Buy a Franchise or Start Your Own Restaurant?

There are a number of pros and cons with franchising a restaurant. Considering these will help you decide if it fits with your goals.

Pros

1. If you get the right franchise in the right place, it can be a lucrative opportunity.

2. You don't have to come up with your own brand name and establish yourself from scratch. In most cases, you're relying on the franchise name to have a certain amount of awareness and a quality product that people know and want in your area.

3. There is help and training available to get you up and running. Most franchises will train you to make their product and teach you how to run one of their units.

4. There is marketing support already in place. You will have to pay for it, but with the big name franchises, there is advertising and promotional support.

Cons

1. The franchise determines how much freedom you have, if any, with the menu and design of the restaurant.

2. The best franchises and franchise locations, especially McDonalds, are often very expensive and hard to obtain.

3. You will owe franchise fees for everything from paying for TV advertising to paying part of your sales to the home office.

4. Franchises have a lot of rules that you must follow to avoid getting fined or even losing your franchise rights. Some franchises are better than others at providing support for their franchisees. Do your homework. Talk to franchise owners before you buy. Make sure you agree with the philosophy of the franchise owners before you invest in their vision.

If you decide to forgo the franchise route, you'll have a lot more freedom, but your product will be more of an unknown. You'll have a lot more to do, and your task will be that much more daunting, yet potentially more exciting.