Community Franchising - Good Governance?

In January 2011, Shaftesbury Partnership (www.shaftesburypartnership.org) published a report[1] on social franchising looking at lessons to learn from commercial franchising:

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“Some of the key characteristics of social franchising (are):
• The model must be Proven, and
• Scalable.
• High Levels of Involvement,
• Cost, and
• Risk on the part of the franchising  organisation, necessitating
• High levels of Control”

Commercial franchising is very well established in the UK:

“...there are 842 franchise systems with nearly 35,000 franchise units operating in the UK. In total, they employ almost half a million people and generate over £11 billion in revenues.”

Yet Social Franchising (secular or faith based) is not so well established:

“...the systematic replication of projects in the non-profit sector still remains the exception to the rule. This is understandable - many players in the so called third sector rightly see themselves as ‘social change agents’ – as an outlet for innovation. They prefer to focus their energies on the development of new approaches. Imitating those of others is considered as ‘not sexy’. The result is one pilot project after the other. Many prototypes but few replications.”

“Yet the benefits of Commercial Franchising are clear:
• Proven ‘Business’ Model
• Established Market
• Meets a Clear Demand for Products & Services
• New Product Development
• Initial Training
• Ongoing Support
• Economies of Scale
• Greater access to (bank) Finance
• The Safer Option - average failure rate of franchise units less than 5% each year since 2001
• Better Growth Prospects: much more likely to survive and grow more quickly.
• Proven Processes and Resources
• Greater Profitability: more efficient.”

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From the above information from the report, one can see that the benefits could be adapted for taking on a Community Franchise to:

• Proven Ministry Model
• Meets a Need in the Community
• Improvements Shared
• Training
• Ongoing Support
• Economies of Scale
• Able to Present Better Case for External Finance
• Less Risk
• Better Growth Prospects.
• Proven Processes and Resources
• Efficient

These benefits are very significant and one can argue from a Governance point of view that taking a Franchise should be the main strategy of churches rather than developing ‘your own thing’. ‘Take Not Make’ needs to become a key policy.

[1] SOCIAL FRANCHISING: SCALING UP FOR SUCCESS Simon McNeill Ritchie with Patrick Shine and Antony Hawkins