EXPERT ADVICE
What do Women Want in Franchising? by Marilyn Imparato, Consultant, The Franchise Consulting Company What do women want in Franchising? Intriguing question, isn’t it? I think you will be very surprised to hear the answer to this. Believe it or not, there is not one single sector or industry that stands out. The reason for this is quite simplistic – every woman comes from a different socio-economic background, educational background, different profession, different passions and different goals for their personal and professional lives. Over the course of the last six and a half years I have helped women secure franchises in the fitness industry, technology industry, healthcare industry, manufacturing industry, education sector, home improvement industry, real estate industry and many other industries as well. What this has illustrated to me over the years is to ensure that I treat every single individual as just that, an individual, whether it is a male or female, couple, partners or family business venture. A key component to the future success in any business venture is to meet the individual’s priorities first and foremost. It is not just about how much money someone is going to make out of the Franchise. I’m not saying that
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profitability doesn’t matter, it’s just not always the biggest driving force in determining the best franchise for an individual. Consider this question… Would you rather make a lot of money and not enjoy what you do or would you rather follow your passions and motivations over lots of money? Difficult question to answer, isn’t it? The great thing is you really do not have to give up one over the other, you just need to find an optimal, realistic balance between passions and profits. I am a firm believer that passions will drive profits,
MARCH 2020 | WWW.FRANCHISEJOURNAL.COM
no matter what the business is! It may take you longer but the drive, determination, and positive energy will propel the profits far greater in the long run than running a business that you are not passionate about. One exception here, if you are well capitalized with the capability to hire an entire staff to run your entire operations, then profits over passion may be the route you choose. As long as the business makes sense for you to run either semi-absentee