(FORTUNE Small Business) – About a year ago this magazine inaugurated its Small-Biz Makeover series with a piece about Michael Meyer and his chain of high-end fast-food stores in the Washington, D.C., area called Marvelous Markets. Business was good, but Meyer was looking for ways to boost margins and wanted to expand the business through franchising. We brought in three retailing consultants to offer suggestions, and recently caught up with Meyer to see how he was doing.

Turns out that sales are up 10% and earnings 40% in the year since the article came out. Meyer says the biggest boost to sales and margins came from getting better at putting the right amount of food on the store shelves at the right time. Too few items means missed sales, and with perishable food, any oversupply means a lot of stuff gets thrown out. Meyer gives credit for that insight to consultant Randy Fields, co-founder of Mrs. Fields Cookies, who specializes in managing inventory. "Randy pushed us on that," he says. "We thought we knew it, but we weren't focused enough on it."

The two other consultants, John Varsames and Neil Culbertson, both concentrated on store appearance and marketing. At their suggestion, Meyer improved his signage to help new customers navigate the stores better. And he drew up menus for the prepared dinners that Marvelous Markets sells. Cashiers slip the menus into every shopping bag, boosting dinner sales and the catering business.

Although Randy Fields urged him not to expand via franchising, Meyer is proceeding with plans to franchise a score of stores in the Washington area soon, with more in other regions later. Meyer likes franchisees because they have a sense of ownership and commitment to the stores that even the best hired managers often lack. "Franchisees are store managers on steroids," he says.

Meyer, a very serious sort, ended up rejecting another suggestion he got from the cookie maven last year. During the makeover Fields described how his former wife, Nancy Fields, identified really energetic, uninhibited people to manage her cookie stores. She would ask candidates to sing "Happy Birthday" during job interviews. "I tried it about two times," says Meyer. "People looked at me like I had three heads. I think you need a certain personality to ask that of people." --B.O.