AMERICA’S WORST FRANCHISES According to Forbes
AMERICA’S WORST FRANCHISES… According to Forbes
What are America’s worst franchise opportunities?
Using data compiled by franchise research company FRANdata, Forbes magazine has compiled its list of the 30 worst franchises in America.
Forbes ranked what it believes to be the ten worst franchises in each of three investment categories:
- — franchises requiring an investment between $0 – $250,000,
- — franchises requiring an investment between $250,001 – $500,000,
- — and franchises requiring an investment of $500,001 or greater.
What do you think? Did Forbes miss your pick for worst franchise? Leave your nomination with a comment below.
To learn more about why Forbes included specific franchises, and to share your opinion, click on the links to franchise company pages in the table below.
FRANCHISORS: If you feel your franchise has been unfairly named to Forbes “Worst Franchises” list, post your rebuttal below or email it to UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com for immediate publication.
Also read: AMERICA’S BEST FRANCHISES According to Forbes
See all our FRANCHISE DISCUSSIONS by Company
FORBES WORST FRANCHISES 2014
| INVESTMENT RANGE | Source: Forbes | ||
| RANK (10 Being Worst) |
0 – $150,000 |
$150,001 – $500,000 |
$500,001 and over |
| 10 | SuperCoups | Dippin’ Dots | Country Kitchen International |
| 9 | Realty World | Steak Escape | It’s a Grind Coffee House |
| 8 | Parable | Commission Express | Tastee Freez |
| 7 | UBuildIt | COOKIES BY DESIGN | Atlanta Bread Company |
| 6 | Aero Colours | Dream Dinners | Bennigan’s |
| 5 | All Tune and Lube | Avalar | Shoney’s |
| 4 | Curves | DreamMaker Bath & Kitchen | Bonanza Steakhouse |
| 3 | House Doctors | Golf Etc. | Desert Sun Tanning Salons |
| 2 | ERA Real Estate | Samurai Sam’s Teriyaki Grill | La Salsa |
| 1 | FastFrame | Great Steak & Potato Company | Ground Round Grill & Bar |
Franchisor Rebuttals to Date:
DREAMMAKER BATH & KITCHEN President Responds to Forbes Worst Franchise List
UBUILDIT Responds to Forbes Worst Franchise List
Methodology: According to Forbes,
FRANdata did screen for two key criteria over those years that give some indication of market demand for the brand and overall support for its franchisees: growth rate and the so-called continuity rate. Continuity gives some indication of the ongoing success of the stores… Other factors that affected the ranking: a franchisor’s transparency in reporting historical performance, which lets prospective franchisees evaluate the opportunity; support for franchisees (financing and the like); and recurring revenue self-sufficiency (does the franchisor depend on revenues from selling additional franchises to sustain ongoing operations?)
Read Forbes’ America’s Best And Worst Franchises
For a more detailed look at Forbes methodology, click here.
WHAT DO YOU THINK? DID FORBES MISS YOUR PICK FOR WORST FRANCHISE? SHARE A COMMENT BELOW.
TO COMMENT ON FORBES WORST FRANCHISE PICKS, CLICK LINKS IN THE TABLE ABOVE.
TAGS: Worst franchises, Worst franchises in America, Forbes worst franchises, bad franchises, franchise failures, buying a franchise, franchising, Unhappy Franchisee, Forbes magazine
Liberty Tax should definitely be included. Talk about lack of support and large fees everywhere…
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Dickey’s Barbecue Pit should be up there in the top ten as well. They promise so much and deliver so little. They misguide unknowing people with no experience and lead them into bankruptcy. They claim to help with lease negotiation, financing, equipment, construction, management training and what they actually offer is bad advice from inexperienced and uncaring hourly workers. They have such a high turnover of employees that none have the foundation to do the work correctly. They take money from mom and pop and lead them around until they are out of money and leave them high and dry. Then you are in a situation that is uncontrollable and they blame you for being a bad manager even though they promise management training that does not exist. Call me anytime and I will tell you my story.
I am a former church’s chicken franchisee in. Owned 3 units in Philly and NJ. From 2007 to 2010, we had great sales, great corporate and everything was perfect. Once the company was sold to a fortune 500 company based on California, that is when problems started. Company started stealing our ad funds and stopped advertising. They brought a new distributor setting very high product prices and made all franchisees sign up by lying and promising low prices. Total 4 franchisees here, company stole $250k to $500k per franchisee. When we complained, they cancelled our franchise agreement and shut down all of my units and 5 other units from other franchisees. Church’s Chicken is a thief, thug, criminal. They stole however they can. The prices of products were almost double than outside prices because they were making commission. They destroyed every franchisee and our investments here
and played with our future. They are the worst and most unprofessional company to invest.
