Geoff Hill has agreed to join Roark Capital Partners as a vice president, once he steps down as president of Cinnabon at year-end. Cinnabon is a unit of Focus Brands, a Roark portfolio company where Hill previously ran sales and development. We've got 5 Questions for him, including one that is obviously more important than the other four: 1. Your focus will be on franchising. What are the signs of a strong franchise brand, and warning signs of a weak one? The first sign we look for at Roark is how the brand itself is performing at the unit level. The term we use is ULE, or unit-level economics. It’s obviously important that the franchisor and company itself is doing well, but the only way to know if it’s a viable concept is if money is being made at the individual units. A lot of time I see people get caught up by a name, and good EBITDA at the corporate level. You need to dig down further, because if the units are struggling, then that corporate EBITDA will eventually come down as well.
