Can Tiffinbites curries take on McDonalds?

Tiffinbites hopes to create 50 potential franchises throughout Britain by the end of 2009. For a fee of £150,000 plus a share of profits, franchisees get prepared food from a central kitchen which they reheat in store. As with most franchises, they also get full marketing and training support as part of the package. One of the Tiffinbites directors, Arjun Varma, is quoted by the BBC: “We are aiming for the young entrepreneurs who want to get into the Indian food industry. Rather than taking on a family-run scenario, they can have a professionally-backed franchise, which they would then build into two or three restaurants depending on their appetite”.

But some marketing and branding experts are not so sure. The traditional Indian restaurant is a family-run business offering authentic home recipes on the menu, something that would be lost in a franchise. Although the firm would enjoy some economies of scale, it could all become rather impersonal and unoriginal.

The Indian food sector has come a long way in the last 40 years, sometimes topping polls as the nation’s favourite food. But the Home Office’s recent clampdown on all non-EU immigration is taking its toll on the ethnic food sector. Family businesses struggle to get the staff. Perhaps the modern franchise format has come at the right time to secure the future of the British curry.