BFANEWS
Great Northern Breakfast celebrates franchising in the North
Steph McGovern
nBringing franchising ‘up North’ the bfa will be launching its inaugural Great Northern Breakfast on 21 June in Manchester.
The event, sponsored by Lloyds TSB, is held at the Midland Hotel and will celebrate the vibrant and thriving franchise sector in the north of England – which has an annual turnover of over £3billion and rising – and employs over 135,000 people. In the North- West alone, the sector has seen its economic
contribution to the region increase by over 36 per cent and employment levels by 35 per cent compared to pre-recession levels. The keynote speaker on the day will be business breakfast journalist Steph McGovern, who has reported on business and finance on national television for the last decade, recently covering the Eurozone crisis summit in Brussels and the Italian debt meetings in Rome. Two senior figures from the UK franchise industry will also feature at the event. The bfa chairman and founder of Blazes Renewables, Michael Eyre, and 2011 UK Franchisee of the Year Catharine Chalton, Wirral franchisee for Home Instead Senior Care will be in attendance as speakers.
Brian Smart, director general of the bfa, said: “Franchising has shown time and again its robustness as a business model both before and since the economic downturn with consistent long-term growth.
“This is particularly true in the North, where
the sector has demonstrated impressive resilience to economic pressures. We’re delighted to be able to showcase the industry to the wider business community and with Steph bringing her experience and humour alongside real-life franchising stories, we’re sure this will be a great event for the region.” The breakfast is aimed at anyone with an interest in the business community in the North and will raise awareness of franchising as a business concept. Following the success of the well-established annual Scottish Business Breakfast, which attracts some 300 delegates each year, strong attendance numbers are anticipated.
Beginning at 7.45am, the breakfast will finish at 10:00am in time for the opening of the British Franchise Exhibition taking place at nearby Manchester Central.
More information and booking details can be found on the bfa’s website,
www.thebfa. org/north.
Job Centres offered franchising advice
n Through its new relationship with the Department of Work and Pensions, the bfa was invited to participate in a national phone conference for Job Centre advisors to help improve their understanding of franchising. As part of a week focussing on the hospitality sector, the bfa took part ensuring that the right ethical and objective advice was provided to help future prospective franchisees.
Working with the US Embassy
n The bfa have been working with the US Embassy Commercial Service over recent months to build new resources that will help provide a real and improved insight into the UK franchise industry. The new resources are particularly designed to help US franchisors and investors considering the UK by arming them with the right advice from day one. Further work is now being carried out to increase this information and build new relationships within the Embassy.
Youth enterprise
n The bfa’s business development manager Kerry Bhella was invited to attend the 5th NACUE Leaders Summit at the IoD, Pall Mall, in late April to give a presentation on franchising as a viable option for the summit’s student enterprise society leaders.
Kerry Bhella 12 |
www.franchisornews.co.uk
NACUE is a support and funding body that represents, trains and champions young entrepreneurs.
With more young entrepreneurs coming into franchising each year, these sorts of events are a great way to get the right information across to franchisees and franchisors of the future, and the bfa is looking forward to working with NACUE again.
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