EXPERIMAC Franchise: Who Benefits from Failed Franchises?
A distressing number of Experimac franchise owners are closing their stores, fighting off bankruptcy while trying to save their homes and assets. Does franchisor United Franchise Group (UFG) still make money when its franchises fail? How about those who continue to hype, promote and sell this dubious investment? Do SBA loan packagers like Paul Bosley and First Financial, or SBA lenders like Celtic Bank, profit from what’s now clearly a risky investment? Who gets hurt… and who continues to profit… even as franchisees fail?
(UnhappyFranchisee.Com) We have reported that United Franchise Group (UFG) continues to aggressively promote its Experimac franchise opportunity despite the fact that the Experimac franchise turnover rate is an estimated 36%, Experimac franchise SBA loan defaults are estimated at 20% – 35% and rising, and it appears that 23% of the surviving Experimac franchise stores may be for sale… some at fire sale prices.
To make matters worse, Experimac and UFG are now on the losing end of a trademark dispute with Apple, Inc. over their ill-informed decision to include the registered trademark (“Mac®”) of one of the world’s most powerful companies in their trade name (ExperiMAC). So United Franchise Group has begun the embarrassing, costly and brand-damaging process of changing the franchise’s trade name to Experimax… the cost of which will likely be passed on to “Experimac” franchisees (More on this to come…)
Does United Franchise Group (UFG) Profit From Failed Experimac Franchises?
With such a high number of franchise owners in distress, and facing the need to make a systemwide name change, one might think that United Franchise Group and Ray Titus would cease franchise sales in order to concentrate on supporting the franchise owners fighting for survival – and come to the aid of those whose decision to trust UFG has left them fighting for financial survival.
One might think United Franchise Group (UFG) and Ray Titus might call a moratorium on new franchise sales until they figured out what is broken in their system, and what is leading to such a high failure rate.
One might even think that Experimac might suspend royalties or drop its mark-ups on equipment, supplies, and vendor kickbacks to make its franchise model a little more sustainable.
However, United Franchise Group and Experimac/Experimax continue to hype their industry “awards” and paid-for accolades, and advertise Experimax as a great franchise investment. We haven’t heard of any initiatives that indicate that they are even concerned about their franchise failures.
Ray Titus, CEO of Experimac franchisor United Franchise Group (UFG), claims “our company is on the right track toward success — and has been since its inception.”
Could it be that United Franchise Group and Experimac Franchising, LLC are set up to succeed even if many or most of their franchise owners fail?
90% of United Franchise Group’s Experimac Revenue Comes From Selling New Franchises, Not Helping Established Franchise Owners Succeed
We invite CEO Ray Titus and United Franchise Group to set us straight if we are mistaken, but our review of the Experimac Franchise Disclosure Documents from 2014-2018 indicate that UFG has a financial incentive to focus on selling, rather than supporting, franchisees or fixing a flawed business model.
In 2017, only 10% of Experimac Franchising LLC’s total revenue was from royalties from established franchise locations. In 2016, franchise royalties amounted to 4.27% of total revenue, and in 2015 royalties accounted for less than 1%.
In the audited Financial Statements in its 2015-2018 FDDs, Experimac Franchising, Inc. posted initial franchise fee revenue of $2.3M in 2015, $4.7M in 2016, and $4.0M in 2017.
They posted revenue from initial equipment packages for new stores of $1.9M in 2015, $7.1M in 2016, and $7M in 2017.
For the years 2015-2017, Experimac Franchising Inc. generated total revenue of $29,136,144. Of that, only about $1.8M (6.2%) came from existing store royalties.
In fact, Experimac Franchising, LLC paid more than $11 million in sales commissions for that same period, more than 6X what they collected in royalties.
United Franchise Group Generates Millions in Franchise Fees, Start-up Equipment & Inventory… Whether Franchisees Succeed or Fail
Although Experimac Franchising LLC only began franchising the Experimac concept in October, 2014, they charge an up-front, non-refundable franchise fee that is higher than some companies with 60 or 70 years of experience, thousands of units, and global name recognition. Here are the franchise fees of some well-known brands (Source: 2018 Entrepreneur 500)
EXPERIMAC’s Franchise Fee is Larger Than Most Major Brands
United Franchise Group charges a higher franchise fee for their relatively unproven, untested Experimac franchise than major franchises with decades of experience and universal brand recognition.
