A Miami restaurant group is helping restaurateurs hit hard by the pandemic—and taking its innovative concept across the country.

The Local Culinary‘s virtual restaurant franchise model has signed five new franchise agreements across three states in the last 30 days. This week, the organization announced it will waive all initial fees for new franchisees through the end of the year, in an effort to further support independent owners seeking relief from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Based on the success we’re seeing with our current franchisees participating in the program, as well as new challenges we anticipate restaurants will face this winter, we wanted to offer a truly risk-free opportunity to join our program, waiving initial franchise fees for those who come onboard by the end of the year,” said Alp Franko, founder of The Local Culinary. “We are passionate about helping independent restaurants survive the pandemic, while also setting our partners up for long-term success to thrive in a very competitive industry.”

The two-year-old business introduced the virtual restaurants franchise in July, allowing independent restaurants to incorporate the company’s made-for-delivery brands into their existing kitchen spaces and operations, adding to their menu offerings and expanding their customer bases almost overnight. Growing both locally and nationally, The Local Culinary helps independent restaurants deliver modern, chef-driven concepts to new markets. Joining the six existing franchisees in Florida, The Local Culinary’s brands will now be implemented into the existing kitchens of independent restaurants in San Francisco, CA, San Jose, CA, San Mateo, CA, New Orleans, LA, and New York City, NY. As the demand for food delivery services continues to rise, restaurants are now looking for options like this, in order to capitalize on the industry’s evolution and increase revenue.

In the cooler months ahead, outdoor dining is set to decrease, and food delivery services will continue to rise in demand. To help restaurants prepare for the slower months, The Local Culinary is waiving the $50,000 entry fee for its ghost kitchen franchise model through the end of the year. Restaurants who sign on as a franchisee of The Local Culinary can maintain their existing brand name, space and operations, simply adding on with services that complement their offerings. They receive on-site training from the company’s chefs, exclusivity in their territory, assistance in optimizing their kitchen for delivery and tablets to field orders. In addition, the franchisees receive qualitative and profit-driven brands with well-studied menu engineering.

“Our franchisees are seeing an instant return on investment, noting sales are up by 15 or 20 percent on average after coming onboard,” said Franko. “We are committed to working with each restaurant owner and operator to create a strategy that works for them, adjusting the model to address the varying consumer demands in each of these new areas.”

For information on franchisee opportunities, contact Alp Franko at alp@thelocalculinary.com.