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Taco del Mar is a Seattle, Washington-based Fresh Mex fast casual restaurant chain that specializes in Mission burritos. Since opening in Seattle on June 8, 1992 by brothers James and John Schmidt, it has expanded into over 260 locations in the U.S. and Canada. It is known for its relaxed, seaside-themed decor. The name "Taco del Mar," meaning "taco of the sea" in Spanish, refers to the chain's original specialty – fish tacos. Like the larger Subway chain, the customer directs the preparation of his or her meal, requesting ingredients as it moves along an assembly line. A standard selection of "Mission Style" (referring to San Francisco's Mission District) Mexican ingredients is available, including wheat, flour, tomato, or spinach tortillas, and fish, beef, pork, or chicken. ==2008 franchisee lawsuit== In 2007, Taco del Mar announced that more than 30 franchisees closed their restaurants. Taco del Mar executives cited poor sales and bad locations as the cause of the closures. Previously Taco del Mar closed restaurants throughout the Dallas and Boston markets due to poor financial performance. However, a group of franchisees and Master Developers called The Truth About Taco del Mar charged that several Taco del Mar executives took secret kickbacks from various suppliers that raised restaurant operating costs, hurting franchisee profitability and contributing to the store closures. There is no evidence of alleged kickbacks; furthermore, Taco del Mar founder James Schmidt said if there ever were kickbacks proven, the money would be returned to the Franchisee. The group also claims that Taco del Mar intentionally removed former franchises from its uniform offering circular (UFOC) to mislead potential investors into purchasing restaurants from the franchise. In December 2007, reporter Julie Bennett conducted an investigation and found many franchisees outside of Washington and Oregon were losing money at Taco del Mar.〔(Franchise Times story )〕 More than 20 franchisees are currently preparing a class-action lawsuit to recover costs from Taco del Mar Franchising Corp and Conrad & Barry Investments. In November 2007, Taco del Mar Franchising Corp President David Huether resigned. Less than one month later, Neal Hollingsworth, Taco del Mar's VP of Franchising Sales also resigned and left the Seattle/Tacoma area.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Another executive leaving Taco Del Mar )〕 Failure rates of restaurants is commonly thought to be high. Recent studies have mitigated some of those assumptions, but still show three-year failure rates of all restaurants to be about 61.4%, and that franchise restaurants fare slightly better than independently owned locations. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Taco del Mar」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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