• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.25-34
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• 2013

Purpose - This study examines the adverse press coverage that has increased in proportion to the remarkable growth of various kinds of franchise businesses in the food service industry. Today, the trust of franchisees in relation to their franchisor, and the maintenance of good relations between the two, has become a significant social issue. This study investigates relationship satisfaction and the long-term commitment between the franchisor and franchisee. Research design, data, methodology - We used a path analysis to investigate the relationship between justice and trust, trust and relationship satisfaction, justice and relationship satisfaction, trust and long-term commitment, and relationship satisfaction and long-term commitment. Structural Equation Modeling and a Sobel test were used to investigate the mediating effects of trust and relationship satisfaction. Data were collected from 237 Food Franchisees in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province in order to test the theoretical model and its hypotheses. Two research methodologies are generally used in the distribution management field. For this study, an empirical method was used. Results - A causal analysis was carried out to test if the research model has a sufficient fit index (for instance, χ² = 46.694, df = 10, p = .000, GFI = 0.946, AGFI = 0.850, RMR = 0.034, NFI = 0.966, CFI = 0.973), and the results showed that the model was sufficient, thus demonstrating the suitability of the research model. Each hypothesis had a positive influence, both on long-term commitment and relationship satisfaction. Justice with the franchisor had a positive influence on trust. Relation satisfaction cognized by franchisees was found to positively influence long-term commitment. The franchisee perception of justice in relation to the franchisor had no significant influence on long-term commitment. The study investigated the hypothesis that trust could mediate justice and long-term commitment, and that relationship satisfaction could also mediate long-term commitment Both trust and relationship satisfaction were found to be important for long-term commitment. Specifically, trust sub-factors and justice sub-factors influenced long-term commitment. Identification-based and knowledge-based trust were more important than calculus-based trust. Distributive justice was deemed more important than procedural justice; distributive justice should thus be strengthened. Conclusions - Both franchisor and franchisee were independent businesses. Evidently however, the franchisor could not ensure profit without long-term commitment from the franchisee. As for the success of the franchise business, the franchisor should carry out appropriate strategies leading to a satisfactory relationship. For example, transparency makes it possible to maintain and enhance trust and to improve relationship satisfaction. Just relations between franchisor and franchisee should make it possible to maintain and enhance the franchisee's trust. The franchisor should provide a variety of information with respect to the franchisee's business success. Finally, in order to improve the franchisee's long-term commitment, the franchisor should ensure a just approach with trust and relationship satisfaction among their strategies.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.11 no.9
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• pp.3210-3222
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• 2010

Franchise Industry has a big portion in national economy, and contributes to protecting self-employments and making jobs. One of good way to increase the success of franchise business is operating some franchisor's company owned outlets before franchising. The purpose of this research is to understand the effects of the company owned outlets on franchisor's current performance. According to the result, the operation term, scale, and location of company owned outlet increase the legitimacy of franchisor. The operation term, and scale of company owned outlet increase the efficiency of franchisor, And both legitimacy and efficiency increase of franchisor's current achievement.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.19-32
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• 2019

Purpose - This paper aims to investigate the mediating effects of relationship fairness factors between franchisor's support services and performance(re-contract intention) in food service franchise. More specifically, fairness was measured into distributive, procedure, interaction, and information, franchisor's support service was divided into pre-start support services (initial support services) and post-start support services (continued support services), and performance (re-contract intent) was measured using 3 items such as re-contract, contract extension, and recommendation. Research design, data, and methodology - The population for the survey is the head of franchises in the metropolitan area (Seoul/Gyeonggi), which operates a restaurant franchise, and samples included a wide range of overseas/domestic brands and regions. The survey was conducted from August 1 to September 30, 2018 through the survey agency. The survey was conducted together with a telephone interview and a direct visit by the investigator. A total of 205 questionnaires were collected and retrieved, 4 questionaires containing missing information were excluded and 201 responses were used for analysis. Results - The results shows that franchisor's initial support services have significant positive effects on procedural, interpersonal, and informational relationship fairness, and continuous support services have significant positive effects on distributive, procedural, interpersonal, and informational relationship fairness. This study also shows that informational and procedural fairness have significant positive effects on performance(re-contract intention). Finally, continuous services a significant positive effect on performance(re-contract intention). Conclusions - The results show that franchisor make a manual, and should improve fairness through regular investigation whether support services was executed as promised in the manual after franchisee operation. In addition, information fairness and procedural fairness have been shown to increase performance(re-contract intention). These results mean that the franchisor's headquarters should provide product and service support for the merchant in accordance with the manual and management policy to reduce asymmetry in information and improve procedural fairness to enhance performance(re-contract intention).

