Posted on 06 February 2014. Legal aspects of franchising ranging from disclosure issues to the pitfalls of social media will be dealt with by eight lawyers specialising in the sector at a British Franchise Association (BFA) legal seminar at the Hilton Warwick on February 27. The speakers with their topics, in programme order, will be: Nina Moran-Watson (NMW Legal/Franchise Consultancy Services) – What pre-contractual disclosures should be made to prospective franchisees? Stuart Hutson (Clyde & Co) – What clauses are implied into a franchise agreement (excluding good faith)? John Pratt (Hamilton Pratt) – Do franchisors have to act in good faith to their franchisees? Nicola Broadhurst and Gustaf Duhs (Stevens...

Posted on 03 February 2014. Liverpool Football Club (LFC) has announced a multi-year partnership with the Dunkin’ Brands group, the parent company of Baskin-Robbins and Dunkin’ Donuts. Under the agreement Baskin-Robbins will become the official provider of ice cream to the club and Dunkin’ Donuts the official bakery partner and supplier of coffee and tea. Billy Hogan, Liverpool’s chief commercial officer said: “We are delighted to be joining forces with Dunkin’ Brands, one of the world’s most iconic names and we welcome both to the LFC family.” Dunkin’ Brands has also announced that the group is planning to open between 685 – 800 new stores worldwide in 2014. The company...

This month, New Horizons have released a new version of their multi award-winning Mentored Learning programme. ML 3.0 allows for remote delivery of mentored training for students. This is exciting news for New Horizons as it means that franchisees can provide their industry leading services without even having to be in the same room as their clients.  This improved remote learning offering opens up a much wider client demographic for franchisees and ensures New Horizons maintain a leading position worldwide. A major advantage to franchisees, these training methods are not only preferred by customers, but also strategically designed to decrease costs and increase margins, vital in today’s economic climate. In...

  Janis Anderson of Caremark, the domiciliary care provider, has been crowned winner of the British Franchise Association (BFA)/HSBC Franchisee of the Year Awards 2013, supported by Express Newspapers.Also named Female Franchisee of the Year, Anderson impressed the judges for delivering a high quality service for customers while propelling her business forward. Anderson said: “It’s brilliant to be recognised for all the hard work which contributes towards Caremark’s success, especially at such prestigious awards. I became a Caremark franchisee at a challenging time when cuts were being introduced but this spurred me on to drive the business forward and we have since grown from strength to strength. “At Caremark we...

   As a banker the only real way you can assess how a business is performing is by being provided with regular, up-to-date and meaningful management information, reports Dave Williams, director of franchising at RBS. However, many businesses struggle to provide enough detail to enable a thorough assessment. One can understand to some extent why an independent business, with often limited resources, may not have this information, but franchises should be in a much stronger position being cloned businesses, with benchmarking against the rest of the network assumed as part and parcel of the package offered by the franchisor. The power to insist on the provision of financial information is...