Franchisee resource center

In the Cold Stone case, the franchisees are also seeking information relating the pricing of the supplies on which the franchisor is receiving the vendor rebates. If it turns out that the prices that vendors charge franchisees are artificially inflated in order to allow for payment of these “kickbacks” to the franchisor, then the franchisees no doubt will assert additional claims in their lawsuit against Kahala. Such claims may include fraud for inadequate or misleading disclosures in the Cold Stone FDD (if in fact information was withheld – at this point, we don’t know who is right or wrong).

The franchise agreement should also address who gets to use the franchisee’s phone numbers after the franchise agreement expires. Traditionally, this right has belonged to the franchisor, but with home-based businesses becoming the norm, franchisors that allowed franchisees to use their home phones or existing cell phone numbers might have an issue regaining control of this component of their former franchisees’ business presence.

With a second lease on life and control of the franchisor squarely in the hands of private equity professionals, will Quiznos be able to navigate a still-shaky economy, challenge Subway for supremacy, and win back the trust of its surviving franchisees?

Consumer social networking sites are not only transforming how people live their daily lives, they are also influencing several business-related functions. More and more of these socially-enabled tools, platforms, and best practices are fundamentally changing the way companies handle data, manage customers, and perform market research. Businesses can harness the power of socially-enabled tools that promote collaboration and eliminate departmental boundaries that might inhibit innovation. We aren’t talking about the need for small business to have and manage their own social media accounts. At this point, such initiatives should be a given. The focus is on ways social sharing is altering business processes at a core level, transforming how people “work.”

Moneyball is a film about baseball, but on a deeper level, it’s about how to succeed in life through a series of broader principles, which can be applied to many areas, including business. Here are five such principles that business owners can utilize.

Several other big-name corporations have been in the news recently for raising similar issues. Nike recently sent a letter to someone selling “Just Jesu It” t-shirts. Best Buy sent a letter to Geek On. Hell’s Angels sent a letter to a designer in California.

So, what do you do, then, when your fellow franchisees start using rougher towels, or take the milkshake off of the menu? Now all of a sudden some of the inherent value in your franchise is gone. Your hotel chain is seen as declining in value, and out-of-towners stay away because they think that you, too, have taken their favorite milkshake off of the menu.