DESTINY

How can buying a franchise change your life and help you achieve your goals?

What are you looking for out of life? More control, more security, more money? Are you looking to provide a better future for your family, or a better lifestyle? Are you looking to change what you do or where you live?

If so, you’re not alone. A survey of visitors to our website reveals that the top three reasons people look at buying a franchise are:

• Greater income and wealth-building potential

• Better life balance

• More security and stability

Other reasons given include: more security and stability; achieving a personal challenge; making a career change; having greater control; building something to pass on to the children; and more flexibility.

If you choose well, buying a franchise can significantly increase the chances of getting what you want out of owning your own business – and significantly reduce the risks of self-employment, too. It also makes it easier to raise the finance, because banks are often more willing to lend to people buying into a franchise with a proven brand and systems than they are to independent start-ups.

That’s why buying a franchise can help you change your destiny. Our cover star, Nick James of Jani-King, which is the newly-crowned Westpac Supreme Franchise System of the Year, describes their goal as ‘Changing lives, one business at a time.’ You can read more about the Awards on page 24, and more about Jani-King on page 32 – but first, let’s look at why franchising works for so many different people in so many different types of business.

Ready to go

When you buy a franchise, you’re buying a ready-made business format that someone else has researched and developed for you. You may be opening your own business in a brand-new location, but all the product design, service processes, management systems and profitability studies have been carried out already. It’s still up to your own efforts to make it successful, but someone else has already proved that it can succeed if you follow the system.

If you’ve never worked for yourself before, you won’t believe how hard running your own business will seem at first. But if you buy a franchise, because of the guidance you receive from an experienced franchisor, your own hard work will always be directed to the right areas. That saves your time, effort and money from being wasted on trying things the franchisor has already discovered don’t work.

Training

When you buy a franchise, a good franchisor will ensure that you are fully trained in every aspect of running your business – not only using the equipment but managing people and cashflow, creating your customer database, purchasing, promoting the business, and lots of other things.

In many cases, this will extend to setting up your accounts on a computerised system using a standard template (something that can save you a lot of time) and setting measurable and achievable goals for your business using Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s). No-one expects to be a winner straight away, but by sharing and comparing statistics from other franchisees in the same group, you can see how to improve your performance and stay on track as you grow.

In addition to this, you should get a detailed operations manual to help you apply the systems and processes you’ll need to run your business efficiently and profitably.

Support

Franchising, properly done, is a ‘partnership’ between franchisee and franchisor: the franchisor makes his or her income from the success of your business, so it’s in their interests to help you make the most of your territory. Consequently, you should get a level of support which the independent businessperson can only dream of.

This starts with the selection process. Good franchisors only want to appoint people who they think will succeed, so just by being offered the franchise you should be confident you possess the necessary qualities. The tougher the selection process, the better for you – no matter how it feels at the time.

Equally important is the continuing support. A franchisor should have people experienced in every aspect of your business who can answer any questions you have on a day-to-day basis. In addition to this, they have a monitoring role, helping you to maximise your performance in such areas as production costs, sales, promotion, staff recruitment and so on, and providing additional training or advice as required.

Many franchisors also carry out some management functions on behalf of their franchisees such as making customer bookings, quoting and even invoicing or credit control. These can be invaluable – you can spend the time saved on doing the work that you actually get paid for.

Power behind you

One of the major benefits of being part of a franchise is the buying power you have as part of the group. If you owned an independent café, you’d pay the going rate for your coffee, cups and food supplies. But if you’re part of a chain of 20 franchised cafés, you’ll get a substantial discount –and someone else will be doing the negotiating for you.

In the same way, if you buy a piece of equipment recommended by the franchise, or services such as insurance, couriers or communications, you should get them cheaper than an independent operator. Some items may even be unique to your franchise. You’ll have someone on your side when it comes to dealing with landlords, too. These benefits could more than make up the ongoing franchise fee you pay, as well as gaining you an edge over your competitors, or improving your bottom-line profit.

Another advantage is that a manufacturer is a lot less likely to let a franchise down on quality or delivery, too – and might help fund special promotions because of your importance to them.

Off the line faster

You’ll only open your business once, but your franchisor will have helped people do it plenty of times. That means that everything should be smoother for you – service and quality should be better, wastage lower, and your business should be known and well-promoted right from the start. In turn, that means reaching profitability faster, which is good news for you and your bank manager.

Of course you’ll still have to work at it to stay ahead, put in the hours and the effort, be prepared to get on the phone and follow up online contacts or go out and meet new people, but even here the franchisor will have been able to help you prepare what to say and how to organise your time. And you are likely to have one of the franchisor’s trained team come along and help you for the first few days or weeks to ensure that you feel comfortable with the business and, crucially, build a good reputation with your new customers right from the start.

Some franchises, especially in service businesses, will even provide you with your first customers or contracts.

Ready-made reputation

An independent business starting up has to create a name and a reputation for itself – often a long, slow and expensive process. In comparison, an established name is probably the most visible part of a franchise operation and gives new franchisees a head start.

Part of a team

One of the hardest things about running your own business is that sometimes you feel very much on your own. Where do you go to when you want to chew over problems, or to talk over a new opportunity, or to get information on a new piece of equipment?

With a franchise, you have a choice. There’s a franchisor on the other end of the phone or the email whenever you need specific advice. You have other franchisees who are running into exactly the same sort of issues as you on a regular basis, and some of them are certain to become good friends – the sort of friends you can ring up and let off steam to occasionally. And then there will be field visits from franchisor staff, franchise meetings, conferences, newsletters, WhatsApp groups …

It all helps to reduce that feeling of isolation. as well as ensuring that you have the knowledge and the tools you need to create your own business.

It still means hard work

In the following pages of this magazine you’ll find plenty of examples of people who have invested in their own businesses. Some have just started, some are racing ahead, some are already winners.

What their stories show is that success in business, just like success in top level sport, requires hard work, commitment and a lot of learning. If you are looking at taking up a franchise, don’t forget that. Choose one that you believe you will enjoy working in, and be prepared to put your all into it.

Franchising cannot guarantee success, but through training, support, power and processes, it can stack the odds in your favour and empower you to achieve your goals – and change your destiny.