Although trained as an accountant, Brozin knew accountancy was not something he was meant to do. “I was a failed accountant, so talking at a CIMA conference is especially intimidating. I think I failed accounts three or four times,” he said at the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) World Congress held in the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre last month.

To pursue his dreams, Brozin, together with his friend and Nando’s co-founder Fernando Duarte, left their jobs working for Brozin’s father in April 1987. 

“I knew him [Fernando] since we were young. I probably met him when we were 20. We worked together and decided to go after this [dream]. I was actually working at my father’s company, Sanyo, the electronics business, selling hi-fi video. I was the marketing manager and Fernando was the technical manager,” Brozin told Manager@Work in an interview on July 13 when he was in Malaysia to attend the CIMA congress.

“We just became unhappy there. There’s a stage in your life where you get restless. My father was very supportive of me following my passion and dreams,” says Brozin who graduated from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg with a degree in commerce. 

The year Brozin and Duarte left their jobs, the duo bought a restaurant called Chickenland, located in Rosettenville, south of Johannesburg for approximately US$100,000 (RM354,000).   

“It was a real broken-down little café, a real dodgy little spot. [But] I knew it in my heart when I tasted the chicken. I spoke to Fernando, ‘Why don’t we buy this restaurant, fix it up and take it global?’ We didn’t know what we were doing, we really were naïve to the point of stupidity. [But] we bought the place and rebranded it,” says Brozin who is now CEO of Chickenland (Pty) Ltd which operates Nando’s restaurants.

The taste that got Brozin hooked was chicken that had been marinated in peri-peri sauce for 24 hours prior to being flame-grilled. Peri-peri, or Pili-pili in Swahili for bird’s eye chilli, is a fiery little red chilli commonly found in South Africa. The sauce is made up of a secret blend of peri-peri, herbs, spices, lemon and vinegar. Nando’s now retails Peri-peri sauce — available in mild, hot and extra hot — at its outlets and hypermarkets.

The Portuguese flame-grilled chicken was a legacy from the gold rush in the early 1900s, which saw many Portuguese flocking to Mozambique in South Africa. During that time, many informal Portuguese cafés were set up to cater for the community in South Africa.

After buying Chickenland, Brozin and Duarte renamed the restaurant Nando’s, after Fernando. “We wanted to name it Fernando’s. We couldn’t register Fernando’s but we could register Nando’s. His son is called Nando as well. So it has been named after Fernando and his son, in a way. It’s a short name, it’s a lovely name and it’s linked to a person. We love to think that every restaurant has a personal touch,” says Brozin.

Brozin’s love for peri-peri chicken hasn’t waned over the years, and he still eats his favourite Nando’s meal — extra hot quarter chicken — three to five times a week.

“That’s my staple Nando’s; I love it. The thing about Nando’s is, all of us eat Nando’s. I don’t think there’s any one person at Nando’s that doesn’t eat Nando’s. There are some guys that eat it every single day and you can,” says the 50-year-old father of three — two sons aged 22 and 19, and a 15-year-old daughter,  who, apparently, love Nando’s almost as much, if not more, than Brozin does. “They eat Nando’s every single day of their life,” he says.

Within two years of buying the café, Brozin and Duarte took Nando’s global but were not greeted with the success they had expected. In hindsight, he says they should not have rushed into going abroad.

“The biggest mistake we made was thinking you can just take a South African business model and transport it overseas. You’ve got to understand the local market that you’re operating in, cost, your brand positioning and several little elements that you can’t just transport from one place to another. It doesn’t transport that easily, particularly today,” he says.

“I think 40 or 50 years ago, it might be a lot easier but today, it’s a lot more difficult. The labour costs are different, rentals are different, cost of sales is different, everything is different.”

Brozin says positioning Nando’s as a brand above fast food but below fine dining meant different things in different markets.  

“We are not a cookie-cutter chain. If you look at our restaurants in the UK, they are very different from the restaurants that you see in South Africa or the restaurants that you see in Malaysia. Our Malaysian restaurants are very similar to the South African model but use local creativity and local resources.”

Going global while thinking local proved fruitful for Nando’s and the restaurant chain now has some 700 outlets in 26 countries, including the UK, New Zealand, the US, the United Arab Emirates and India. The three biggest markets for Nando’s are South Africa, Australia and the UK, which has around 300, 250 and 200 outlets respectively.