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.73-101
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• 2010

Using data collected from franchisees from Busan, we empirically examined the relationship both structural (tie strength), relational (trust), and cognitive (shared value) of social capital and between those dimensions and the patterns of economic performance and noneconomic performance (relationship continuity intention). So we established 9 hypotheses to test the structural relationship among dimensions of social capital and performances like below. H1: A franchisee's perceived tie strength with its franchisor will positively influence its trust in the franchisor. H2: A franchisee's perceived shared value with its franchisor will positively influence its trust in the franchisor. H3: A franchisee's perceived tie strength with its franchisor will positively influence its economic performance. H4: A franchisee's perceived shared value with its franchisor will positively influence its economic performance. H5: A franchisee's perceived trust in its franchisor will positively influence its economic performance. H6: A franchisee's perceived tie strength with its franchisor will positively influence its relationship continuity intention with the franchisor. H7: A franchisee's perceived shared value with its franchisor will positively influence its relationship continuity intention with the franchisor. H8: A franchisee's perceived trust in its franchisor will positively influence its relationship continuity intention with the franchisor. H9: A franchisee's perceived economic performance will positively influence its relationship continuity intention with the franchisor. The conceptual model specifying the relationship among dimensions of social capital and performances is presented in Fig. 1. Tests of the hypotheses were performed using a structural equation model. This model also reflected a good fit to the data ($\chi^2$=101.12 df=62 p=0.004, RMSEA=0.050 GFI=0.936 AGFI=0.895 NFI=0.959 CFI=0.986). The standardized solution estimated by the AMOS 7 program was for interpreting the structural results (Table 1). As was expected, tie strength and shared value were founded to be significant predictors of trust (H1 supported; H2 supported). Tie strength and trust have a significant positive effect on economic performance (H3 supported; H5 supported). But shared value have not a significant effect on economic performance (H4 Rejected). Tie strength were not associated with relationship continuity intention (H6 Rejected). While on the other higher shared value, trust, and economic performance have a significant effect on the relationship continuity intention (H7 supported; H8 supported; H9 supported). The results show integratedly that, first, tie strength does not affect directly but affects indirectly on relationship continuity intention via trust and economic performance. Second, shared goals affect directly and do indirectly via trust on relationship continuity intention. But shared goals does not affect via economic performance on relationship continuity intention. Finally, the study suggests important implications for both research and practice for franchise system especially.

• Culinary science and hospitality research
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.16-32
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• 2012

The purposes of this study were to understand how franchisor's influence strategies influenced franchisee's boundary spanning behaviors and how franchisor's entrepreneurship influenced franchisee's boundary spanning behaviors. This study also analyzed whether franchisor's entrepreneurship played a moderating role in the causal relationship between franchisor's influence strategies and franchisee's boundary spanning behaviors. Based on a total of 698 self-administered questionnaires obtained from franchisees(food-service unit owners or managers) in Korea, frequency analysis, exploratory factor analysis, reliability analysis and hierarchical regression analysis were conducted. The research findings showed results that firstly, promise (${\beta}$=0.292), threat (${\beta}$=-0.256), recommendation (${\beta}$=0.200), information exchange (${\beta}$=0.359), request(${\beta}$=-0.097) and legalistic plea(${\beta}$=-0.137) had a significant effect on franchisee's boundary spanning behaviors and secondly, franchisor's entrepreneurship had a significant positive effect on franchsee's boundary spanning behavior. In addition, the effects of franchisor's promise(${\beta}$=0.168) and threat(${\beta}$=-0.075) on franchisee's boundary spanning behaviors were found to be partially moderated by franchisor's entrepreneurship. Franchisees wanted franchisors to execute a high level of entrepreneurship and deliver a promise in an influence strategy. Limitations and future research directions were also discussed.

