I cant be at 50 places at once... Franchising

[menetworkjadaltd]

I am a one man band, but I have many demands to be at many places at the same time

Is franchinsing the best way to handle this? (the business model is very easily franchisable)

 

[kulture]

You are going to give us a lot more details than that to even begin to answer the question.

 

[MOIC]

Many factors involved . . . .

Is it an established profit making business?

Who are your competitors?

How easy is it for someone to copy your business model?

What's your USP?

Are the products used easily scalable?

Do you have any patents for your products?

. . . . . and the list goes on and on.

I would suggest visiting some of the franchise exhibitions, as well as perhaps employing staff to open 2 or 3 branches to see how additional outlets work.

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Are you taking advantage of the tools and tech available to make life easier ?
Ie voip ,virtual reception etc.
Can you have sub contractor in other parts of the country
Franchising mat not be the answer

 

[kulture]

Ever thought of employing someone?

 

[fisicx]

What is it you do?

 

[WaveJumper]

Obviously too much networking............ but as above more detail required

 

[Mark T Jones]

Franchising is mostly about brand and process - and ideally, consumables

Is your brand strong enough?

Are your processes consistent, but sufficiently unique that they can't just be copied?

Are there recurring sales?

 

[PugwashEQ]

If you are a one-man band then there isn't a hope in hell that you have the systems in place to run a franchise. About 20 years ago we were a franchisee in one business and a franchisor in a totally different business model.

Selling franchises is hard hard work- it's great if people just "buy" them, but you need a track record, you need a system in place to actually enable them to deliver you"value add"- solely a brand isn't enough.

If you aren't profitable to employ someone to take the work off you then that indicates that the franchise won't be profitable enough for you as a franchisor- because typically a franchisor will take 10% of a small business's revenue (once you factor in ALL costs).

To be really viable as a franchise you need to make sure that your idea is:

• Profitable- to give you and the franchisee a good margin (don't forget you are competing with other franchise networks)
• Repeatable- you have to be able to prove the work can be done the same time and time again
• Teachable- you need to be able to teach a complete amateur who has no skills whatsoever if your field
• Unique! Ie has an underlying reason that makes the business idea sell to end-users (ie can't just be in the right territory, or a cheap price- it has to have something genuinely unique)
• Defensible- you need to ensure you can't be copied easily (or else your franchises just set up in competition instead! Typically this needs IP of some sort)
• Codified: ie you need to have systems that can be transferred to other people that allow the business to run almost on a stand-alone basis.
• Marketable- yo need to have a great track record, a management team who can keep the business going whilst you're selling and training franchisees, and you need at least regional if not national marketing coverage.

You need to have all of the above at least mostly addressed otherwise you will spend a LOT of money and even MORE time to end in failure (go one, ask me how i know........ I've still got the scars!)