Brozin would not disclose the company’s annual revenue, but a March report on South African online news site Dispatch Online placed Nando’s operating profits worldwide in the region of 1.4 billion South African rand (RM619 million).

But going local while expanding globally would not have brought the chain the success it enjoys today without the so-called “Nandocas”, a word coined by Nando’s to refer to employees.

“Any business is about people. Thank God we have a great product but it would be nothing without people. We actually treat our grillers unbelievably well. We treat everyone in the restaurant well. There is a real family feel in each restaurant,” says Brozin.
 
Family is one of the values that Nando’s outlets around the world emphasise, the others being pride, passion, courage and integrity. In fact, family value was the reason the restaurant chain de-listed from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 2003. 

“We were a public-listed company at one stage and family dropped out of the values. I couldn’t help but think when you drop one of the values, what does it mean? Is it a big thing, is it a small thing?” asks Brozin.

“As a public-listed company, we were obviously chasing after profits, chasing the next quarter and you start compromising small, little things. So we did a share buy-back, got a partner to come in, and added family [value] back in.”

In 2007, to show appreciation for its “family members” or the “Nandocas”, Nando’s in South Africa closed all its outlets for a whole day in conjunction with its 20th anniversary and brought all its 6,500 employees to Johannesburg for a day of activities and musical performances. 

“The interesting thing about that is that within the next week, we regained the profit lost during that one day. It was unbelievable and it was when the recession began. When you bring out the best in Nando’s, you bring out the best in yourself,” he says.

The Nandocas include many young people and while Brozin finds retaining them to be a challenge, he feels happy if they move on to better opportunities.

“It’s always difficult to retain young people, good talent, because they are restless but we find young people today are very responsible. They’re much more responsible than 20 years ago, I think. The young people today actually want to leave the world today in a better place than they received it,” he says.
 
“If you can actually find projects, find a reason for young people to stay within the organisation, it refreshes the organisation. I love having young people in the business, its like [they’re] challenging [me] all the time. They’re bloody intelligent and they’re forcing the organisation to do good.”

Nando’s Malaysia CEO Mac Chung Lynn says the chain has found that in Malaysia, different things appeal to their young employees at different stages of their lives. 

“At certain stages of their lives, it might be money, at others, it’s about friendship and motivation. It’s really understanding what works for each person. We do a lot of social responsibility work, we’ve gone green,” she says.

In March, Nando’s embarked on a green initiative that entails using paper bags and paper containers for take-away meals. At the same time, 50 sen from every sale of an eco bag worth RM2.40 designed by local designer Melinda Looi is channelled to the Malaysian Nature Society.

“We’ve got lots of people who’ve left Nando’s, they still cherish Nando’s close to their heart. Five years down the line, they still say, ‘Of all the places I’ve worked, Nando’s is still very special to us’,” says Mac.

The Nando’s model is a mix of franchising and Nando’s-owned outlets. About half of the approximately 700 Nando’s outlets around the world are franchises. In South Africa, 200 of Nando’s 300 outlets are franchises.

Finding good business partners is just as important to Brozin as finding good employees. Compatibility, or complementary values, is important and it is the underlying factor in Brozin’s 22-year partnership with Duarte, Nando’s chief operating officer.

“The way we explain our relationship is that I make sure of the tracks and he makes sure the trains arrive on time, if that makes sense.

“I’m always trying to pull new tricks and he makes sure the trains are running. We have a fantastic relationship. We’re very different people; he’s more detail-oriented, more precise than I am. I’m not a great one on detail. We have a great understanding,” says Brozin.

Finding a business partner is almost akin to getting married, he says.

“[When you get married], you’re not only marrying your wife, you’re marrying the family. Around the world, we look for that kind of relationship as opposed to corporate relationships, which haven’t really worked for us yet. [In] a big corporate relationship, we find that… the general manager keeps changing and you’re never sure who you’re working with,” he says.
 
But there is no secret formula involved when looking for a business partner, says Brozin.

