RINGING IN THE CUSTOMERS

by D'Lyn Ford

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This sidebar appeared in the Winter 1996 issue of New Mexico Resources,
as an adjunct to the article "New Mexico's Cookin'".
Photography: Tomilee Turner

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Since they were teenagers, brothers Rick and Wayne Collins have been building things together. First it was houses, then a construction business, and now Tastee Freez franchises in New Mexico and Texas.

The move from solar-powered homes to Sunbelt Tastee Freez, Inc., began in 1983, when the brothers asked the Roswell owners about opening another Tastee Freez near a new Artesia motel. Instead of expanding, the owners wanted to retire. The Collins brothers bought not only their first Tastee Freez, but also area franchise rights. Today, they operate four company-owned stores and are franchisors for all of New Mexico and 19 Texas counties.

Although they had no restaurant experience to start with, the brothers knew they liked the food and relished working with people.

"Even before we bought the South Main store, Tastee Freez was one of my favorite places to eat," Wayne says. He recalls that as a kid, the Portales teams he and his brother played on always stopped off at the Roswell restaurant after games.

The brothers have taken care to preserve the treats New Mexicans associate with Tastee Freez. Surprisingly, though, the smooth, real dairy ice cream cones, sundaes, and banana splits are not the top sellers. The hands-down winner? Chicken strips, hand-breaded to order, with steak fingers in second place.

But the signature Tastee Freez food has to be the onion rings, served in huge baskets, piled high. One large order is enough to satisfy a table of high school athletes or a college crowd.

"We knew we were on to something when one day after reading an article about wowing the customer, I took an order of onion rings out to a woman and she actually said, 'Wow!'," Rick says, chuckling.

In Roswell, the restaurants exhaust a 50-pound bag of onions each day and twice as many on weekends. During a July Fourth grand opening, the new Tastee Freez in Logan went through 900 pounds of onions in about five days.

"Ten days after it opened, a truck driver came in because driving along the interstate in Kansas another trucker had told him, when you go through Logan stop for the onion rings from Tastee Freez," Wayne says.

During those critical first days, Rick and Wayne worked in the new store. It's one of the ways they help franchisees succeed, along with offering assistance in securing equipment, managing inventory, and training employees. In the high-risk restaurant business, franchises are a popular option because they offer an established food formula and chain identity.

Rick and Wayne are sought-after leaders in the national chain, frequent hosts for trainees, and guest speakers for NMSU restaurant classes. They are interested in their employees, known to many customers, and still quick to answer the drive-through whenever they visit the restaurants.

"The restaurant business is a people business as much as a food business," Rick says. "The people who succeed with a franchise have to enjoy the contact with people."