Scottish Franchise Week Celebrations Look to Create Many More Scottish Franchising Businesses

Scotland’s franchising sector has successfully weathered the recession and is looking to provide the economy with a major business and employment boost as more and more people look either to franchise their existing businesses or to buy into one of Scotland’s 450 different franchising brands.

Encouragement for individuals and businesses to get into franchising comes as the sector prepares for Scottish Franchise Week 2012, the most important date in the Scottish franchising calendar, sponsored by Lloyds TSB Commercial and supported by Platinum Wave and whichfranchise.com. The week will include a series of events to be hosted between 30th April and 4th May.

The showcase for the industry, organised by the British Franchise Association, will highlight the sector's commercial impact on the Scottish economy, with its 450 franchising brands, 2400 individual franchisee businesses and 36,000 stable jobs. Turnover from these businesses currently amounts to £800 million.

Growth has been significant: just 20 years ago, Scotland hosted 183 franchise brands through 490 locally-owned franchisee businesses. At this point it was employing 12,600 people and generating turnover of £120 million.

Scottish Franchise Week 2012 will celebrate another successful year for franchising in Scotland, which is one of the most vibrant franchise markets in the UK and a major contributor to the Scottish economy. A further aim is to provide a focus for the thousands of Scots who tell opinion pollsters they would like to run their own businesses.

Brian Smart, Director General of the BFA, said: “Franchising has allowed the growth of entrepreneurial talent in Scotland, creating an environment in which businesses can expand much faster, but also much more sustainably, than would otherwise have been possible in a period of economic challenges.

“The sector has also given more people the opportunity of running their own business as franchisees, supported by a proven business model and with logistical and administrative backing from the parent franchisor.”

Richard Holden, Head of Franchising at Lloyds TSB Commercial, said: “Franchising has proven to be a highly effective development strategy for business owners in Scotland over many years and the security gained by being part of an established brand with a tried and tested business model is invaluable. We are proud to sponsor Scottish Franchise Week again this year which celebrates the success of franchising in the country and which in turn helps economic growth and job creation.”

One of the main events of the week is the Scottish Franchise Breakfast, which will be attended by 300 people and is taking place on May 3 at the Hilton Hotel in Glasgow, where the keynote speaker is the ex-Olympic athlete Roger Black.

There will also be presentations from David Weir, MD of the Scottish arm of énergie Group, a fast-growing fitness club franchise and from Hugh Davidson, who has been running his Water Babies franchise for nine years teaching over 1200 little ones a week to swim from his operations in Glasgow and Edinburgh.