Citing weak customer response, the local franchisee of American fast-food company Popeye's Chicken & Seafood is pulling out of Jamaica and relocating to Trinidad and Tobago.

Lake. Popeye's has not attracted the volumes of traffic we would of liked

"The Popeye's brand has not attracted the volumes of traffic in the Jamaican market that we would have liked," said Richard Lake, proprietor of Restaurant Associates, which holds the franchise for both Popeye's and Burger King in Jamaica. "However, it is attracting this in Trinidad, so we are moving the equipment there to make better use of the assets."

Popeye's is owned by AFC Enterprises of the USA. In 2004, Restaurants Associates Limited negotiated the Jamaican franchise when businessman Anthony Levy surrendered the rights to the brand after it had expired and came up for renewal. Under the franchise agreement, the six restaurants from which Popeye's once operated were excluded from the deal, thus Lake established separate restaurants in Liguanea and on Constant Spring Road.

Popeye's will now join a long list of American fast-food companies, including internationally renowned brands such as McDonald's and Taco Bell, which were unable to firmly implant themselves in the competitive Jamaican market, which analysts have long described as over-crowded.
Like most of these entrants, Popeye's was unable to withstand the fierce competition because it lacked the market penetration enjoyed by the pioneering KFC and Burger King franchises which, having set up shop in Jamaica during the 1980s, had gained an unshakable foothold in the market by 1995.

"Both of those brands, Burger King and KFC, offer very quality products that are applied to the local market," said Lake. "Both of those products have (immense) brand loyalty and set a certain standard for which everyone had to follow, and it seems that those standards by both companies have been extremely high and it's not easy for other companies to follow suit."

Lake told this newspaper that the franchise's relocation will culminate with the sale of the property on Constant Spring Road, for which he said he has received "very attractive offers".

"We were seeing some very good offers for the properties, which were too good to refuse," said Lake, in justifying his decision to relocate the franchise to the twin island republic. "We only have the Constant Spring store left and as soon as that real estate transaction is completed, we will shut down the brand here, which is probably in another three months."
Lake declined to say how much he was asking for the properties. However, a very reliable Business Observer source said he sold the Liguanea property for US$1.2 million to FirstCaribbean International Bank.

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