| Franchise | Started Franchising | U.S. Locations | Franchise Fee |
| McDonald’s | 1955 (64 Years) | 13,232 | $45,000 |
| Taco Bell | 1964 (55 Years) | 5,886 | $25,000 – $45,000 |
| Baskin Robbins | 1948 (71 Years) | 2,551 | $25,000 |
| Pizza Hut | 1959 (60 Years) | 6,021 | $25,000 |
| Dairy Queen | 1940 (79 Years) | 4,442 | $35,000 |
| Subway | 1974 (45 Years) | 25,185 | $15,000 |
| The UPS Store | 1980 (39 Years) | 4,720 | $29,950 |
| ACE Hardware | 1976 (43 Years) | 4,313 | $5,000 |
| EXPERIMAC | 2014 (5 Years) | 94 | $49,500 |
Experimac Franchising Generates Most of Its Revenue on the Required Start-up Packages
Equipment Opening Package: Experimac Franchising LLC charges $94,900, plus taxes, for the equipment package they require franchisees to purchase from them. According to the 2018 FDD:
The equipment package contains all of the equipment and supplies, except for a few items, to begin operations….
For the year ended December 31, 2017, our gross revenue from the sale of equipment and supplies to franchisees was $7,007,419 or 56.3% percent of our total revenue of $12,449,439.
We are the only approved supplier of the required equipment package.
According to Experimac Franchise Disclosure Documents, revenue from Equipment Opening Packages were as follows: 2015: $1.9M; 2016: $7.1M; 2017: $7M
Inventory/Opening Package: Experimac Franchising LLC also requires new franchisees to purchase an opening inventory package from their closely aligned affiliate, Preferred Supplier, for $10K – $39K. According to the 2018 FDD:
The cost of the retail accessories and repair (parts) inventory/opening inventory package including shipping is $15,000 to $39,000 plus taxes. The retail accessories and repair (parts) inventory contains an initial inventory of products including accessories for cell phones, computers and tablets and other electronic equipment and parts you will use to make repairs and upgrades. The opening inventory package contains an initial inventory of pre-owned electronic equipment. The costs of the retail accessories and repair (parts) inventory/opening inventory package are due at closing and are nonrefundable.
The “Preferred Supplier” affiliate entity is owned by CEO Ray Titus and President Jim Muir. The affiliate is so closely aligned with the franchisor, checks written for the Preferred Supplier package can even be made out to Experimac Franchising LLC. It appears that having broken Preferred Supplier off as a separate entity means this revenue doesn’t have to be disclosed in the audited financial statements.
Experimac/Preferred Supplier Revenue from Inventory Start-up Packages were as follows: 2015: $1.9M; 2016: $2.1M; 2017: $1.9M
| Start-up Package | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | TOTAL |
| Equipment Opening Package | $1.9M | $7.1M | $7M | $16M |
| Inventory Opening Package | $1.9M | $2.1M | $1.9M | $5.9M |
| TOTAL | $3.8M | $9.2M | $8.9M | $21.9M |
Equipment & Inventory Financing Kickbacks: According to the 2018 FDD, Experimac Franchising LLC “indirectly” arranges equipment financing for franchisees and receives a fee from Advantage Leasing Corporation equal to 1% of the total lease amount. The 2017 FDD states that Experimac Franchising receives 2% of the total lease amount from Advantage Leasing Corporation.
Approved equipment leasing companies have included TimePayment Corp. (2015, 2016 FDDs), VFS LLC (2017 FDD), & Advantage Leasing Corporation (2017, 2018).
Input needed: What is the default rate on Experimac equipment leases? Are these equipment leasing companies able to make a profit on Experimac leases given the store turnover rate? Please comment below or email in confidence UnhappyFranchisee[at]Gmail.com.
Benetrends ROBS Franchisees’ 401Ks
Benetrends is another company that seems to get their money whether franchise owners succeed or fail.
Benetrends helps Experimac owners put their 401(k)/IRA retirement funds in play (and risk) with what’s aptly called ROBS or Rollovers as Business Startups.
Have you had experience with Benetrends, Guidant, or other ROBS service providers? Please share a comment below.
EXPERIMAC SBA Loan Pipeline: Are Taxpayers (Also) Being Defrauded?
Experimac franchise owners have reported a very disturbing system that seems designed to extract money from them and, eventually, American taxpayers. If you can help provide some insight into this somewhat complicated and highly disturbing system, please contact the author in confidence.
Franchise owners report that they were directed by Experimac to a man named Paul Bosley, who owns a company called HealthClubExperts d/b/a Business Finance Depot. Bosley, of Mt. Dora, FL, is also a former Vice President of First Financial. Franchisees allegedly paid $5,000 for Paul Bosely and First Financial to help put together and submit their SBA loan application to a particular lender, Celtic Bank.
Bosley has bragged at having funded more than 70 Experimac franchisees, as well franchisees of other United Franchise Group concepts.
