According to a survey conducted by Franchise Business Review, a market-research company in Portsmouth, N.H. the owners of food franchises are less satisfied with their experience, on average, than people who run other types of franchises, plus food franchisees work relatively long hours and often don’t make all that much money, according to the survey, published in September, of more than 4,300 franchisees running about 100 different food-franchise brands.
Food franchisees earned an average of $82,000 in 2012, according to the survey, but that average masks wide disparities: 50% of the food operators surveyed said they earned less than $50,000, while 25% earned more than $100,000.
Restaurant operators also tend to work long hours: 68% of franchisees surveyed work 40 or more hours per week, 59% work evenings at least a couple of times a week, and 47% “almost always” work weekends (that compares to 35% of franchisees in all industries).
One franchisee quoted in the report said restaurant owners should expect to work 10- to 14-hour days. Read the report.
Thanks for posting our report. It’s important to note that while satisfaction among food operators IS slightly lower than satisfaction of operators across all industries, satisfaction in food has improved considerably over the past several years, and the 40 companies featured in our report actually scored higher than our average score for all of franchising. We’ve seen a significant effort by franchisors to make improvements at the unit level in efficiency, profitability, and culture, and that’s reflected in the improved satisfaction over the past several years.
Running a food franchise definitely takes a special kind of person—one who is passionate about the food industry and all the management elements that come along with it – but our research shows there really are some great opportunities out there and we want to make sure people know that.