Clay McGee was soon to graduate from Arizona State University with a degree in marketing when he realized that the corporate world wasn’t for him. He wanted to be his own boss and run a business, though he had little experience or cash.
Then it hit him: franchising.
“I pretty much knew I didn’t want to go and apply for jobs and fight against the rest of the working class and try to stand out above it,” Mr. McGee, 24, said. “So I started shopping for a franchise because I figured it would be a good opportunity for someone to hold my hand through the whole thing.”
Today he owns a 1-800-gotjunk? franchise in Springfield, Mo., that brought in about $120,000 last year and has four employees. And he plans to buy a second one in Branson.
It is hard to say if Mr. McGee signifies a growing group of graduates bypassing regular employment to become franchisees. The numbers are still a small piece of the overall franchising pie — only about half a percent, according to Eric Stites, founder and president of Franchise Business Review, a franchise market research firm in Kittery, Me.
Many college graduates who enter the franchising world do it with their parents’ money, specialists say, or at least use their parents as backups to secure bank loans.
But many franchise companies see these recent diploma recipients as a new frontier for their businesses and are aggressively marketing to this population, especially those companies with products and services that cater to a younger demographic, and employ young people, said Robert Justis, director of the International Franchise Forum and chairman of the Rucks Department of Management of the Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.
Driving interest among the college set, Mr. Justis added, is a growing disenchantment with corporate America. In addition, an increasing number of entrepreneurship courses at colleges is igniting interest among students to start their own businesses. He estimated franchising is now being taught on about 200 campuses in the United States.
Brian C. Scudamore, chief executive of the Vancouver-based 1-800-gotjunk?, says recent college graduates are “more malleable” than people in their 40s and 50s.
Franchisors want franchisees they can mold because the system has a structure of rules and concepts in place that franchisees usually must follow without deviation.
For Wing Zone, a chain of 100 Buffalo wing delivery stores, the college educated are franchisee candidates because they are typical wing customers, said Matt Friedman, who co-founded the company when he was at the University of Florida, Gainesville, in the early 1990s. He cooked wings with homemade sauces in his fraternity house kitchen with his partner, Adam Scott. “College markets have been our bread and butter,” Mr. Friedman said.
To pull in more franchisees, Wing Zone started a college tour this year.
Many late-night wing deliveries from Wing Zone were made to the dorm room of Adam Wyatt, a former student from the University of Kentucky who became a franchisee.
Mr. Wyatt said he loved the wings store concept so much he decided to leave 30 hours short of earning a degree in business management and bought a franchise in January 2006.
“I was watching my older friends come out of school and get an entry-level job — the job market is competitive,” he said. “I thought to myself, ‘I don’t want to start out in an entry-level sales job. I wanted to have more control.’ ”
He looked at a variety of options, including hair-cutting and liquor store chains, but decided on Wing Zone because he was familiar with the brand as a devoted customer.
The idea of entrepreneurship was captivating to Mr. Wyatt, whose mother (a teacher) and father (a vice president for a manufacturing company) had never owned a business. “It was a big step for all of us,” said Mr. Wyatt, seeing the venture as one he has embarked on for the whole family. Indeed, his parents helped him finance part of the $300,000 venture using savings and also vouching for a loan.
He now has 20 employees and $600,000 in annual revenue, and this year he turned a profit.
An allure for college graduates with little everyday business experience is that franchise companies offer a lot of hand-holding. As soon as Mr. Wyatt signed the franchise agreement, he went to the company’s headquarters in Atlanta and spent 14 days there working in a corporate store and taking classes. When he opened his store, Wing Zone sent two representatives to help him.
“I also have a guy up there I can call if I need to run anything by him,” he added.
While franchising may look like the perfect plan for young graduates who want to bypass the rough and tumble job market, it’s not for everyone. Steven A. Rosen, the chief executive of FranNet, a franchise consulting firm in Louisville, Ky., for one, believes college graduates should first get meaningful work experience before investing thousands in a franchise.
The profile of a successful franchisee, Mr. Rosen said, “is someone that can manage of crew of kids making $8 an hour.” While college graduates have good classroom experience, “that doesn’t prepare them to run a business.”
The biggest hurdle for younger franchisees is money, said Adam J. Siegelheim, a franchise lawyer based in Lawrenceville, N.J. “They need money to sustain losses during the first few months, or even years,” he said, adding that the most common group of new franchisees remains middle-aged workers who have been laid off and have severance packages to finance the effort.
Mr. McGee said he needed about $150,000 upfront to pay for the 1-800-gotjunk? franchise start-up fees and the trucks to run the hauling business. But at his age he had little credit history; he approached 11 banks before he was able to secure the loan he needed.
