Mel Coffland

Franchisee/Operating Principal
Territory: Columbus, Ohio

Mel began his restaurant career with Cici’s Pizza, the 100-unit $2.99 pizza buffet concept, in January of 1995. He started his journey with Cici’s as an Assistant Manager opening the new Bellaire and Bissonet location. Then, he opened the new Humble location in April, before he became the General Manager at the Atascocita store in June of ’95. Mel’s next move was to take over the training store in Pearland in December of ’95 with responsibilities including making decisions on franchisee candidates for the corporate office. In March of ’96, the training department in Dallas changed the responsibilities of their training manager role and Mel was the first manager to become a training manager with a nine-month goal of obtaining experience and knowledge to be promoted to District Manager.

Mel was promoted to District Manager in November of ’96, and served in the role of Franchisee District Manager over 42 stores at the time of his departure from Corporate in January of 2001. In January 2001, Mel joined forces with Wyatt Hurt in San Antonio, buying the 8 year old, and previously owned by 3 different franchisee store at Nacogdoches and O’Connor. Wyatt and Mel raised the store sales of $12,000 to over $16,000 in March thru August with a consistent 20 to 25% increase over prior year. Wyatt and Mel built 2 new stores in San Antonio in a nine-month period which far exceeded the past performance of the market.

Mel made a great decision for the future of his career and his family by joining the impressive and ever growing The Marwin Group team. He is charged with developing 12 stores at a minimum in the very promising Columbus, Ohio market. He is very familiar with the area as he was born and raised in Shadyside, Ohio, which is the pride of the Ohio Valley, just 120 miles east of Columbus. Mel currently resides in Columbus, OH with his wife P.J. and their sons Reed and Jack.