Franchisee resource center

Most of you are probably already familiar with franchises. You may even patronize a variety of franchised businesses without realising that they are franchises. These businesses range from car servicing and financial services to yogurt and home repairs. According to the International Franchise Association(IFA) franchises employed nearly 9,000,000 Americans in 2015 and generated nearly $880 billion. Franchising is difficult to escape.

Once you've found a franchise (or multiple franchises) that you are interested, the real research and diligence process begins. You need to figure out whether the franchise you are looking at really makes sense for you from a financial and lifestyle perspective. Your best source of information for all of this is the Franchise Disclosure Document, or FDD.

When people think of the costs of opening a franchise they typically just think about the franchise fee. That makes sense, seeing as the franchise fee is typically a substantial cost, ranging from a few thousand to a few hundred thousand dollars. But, this isn't the only payment a franchisee needs to make to the franchisor. Once operations start a franchisee typically needs to pay some form of ongoing royalties to the franchisor.

Many of the franchisees we talked with had to make a decision first on whether they would open an independent business or a franchised one. A few of their stories follow.

Reading through a FDD is a key part of your research, but it can’t answer all the potential questions you might have about how it is to actually operate a given franchise. The best way to do this is actually to start talking to current franchisees. The best way is to this is to call or visit a franchisee, don’t just email them. You might need to be a bit persistent, but if you are then you can get all of your questions and concerns answered.

Now that we’ve discussed the franchisor’s point of view and arguments towards negotiating the franchise agreement, here are a couple of tips for not wasting time on trying to negotiate items which franchisors do not alter and concentrating on the change-able clauses in the Franchise Agreement.

Owning your own business has always been a linchpin of the American Dream. With the advent of franchising, prospective owners now face a choice between running an independent business and operating their business unit as part of a franchise system. Put differently, they can launch a brand new restaurant churning out specialty cakes and ice cream sundaes, or open a Cold Stone Creamery location. Determining the right option for you comes with some complexities, but there are a couple of primary factors to consider: Your risk tolerance and your personality type.

Here at FranchiseHelp we’re constantly asked about the opportunity to buy a franchise. Unfortunately I’m going to have to tell you something that might disappoint you. You can’t “buy” a franchise. In reality you are engaging in a “leasing” transaction rather than a “purchasing” transaction. Why is it a lease? In any franchise deal, the franchisee receives the assets up front, but only for a period of time - the term of the franchise agreement. The term of the agreement may run for five to ten years, or in some cases it may run for as little as a year or two. At the end of the day the renewals of these agreements are at the option of the franchisor, and the reasons for not renewing an agreement should be completely spelled out in the Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) and franchise agreement.

Most of you are probably already familiar with franchises. You may even patronize a variety of franchised businesses without realising that they are franchises. These businesses range from car servicing and financial services to yogurt and home repairs. According to the International Franchise Association(IFA) franchises employed nearly 9,000,000 Americans in 2015 and generated nearly $880 billion. Franchising is difficult to escape.