What Are The Best Business Opportunities You Can Open Right Now?

There’s no doubt that location is key in franchising.

Especially for businesses that rely on foot traffic, store location has proven to be a critical success factor for growth.

But business is a matter of when, not just where.

Particularly in a down economy, time is of the essence. As economic growth slows, companies generate less revenue, lay off workers to cut costs, and that reduces consumer spending and forces businesses to lay off even more workers. As such, you have to strike while the iron is hot.

When you should open your business is just as important as where you open it.

In this article, we’re going to give future franchise owners insight, resources and a spark of hope around starting a franchise in a down economy. (And be sure to check out our last post, Starting a travel business during COVID-19!)

Evolving your understanding of the business model

Franchising has fundamentally transformed how people purchase products and services today. Most consumers have some understanding of the franchising model. It's part of everyone’s daily lives. You can’t even drive down any major street in the world without passing by some kind of business that's part of a franchise network.

But what many business professionals lack is an understanding of is the variance in time among available franchise opportunities.

Turns out, potential owners don’t have to wait a year or longer to turn their entrepreneurial aspirations into a thriving enterprise.

Starting a franchise does take many steps, like researching, contacting franchisors, reading FDD’s, financing and legalities, just to name a few. But if you filter your decision making process through the asset of speed, aka, when to open along with where to open, you can speed up the launch process dramatically.

To evolve your understanding of the diverse business models available in the franchising space, let’s do a quick brainstorming exercise. This will be fun!

Imagine you’re thinking of opening a business sometime this year. Awesome. Now, before you start staying up late every Sunday night to do research, try this. Ask these filtering questions that you might not have considered when it comes to franchising:

• What if you didn’t need to find real estate?
• What if there were no initial staff hires to be made?
• What if working from home or remotely becomes a safety necessity?
• What if your startup capital would be limited and won’t require financing?
• What if there was no need to go through a lengthy store construction process?

These types of franchises do exist. They’re innovative in their thinking, affordable in their investment, and most of all, expeditious in their opening. In our next section, we’ll explore a list of potential opportunities that have speed as one of their competitive advantages.

Joining The Wellness Revolution

Healthy YOU Vending is the nation’s largest supplier of healthy vending machines. The proven model requires no employees and allows you to monitor your machines from home or from mobile devices. Technically, this is what we label a business opportunity, not a franchise, as the operators pay no ongoing royalties after purchasing their machines. The upside is, the owner will get franchise level support and work with a home office that coaches but does not dictate. Best of both worlds!

Many Healthy YOU Vending operators are seeing an increase in revenue during this time where packaged food is more trusted than prepared food and people try to minimize visits to public places for their meals. This category is becoming more and more attractive to health conscious business owners who want to grow their business during a down economy without breaking the bank.

Coffee As A Service

Ever worked in an office with terrible coffee? You’re not alone. Millions have suffered this sad state of caffeinated affairs. Fortunately, Xpresso Delight has become a category of one in this burgeoning Coffee As A Service space.

Here’s how it works. As a franchise owner, you essentially run a b2b sales operation, utilizing the franchisor’s time tested marketing and sales playbook to scale a recurring revenue business. Instead of having your office pay for cheap, sludgy coffee for their teams, this franchise provides premium automatic espresso machines and a proprietary blend of coffee to offices so employees can drink latte and cappuccinos all day long.

Considering this kind of franchise doesn’t require you to deal with expensive, labor intensive and time consuming efforts like real estate and construction, coffee as a service might be the right entrepreneurial path for you during a down economy.

Driving Cars, Driving Sales

When consumers are dealing with lean times, the mantra tends to be, if something can be fixed, choose repairs over replacements to save money. Especially when it comes to cars. This trend represents a smart business opportunity in automotive repair that, quite literally, has the upside of speed.

One franchise opportunity that comes to mind is co-branded with a NASCAR Hall of Famer, Richard Petty. Fleet Services International (FSI) provides on-site maintenance and repairs for commercial car and truck fleets. They’ve been has been the #1 Industry leader since 2001. If you’re looking for a business model with fairly low capital outlay, and enjoy managing a team of specialists, who make the actual repairs, then you’ll be off to the races in no time.

P.S. There’s a fascinating study from the Journal of Marketing Channels about automotive service franchises during times of an economic recession. This most significant finding of the study is that generalist franchise systems, aka, those offering a broad range of automotive services, will tend to have greater longevity than specialists during periods of economic recession. Sounds like driving sales to us!

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Ultimately, none of us can’t afford to be tone deaf to the economic realities that are out there right now. Times are tough for millions, and the media rhetoric isn’t making things any less scary.

But there’s a light at the end of the franchise tunnel. If you can learn to filter your entrepreneurial decision making process through the asset of speed, then you can increase the chance of your own personal economy thriving,

Location, location, location is still a mantra worth remembering.

But considering the current state of affairs, timing, timing, timing is another good one.

When you open your business is as important as where you open it.

Scott Ginsberg is Head of Content at Metric Collective, the parent company of FranchiseHelp. He started his first business at age 12, where he earned $364 dollars.