“We don’t have a formula, we don’t put an ad on the website to say we’re looking for partners. We probably get about 100 requests a day for Nando’s franchises around the world right now. And of that 100, probably three or four of them a year will come through as partners, if at all,” he says.

Brozin met Mac back in 1997 when she was working as an architect in London. Prior to their meeting, there had been discussions between Nando’s and Mac’s family about acquiring the franchisee licence for Malaysia, and Mac had already been identified by the family as the one who would run Nando’s in Malaysia if the deal was successful. The two clicked from the beginning, as was evident from the interview last month. Brozin says he liked her energy, and Mac says she liked his down-to-earth nature.

“He’s very humble and he takes care of his people really well. I could see that when I travelled with him to a few places.

Everywhere we went, he thinks of buying gifts for someone who works for him,” she says.

Their compatibility extends to their two families who meet regularly. Brozin even plays golf with Mac’s brothers.

After getting the franchise, Mac opened the first Nando’s in Malaysia in Bangsar in 1998. Nando’s Malaysia now has 32 outlets in the country and plans to open two more by the end of this year and another three or four next year. Nando’s Malaysia raked in RM48 million in revenue last year and is aiming for RM58 million this year.

“We’ve had an incredible response to Nando’s in Malaysia. People at the [CIMA] conference have been so complimentary of eating Nando’s, it’s unbelievable,” says Brozin, obviously pleased.

“I judge the brand from when I arrive in a country and you speak to the customs guy and he says ‘What are you doing?’, and I say ‘I work at Nando’s’. He either smiles or he doesn’t. And in the early days, they never knew Nando’s but today, when I come to Malaysia, I say Nando’s and I get a huge smile,” he adds.

Although the Nando’s brand is positioned above fast food but below fine dining. Brozin regards every food operator as a competitor.

“We say it’s a share of stomach. Wherever you can eat is essentially a competitor for Nando’s. We respect every operator, we respect every food offering and we can’t say there is a competitor that is directly against us,” he says.

In Malaysia, some may see Berjaya-owned Kenny Rogers, which has 62 outlets throughout the country and also serves grilled chicken, as a direct competitor but Mac begs to differ.

According to her, Nando’s did a survey in 2007 and asked its customers where they would go if they were not eating at Nando’s. The survey found that customers named hawker stalls as their top picks, followed by McDonald’s and KFC. The remaining choices were a mixture of hotels, fine dining and other restaurants.

Mac adds that Nando’s in Malaysia is establishing itself well as a household name in the Klang Valley and other main city centres, namely Penang, Melaka and Johor Baru.

Although the chain has been affected by the global economic downturn, Brozin says the fact that Nando’s is in the food industry makes it well-insulated compared with other industries.

“It’s had different effects on different places. In South Africa, we’ve had a little bit of impact on the business model but we’re managing it well. Again, I think if you concentrate on quality and service, and you concentrate on the basics of any business, you’ll come through it fantastically,” he says.
 
“We’ve had great opportunity around the world with new locations and cheaper rentals, and more opportunities which we think wouldn’t have come about if the recession didn’t come about. It’s good — it shakes the tree a little bit and that’s been a very good thing for us.”

Yet even in a downturn, Nando’s blend of success has attracted the likes of Yum Brands, the US owner of KFC and Pizza Hut.
The Times UK reported in March that the fast food giant had held informal talks with Nando’s Group Holdings’ major shareholder, Capricorn Ventures International (CVI), about a possible bid. CVI is owned by South African entrepreneur Robby Enthoven.

Duarte ended months of speculation when he said in a June 20 report in South Africa’s Business Times that Nando’s was not up for sale. “We have a long way to go. We’re embarking on a long-term strategy and there’s a lot of work to do there,” he said in the report.

Looking ahead, Brozin says he is more concerned with growing the markets they are already in rather than on expanding in new territory. Nando’s opened two outlets in the US last year, but Brozin plans to expand slowly there, opening another three or four restaurants over the next three years.  

“We’re not really looking at being the biggest in the world. We just want to be the best. We want to do really good innovative stuff in the markets that we’re [already] in. So it’s really an inward-looking strategy over the next 18 months, to grow and strengthen the base,” he says.

This article appeared in Manager@Work, the monthly management pullout of The Edge Malaysia, Issue 769, Aug 24-30,2009.