| Expanding franchise helps get
dinner ready
by Heather
B. Hayes
for Virginia Business
February 2006
What’s for supper? It’s
a question that moms grapple with every day. Richmond
businesswoman Danessa Knaupp thinks she has an answer
for them.
The former Capital One project manager and mother of
two runs My Girlfriend’s Kitchen, a franchise
that provides customers with a hassle-free way to assemble
and take home 12 ready-to-cook, family-sized entrees
in less than two hours.
My Girlfriend’s Kitchen, based
in Salt Lake City, now has nine franchise locations
and another 12 are slated to open soon. Knaupp’s
Midlothian store was the first on the East Coast.
The premise is simple: For $199, the Kitchen staff handles
the dreary side of cooking: they plan the recipes; shop
for ingredients; do all chopping, slicing, dicing, browning
and sautéing; and even wash the dishes.
Customers are given recipe cards for the entrees they
plan to make. They then head to various stations in
the kitchen, where they measure and stir ingredients
before spooning their creations into freezable containers.
Later at home, they can take a food package out of the
freezer and heat it up for dinner.
“It allows women to be super-efficient,”
says Knaupp. Menu options range from dishes like “Thrilling
Meatloaf and Potatoes” to the more exotic “Maple-Glazed
Pork Chops in a Cumin-Infused Sauce.”
The process “takes away pressure for women, allows
them more time with their family and provides peace
at the dinner table,” Knaupp says, noting that,
for an additional cost, her business will also assemble
and deliver meals. “It’s hard to put a value
on that.”
Knaupp’s venture has already attracted a steady
following. Her first location in Midlothian, which opened
last April, had to double its staff and booking capacity
in just six months. Knaupp and her business partner,
Lynne Laube, who still works at Capital One, have doubled
their initial annual revenue projections. They plan
to open a second My Girlfriend’s Kitchen this
month in the Short Pump area of Henrico County.
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