Even with the loan, he ended up having to sell his car the first year because he was not bringing in enough money. “I pictured myself having employees and playing golf, but I basically hauled junk for two years,” he said, adding, “if you don’t put in 90-hour weeks, you’re not going to succeed.”
Via-NYTimes
Monday, July 30, 2007
Selling Peanut Butter Sandwitchs He Become Rich
Joe Moffatt's favorite sandwich is The Hotshot: sun-dried tomato peanut butter, jalapeños, potato chips, cheddar, bacon and mayonnaise. The Hotshot, of course, is his own invention. And the place where he eats it is his own, too: a P.B. Loco cafe.
In February, Moffatt, 29, and his wife, Hollie, 30, opened their P.B. Loco franchise in Tupelo, Mississippi. "People think you're crazy for opening a store for just peanut butter," says Moffatt. But he was sold on the unique concept and thought others would be, too. He was right--he projects first-year sales of about $275,000.
Still, he admits that sometimes it's hard to overcome people's preconceptions about peanut butter. While plain, old peanut butter and jelly is available, P.B. Loco is all about creative concoctions made with gourmet peanut butter flavors, including Asian Curry Spice, European Cafe Mocha and Jungle Banana.
Part of Moffatt's challenge is that P.B. Loco started franchising in 2004, so it's hardly a household name. But being with a newer franchisor has its upside as well. "We're all still learning together," Moffatt says of the corporate office and its franchisees. The excitement for Moffatt is getting to experiment and help shape the franchise's future. While most other cafes are in malls, his is a stand-alone location. He has created a coffeehouse feel with leather couches and flat-screen TVs, and he offers gourmet coffees--an addition that other franchisees have adopted as well. His latest contribution? P.B. Loco is adding The Hotshot to its menu.
More at:http://www.pbloco.com/
Via-Entr
In February, Moffatt, 29, and his wife, Hollie, 30, opened their P.B. Loco franchise in Tupelo, Mississippi. "People think you're crazy for opening a store for just peanut butter," says Moffatt. But he was sold on the unique concept and thought others would be, too. He was right--he projects first-year sales of about $275,000.
Still, he admits that sometimes it's hard to overcome people's preconceptions about peanut butter. While plain, old peanut butter and jelly is available, P.B. Loco is all about creative concoctions made with gourmet peanut butter flavors, including Asian Curry Spice, European Cafe Mocha and Jungle Banana.
Part of Moffatt's challenge is that P.B. Loco started franchising in 2004, so it's hardly a household name. But being with a newer franchisor has its upside as well. "We're all still learning together," Moffatt says of the corporate office and its franchisees. The excitement for Moffatt is getting to experiment and help shape the franchise's future. While most other cafes are in malls, his is a stand-alone location. He has created a coffeehouse feel with leather couches and flat-screen TVs, and he offers gourmet coffees--an addition that other franchisees have adopted as well. His latest contribution? P.B. Loco is adding The Hotshot to its menu.
More at:http://www.pbloco.com/
Via-Entr
How To Guide Your Business
Directed to assisting small businesses with answers they need.It is guide for small business where they can get lot of information and guidance how to run small business.
more at:http://www.work.com/
more at:http://www.work.com/
Gazhoo is a new marketplace for the buying and selling of documents of all sorts
Gazhoo is a new marketplace for the buying and selling of documents of all sorts. The content on the site is namely to offer alternatives to companies that provide documents for download with high premium costs, such as legal document sites.
The main purpose of gazhoo is to provide a place for content creators to sell their documents. You’ll find a number business-oriented documents, such as time-reporting sheets and legal documents, as well as reports and essays. Users can upload their documents and name their price for documents to be sold via Paypal. Users can offer their content for free as well. Those that would like to purchase a document can view 50% of the content without downloading it in its entirety. Gazhoo uses Flash Paper to display uploaded documents.
The site doens’t act as a community, so you won’t be able to search by user or view their profile in order to see all of the documents they’ve provided to gazhoo. Although most would liken gazhoo to a site like Scribd, it lacks many of the social interaction features that Scribd has, such as comments. There’s also no option to download a free document directly–you must first register as a gazhoo member and place the item in your cart.
more at:http://www.gazhoo.com/
The main purpose of gazhoo is to provide a place for content creators to sell their documents. You’ll find a number business-oriented documents, such as time-reporting sheets and legal documents, as well as reports and essays. Users can upload their documents and name their price for documents to be sold via Paypal. Users can offer their content for free as well. Those that would like to purchase a document can view 50% of the content without downloading it in its entirety. Gazhoo uses Flash Paper to display uploaded documents.
