• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.87-102
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• 2018

The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of food service franchise's support system on franchisee's trust, financial performance and intention of multi-store operation. For this purpose, the results of the survey were collected for 111 small and mid-sized food service franchisees in Korea with less than 100 brand franchises, referring to article 9 of the act on Fair Trade. Structural equation model analysis was used for hypothesis testing. The results of the study are as follows; First, a support for store development, education, logistics, and supervisors among franchise's support system were found to have a significant impact on the franchisee's trust, but public relations support was not significantly affected. Second, a support for store development had significant influence on the financial performance, but the support for education, logistics, supervisors and public relations did not significantly affect the financial performance. Third, franchisee's trust has been shown to have a significant impact on financial performance and intention of multi-store operation. Fourth, financial performance was shown to have a significant impact on the intention of multi-store operation. Finally, confirming the mediated effects of financial performance on the effect of franchisee's trust and intention of multi-store operations also proved to have indirect effects. This study identified the impact relationship between the small and medium-sized food service franchise support system, franchisee's trust, financial performance and intention of multi-store operation. In particular, it is deemed meaningful that the performance of Korea's small and medium-sized food service franchises and the relationship of influence that can grow together through the qualitative growth of the franchise's system.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.49-59
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• 2011

A franchise can be said to be the main method of distribution and marketing. It appears to be the future of the retail industry and is one of the world's fastest growing businesses sectors, as many policy reports and research results have acknowledged. Korea's franchise industry began in the 1970s, spread out into many areas (including food services, retail, and the service industry), and has grown by over 10% each year ever since. The industry's influence on the national economy becomes ever greater. Although the size of the franchise industry is expected to grow as it spreads and as the government expands its support, it has not yet attracted much academic interest. Research has so far been very fragmented. The main interest has been the relationship and conflicts between the head offices and the affiliates. No study has yet occurred on whether the concepts of satisfaction and intent to conclude a contract directly affect the success or failure of the affiliates. Few studies have empirically inquired into the demographic characteristics and abilities of the affiliates that significantly affect their results. Domestic franchise industries must prepare to leap from quantitative to qualitative growth. Most important is the need for affiliate headquarters and affiliates to build confidence between them. A friendly and reliable relationship between affiliate headquarters and affiliates will eliminate distrust from the franchise and maintain a healthy franchise system. This study suggests that current and prospective heads of affiliation should concentrate not on attracting affiliates but on investment and techniques of affiliate support. They should work on the reinforcement of brand power, the appropriate affiliate business environment, systematic education/training, taking burdens off the affiliate business persons, consolidating the relationship with the affiliate business persons, marketing mix factors (e.g. products, price conditions, logistics and shipping services, promotion, supervising and supervisor, operation procedures/processes, and material evidence); these all greatly affect the success or failure of the affiliate business. Supporting the affiliates is an important factor that enhances their results and satisfaction and consequently increases the positive recommendations to others and the ratio of recurrent conclusions of contracts, which ultimately generate the growth of the franchises. In addition, it is suggested that prospective franchise founders should make every effort to choose a good head office since the characteristics of the head office greatly influence the success of the affiliates. This study is significant in that it grasps the characteristics of the head office of affiliation and of the affiliates that influence affiliate results in ways not yet academically attempted.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.81-101
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• 2012

