Jason Hood, Owner, Pita Pit (Australia), joined us for a brief chat at the Sydney Franchising & Business Opportunities Expo, August 2022.

We covered some of the key aspects of the Pita Pit franchise business including the type of people that are best suited, any common misconceptions about the brand or industry, as well as what he loves about what he does and more..

What is your business?

“Pita Pit, so it's a Canadian franchise originally. 

We've got (stores) across 17 countries, over 600 stores, very successful market for us is New Zealand. We have over 100 stores there. We sell pita breads, salad boxes, rice bowls, smoothies, vegan products, gluten free. So we cover off a lot of different products. 

Where are you located?

Currently we've got four stores in Western Australia, and four in Queensland. 

What do you love about the business and what you do?

The food, (and) meeting people. I still love to see I've been in the industry for 30 years myself, but the strength is our food, our reviews and the tastes that we get. 

Flavor profiles off the grill. It's a beautiful product. 

What do you look for in the right-fit person to be a franchise owner, can you describe them?

Owner operators are ideally what we're after. People who are great at building relationships, working with people, have the rapport with their staff and their customers basically around the skills that you need. 

What’s a common misconception you believe people have about your brand or niche?

We don't have to have chef experience or anything like that. It's a very simple model to work with. 

What would your advice or guidance be to people looking to get into their own business?

Yeah, obviously due diligence, work on the site, analyse where you're looking to go in to to find out the strengths and weaknesses in the area. Obviously go and speak to some of our franchisees. They're the best attributes for our business and most of the people that are in with us would love to do a second or third store for us. 

What is your key focus for the next 12-18 months?

I'm a little bit different, so I'm from a franchisee background, so we're not bound by trying to have store numbers or criteria that we need to make. 

We're looking for the right people and the right locations and find sites that are profitable.”