Chick’nCone built its name on a simple idea: take a beloved comfort food, chicken and waffles, and reinvent it as something you could eat on the go, no fork required. What started as a single location selling crispy, hand-cut chicken tenders in a fresh-baked waffle cone caught on fast, first on social media, then on the street. When the founders were ready to turn that early momentum into a real national franchise system, they turned to Franchise Marketing Systems to build the strategy, structure, and sales engine to get there.
Chick’nCone: A Waffle Cone Idea Built to Scale
Chick’nCone grew out of a straightforward problem: chicken and waffles is a great combination, but eating it properly requires a knife, a fork, and a table. The founders set out to fix that, hand-rolling fresh waffle cones and filling them with crispy, made-to-order chicken tenders and a rotating lineup of house-made sauces. The format was portable, shareable, and instantly photogenic, exactly the kind of product that spreads on social media before it ever spreads through paid advertising. With a single location proving the concept worked, the brand was ready to franchise, but it needed the business infrastructure to support growth beyond one storefront.
Reading the Opportunity in the Fast-Casual Market
The fast-casual food and beverage segment rewards brands with a clear point of difference, and Chick’nCone had one: a menu item nobody else was selling, built around a small footprint and a simple operating model. FMS Franchise’s experience across the food and beverage franchise sector helped shape how Chick’nCone would be positioned to prospective franchisees, as a low-cost, high-visibility concept that could open in small spaces, food halls, and non-traditional venues without the overhead of a full-service restaurant.
Engineering a Franchise Model From One Location
With a single proven store as the starting point, FMS developed the franchise strategy from the ground up, working through the unit economics, franchise fee structure, and territory approach needed to make Chick’nCone attractive to first-time and multi-unit franchisees alike. The team then wrote the franchise business plans that would carry the brand’s pitch to investors, lenders, and prospective owners, translating one location’s success into a model that could be trusted to repeat itself, store after store. That kind of foundational work mirrors the process FMS outlines in its guide on how to franchise a business, where the model has to be sound before a single franchise is ever sold.
Systems Built for Consistency
A single successful store doesn’t guarantee the fiftieth one runs the same way, so FMS created the franchise training and franchise operations manuals franchisees would rely on every day: cone rolling and chicken prep standards, sauce and menu consistency, food safety, and day-to-day store operations. This documentation followed the same discipline FMS applies whenever it helps a client develop a franchise operations manual, so a Chick’nCone in a new state or a new country could deliver the same product and the same experience as the original.
Bringing Franchisees to the Brand
With the operational foundation in place, FMS built the franchise marketing campaign to introduce Chick’nCone to prospective franchise owners, positioning the brand’s viral, social-media-driven appeal as a business advantage rather than just a novelty. From there, FMS worked directly with the company to market, sell, and promote the franchise system, turning inquiries into qualified candidates and qualified candidates into signed franchisees. That combination of storytelling and structured sales process sits at the center of how FMS approaches franchise development for brands ready to scale beyond their first location.
Looking Ahead
What began as one store built around a simple, portable idea is now a growing national franchise brand with the strategy, systems, and sales infrastructure to keep expanding. It’s the same principle that took Chick’nCone from a single storefront to a recognizable name, applied through every stage of franchise growth.
Ready to Franchise Your Own Concept?
If you’ve proven your concept at one location and you’re ready to build a real franchise system around it, the FMS Franchise team would like to hear from you. Contact FMS Franchise to start the conversation.