A franchise system develops competitive products for a franchise store through the system established by the franchise head office. Therefore, it has advantages of expanding the marketing effect since the risk of failure is reduced for a founder and the franchise head office supports the overall sales, advertisement and promotional activities. Also, a franchise store has advantages of fulfilling necessary facilities and tools on advantageous terms, reducing expenses by purchasing in bulk, and getting a supply of products with stable qualities. However, aside from such advantages, franchise head offices are forcing franchise stores to make unnecessary investments in equipments and remodel the interior. Also, franchise business operators are being made to share the cost of marketing and multiple franchise stores are being approved within the same business district, and franchise business operators are suffering damages. Therefore, cases of shutting down a franchise store or not renewing the contract are frequent. From the position of a franchise head office, profits that are generated from franchise fees, interior remodeling fees and supplying facilities and materials will increase as the number of new franchise stores increases. However, franchise stores are faced with difficulties due to excessive competitions between similar types of businesses and the overlapping of business districts that come from increases in the number of stores, and they eventually end up shutting down. Therefore, in order for a franchise business operator and franchise head office to grow and develop continuously, opening new stores is important, but successfully renewing the contract by maintaining a relationship with an existing franchise business operator is desirable. In this aspect, a study that examines the elements that can affect the relationship between a franchise business operator and franchise head office is believed to be important for the development of the franchise industry and creating safe jobs for the public. With an emphasis on the relationship between a franchise head office and franchise store, this study attempted to examine the effect of characteristics of a franchise head office and franchise business operator on the bilateral relationship such as the faith and immersion, and wished to review the effects of such faith and immersion on the satisfaction of a franchise store, including an intention of renewing the contract. In particular, in the current situation of great uncertainties in the market, this study also wished to examine how uncertain market elements will affect the relationship between the characteristics of a franchise head office and franchise business operator, and the faith and immersion. The study revealed that among the characteristics of a franchise head office, the standardization management of a franchise head office hinders a franchise store's faith and immersion in a franchise head office. Also, a franchise head office's support was shown to increase a franchise store's faith and immersion. However, it was revealed that a franchise head office's regulation and incentive policies for a franchise store do not affect a franchise store's faith and immersion. Among characteristics of a franchise business operator, a franchise store's healthy financial status and entrepreneur spirits were shown to enhance the faith and immersion in a franchise head office. However, it was shown that excellent business abilities of a franchise business operator actually reduce the immersion for a franchise head office. Also, the faith and immersion in a franchise head office were shown to enhance the intention of renewing the contract by increasing the satisfaction for a franchise head office. In addition, it was originally believed that the effects of a franchise business operator's characteristics on the faith and immersion in a franchise head office will vary depending on the market uncertainty, but the effect of a franchise business operator's characteristics depending on the recognition of uncertainties was shown to be insignificant. Such findings show that instead of making a franchise store pay for equipment investments and marketing and obtaining profits by force, a franchise head office should actively support a franchise store so that a franchise store's business activities can be conducted well, which will bring profits to a franchise store and ultimately to a franchise head office. This is a more desirable direction for the development of both parties. Implications of such findings are summarized as follows. First, it was shown that a franchise head office's standardization management actually reduces a franchise store's faith and immersion. Therefore, it is believed that instead of conducting standardization managements for regulating and managing franchise stores, measures should be developed so that franchise stores can actually participate voluntarily. For this, a head office should put in efforts to develop and provide standardized manuals, and make sure that a self-review system takes root. Second, a franchise head office's incentives did not have significant effects on the faith and immersion, but the support was shown to be effective. Therefore, it can be seen that instead of taking post-measures for a franchise store, taking pre-measures of actively supporting is more effective in maintaining a franchise store. Third, among characteristics of a franchise head office, it was shown that a franchise store's healthy financial status increased the faith and immersion in a franchise head office. Therefore, when selecting a franchise business operator, instead of thoughtlessly opening up franchise stores for the profit of a head office, it is believed that reviewing a franchise business operator's financial firepower and credit status is necessary. As for academic implications, previous studies examined the relationship by focusing on the characteristics of a franchise head office and franchise store, but this study focused on the characteristics of a franchise business operator. Therefore, this study dealt with the importance of a franchise business operator's competence, and is significant because it revealed the fact that a franchise business operator's excellent commercialization ability can become an element that hinders the immersion in a franchise head office. It was originally believed that a franchise store's characteristics will have different effects on the faith and immersion depending on the market uncertainty, but it was shown that the effect of a franchise store's characteristics depending on the recognition of uncertainties was insignificant, and that is the limitation of this study.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.152-172
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• 2011

This study aims to analyze the effect of franchisor's pre-open support services on franchisee's relationship quality and performance in foodservice franchise system. The analysis data was collected from 500 franchisees located in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do of Republic of Korea. The finding are as followings: firstly, the factors of information providing, market researching, interior and equipment supporting, education and training supporting, sale and promotion supporting, and legal supporting influence positively franchisee's satisfaction. Second, regarding relationship among relationship quality, satisfaction positively influences trust and commitment, and trust positively influence commitment. Third, relationship quality influences positively both financial and non-financial performance.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.177-190
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• 2017

This study investigates the effects of franchisors' characteristics including brand reputation, training and product related support, franchisees' characteristics including store location and management on the performance and recontract intention of franchisees in bakery franchise industry. Also, this study examine the moderating effect of CEO experience of franchisees among the franchisors' and franchisees' characteristics, and performance. To empirically test these relationships, data were collected from 386 respondents who are franchisees in the bakery franchise sector. In the verification of hypotheses, the structure equation modeling(SEM) is used. The results of this study are as follows. First, franchisors' brand reputation, training support, and franchisees' locational factor have significant effects on the financial performance of franchisees positively. However, franchisors' product related support and franchisees' management of the store have not significant effects on the performance. Second, the performance of franchisees has positive effect on the recontract intention. Third, the moderating effect of CEO experience is only significant in the relationship between franchisors' training support and the performance. Based on the findings, this study suggest the importance of building a good brand image and superior training system for franchisors to improve mutual ongoing growth. Also, franchisors should determine whether nascent franchisee entrepreneurs have CEO experiences to further improve performance. If they do not have related experiences, both opening and ongoing training supports of franchisors and the efforts of franchisees towards learning are required. Finally, this study suggest that both franchisors and franchisees should accurately analyze the conditions of possible locations and establish strategies to select beneficial location before starting a franchise business.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.65-85
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• 2010

The key success factors for Franchise Enterprise as a virtual company which is established based on franchise system are the competitiveness of sub-systems in franchise system such as franchisor, franchisee, vendor(supplier), and customer, and to sustain the symbiotic relationship among sub-systems. In this regard, evaluating franchise system is considered to be implemented in different contexts and methods comparing with extant evaluation system in franchise business which is more focused on the relationship between franchisor and franchisee. The flagship role of establishing franchise system is to be franchisor system, however, the symbiotic relationship among other sub-system including franchisee, vendor, and customer leads to successful Franchise Enterprise. The purpose of this study is to research existing evaluation systems for franchise business and to explore the model of evaluating franchise system, what is called, "Symbiosis Index".