An anonymous complaint posted on a consumer website sums up what we have heard several time over:
Celtic Bank participated in the fraudulent origination of countless loans used in the startup of Experimac franchises. A third party, Paul Bosley acted as the intermediary charging upfront fees to handle the creation and assembling of loan applications which included falsified financial projections for Experimac locations.
The documents produced were identical in nature across more than 50 applicants and were solely produced Bosley and presented to Celtics underwriting group. It was well known by Celtic that this practice was in place and Bosley held close ties with this lender at the Florida branch.
At least one applicant was released by Celtic due to fraud and there are many more individuals that entered into agreements with United Franchise Group and the Experimac frnachise who have suffered great financial losses and bankruptcy due to this illegal and fraudulent scam…
Celtic Bank apparently processed and approved dozens of SBA-guaranteed loans issued to Experimac franchisees, many of whom have defaulted or are in the process of defaulting.
It’s our understanding that in the case of a default, SBA lenders like Celtic Bank go after the franchisee and any guarantors for payment. This may include seizing assets, including homes, cars or other assets.
Once the franchisee has been completely drained or declared bankruptcy, Celtic Bank would recover up to 85% of their outstanding loan amount from the Small Business Administration ie the American taxpayer.
So EXPERIMAC franchise seems to be a real moneymaker – for everyone except the franchise owners and the American taxpayer.
WHAT DO YOU THINK? ARE YOU AN EXPERIMAC FRANCHISE OWNER OR FRANCHISEE OF A UNITED FRANCHISE GROUP BRAND?
DO YOU KNOW WHY EXPERIMAC FRANCHISES ARE FAILING? PLEASE SHARE A COMMENT BELOW.
ALSO READ:
EXPERIMAC Franchise Complaints
EXPERIMAC Franchise Complaints – Part 2
EXPERIMAC Franchise Closed Store List
EXPERIMAC Franchise Stores For Sale
FRANCHISE DISCUSSIONS by Company
UNITED FRANCHISE GROUP (UFG) Franchise Complaints
SIGNARAMA Franchise Complaints
Contact us:
TAGS: Experimac, Experimac franchise, Ray Titus, Jim Muir, Paul Bosley, Celtic Bank, SBA Franchise loans, Experimac franchise opportunity, Experimac franchise complaints, Franchise Funding, First Financial, TimePayment Corp, United Franchise Group, United Franchise Group franchise, United Franchise Group franchise opportunity, United Franchise Group UFG, Ray Titus, SBA loan defaults, unhappy franchisee
Sean, interesting analysis.
I would be looking at other primarily product franchises like mufflers, etc. Most of those product franchises make money from the required product purchases. Don’t know whether these numbers are out of line with those other franchises. Could be.
Here is the thing that is far more troubling, at least to me.
You pay for the trademark — it is a trademark license. And then it turns out that what you paid for is about to get cancelled.
That is appalling stupid behavior by the franchisor and its trademark counsel.
”
From time to Lime, the Company is involved in litigation, and most or which is incidental and normal to its business. In February 2017, an Opposition was filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Trademark Trialand Appeal Board (TTAB) against the Company’s application 1’01’ a registration of its logo mark. June 2017, a Petition for Cancellation was filed with the USPTO to cancel the registration of the Company’s registered trademark.
The Company has been engaged in ongoing settlement negotiations. Outside counsel has expressed an opinion that they believe the matter will be resolved resulting in a resolution or the TTAB proceedings and without litigation. The Company has accrued $300,000 for future expenses associated with the matter.”
This is a very accurate assessment of Experimac and UFG. You mentioned Benetrends, they also charged a $5,000 fee to use their service and Fidelity Investment knowingly uses this money to invest money into a failing business. This seems to be a breach of their fiduciary responsibilities.
When we were going through the process of getting our SBA with Paul Bosley he changed our numbers a couple of times so we would qualify.
Michael:
I agree. Apple, Inc. has to be one of the fiercest protectors of its IP and TMs in the world, so it’s hard to believe that they would have launched the chain with “Mac” in their name… especially when it was clearly a reference to the trademarked products. They must’ve known this was coming since they have used the ExperiMAX name for international development for some time.
Last month they filed a material amendment to their state registrations to reflect the name change. I don’t even think there’s a mention of the reason for it or a mention of the trademark dispute in the litigation section.
Anyone with information about Paul Bosely and his First Financial/Celtic Bank pipeline can contact me in confidence at UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com.
Did Bosely also coordinate the equipment leases with TimePayment Corp.?
Anyone with experience dealing with Benetrends can contact me in confidence at UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com.
