The 90-day franchise store launch timeline, week by week
What actually has to happen in each of the twelve weeks before a store opens, which tasks run in parallel, and where the real dependencies are.
Ninety days is the working assumption for a standard-format retail or food store launch once the site is secured. It is achievable and it is not comfortable. The teams that hit it are not faster at any individual task — they are better at starting the long-lead items early and at not letting sequential work masquerade as parallel work.
Here is the shape of those twelve weeks.
Weeks 1–2: lock the constraints
The goal of the first fortnight is to convert unknowns into contractual dates. Execute the landlord agreement, take handover, and set the opening date by working backwards from the fit-out window.
In the same fortnight, start every long-lead item, even though it feels early: file the trade licence, file for the fire NOC, apply for signage permission, and order the internet connection. None of these depend on the fit-out, and all of them can independently delay opening.
Weeks 2–4: design frozen, contractor awarded
The layout drawing goes to Operations for sign-off and, where applicable, to mall management for design approval. Contractor quotes come in and the award is made.
The failure mode here is a design that is still being revised while the contractor is being awarded. A quote against a drawing that changes is not a quote — it is the opening bid in a variation negotiation you will lose during week nine.
Weeks 3–8: civil work and the licensing grind
This is the longest stretch and the one where visible progress is misleading. Flooring, ceiling, plumbing, and electrical run on the contractor's schedule and mostly look fine from photographs.
Meanwhile licensing proceeds through steps that are invisible until they block you: an application is filed, an inspection is scheduled, an inspection happens, a certificate is issued. Track all four as separate states. A checklist that has one row reading "Fire NOC" will show that row as in-progress for six weeks and tell you nothing.
Weeks 6–9: hiring and systems, in parallel
The store manager should be hired by week six, because they need to be present for the back half of fit-out and they run the hiring for everyone else.
Systems work starts now: POS procurement and configuration, payment acceptance, the store record in inventory and ERP, CCTV. The internet connection ordered in week one should be provisioned around here — if it is not, escalate immediately rather than assuming it will resolve.
Weeks 9–11: equipment, brand elements, and the opening order
Kitchen or back-of-house equipment is delivered, installed, and test-run. Signage and brand elements go up. Furniture and fixtures are installed.
The opening stock order is raised so that it arrives after fit-out completion and before the dry run. Delivered too early and it sits in a construction site; too late and the dry run is theatre.
Staff training runs across these weeks. Record completion per person, not per store — "training done" for a store where two of nine people were absent is a false statement you will discover on day one.
Week 11: snagging and the dry run
The snagging walkthrough produces a punch list with photographs. The dry run puts real transactions through the real POS with the real staff.
Treat the dry run as a gate rather than a formality. It is the only point before opening where the whole system is exercised end to end, and it routinely surfaces a tax configuration error or a payment terminal that was never tested against a live account.
Week 12: opening
Final licences in hand — granted, not applied for. Operations walkthrough signed against the brand audit. Local marketing live. Escalation path published with names and numbers.
Where 90 days actually goes wrong
In our experience the slip is almost never in construction, which is scheduled, contracted, and visibly monitored. It is in the items with an external dependency and no internal owner:
- A licence that needed an inspection nobody scheduled
- A signage permission that was assumed to be part of the fit-out
- An internet connection ordered in week nine instead of week one
- An electrical load sanction discovered to be insufficient after equipment arrived
Every one of these is a task that crosses a department boundary. The structural fix is to make ownership and sign-off explicit for every row — see how to run department approvals — and to derive dates from the opening date so a moved launch moves the plan with it.
For the underlying task list, see the full store launch checklist.
