Roll’d – Meet Bao Hoang, Founder of Vietnamese Street Food Empire

What inspired the birth of Roll’d?

Roll’d is inspired by great Vietnamese family recipes handed down from my mother, Phien, who with my father, Quy and my two older brothers, came to Australia by refugee boat in 1981.

Over the years, I’ve watched people walk around eating sushi rolls, including my kids, and I’d think, “That would be great if it was a Vietnamese rice paper roll.” So, from there the idea of Roll’d came about, and being quite competitive I was keen to knock the famed sushi roll off its pedestal! I wanted fresh Vietnamese to become the go-to option and I wanted to share my family traditions and shape the way Australian’s interacted with Vietnamese cuisine and culture.

The first Roll’d opened in 2012, in the competitive heart of Melbourne’s CBD.

Tell us about your delicious menu

Fresh, flavoursome, healthy and delicious Vietnamese street eats, inspired by the best of our Mamas’ family recipes. Australian-born, rich in heritage and flavour, we deliver value through memorable food experiences.

Where are your current locations?

We currently have 86 stores nationwide, with more slated to open in the new year!

What type of person makes the perfect Roll’d franchisee?

Whilst food experience is definitely a leg-up, as is business acumen, Roll’d places high emphasis on an individual’s values, attitudes and work ethic. Whilst we absolutely work to support all our franchise partners, it is very much up to our individual franchisees to drive sales through driving our values, overall business strategies, national and local campaigns, and general culture with their frontline team members at store level. Hence, an ability to build relationships, strong leadership, and communication skills are highly important, as is general management skills.

What support do you offer your franchisees?

At Roll’d, our people are our most valuable asset, none more so than our franchise partners. We have multiple teams to support our franchise partners through the Franchise process and overarching requirements until their store opens, and then further supported post-opening. The Property team will work to source the right location, lease requirements, shop build etc. The Operations and Training team then provides a comprehensive training plan, to create alignment with Roll’d processes and policies, from store operations to business, people and financial management. This is further supported by a dedicated Area Manager, an online training platform and detailed operational guides and workbooks. A dedicated Marketing team then assists with growth by providing support via national campaigns, localised community marketing, as well as online and social media strategies.

How has your business coped with the impact of Covid over the past year?

Like all Australian businesses, Roll’d has suffered high and low points during the Covid crisis. The biggest challenge has been making sure that our business survives obviously, but also to keep positivity, and in turn, productivity within our culture.

Our business is built around people and our number one priority is looking after people. We are continuing to support our staff and maintain as many jobs as possible. We’ve innovated and introduced a fair few initiatives that have really brought the ‘hustle’ and creativity within our team, which has been amazing to witness.

We’ve found in showing strong support to one another, we have further fostered a really fantastic sense of community among the Roll’d team and are coming out of this better and stronger.

We have adapted and launched more delivery options including the Roll’d Runner food truck and are always engaging new customers with competitive offers like our recent 50% off menu-wide deals, free delivery deals, and new menu items such as the United by Noodles soup range, Roll’d Meal Box range, and new dinner-focused range of rice – an obvious addition being a staple of Vietnam. We’re charging ahead with our aim to feed more and more Australians from the comfort and safety of home.

As adverse as this time may seem, it is about supporting each other, maintaining our quality products, and ensuring our food is accessible and affordable.

rolld.com.au/franchise