BFANEWS
Scottish Franchise Week once again a resounding success
S
cotland hosts a wide variety of exceptional franchisees, exciting brands and renowned professional advisers in the sector. Each year, the British Franchise Association (bfa) hosts
Scottish Franchise Week, sponsored by Business Franchise magazine, at the end of April to celebrate a diverse and important part of the Scottish economy. Here, Pip Wilkins, head of franchising at the bfa, and Suzie McCafferty, managing director of Platinum Wave, share their personal experiences of the event.
Suzie McCafferty Well, that went well didn’t it? One of the reasons I look forward to Scottish Franchise Week every year is because it gets better each time. Obviously there’s nothing we can do about the weather, so let’s just leave that to one side (which is much easier to do if you didn’t attend the golf day, admittedly), but Glasgow and Edinburgh once again provided a splendid stage upon which to debate and celebrate all things franchising. If the main reason for the week is to
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encourage more people into the industry, then the fact that attendee numbers were up for both the prospective franchisee and franchisor seminars seems to suggest that SFW is meeting its brief. That said of course, we want to see those numbers rising year after year; perhaps even to the point where we need to run both seminars every day throughout the week to accommodate everyone.
Suzie (right) with Carol Smillie
I don’t actually think that’s overly ambitious. If every franchisor was to recommend to all their Scottish / north of England leads that they attend the seminars, and if Affiliates were to do the same with those they know in the early stages of considering franchising their business north of the border, then I suspect we could
easily achieve those kinds of numbers. A full complement of marks must go to co-sponsors HSBC for all of the team’s input, but in particular for securing Rox the jewelers as the venue for the always well- attended social evening. Diamonds may well be a girl’s best friend, but rumours abound that both of the evening’s purchases were for gentlemen’s watches. From the ever- flowing cocktails and canapés to the faultless staff, it was a fantastic evening of networking and very much raises the bar for next year… unless of course we go back. The highlight of the Business Breakfast for me, and I am sure I am not the only one, was keynote speaker Carol Smillie! She was brilliant. Such an inspiring story of what can happen when a fantastic idea meets hard work and determination; I think we will have to work very hard to find a more engaging speaker for next year. On a personal note, however, I would rather not have to sit next to a famous TV personality and former model again at 6am after an evening of Glasgow- strength cocktails.
My thanks as always to the wonderful Scottish Forum and the hard-working SFW
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