Döner Haus has big plans moving forward, starting with a company-owned 830-square-foot location coming to Hell’s Kitchen at 677 9th Ave., in addition to the first franchise location heading to Bayside. Both locations are expected to open by May, according to a release.
Franchising director Eddie Fahmy shared future plans for Döner Haus with What Now New York, saying that they are already gaining momentum in franchising. Following the Bayside opening, more franchise locations are expected to join the New York market as well as the California market. They currently have 21 franchise commitments.
The Hell’s Kitchen and Bayside openings will spearhead the Döner Haus expansion.
“We’re opening them in strategic locations to make it more accessible to the population of New York,” Fahmy said.
Currently, the brand has locations in East Village and Astoria. Moving forward, Fahmy could see having four or five locations in Manhattan alone. However, Fahmy says the brand is aiming for national expansion.
“We’re getting interest from everywhere from Los Angeles to Phoenix to Dallas to Houston to Austin to Nashville to North Carolina,” Fahmy said. “I’m getting calls from all over the country.”
Fahmy believes that the simplicity, authenticity and quality of the Döner Haus products set the brand apart from others. Döner Haus uses filler-free, organic halal beef and chicken, and the menu offers only a few items: Döner kebabs, sandwiches, wraps and boxes.
“We do one thing and we do it right. We want our customers to feel like they took a trip to Europe and had a very authentic German-style Döner kabab,” Fahmy said. “We want our stores to be simple. We don’t expand the menu.”
When it comes to franchising the brand nationally, Fahmy said the simplicity of the Döner Haus model will help them remain consistent in delivering high-quality experiences and products to customers. The fact that Döner Haus locations, which largely cater to a take-out and delivery model, can operate with small footprints will also help them scale.
“We can fit into a 600-square-foot [space] and still operate and do the volume we need to do to be profitable,” Fahmy said. “We knew the plan was to scale, so we’ve set up national distribution. We can set up a store literally anywhere in the country, and they’ll get deliveries of our products. It’s all seamless. That was done before we even opened a second location, because we wanted to make sure we could scale and we knew once the ball started rolling it would be very fast.”
