"I read all the customer complaints personally": Ajay Kaul, CEO, Jubilant FoodWorks

Earlier this week, Domino's, the international pizza serving chain, launched its 600th store in India. India tops the growth rate in the international Domino's network and has the second largest network of restaurants after the UK. It also employs more than 23,000 people.

Not content, it is making a big push to expand its footprint, especially in smaller towns. On the occasion, afaqs! spoke to Ajay Kaul, the hard-pushing CEO of the Rs 1,400-crore Jubilant, on what drives the Domino's clock - like clockwork. Excerpts:

Edited Excerpts

We are one of the few companies in this space to invest in its own supply chain. Once we decided on a huge store network, we had to target the tier 1, 2 and small towns as well. We are in 130 cities already. If the supply chain is not in your control, you have to depend on others. Last year, we upgraded our factories in Mumbai and Kolkata and built a new one at Chandigarh at a cost of Rs 70-80 crore. This year, we plan to construct three new factories at Hyderabad, Guwahati and Nagpur and upgrade the Noida production unit.

We believe in a pan-India growth story. And if this growth has to be at 125 stores per year, we cannot ignore any corner of India. We plan to invest Rs 8-11 crore in the Guwahati factory and in two to three years we can create at least 30-40 stores across the Northeast though it is the toughest market to crack. However, as the transportation improves, the market will open up.

India has huge potential and if we can own a profitable store, why not? We are a publicly listed company and we don't use the franchise model: that means capital expenditure and ensuring a return on investment in a certain time. We are answerable to shareholders who are happy now. We are a completely frenzied company on return on investment and capex applied. Apart from Domino's stores, we will open 18 more stores for Dunkin donuts.

We are a delivery-centric company. So, it starts from mapping households that we can target for our business: basically people from SEC A, SEC B but not the slums. And we have a written norm that there should be at least 15,000-20,000 households. No household should be more than 8-9 minutes away from a store. Apart from households we check if there are any colleges or business parks, which only reinforces our decision to open up a store there.

Intitally, we attacked the top of the pyramid. We were seen as reasonably expensive, and people walking through the door would find it difficult to afford us. Then, we came up with the Rs 35 pizza to attack the middle of the pyramid and that opened the floodgates for us. We widened our customer base though we are still far from the bottom of the pyramid. We now see Domino's as a single room where you get pizzas from Rs 35 to Rs 500. We are a full-range pizza serving company and not just a value-based or an affordable one.

There are many mom and pop stores, which server burgers and pizzas, so people come to know about these things. In 1995, after the government gave its nod for QSR (Quick Service Restaurant) chains, we initially had to tell people what a pizza is. People did not see it as a meal but as a snack. But over the years there has been change. People see it as a lunch and dinner thing and they party at Domino's.

We will grow mercilessly. Despite a slowdown, we believe that the Indian growth story is intact. And, we will be opening 125 stores in the next one year. We will be going into 20 new cities in the next two years.

We do it in various forms. We randomly call the walk-ins to determine our customer satisfaction index. Be it via stores, facebook, website or any other medium, I ensure that I read all the customer complaints personally.

First, '30 min or else for free': it was a service proposition that got transformed into a product feature. People took it as the pizzas that are delivered in 30 mins. They remembered more of 30 mins rather than the pizzas. If it came on time, hot, sizzling and great, it forced the customer to re-order. This created enormous interaction and it is largely because of it that we have a 67 per cent market share today.

The second was 'Pizza Mania for Rs 35'. It cut across all value for money barriers and brought it to a point where all the floodgates were opened and a new kind of customer walked in.

An initiative that failed: It goes back to 12 years, when we thought that the 'Hungry Kya' campaign had created enough excitement and customers would walk in. We went on a crazy expansion spree in the small towns but had to retract our steps and reduce the stores from 100 to 50.