Franchising Dreams

Franchises have become an ever-present feature of American life, both in our landscapes and our economics. Peter M. Birkeland worked for three years in the front-line operations of franchise units for three companies, met with CEOs and executives, and attended countless trade shows, seminars, and expositions. Through this extensive fieldwork Birkeland not only discovered what makes franchisees succeed or fail, he uncovered the difficulties in running a business according to someone else's system and values. Bearing witness to a market flooded with fierce competitors and dependent on the inscrutable whims of consumers, he revealed the numerous challenges that franchisees face in making their businesses succeed. Book jacket.

"Johnson astutely reveals that franchises are not Borg-like assimilation machines, but, rather, complicated ecosystems within which creative workers strive to create compelling 'shared worlds.' This finely researched, breakthrough book is a must-read for anyone seeking a sophisticated understanding of the contemporary media industry." —Heather Hendershot, author of What's Fair on the Air?: Cold War Right-Wing Broadcasting and the Public Interest While immediately recognizable throughout the U.S. and many other countries, media mainstays like X-Men, Star Trek, and Transformers achieved such familiarity through constant reincarnation. In each case, the initial success of a single product led to a long-term embrace of media franchising—a dynamic process in which media workers from different industrial positions shared in and reproduced familiar cultureacross television, film, comics, games, and merchandising. In Media Franchising, Derek Johnson examines the corporate culture behind these production practices, as well as the collaborative and creative efforts involved in conceiving, sustaining, and sharing intellectual properties in media work worlds. Challenging connotations of homogeneity, Johnson shows how the cultural and industrial logic of franchising has encouraged media industries to reimagine creativity as an opportunity for exchange among producers, licensees, and evenconsumers. Drawing on case studies and interviews with media producers, he reveals the meaningful identities, cultural hierarchies, and struggles for distinction that accompany collaboration within these production networks. Media Franchising provides a nuanced portrait of the collaborative cultural production embedded in both the media industries and our own daily lives.

An Introduction to Franchising is a concise yet comprehensive guide to the world of franchising. Looking at the field from the perspectives of the franchisor and the franchisee, the book offers a good balance between the theories behind good franchising practise, and hands-on practical guidance. Applied theory is evident in the broad range of real-life case studies included in the book. With many of the world's leading companies operating franchise models, this book will offer readers a genuine insight into the potential advantages and disadvantages of franchising. The book also examines the financial, legal and ethical implications of franchising, whilst anticipating future concerns and challenges for the franchising model. An Introduction to Franchising is an essential guide for all students of franchising, entrepreneurship and marketing. It is also a must-read for anyone wishing to start their own franchise business.

Franchising is one of the major engines of business expansion and job creation globally. The Handbook of Research on Franchising offers new insights into entrepreneurial behavior, organizational forms, regulation, internationalization, and other contemporary issues relating to this dynamic business strategy. The Handbook challenges both practitioners and scholars to give attention to the conclusions of scholarly research on this business model. Practitioners can benefit from the results of high quality scientific research, and scholars can find exciting opportunities for contributing to the body of knowledge of a subject that has not received sufficient attention in educational institutions.

This book describes in much detail both how and why franchising works. It also analyses the economic tensions that contribute to conflict in the franchisor-frnachisee relationship. The treatment includes a great deal of empirical evidence on franchising, its importance in various segments of the economy, the terms of franchise contracts, and what we know about how all these have evolved over time, especially in the U.S. market. A good many myths are dispelled in the process. The economic analysis of the franchisor-franchisee relationship begins with the observation that for franchisors, franchising is a contractual alternative to vertical integration. Subsequently, the tensions that arise between a franchisor and its franchisees, who in fact are owners of independent businesses, are examined in turn. In particular the authors discuss issues related to product quality control, tying arrangements, pricing, location and territories, advertising, and termination and renewals.

From side-hustlers to start-ups, freelancers to small business owners, Americans have a special affinity for people who make it on their own. But the dream has a dark side. “One day I’ll work for myself.” Perhaps you’ve heard some version of that phrase from friends, colleagues, family members—perhaps you’ve said it yourself. If so, you’re not alone. The spirit of entrepreneurship runs deep in American culture and history, in the films we watch and the books we read, in our political rhetoric, and in the music piping through our speakers. What makes the dream of self-employment so alluring, so pervasive in today’s world? Benjamin C. Waterhouse offers a provocative argument: the modern cult of the hustle is a direct consequence of economic failures—bad jobs, stagnant wages, and inequality—since the 1970s. With original research, Waterhouse traces a new narrative history of business in America, populated with vivid characters—from the activists, academics, and work-from-home gurus who hailed business ownership as our economic salvation to the upstarts who took the plunge. We meet, among others, a consultant who quits his job and launches a wildly popular beer company, a department store saleswoman who founds a plus-size bra business on the Internet, and an Indian immigrant in Texas who flees the corporate world to open a motel. Some flourish; some squeak by. Some fail. As Waterhouse shows, the go-it-alone movement that began in the 1970s laid the political and cultural groundwork for today’s gig economy and its ethos: everyone should be their own boss. While some people find success in that world, countless others are left bouncing from gig to gig—exploited, underpaid, or conned by get-rich-quick scams. And our politics doesn’t know how to respond. Accessible, fast-paced, and eye-opening, One Day I’ll Work for Myself offers a fresh, insightful cultural history of the U.S. economy from the perspective of the people within it, asking urgent questions about why we’re clinging to old strategies for progress—and at what cost.

In America, a new franchise outlet opens every eight minutes-a rate that is accelerating both here and worldwide-yet to date, no publication has provided more than a cursory glimpse into the owners' experiences. The Franchise Ratings Guide is a deeper examination, revealing an industry in which deceit is common and a full 30% of franchise owners regret their purchase. The Franchise Ratings Guide provides essential and thorough advice on pre-purchase steps, in-depth, actual owner insight from more than 3,000 franchise owners, and reference data on each company surveyed, including contact, investment, and royalty information. It's got all the information you need to make an informed investment decision.