Northwest Territories Feature Articles

You'd think selling franchises in one of the worst economies since the Great Depression would daunt even the hardiest franchisor. But many franchisors, both well-established and new to the scene, keep on plugging when the economy goes south. Some even consider this a great time to grow.

Many franchisors have reached their limit on expanding into suburbia, but the imperative to grow remains strong. In response, an increasing number are training their sights on America's cities.The move to the suburbs has been a decades-long trend in the United States, and franchisors have followed suit. But more than half of the U.S. population live in the country's top 25 metropolitan areas, and nearly 80 percent live in the top 100 metro areas.Cities are complex, crowded places, running the gamut from blighted ghettos to luxury high-rises. Suburban commuters flood into them by the millions each day to work and shop, creating a vibrant marketplace. And the under-served inner cities are hungry for retail goods and services, jobs, and entrepreneurial opportunity, making them fertile ground for franchisors who take the time to learn, understand, and develop relationships with the people who live there.The Initiative for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC), founded in 1994 by Harvard Business School Professor Michael Porter, studies inner cities with a focus on economic development. According to ICIC, "[T]he inner city retail market offers significant profit potential for retail companies now operating in the highly competitive, over-saturated suburban markets." According to an ICIC study, the country's inner cities contain:

John Smythe says he was a typical 21-year-old when he was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1965. "I was just kind of rolling through life and not really giving it that much thought," says the 62-year-old veteran today. The Army was a good experience for him, and where he learned the skills and philosophies he's using today as a CMIT Solutions franchisee in Everett, Wash.

Technology tools have become a mainstay for every multi-unit franchisee, used for planning, budgeting, forecasting, and many other daily activities. Today franchisees are embracing technology for demographic research and site selection.

It was like a gut punch for Charlie Marshall. In less than a year's time, the Spring-Green Lawn Care multi-unit franchisee went from paying $12 per bag for lawn fertilizer to more than $25 per bag. "That will make you look for ways to streamline and cut costs," says Marshall. To add insult to injury, gasoline prices were skyrocketing, making it even more expensive to fire up his seven trucks and dispatch crews to care for his customers' lawns each day.

Retailers have never been shy about enticing customers to buy through all kinds of incentives. Now a franchisor has followed suit. During the last quarter of 2008, Seattle-based Emerald City Smoothie was offering a "buy one, get one free" franchise promotion. Seriously.

"One day I had 1,000 people, the next day I had a hair salon with 5 stylists," says Richard Bielecki, Fantastic Sams regional owner for South Texas and New Mexico.

If you could get better performance from your franchisees and increase the overall value of your brand at little or no cost, you'd be crazy not to. That's the business proposition of business coaching. While it may sound like vendor pitch, this assessment comes from a growing number of franchisors and franchisees.

In these tight economic times, many multi-unit franchisees and area developers are focusing less on continuing the remarkable unit growth they've enjoyed for the past five years, and more on improving performance at their existing units. As consumer spending drops, savvy franchisees see increased royalty streams as a more attractive prospect than spending long hours with struggling franchisees, or worse, shuttering failing ones as the U.S. economy continues to sputter.

When your grandfather is one of the co-founders of a successful franchise concept and system, it might seem natural for subsequent generations to be involved. But that wasn't always the case for Justin and Sally Haddock. "My grandfather, Jack Fulk, along with Richard Thomas, co-founded Bojangles'," says Justin. "My mother and father followed suit and they have been franchisees since 1980." In fact, his folks still operate 39 Bojangles' locations today.

There was a time when franchise site selection was as simple (not to mention as rudimentary and often random) as pushing pins in a map on a wall. Maybe they turned out to be good sites, maybe they didn't. But as technology continues to evolve and the tools are recalibrated to further refine the site selection process, the art is becoming a science.

"Franchising works by combining the drive and energy of the entrepreneur with the experience and expertise of the franchisor." This wonderfully concise description of franchising comes courtesy of a franchisor from Down Under: Jesters Franchising, purveyor of Jesters Jaffle Pies (all-natural meat, vegetable, and fruit pies) with 50 units in New Zealand and Australia.

The Area Developer 2008 Multi-Unit Franchise Conference in Scottsdale earlier this year offered a vibrant kaleidoscope of franchise veterans gathered to share best practices. During the conference I had several discussions with franchisors that had used area representatives and area developers as an expansion strategy with varying degrees of success.

When Pat Williamson was a sophomore at the University of Georgia in 1969, he was home from school one weekend and heard about a summer job opportunity. A Frito-Lay route man stocking the shelves in Williamson's father's retail store had asked if there were any kids looking for a summer job. Williamson's grandfather overheard the request and passed along the info to young Pat.

During the past 20 years, we have witnessed a generation of multiunit franchise operators grow up. Today there are more than 40,000 of them.

Every year thousands of franchise companies pour money and other precious resources into lead generation and sales with varying degrees of success. But few rise to the top.

In franchising, no one has to be reminded of the importance of making deals and signing fabulous new franchisees. But unless you actually open new units, inking the deal is only part of the story. This important distinction--between units sold and units opened--led us to examine six franchises that grew by more than 100 units between 2005 and 2006 and ask them how they did it.

Bill Dalton owned eight Grease Monkey franchises in the Seattle metro area. Today he owns one--a five-month-old, state-of-the-art facility in his home of Montgomery, Texas.

The former Soviet Union was a frightening frontier for expanding businesses in the early- to mid-1990s. The former communist country was experiencing growing pains as it left behind decades of closed existence and began embracing a new economy built around more of a free market-based environment. And it was just this setting that Jake Weinstock and Paul Kuebler dived into headfirst.

"I don't care about numbers and notes on a piece of paper; it only matters if you actually close the sale."

Conventional wisdom would say the best franchise operators are individuals with past business experience - or even better, previous franchising experience. But that may not be the case any longer. A youth movement is under way in the world of multiunit franchising.

A really hard job for any franchise company's tech department is coordinating all the different systems in franchisee locations. As everyone gets more and more dependent on standardized machines and programs, it's easy to think that the basics are taken care of.

A number of franchises now reaching a middle stage of life are facing issues they never anticipated when they first started selling franchises.

The Little Caesars Pizza story is… well, quite a story. Founded by Mike and Marian Ilitch, first-generation Americans of Macedonian descent, the company is approaching its 50th anniversary. Still family owned and operated, Little Caesar Enterprises, Inc. has grown prodigiously since its first store opening in 1959 in Garden City, Mich.

Building a portfolio. Growing beyond one unit. Expanding outside a single brand.

On Wall Street, smart investors will tell you that diversification is a critical part of any portfolio. It's an approach that can shelter investors from significant losses by spreading the risk. It's also a good way to ensure consistent dividends. And diversification is a strategy that is being adopted and becoming more and more popular among multi-unit franchise operators.

If it's true that you learn from your mistakes, James Young is wise beyond his years. Celebrating his third anniversary with Spring-Green Lawn Care and approaching his first as its president, Young, 34, is hoping the steep angle of his learning curve is finally leveling off.

Mobile Attic is on top these days, literally and figuratively. The Elba, Ala.-based firm is the winner of this year's Franchise Update Store Redesign contest. This entitles the five-year-old company to a redesign by Total Resource Group of Lincolnwood, Ill. We'll show you the new design when it's done.

As more franchise brands push outward from their local or regional base seeking growth on the national stage, choosing the right city or designated market area (DMA) is always a critical factor in success.

Franchising is founded on the concept of replicating success at the unit level. But Mary Rogers is taking that premise one better: she's replicating success at the franchisor level.