About a year after Focus Brands changed its name to GoTo Foods, the multi-brand franchising company is getting “more sophisticated” with co-branding.
CEO Jim Holthouser said the Atlanta-based parent to Auntie Anne’s, Cinnabon, Carvel, Jamba, McAlister’s Deli, Moe’s Southwest Grill and Schlotzsky’s signed a record 1,177 franchise agreements in 2024, of which 578 are domestic and 599 international, although the company declined to give a breakdown by brand. Across the seven brands, more than 475 new units were added within the fleet of roughly 6,600 outlets last year.
Those 1,177 agreements also included 353 co-branding deals across 173 locations in 24 states, and about half of those will bring previously mall-based brands like Cinnabon, Auntie Anne’s and Jamba increasingly to streetside locations.
Because, as Holthouser puts it, “They’re not building malls anymore.”
Moving the group’s snack brands out of malls has long been a goal for GoTo Foods. Individually, such brands would have a hard time generating the sales volumes to support paying streetside rents. But with co-branded units, the combined sales make it work, said Holthouser.
“When you put them together and you blend them, and you’re just about doubling your AUVs, well, guess what? Now, all of a sudden, the economics are making sense,” he said.
Co-branding is having a moment.
Dine Brands is co-branding its Applebee’s with IHOP, using a shared kitchen but separate entrances. Craveworthy Brands is looking to co-brand its recently acquired Kinnamōns concept with Dirty Dough. Fat Brands is working on co-branded Fatburger and Round Table Pizza units, as well as Fatburger/Buffalo Express wings, and other combinations.
Holthouser, however, said co-branding is tricky in the quick-service world. Some companies are “co-locating,” or essentially putting two units in one building side by side. Others are simply “mashing two menus.”
GoTo Foods, on the other hand, is blending brands in a way that creates menu efficiencies by eliminating what doesn’t sell well, reconciling the use of equipment and changing the layout of the kitchen to benefit both brands.
“When it’s done well, everybody wins,” said Holthouser. “We have learned a lot from franchisees.”
The co-branding push has primarily impacted GoTo Foods’ two “behemoth” brands, the pretzel-focused Auntie Anne’s and giant-cinnamon-roll brand Cinnabon, both of which have about 2,000 units each. Franchisee The OM Group, for example, has committed to 12 streetside Auntie Anne’s/Cinnabon co-branded locations in Michigan and Ohio.
But Jamba and Carvel are also joining into co-brand deals, which Holthouser contends will help those regional brands gain national awareness.
Carvel, for example, which is a nearly 100-year-old brand familiar in the Northeast, is not as well known on the West Coast. The California-born Jamba, likewise, is relatively unknown on the East Coast. Co-branding offers an opportunity for franchisees to introduce those brands to a new audience in partnership with a more familiar snack, as well as generating sales across different dayparts.
With the rebranding launched last year, GoTo Foods has also been working to bring all seven brands onto one digital platform architecture and point-of-sales system, a process that takes time. So far, about 1,600 units are on the Qu POS, for example, which allows the restaurants to add self-serve kiosks and integrate with their loyalty program.
The system also allows for smarter AI-driven upselling—a customer in Phoenix on a hot day might be prompted to add a cold drink, for example. Holthouser said Jamba and Moe’s units that are on the new digital system are showing about a 10% increase in average check.
GoTo Foods, however, is not offering any projections of when all of the seven brands will be on the shared digital platforms. But when that does happen, there is more potential down the road for things like a unified GoTo Foods loyalty program that would cross all brands—though Holthouser said that doesn’t make sense to do yet, since the brands are largely regional.
The shared digital platform would also make it easier for GoTo Foods to add more brands through acquisitions, which Holthouser said he is trying to do.
“I need to bring different kinds of food in here,” said Holthouser. “I have got to have burger options, and chicken and pizza. I have got to have all kinds of other stuff besides burritos and great sandwiches and Cinnabons.”
GoTo Foods is among the restaurant companies owned by Roark Capital, an Atlanta-based private equity firm that is also reportedly considering an acquisition of Dave’s Hot Chicken.
Holthouser said he had read the same reports. But, if true, he didn’t think that would be a brand that would be put in the GoTo Foods portfolio.
GoTo Foods would look for a franchise-able brand ranging anywhere from 100 to 900 units—something big enough to be recognizable but not so big as to overwhelm the portfolio, he said.
“We’re pretty selective,” he added. “We’ve made a couple of runs. It just has not worked out yet, but I’m pretty confident it will.”
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