The site doens’t act as a community, so you won’t be able to search by user or view their profile in order to see all of the documents they’ve provided to gazhoo. Although most would liken gazhoo to a site like Scribd, it lacks many of the social interaction features that Scribd has, such as comments. There’s also no option to download a free document directly–you must first register as a gazhoo member and place the item in your cart.
more at:http://www.gazhoo.com/
Referral Key helps you generate and track sales leads with professionals you know and trust and allows you to expand your business network
ReferralKey.com, a site that helps you exchange referrals with professionals you know and trust. Sign up is free. Use Referral Key to generate sales leads and to strengthen and expand your business network. The site provides you with detailed reporting tools to track and analyze your referral partnerships and customize your program for maximum effectiveness. If you are a professional looking for new clients, you can list your business on Referral Key.
Referral Key helps you generate and track sales leads with professionals you know and trust and allows you to expand your business network to establish new referral relationships. Sign up is free and it takes just a few minutes to set up your referral network and begin exchanging referrals. When you join, you’ll send invitations to business associates you know asking them if they would like to exchange referrals with you. The people you choose are not subject to any fees, so they have nothing to loose by accepting your invitations. The referrals you receive are qualified, which means your trusted associates have identified clients who need the services you provide. Referrals are immediately emailed to you so you can follow up on the leads promptly to address the needs of the person being referred and hopefully turn the referral into a sale. Referral Key also tracks the effectiveness of your referral partnerships to ensure leads are reciprocal and your relationships are mutually beneficial.
More at:http://www.referralkey.com/
Referral Key helps you generate and track sales leads with professionals you know and trust and allows you to expand your business network to establish new referral relationships. Sign up is free and it takes just a few minutes to set up your referral network and begin exchanging referrals. When you join, you’ll send invitations to business associates you know asking them if they would like to exchange referrals with you. The people you choose are not subject to any fees, so they have nothing to loose by accepting your invitations. The referrals you receive are qualified, which means your trusted associates have identified clients who need the services you provide. Referrals are immediately emailed to you so you can follow up on the leads promptly to address the needs of the person being referred and hopefully turn the referral into a sale. Referral Key also tracks the effectiveness of your referral partnerships to ensure leads are reciprocal and your relationships are mutually beneficial.
More at:http://www.referralkey.com/
for Creating Free Presentaions And Demos
Webinaria can help bring your content to life. Businesses that are able to capture and record live interactions with web-based content are able to more effectively train and educate employees and customers. Webinaria aims to provide a more animated and theatrical presentation of business communications
Webinaria.con record your desktop screen movements, you can also add some voice narration and Webcam videos, and upload all of them to the web in Flash format for free. For instance, you want to do a presentation of how a certain software works, but your clients are abroad. So maybe your best option will be a video presentation. Thought they were hard to do? Forget about that: using your microphone and your webcam, quickly start recording your desktop presentation, demo or screencast. Modify the capture area from your active window to a customized area, adjust your hardware or recording quality, and edit the audio and webcam properties frame by frame. Convert from a video file (AVI, for example) to a Flash Video (FLV) using the latest compression technology, and upload everything to their Flash player. With Webinaria, you can also host your stuff there (for free0.
more at:http://www.webinaria.com/
Webinaria.con record your desktop screen movements, you can also add some voice narration and Webcam videos, and upload all of them to the web in Flash format for free. For instance, you want to do a presentation of how a certain software works, but your clients are abroad. So maybe your best option will be a video presentation. Thought they were hard to do? Forget about that: using your microphone and your webcam, quickly start recording your desktop presentation, demo or screencast. Modify the capture area from your active window to a customized area, adjust your hardware or recording quality, and edit the audio and webcam properties frame by frame. Convert from a video file (AVI, for example) to a Flash Video (FLV) using the latest compression technology, and upload everything to their Flash player. With Webinaria, you can also host your stuff there (for free0.
more at:http://www.webinaria.com/
Earn While You Travel
BackPackersJobSearch allows backpackers to find a job in the place they are wishing to travel to. This is very useful both for backpackers and for employers. While backpackers gain money to continue their trip, employers have access to a person that can assist them in business. Unluckily this service is only working in New Zealand and Australia. Another great feature of this website is that it is free for travelers to register. So backpackers, what are you waiting for? Check out this website, you might find it very useful.
Backpacking industry is booming beyond belief, figures released on footprintsdownunder.com show a gain BACKPACKER INDUSTRY BOOMS VISAS are up 15% an increase of 102,966 over last year They all need work and BJS is a first for Oz then the world .
More at:http://www.backpackersjobsearch.com/
Backpacking industry is booming beyond belief, figures released on footprintsdownunder.com show a gain BACKPACKER INDUSTRY BOOMS VISAS are up 15% an increase of 102,966 over last year They all need work and BJS is a first for Oz then the world .
More at:http://www.backpackersjobsearch.com/
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