Entrepreneur: PR Nightmares: How Franchises Face Them

By: Tracy Stapp

You remember that TV theme song from the 80's, "You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have, the facts of... franchising"? Okay, so maybe that's not exactly how it went. But it does ring true. One of the big selling points of joining a franchise is that you get to reap the benefits of a well-known brand with a built-in reputation.

Unfortunately, the corollary to that is that if something happens to hurt that reputation--fairly or not--you reap the damages, too. Remember the woman who "found" part of a finger in her chili at a Wendy's in San Jose? Even though it was soon proven that she had planted the offending digit, the damage was already done. Wendy's stores across the country suffered an average 2-2.5% decrease in sales, with franchises in the Bay Area especially hard hit. (more)