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.31-66
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• 2009

This study investigates the effects of supervisors' leadership style on franchisees' trust and commitment in a franchise system. We classified leadership into two styles - transformational leadership vs. transactional leadership, and it was hypothesized and tested that these two leadership styles have differential effects on trust and two different types of commitment - calculative commitment vs. affective commitment. A questionnaire survey was conducted to collect the data and a total number of 184 Korean franchisees in diverse industries participated to the survey. Using a structural equation modeling, we confirmed some differential effects of the two leadership styles. Transformational leadership was found to have positive effects on franchisees' trust in and affective commitment to the franchisor, while it has no effects on calculative commitment. On the other hand, transactional leadership was positively related to calculative commitment to the franchisor. But it had no effects on trust and affective commitment. Meanwhile, we also found that trust positively affects on both types of commitment. The results of this study suggest that the quality of franchisor-franchisee relationships can be improved by supervisor's strong leadership, especially by transformational leadership, and that transformational leadership, when compared to transactional leadership, is more important for developing a long-term and stable franchisor-franchisee relationship.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.1-27
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• 2008

In a power-asymmetry relationship like franchise system, a high dependent franchisee must often rely on its powerful partner. Therefore, in order to build up 'win-win' systems, therefore channel members should increase trust and commitment each other to enhance the relationship quality to sustain long-term cooperative relationships. First of all, to increase the relationship quality in franchise system, franchisor should increase franchisee's perception of the powerful franchisor's justice. The point of this research, I established basic hypotheses and comparative hypotheses to examine franchisor's behavior what franchisee expected which influences on franchisee's attitude and behavior in power - asymmetry relationship in franchise system. For the purpose of the empirical testing, managers of franchisee in the food service industry of Korea had been selected and analyzed, and major findings in this study as follow: First, the relational norm between franchisor and franchisee increased both distributive justice and procedural justice, especially relational norm had more effect on procedural justice than distributive justice. Second, distributive justice increased both economic commitment and social commitment while procedural justice just increased social commitment only but economic commitment. So, on the relational commitment, distributive justice was more important element than procedural justice. On the other hand, procedural justice had indirect effect on economic commitment through distributive and social commitment.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.65-84
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• 2014

The purpose of this study is to review the theories and cases of performance sharing in the franchise industry to present a method for more effective franchise performance-sharing. To that end, this study reviewed the theory on resource dependence and the theory on inequality to describe the performance-sharing between the franchisor and the franchisee and their relationship. It also looked at the cases of a week-in cooler system at 'Beer Market', the allocation of fees for alcoholic beverage sales to franchisees, the scholarship program of 'Onigiri and Ikyudon' and 'Bonsamo' which is a franchisees' committee for Bonjuk to introduce examples of performance-sharing. Through a theoretical review and case review, this study presents five types of methods for performance-sharing. First, 'the sharing of core competence by the franchise company; second, 'the establishment of a royalty culture'; third, 'scientific analysis of markets and establishment of a revenue forecast system'; fourth, 'reinforced financial support from the franchisor'; and lastly, 'the positive application of franchisees' committees'. Such methods are expected to provide a groundwork for mutual benefit and co-prosperity between franchisor and franchisee.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.173-199
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• 2011

A franchisee has to depend on the overall system, such as knowhow and management support, from a franchisor in the franchise system and the two parties do not start with the same position in economic or information power because the franchisor controls or supports through selling or management styles. For this, unfair trades the franchisor's over controlling and limiting the franchisee might occur and other side effects by the people who give the franchisee scam trades has negatively influenced on the development of franchise industry and national economy. So, the purpose of this study is preventing unfair trade for the franchisee from understanding the causes and problems of dispute between the franchisor and the franchisee focused on the dispute cases submitted the Korea Fair Trade Mediation Agency and seeking ways to secure the transparency of recruitment process and justice of franchise management process. The results of the case analysis are followed; first, affiliation contracts should run on the franchisor's exact public information statement and the surely understanding of the franchisee. Secondly, the franchisor needs to use their past experiences and investigated data for recruiting franchisees. Thirdly, in the case of making a contract with the franchisee, the franchisor has to make sure the business area by checking it with franchisee in person. Fourthly, the contracts are important in affiliation contracts, so enacting the possibility of disputes makes the disputes decreased. Fifthly, lots of investigation and interests are needed for protecting rights and interests between the franchisor and franchisee and preventing the disputes by catching the cause and more practical solutions of the disputes from the government.