I have heard of at least one person having been hit with IRS penalties due to Benetrends. Is anyone else facing similar problems?
All of the above is true, and Paul changed my numbers as well. He basically fed me what he knew I needed in order to get approved for the loan. It felt like they were all working together and knew exactly what to do to make everything look right and to move things along, even if they weren’t even remotely close to reality.
I have a close friend who was taken complete advantage of by Experimac. Definitely was described to him as a much more solid investment than clearly it turned out to be.
I would definitely be interested in speaking to your friend about his experience on a confidential basis. Please share my email with him/her: UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com.
Paul Bosely did more than 70 Experimac loans this way, and also got funding for other UFG franchises as well.
They must have had quite a pipeline set up to process that many in a short amount of time.
Does anyone remember what his fee was? I’ve heard 2%-3% of the loan amount paid before closing. Is that right?
Another player in the game was Tim Phillips. He’s an UFG guy involved with finance too. You should check him out.
No surprise that UFG is having “issues,” since UFG has such a horrible reputation in our industry-especially for hammering on candidates to buy their franchises.
And as an added bonus, they’re the geniuses who came up with the idea of having a retail store franchise that…wait for it…sells franchises.
In a perfect scenario, UFG would buy out Brad Sugar’s franchise “opportunity,” as well as the new franchise coming soon from John Hewitt.
Doing so would make things easier for writers who want to expose questionable franchisors who just don’t care. It would be another form of consolidation.
The Franchise King®
Paul Bosley was the intermediary for Time Payment as well. He did very little work except sending over the projections worksheet with sales projections already there. My only additions were starting cash amount and rent. He told me to change two cells and what to put there. My Celtic rep was Laura Harvey. She was very anxious throughout the process. Bosley said ignore her she has a gun to her head to push these loans through. Now I understand all the anxiety because the whole process was illegal.
Not to be trusted!!!!! Have you seen all the franchise owner reviews??? Unkept promises, lack of support – turning their backs on clients when they needed them the most. Now it makes complete sense, that “ Experimac “ (who had to re-brand themselves as “Experimax” because even Apple sued them, for marketing the “Mac” brand in their name. They steal – not only trademarks – but also their clients money – who then in turn allow their clients stores to steal your equipment (being serviced) and shrug their shoulders- telling you “sorry that happened, but the guy who took your daughters MacBook Pro for repair, doesn’t actually work for us – he was a subcontractor” And we are just supposed to accept that? Who cares? This year has not only brought out the lowest of low times for some Americans, and then to be “kicked while down” by this business owners response- is utterly disgusting.
I tried to get in touch with United Franchise Group #UFG (owners of the “Experimax“ brand) – only to be ignored.
Its my daughters 1st year of college (which went 100% online due to Covid Pandemic) so she’s having to use a tablet for her classes and coursework. They didn’t care – just shrugged and ignored. The store is now closed down, and I’m out $2,600 – shrug. This is the worst possible situation to be in with a company – who doesn’t give a second thought about taking care of their clients or their clients customers. Karma will get them, just DONT let them get you first! Sorry for all the clients/franchise owners, who also got screwed out of money because of Experimax’s unsound business practices.
There is an opportunity to be heard by the FTC. There is a new person heading up the franchise section and the commissioner seems to be concerned about the plight of franchisees. They are reviewing the franchise rule and asking for public comments. I have been interviewed by two FTC attorneys to be on the panel. If I’m on it I’ll make sure the victims of Experimac, of UFG and the SBA loan scam are represented.
Two requests: Please leave a comment at this link below. If everyone comments, they will take notice of Experimac and UFG. Your comment can be a couple of paragraphs or pages in a separate document. But let them know about the false representations both in the Item 19 and supplied to the bank.
Second, put in an endorsement of UnhappyFranchisee.Com as a legitimate source of valid information and for Sean Kelly to participate on the panel. If I get on it, I will make sure that the plight of Experimac franchisees and the predatory loan scam you fell victim to is out in the open and heard by those who are looking into the SBA’s practices. Here’s where you can comment:
https://beta.regulations.gov/document/FTC-2020-0064-0001/comment
Important to note that Experimac is a heavily promoted franchisor made part of the International Franchise Professionals Group as is the case with many unvetted and balance sheet poor franchisors in their group. The IFPG is concerned only with those franchisors that subscribe and pay the fees to do so. The majority do not produce FDD information or copies thereof so as has been the case with most all of them you can easily assume that the FDD for Experimac was never read by anyone at the IFPG. This fact also makes franchise brokers and consultants complicit if ever having presented Experimac to their franchise applicants.