Like hotcakes - Westfair Communications

Doug Jones and Joe Spinoso are still thinking really, really big about the potential for their handy wipe foil packets they call Smile Wipes. When they launched their wipes this past summer, they were talking about single orders of wipes in the billions. With a “b.” They still are.

“We”™re talking to the top level in Wal-Mart about putting its logo on each wipe and going chain wide,” Spinoso said. “Costco is also looking at a box of 200 wipes and are deciding on either the Costco logo or the Kirkland logo.” And on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being a homerun, “that”™s a 10, actually,” and could result in close to a billion wipes a year sold through the big box warehouse chain beginning this spring.

But Jones and Spinoso are really holding their collective breath over this one: McDonald”™s, where the duo is negotiating with “the top of the top McMuffin” about branding the handy wipes with a Happy Meal logo and including a foil packet with each Happy Meal the chain sells worldwide. Not only that, but McDonald”™s may even sell bags containing 25 or 50 of the wipes “like they sell toys.”

What”™s capturing the attention of the top echelon of the corporate giants is Jones and Spinoso”™s decision to package in foil-wrapped wipes a proven disinfectant that kills germs for up to six hours. Spinoso stumbled on the ingredient when he owned pet stores in Wilton and Norwalk a few years back and was searching for something to keep his shop clean and germ free. His veterinarian recommended chlorhexidine gluconate, an FDA-approved sanitizer that”™s been on the market since 1976 ”“ but not in handy wipes.

Jones was also looking for a sanitizer for his Stand Firm Fitness center in Wilton when he bought a fish tank from Spinoso and the two began talking germs. After six years of talking, they had all the pieces together and began selling their Smile Wipes the first week of August. The rest is history ”“ or, at least, they hope it will be.

Since they started selling the wipes just a few months ago, “we”™ve sold hundreds of thousands” locally, Spinoso said. “They”™re selling like hotcakes” in local stores such as Caraluzzi”™s markets in Georgetown and Bethel, local markets in Weston and New Canaan, and the Village Market in Wilton Center, which sold a rack of 50 packages of wipes in less than three days. “We have to restock most of the stores every week,” he said.

But those markets are small potatoes compared with what the duo hopes is coming. “We”™re talking with Big Y about their going into all 57 stores,” he said. “We”™re currently in the Newtown Big Y, and in January they want to talk to us about the numbers they want.” Big Y”™s initial order, he said, will be about 5,000 bags with 75 wipes per bag, and an additional 10,000 to 20,000 bags to warehouse.

But Jones and Spinoso aren”™t waiting around for corporate orders to come to them. “It”™s a long process to get into the large retailers,” Spinoso said. “There”™s a lot of interest, but it takes time for each one to evolve.”

The interest isn”™t just from big box chain retailers. A Florida investment company is thinking about putting the names of movies on each wipe and handing them out with popcorn in theaters to promote a new film. And they”™re talking to hotels and casinos, restaurants, health clubs and airlines ”“ just about any market interested in wooing health-conscious Americans.

But probably the best gauge of the probable success of their company is the interest they”™re receiving from competitors that are getting wind of the potential market in the billions. “We actually had some buyout offers from large companies that wanted to buy our product and everything,” Spinoso said. “We turned it down, even though it was in the high 10 figures.”

They said no deal to the offer, he said, because “we”™re having too much fun right now.”

Sandella”™s bites off a year of growth

Michael Stimola confesses that he wasn”™t too good at forecasting the health and growth of his business this year. “It”™s kind of embarrassing,” he said. “We had set a plan together to sell five units” of his Redding-based upscale quick-food sandwich chain, Sandella”™s. Instead of selling five franchise units, “we sold about 215 stores, which kind of blew us away,” he said. “We weren”™t anticipating that.”

Stimola began franchising his sandwich shops across the country earlier this year after several years of licensing the flatbread, healthy-food shops to food service companies, which built about 125 Sandella”™s on college and university campuses. Franchising, he said earlier this year, was to be the next piece in growing his business, which he started in 1994.

“We had a plan to sell 1,000 units in five years, and thought the first year would be pretty light,” he said of his way-off-the-mark first-year sales. He”™s still sticking with his 1,000-units plan for the five-year period, but he”™s rejiggering the annual franchise sales numbers. “We expect to do as well in 2008, and are anticipating franchising another 200 or 215 stores. We”™re trying to forecast better.”

But given the national publicity in trade journals that surrounded his foray into franchising, he may have some difficulty keeping the brakes on the growth of his privately held business. For example, Sandella”™s showed up at No. 301 on its first appearance on the Restaurant and Institutions list of “Top 400” restaurant chains this year; Restaurant Business Magazine put Sandella”™s on its “Future 50” list of restaurant chains to watch; and QSR Magazine said the chain is “ahead of the curve,” that it began offering flatbread sandwiches “before most customers knew what flatbread was.”

The trade publicity “is definitely speeding the interest we”™re having in selling stores,” Stimola said. “That 1,000 number might have to be higher, but I need to keep my head down and open stores.” By the end of 2008, about 35 of those newly-franchised stores should be built and open. “It takes time to do it right,” he said of building the 1,500-square-foot cafÃ©s with comfortable seating and free Wi-Fi. And “we”™re going to keep the bar very high” for future franchisees in order to keep growth manageable.

Numbers

Stimola is carving out his stake in the fastest-growing niche within the upscale sandwich marketplace as customers think twice about chowing down greasy hamburgers and salty fries and look for something a bit healthier. But they still want quick service in a casual surrounding, and his flatbread sandwiches are perceived as healthy alternatives to burgers and fried chicken. He started his company in 1994 with a Sandella”™s in the Crystal Mall in Waterford, then opened another in Massachusetts before opening four Sandella”™s in Manhattan between 1998 and 2000, one next to the World Trade Center, the other next to the Stock Exchange. Six months after 9/11, all his shops were closed, and he changed his business plan, beginning to license Sandella”™s to food service organizations.

Since then he has licensed 125 Sandella”™s and projects about 500 licensed locations in the next five years. In Fairfield County, Sandella”™s are at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury and “one is being built right now at Fairfield University.”

Stimola is working with a company with sales offices in California and Virginia that finds potential franchisees, who meet with him at his Redding offices to negotiate a franchise. This year he sold a group of 50 stores in Los Angeles County and another group in Orange County in California, another 50 in Nevada and another 50 in metro Washington, D.C. “That”™s a good restaurant market,” he said of the nation”™s capital.

Stimola isn”™t aiming to climb too high too fast. He said that while the 1,000 franchise goal is conservative ”“ compared with the 25,000 McDonald”™s or Subway locations worldwide ”“ “I need to prove myself before we raise that number a little bit.”