Real Estate

Starting at the bottom has become a cliché, but this one really is true. Actually, Brian Greenley started as a customer of Maaco-sort of.

Last November Captain D's Seafood announced seven new franchise agreements that will add at least 34 new franchise locations to the system. The largest was with Serve Holdings, led by veteran multi-unit operator Clarence A. Mitchell, III, who bought 20 company stores in the Memphis DMA. He will remodel all 20 with the company's new prototype and develop 15 new stores in the next 5 years. The deal grants Serve Holdings exclusive expansion rights in western Tennessee and three surrounding states (MO, KY, and IL).

Start spreading the news, you may just want to be a part of New York, New York. The Big Apple heads up the list of the top 20 cities in the U.S. for franchising, according to a new study by Franchise Update and FRANdata. This past summer, executives from Franchise Update commissioned researchers at FRANdata, an organization that collects extensive franchise industry information, to tabulate the rankings. FRANdata analysts drew upon more than 250,000 records of franchise locations out of its proprietary database to calculate the results. "We analyzed Direct Market Areas (DMAs) as outlined by Nielsen. We matched zip codes to DMAs and calculated the number of franchises within those DMAs," explained FRANdata data research analyst Brad Morick, who was responsible for the project. The use of the DMAs helped standardize the analysis and interpretation of the rankings. "To my knowledge, no one else has ever done a study like ours," continued Morick. "Since we collect UFOCs from franchises across the country, we know all of their locations and could easily do a cross match. "

Multi-unit, multi-brand, co-branding, area development--you've seen these defined, and they are distinct entities. Most multi-unit franchisees start with a few, and quickly grow one brand, then add another, and often enter into an area franchise agreement.