• Culinary science and hospitality research
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.191-209
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• 2015

The purpose of this study is to identify whether franchisee-perceived franchisor's proactiveness, innovativeness and risk-taking affect franchisee-perceived affective commitment with franchisor, and the affective commitment affects franchisee-perceived external representation and service delivery. Based on total 280 samples obtained from owners or managers of franchise fast-food restaurants in located in Yeongnam province, the research findings are as follows. Firstly, the innovativeness and risk-taking positively affect the affective commitment. Secondly, the affective commitment positively affects external representation and service delivery. But proactiveness does not affect the affective commitment significantly. These findings imply that firstly, franchisor should investigate consumer trends periodically and develop new successful menus and services more than competitors do, and implement new marketing techniques innovatively towards these menus and services. Secondly, franchisor had better adopt high return/risk strategies because of deepened competition and do bold decisions of price change etc. Also, in order to increase proactiveness, franchisor needs to launch new menus and services earlier than competitors and occupy market in advance, which strengthens affective commitment with franchisees. Thirdly, in order to increase affective commitment with franchisees, franchisor needs to match franchisor's value with franchisee's value and same value means same objective. Lastly, limitations and further research directions are also discussed.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.1-24
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• 2012

Franchises have recently emerged as the most rapidly expanding industry positioned to create a large impact in the domestic economic. The Chinese franchise industry developed rapidly in the period prior and subsequent to WTO accession with more than 50% of new franchises brands emerging since 2000. M&A transactions in the Chinese franchise industry have progressed actively. In the period from 2005-2007, due to the wholesale and retail market opening in accordance with the guidelines laid forth within the MOU by the WTO the Chinese franchise market is now the largest market in the world all despite a short history of only 20 years. The amount of franchise market research on China is disproportional to its current size and development potential. Beginning in the 1990s, market research conducted by the International Franchise Association focused on emerging markets in Eastern Europe and China. While the research dealt with the Chinese investment environment, it insufficiently explained the market region and cultural environment. The purpose of this research is (i) to investigate the determinants of the performance of franchise systems in China and (ii) new contract renewals based on performance factors. This study will complement existing research in terms of the franchisee perspective. This study may also prove of the benefit to the franchise companies entering the Chinese franchise market enabling them to develop an effective strategy. This study shows that support, incentives, and system standardization by franchisor yielded a positive effect on management performance. This is consistent with previous studies by Shin (2000) and Kim (2008) targeting Korean franchises. Therefore, in the Chinese market, the franchisor must focus on support, incentives, and system standardization rather than concentrate only on the recruitment of franchisees in order to improve revenue. Hypotheses regarding franchisor control have been dismissed in existing research, in the opinion of this study, due to their complexity and inability to control the merchant as a one-kind-assessment-standard. Our findings show that the franchisees' financial condition, management ability and entrepreneurial spirit, among franchisee's characteristics, have a positive effect on franchisor's business performance and satisfaction for the franchisee. This is consistent with previous studies on headquarters' management performance of Lussier (1996), Heo and Jang (2008), and franchisees' financial condition, management ability and entrepreneurial spirit effect on franchisor's satisfaction of Weaven and Franzer (2007), Kim (2009), Han (2009), and Yoon etc. (2008). Therefore, when permitting a franchisee, financial condition, management ability, entrepreneurship of the franchisee should be carefully considered. Among relational factors between franchisor and franchisee, trust has the positive influence on the management performance of the franchisor while conflict has a negative effect. However, trust, commitment and conflict factors have been shown not to have any impact on the satisfaction of the franchise headquarters. This result is consistent with the previous studies of Pavlou and Ba (2000), Morrison (1999), Weaven and Frazer (2007), Kim and Park (1994), Sohn (2007) which show that trust between franchisor and the franchisees have a positive effect and that conflict has a negative impact on franchisor's management performance. Other factors causing a negative effective on the franchisor's management performance are a rapid environmental changes and uncertainty in the business. This is consistent with Campbell et al (2007), Kim and Kim (2009), Han and Baek (2008). Finally, the high management performance and satisfaction of the franchise headquarters has a positive effect on the intention of franchise renewal. In the case of large markets such as China, the franchisor's strategy and the role is very important. In this study, we also investigated the characteristics of franchisor and franchisee, relationship, and environmental uncertainty affecting on the management performance and satisfaction of franchisor. Recently, Korean franchises are attempting to enter foreign markets through the rise in popularity of Korean culture and entertainment commonly referred to as the Korean wave. This study provides recommendations for Korean franchises intending on entering the Chinese market. First, in order to achieve stable profits, the franchise corporation needs to support the operation of the individual franchisee through incentives and standardization of services. Second, because trust between the franchisor and franchisee has a positive effect on management performance, on-going discussion and cooperation is necessary to reduce the level of conflict.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.27-43
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• 2009

