What Franchise Issue 21.1

ENHANCING REPUTATION A large award also can help you raise your reputation in your own industry, as Aaron Davis, network development manager at Signs Express who won the 2024 Business Transformation Award, said: “Winning this award has really elevated our brand credibility – particularly within the franchising and signage industries, plus the response from our clients and network has been hugely positive.” ADDING CREDIBILITY Sarah Cressall OBE, founder of The Creation Station, who won the 2024 Lifestyle Brand Award said: “Winning boosted our credibility, opened new doors, and gave our whole network a real lift in value and recognition. It clearly evidenced our leadership in the sector and provided strong marketing positioning for us, as a trusted provider of a supportive, professional and dynamic brand.” GOOD LUCK TO ALL PipWilkins, CEO of the BFA said: “Everyone at the BFA is so grateful to all the entrants, those who made it to the finals and to those who didn’t. We are hugely aware of howmuch work goes into entering, with many brands spending weeks honing their entries, and we thank them enormously for their efforts. It is our absolute pleasure running the awards each year, supported as we are by our generous sponsors HSBC UK, giving us the opportunity not only to recognise the efforts of those in our industry, but also to share their success with the rest of the UK. I’d like to thank them all for upholding our standards of ethical franchising, for giving so many people the opportunity to ‘discover their tomorrow’ through business format franchising and for making the British franchising sector so widely respected throughout Europe and the world.” Gillian Morris, UK Head of Franchise at sponsor HSBC UK, concluded: “My warmest congratulations to all the finalists in this year’s awards. It’s certainly not an easy task but shortlisting the entries and choosing the finalists is one of the highlights of my year. As ever, there are some brilliant businesses amongst this year’s entrants. They really do represent the best of British franchising, and I look forward to seeing them all at the awards ceremony in November.” Full details of all the finalists are available at https://www.thebfa.org/bfa-hsbc-uk-british- franchise-awards/ and via the BFA’s Best In Franchising campaign, which runs across all social channels fromMonday 6th October 2025. The 36th annual BFA HSBC UK British Franchise Awards will bring together the very best of the UK franchise industry on the 6th November 2025 for an unforgettable evening of celebration at the Telford International Centre, following on from the BFA’s annual conference. Rise of the multi-brand owner A new breed of franchisee is emerging in the 2020s – the multi-brand, multi-unit owner. These savvy entrepreneurs have identified that if owning one franchise territory or brand works, then two, three, or more works even better. Multi-unit franchisees see the growth potential of owning many territories, using economies of scale to make their businesses highly profitable. They don’t try to change the model (although they often work very closely with the franchisor to enhance or improve it), but they simply repeat their success, over and over again. Franchisors often set up exclusive working groups with these franchisees to support themwith their accelerated business growth. Likewise, multi-brand franchisees have realised that they, and their teams, have expertise in following a franchise model, so why not try doing the same with a different brand or sector? It is not unusual for a multi-brand franchisee to expand from domiciliary care into, say, coffee shops – and make a great success of businesses in both sectors. Usually, they will have a well-established head office, highly skilled at fulfilling all the requirements of running a franchise, so adding one more into the mix isn’t such a huge leap. “Winning boosted our credibility, opened new doors, and gave our whole network a real lift in value and recognition. It clearly evidenced our leadership in the sector and provided strong marketing positioning for us” 54 WHAT FRANCHISE Issue 21.1 Behind the Brand | PARTNER CONTENT