I am a former church’s chicken franchisee in. Owned 3 units in Philly and NJ. From 2007 to 2010, we had great sales, great corporate and everything was perfect. Once the company was sold to a fortune 500 company based on California, that is when problems started. Company started stealing our ad funds and stopped advertising. They brought a new distributor setting very high product prices and made all franchisees sign up by lying and promising low prices. Total 4 franchisees here, company stole $250k to $500k per franchisee. They stole every dollar of ours even deducting higher percentage than they should from our banks. When we complained, they cancelled our franchise agreement and shut down all of my units and 5 other units from other franchisees. Church’s Chicken is a thief, thug, criminal. They stole however they can. The prices of products were almost double than outside prices because they were making commission. They destroyed every franchisee and our investments here
and played with our future. They are the worst and most unprofessional company to invest.
Discovery Point, Legacy Academy, Kids R Kids, are also operating near criminal operations. They do not mark SBA loans as franchised loans and lie rampantly in the franchise disclosures. This list developed by SBA and conclusions drawn based on that statistics are meaningless. These franchisers teamed up with the banks to intentionally not mark the loans as franchised loans. So that their records do not show up in these analyses. Who knows, if all the data were included, all or some of these childcare franchises would have made the top 10 failure list. Note that these franchises sell multi-million dollar SBA guaranteed inferior quality buildings at inflated prices in different business names other than the franchise name.
Discovery Point uses Discovery Development, Legacy Academy uses Commercial Contractors Enterprises, Kids R Kids uses Patrick D. Vinson Reality among many other business identities to hide the franchise related transactions.
In essence, SBA has done a very poor job on monitoring the records and these rogue businesses and banks are feeding on them.
You Need to Include MEGAWRAPS.
I lost lots of money on this franchise. No marketing support or advertising. They want to give you around $100 to advertise. You need lots more than $100 to promote the brand.
Not surprised to see Dippin’ Dots on this list. While the ice cream is good, the franchises are mostly in outdoor craft shows and arenas where it is impossible to get an consistent business. If they were in malls, they would be doing much better.
Aamco should definitely be in there. These crooks completely destroyed my life. I went from being a millionaire to be on food stamps in just a few years.
The worst of 2014,15,and16 has to be Sixt Rent A Car. A german company that came to the US to start car rental franchises and sold a bill of goods to its Franchisees. Of the 12 or 13 franchisees they sold to, 7 of them have sued or are in the process of suing the parent company for fraud among other things. They came here with no idea how the market works in the US and had very little support for it’s franchisees. On top of that, when they finally figured out that a franchise system wouldn’t work in the US, they systematically started to do harm to the franchisees in order to put them out of business so they no longer had to support them. It is truly sad to see so many famiIies lose everything because of the arrogance of the Germans.
Hey Gary Heavin….how do you sleep at night knowing how many people lost their homes because of your franchises ….you screwed them over for every cent you could….you and your bulimic wife….you’re not a christian…you’re an oxygen thief
Philly Pretzel Factory is not on the list? two years of absolutely NO support, NO marketing despite 8% franchise fees taken weekly. Lost 80K 2 years in a row, drained my savings and retirement to $0 lost my house and everything I saved for my entire life. Don’t let the BS undercover boss episode fool you. They do NOTHING for franchisees. Their solution to having no sales is give away free pretzels everyday, put yard signs on all the roads, hang balloons outside ect… which we have done for over a year. ( to get people to know the product) as soon as you sign that agreement and they cash the check you are on your own. They force you to use their architect, and construction supervisor, equipment company, vendors, POS system ( so they can track your 8%) Construction and architect both screwed everything up and cost me an additional 60K in construction fees that PPF said “oh Well” This franchise RUINED what was once a good life for me and my family. We lived in a 35K sq ft house, drove brand new cars, private schools, ect…. I am now looking for public housing , can’t put gas in my car or food on the table. There is a reason why PPF has the highest rate of default on SBA loans. They sucker you in, drain you dry and then throw you to the curb. No Marketing, No support, No guidance. Did I say enough? No I am claiming bankruptcy and will ruin whatever credit I have left for the rest of my LIFE! all on a Dream they sold me and then handed me a NIGHTMARE. Not sure How Dan sleeps at night knowing how many family s and lives he has destroyed.