Warm treats on the way to Cold Stone
As ice turns to slush on some roadways this morning, today may not necessarily be the day that you’re ready to think about your next ice cream treat.
But I thought I’d share this interesting story with you about the success of Cold Stone Creamery’s chain of ice cream shops, which includes one in Roanoke and one in Christiansburg. Cold Stone’s sales suffered during the nation’s economic recession, but the chain is back to growing now, despite competition from other ice cream retailers that mix up ice cream on a cold slab, including Maggie Moos and Marble Slab.
Also, look for some warmer treats to appear on Cold Stone’s menus next month. The chain plans to start serving funnel cakes, brownies and churros to counter winter’s chill.
Additionally, frozen yogurt is coming to Cold Stone’s menus in the spring.
January 18, 2011 - 10:45 AM
What are you talking about the chain is back growing now? Goto the website bluemaumau.org and search for Cold Stone. The franchise is a sinking ship.
Do you not watch the news, this company is slip slidding away, with franchisee money!
Success of Cold Stone Creamery’s chain of ice cream shops? REALLY????
On the contrary, Cold Stone has one of the largest failure rates in the entire country http://thefranchisehound.com/2011/01/25/the-best-and-worst-franchises-to-own/ at 31%. At that’s only for SBA loans. That doesn’t even take into account other forms of financing. In fact, if you remove franchisors with fewer than 200 SBA applications, Cold Stone Creamery has the highest SBA failure rate in the country.
Have you read the Wall Street Journal article or seen the CNBC special that blasted them for closing more than 200 stores, the number of franchisees that needed suicide counseling and exposed their parent company Kahala for taking more than $13 million dollars in kickbacks from franchise owners. Have you seen the discourse that is taking place online? http://www.bluemaumau.org/node/9868/talk
I am a Cold Stone franchise owner with three stores and no one knows better than me of the misery that comes with being a Cold Stone Creamery franchisee. There are stores planning to close across the country. I am planning to close my stores as well. Despite having a very high volume of sales, we cannot make a profit in these stores because of Kahala’s kickbacks. My wife and I cannot even pay our mortgage Me and other franchisees will lose millions, our homes, I even had to pull my kids out of college because I spent their college fund trying to keep my stores open.
Cold Stone Creamery is among the most unsuccessful franchises in the nation and everyone should know that!!!
Not sure who is writing this, more than likely it was the Cold Stone marketing interns, but by now it is pretty well proven that the Cold Stone business model is broken. (http://www.bluemaumau.org/)
How you ask? well, Cold Stone execs won’t tell you, but, about 3 months into owning a Cold Stone you begin to realize that it is costing you $7 to make and sell a $5 creation.
You call Cold Stone support and tell them that you aren’t making any money – and they tell you “c’mon get out there and take some cake to the radio stations, run some BOGO coupons, go to the mall and put flyers on all the cars”.. but you tell them that there are people in line – that the real problem is the cost of the name-brand products are too high, and the Cold Stone product kickbacks are outrageous, that the cost of labor is too high, that the cost of lease and CAM are too high, that the electricity bill is WAY to high because of the 5 freezers and 5 refrigerators are ALWAYS on!
Cold Stone support line goes dead…. “hello, anyone there?!”
Let me save you the pain and life threatening stress, WALK AWAY NOW… really, just walk way. Good luck!
You’re kidding right ~ growing franchise ???????????? This franchise has ruined many, not a few, literally HUNDREDS of family’s finances and emotions, and well being. If you are approached to open one RUN, don’t walk in the opposite direction !!!!
What David said in his post is exactly what happened to me and my family. We lost everything with this franchise including our home and our entire savings. And when our store closed, the company went back in, re-opened the store and then sold it to another franchisee. I went in to speak with him before he closed the store. He told me that Kahala told him the store was profitable and that the prior owner wasn’t a good businessman. He also put his heart, soul and savings into it, but he couldn’t make a profit either.
The only thing I would add is that the economy has nothing to do with the failure of these stores. My store was opened from 2004 and closed in mid-2007. The economy was red hot during the time my store was open. We had lines outside the door every night, but we too could not make a profit.
Cold Stone has known about their franchisees being unprofitable since 2004. They’ve been saying since then that they are going to fix it. They still have not fixed it to this day and I hear from my friends who are still living the nightmare that it has only gotten worse.
When I closed my store, other owners in the center could not believe it because we were always so busy. Don’t be fooled by the long lines. This franchise is a certified DOG and the economy had nothing to do with it!!!
Yes Kahala/Cold Stone is a sinking ship! The recession had nothing to do with the disastrous business model of Kahala/Cold Stone. We purchased our store in 2008 and never heard any bad things about the store until we went to our first co-op meeting. We learned Cecil Rolle was a trouble maker but have learned he is our biggest advocate! We closed our store and filed bankruptcy 6 months after opening our store. Kahala doesn’t care about its franchisees. They only care about their big fat profit from kickbacks. Don’t be fooled, the recession didn’t make over 400 stores close. The bad business model and greed of Kahala did. They will pay all their franchisees in the end who lost their stores. What goes around comes around.
An open letter to all current Cold Stone Creamery operators.
Stand up a make your voice heard. So then why are cold Stone businesses failing at such an extraordinary pace? If it was Cold Stone that chose the operators and trained them, how can they now blame the high percentage of store failures on poor franchisees?
That means the operator is not making money. He can only hope to keep from losing his shirt due to labor costs by working long hours .
In my case, when I applied to construct my first store, Cold Stone offered me a second store existing store and they assured me they would fully support me. At the time I thought, wow what a great fortune with an outstanding company. Not realizing how badly we had been set up for failure, my wife and I celebrated as if we had won the lottery. Our family and friends traveled near and far to be with us during our grand opening.
From the very start, we had excellent cash flow. At the end of the first month however, our income statement showed that we were unprofitable. Upon consulting with the AD, he advised us to invest additional monies into our advertising budget and increase our cake drops. One month later, we had the same result. The AD then said that all businesses are going to struggle to turn a profit early on. He advised me I was going to have to invest money into the business to keep it operating and I would begin to turn a profit shortly. I was skeptical of his response because this was an existing business and the profits should have been immediate.
This was the beginning of a series of lies by my AD to cover for Cold Stone’s broken business model. Things never improved, they only continued to spiral downward. Eventually Cold Stone terminated my store and sold it to yet another victim. Kahala’s hope is that I would be embarrassed for having lost my store and therefore tell my family and friends that I sold the store and then I would go away quietly. They also hope that I would not contact the new owner to tell him just haw troubled the store is. They know that many franchisees in my situation end up divorced and serious health problems due to the stress associated with these failed businesses.
This is exactly what happened to me and so many other Cold Stone owners until I decided to join Cecil and fight against all that is so wrong with Cold Stone. What happened to me, my wife, my kids, my family can happen to you as well. It is therefore important that we all come together and fight Cold Stone until they repay what they owe us and promise to stop hurting others.
Thanks for sharing your insights and news about Cold Stone Creamery franchising. The article referenced in this blog post was written by Dow Jones Newswires about an appearance in New York by the president of Cold Stone.
If you’d like to comment further about Cold Stone’s franchises, e-mail me at jenny.boone@roanoke.com.
Cold Stone You say??? When you meet with the “area executive” his sales pitch is stunningly slick. Quietly TURN About Face AND RUN LIKE Hell itself is coming to you because with “cold bone” that is what you will get; An agonizing and bankrupting boning You KNOW Where. Met that guy, “I came, I saw, I BOLTED” Be Aware, Be VERY Aware. These guys are pro Scam Artists. Caveat Emptor…….