Location decision problems of franchisees which determine revenues and costs in business are one of the most important issues in franchisor research. The major portion of franchisees are located in Kyunegi-do and 5 major cities in Korea. What's the reason behind this fact? The purpose of this research is to provide the rationale for location decisions of franchisor businesses. Based on the break-even analysis, we conclude that major decisive factors of location decisions are demand and costs of franchisor businesses. At the good location which can attract many customers, franchisor businesses can be much more competitive than independent stores. However, at the bad location, franchisor businesses can not be maintained because of high costs.

• Journal of Information Technology Services
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.1-18
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• 2010

Plural governance system in which firms use vertical integration and market governance simultaneously are widely used across various marketing context. Typical examples of plural governance include franchise systems, in which firms own and operate some unit themselves while licensing the operation of some of their units to franchisees. Despite many scholars have attempted to explore the structure of plural governance over decades, there are few insights into its determinants. In this study, we examine the relationship between the proportion of outlets franchised and several franchisor's characteristics based on the perspectives of transaction cost analysis, resource scarcy theory and agency theory. Using franchisor data in Korean Franchise Disclosure Document over the 2006-2009 period, we test the effect of franchisor size, system growth rate, franchise fee, initial investment, and risk sharing on the proportion of outlets franchised. Except for the effect of system growth rate, the results of a series of multiple regression analysis supported the negative effects of franchisor size, franchise fee, initial investment and risk sharing on the proportion of outlets franchised.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.65-88
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• 2008

