Franchisees' Perspective: Leveling the Playing Field

Some of the tools that the AFA has used over the years to level the playing field between franchisor and franchisee include: extensive public relations coverage of some of the most unscrupulous practices of certain franchisors; enlisting the support of hundreds of small-business owners at the 1995 White House Conference on Small Business to put the president and Congress on notice that the issue of franchisee legal rights was a powder keg ready to burst; becoming the primary proponent of the Small Business Franchise Act, which was introduced not once, but twice, by a bipartisan group of lawmakers convinced that baseline standards of conduct at the federal level were necessary in franchising due to the overwhelming imbalance in both the legal and financial power between the parties; testifying before the only two Congressional subcommittees to hold hearings on the FTC's administration of its trade regulation rule regarding the franchisees' viewpoint (American Franchisee Association, Statement of Susan P. Kezios, president, before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Transportation and Hazardous Materials, Committee on Energy and Commerce, Aug. 3, 1994. Also, American Franchisee Association, Statement of Susan P. Kezios, president, before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection, Committee on Energy and Commerce, June 25, 2002.); convincing lawmakers to ask the General Accounting Office (GAO) for an accounting of the FTC's enforcement of its Franchise Rule; and, finally, at the suggestion of FTC staff in 1995, AFA staff and its members began participating in the process of amending the Franchise Rule.