Since the implementation of economic reforms in 1978, the Chinese economy grows rapidly at an average annul growth rate of 9% over the post two decades. Franchising has been widely recognized as an important source of entrepreneurial activity. Trust is important in that it facilitates relational exchanges by permits partners to transcend short-run inequities or risks to concentrate on long-term profits or gains. In the relationship between the franchisors and franchisees, trust has been described as an important source of competitive advantage. However, little research has been done on the factors affecting trust in Chinese franchisor-franchisee relationships. The purpose of this study is to investigate what factors affect the trust in the franchise system in China, and to provide guidelines and insights to franchisors which enter Chinese market. In this study, according to Morgan and Hunt (1994), trust is defined as the extending when one party has confidence in an exchange partner's reliability and integrity. We offered a conceptual model of the empirical study. The model shows that the factors affecting the trust include franchisor's supports, communication, satisfaction with previous outcome and conflict. We also suggested the franchisor's supports and communication like to enhance the franchisee's satisfaction with previous outcome, and the franchisor's supports, communication and he franchisee's satisfaction with previous outcome tend to decrease conflict. Before the formal study, a pretest involving exploratory interviews with owners from three franchisees was conducted to make sure the questionnaire was relevant and clear to the respondents. The data were collected using trained interviewers to carry out personal interviews with the aid of an unidentified, muti-page, structured questionnaire. The respondents comprised of owners, managers, and owner managers of franchisee-owned food service franchises located in Beijing, China. Even though a total of 256 potential franchises were initially contacted, the finally usable sample consisted of 125 respondents. As expected, the sampling method was successful in soliciting respondents with waried personal and firm characteristics. Self-administrated questionnaires were used for all measures. And established scales were used to measure the latent constructs in this study. The measures tapped the franchisees' perceptions of the relationship with the referent franchisor. Five-point Likert-type scales ranging from "strongly disagree" (=1) to "strongly agree" (=7) were used throughout the constructs (trust, eight items; support, five items; communication, four items; satisfaction, six items; conflict, three items). The reliability measurements traditionally employed, such as the Cronbach's alpha, were used. All the reliabilities were greater than.80. The proposed measurement model was estimated using SPSS 12.0 and AMOS 5.0 analysis package. We conducted A series of exploratory factor analyses and confirmatory factor analyses to assess the convergent validity, discriminant validity, and reliability. The results indicate reasonable overall fits between the model and the observed data. The overall fit of measurement model were $X^2$= 159.699, p=0.004, d.f. = 116, GFI =.879, NFI =.898, CFI =.969, IFI =.970, TLI =.959, RMR =.058. The results demonstrated that the data reasonably fitted the model. We also examined construct reliability and reliability and average variance extracted (AVE). The construct reliability of each construct was greater than.80 and the AVE of each construct was greater than.50. According to the analysis of Structure Equation Modeling (SEM), the results of path model indicated an adequate fit of the model: $X^2$= 142.126, p = 0.044, d.f. = 115, GFI =.892, NFI =.909, CFI =.981, IFI =.981, TLI =.974, RMR =.057. As hypothesized, the results showed that it is strategically important to establish trust in a franchise system, and the franchisor's supports, communication and satisfaction with previous outcome tend to reinforce franchisee's trust. The results also showed trust seems to decrease as the experience of conflict episodes increases. And we also noticed that franchisor's supports and communication tend to enhance the franchisee's satisfaction with previous outcome, and communication tend to decrease conflict. If the trust between the franchisor and franchisee can be established in a franchise system, franchising offers many benefits and reduces many costs. To manage a mutual trust of relationship with their franchisees, franchisor's should provide support effectively to their franchisees. Effective assistant services have direct effect on franchisees' satisfaction with previous outcome and trust in franchisor. Especially, franchise sales process, orientation, and training in the start-up period are key elements for success of the franchise system. Franchisor's support is an accumulated separate satisfaction evaluation with different kind of service provided by the franchisor. And providing support definitely can improve the trustworthy image of the franchisor. In the franchise system, conflicts of interests and exertions of different power sources are very common. The experience of conflict episodes seems to negatively relate to trust. Therefore, it is important to reduce the negative side of the relationship conflicts. Communication actually plays a broader role in reducing conflict and establish mutual trust in franchisor-franchisee relationship. And effective communication between franchisors and franchisees can improve franchisees' satisfaction toward the franchise system. As the diversification of Chinese markets, both franchisors and franchisees must keep the relevant, timely, and reliable communication. And it is very important to improve the quality of communication. Satisfaction with precious outcomes seems to positively relate to trust. Franchisors and franchisees that are highly satisfied with the previous outcomes that flow from their relationship will perceive their partner as advancing their goal achievement. Therefore, it is necessary for both franchisor and their franchisees to make the welfare of partner with effort. Little literature has focused on what factors affect the trust between franchisors and their franchisees in China. This study developed the hypotheses regarding the factors affecting trust in the transaction relationship. The results of data analysis supported the hypotheses strongly. There are certain limitations in this study. First, we may point out that some other factors missed in this study could be significantly important. Second, the context of this study, food service industry, limits its potential generalizability for all franchise systems. More studies in different categories of franchise system are needed to broaden its generalizability. Third, the model was tested empirically in a sample in Beijing, more empirical tests of the proposed model in other Chinese areas are needed. Finally, the analysis in this study was solely based on the perception of franchisees and the opinions of franchisors were not included.