• Culinary science and hospitality research
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.174-187
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of franchisor's training on franchisee's trust and relationship satisfaction. In addition, it investigated the difference in the perception of franchisor's training system by the duration of the franchise contract and the frequency of franchisor's visiting. In order to carry out the empirical study, a questionnaire was distributed to franchisees from July 26 to September 1, 2009, and a total of 255 copies were returned and used for analysis. In analyzing the data, three factors of the franchisor's training were obtained: pre-training, franchisor training, and supervisor training. These three factors had a significant effect on franchisee's trust and satisfaction with the relationship. Also, There was significant differences among franchisor's training by duration of the franchise contract. The findings of the study suggested useful implications in the related industries.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.35-49
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• 2021

Purpose: The major objective of this study is to develop a model for the impact of franchisors' Gapjil (verbal·nonverbal Gapjil, abusing bargaining position, refusing transaction, false or exaggerated information, restrictive practices, unfair damage compensation) on franchisee's recontract intention. We also examine the mediating role of economic satisfaction and social satisfaction in the relationship between franchisors' Gapjil and franchisee's contract intention. Research design, data, and methodology: Data were collected from franchisee owners located nationwide in Korea. Out of 256 questionaires distributed, a total of 256 questionnaires were returned. After excluding 10 invalid respondent questionnaires, we coded and analyzed 246 valid questionnaires (effective response rate of 96.09%) using frequency, confirmatory factor analysis, correlations analysis, and structural equation modeling with SPSS 22.O and SmartPLS 3.0. Results: The findings of this study are summarized as follows: First, among the Gapjil of the franchisors, restrictive practices and unfair damage compensation had negative effects on economic and social satisfaction, but verbal and nonverbal Gapjil for economic and social satisfaction was not significant. Second, abusing bargaining positions and false or exaggerated information had negative effects on social satisfaction, but for economic satisfaction, found to be insignificant. Third, economic and social satisfaction had positive effects on the franchisee's recontract intention to the franchisor. Conclusion: The following implications of this study are as follows. First, the construct of Gapjil that occurs between the franchisors and the franchisees was first presented, and the franchisors' Gapjil is divided into interpersonal Gapjil and structural Gapjil. Second, the Gapjil of the franchisors can be an important predictor variable in maintaining and developing a long-term relationship between the franchisors and the franchisees. Third, solving conflict due to the Gapjil problem between franchisors and franchisees can be an important factor for franchisors and franchisees to co-survive and thrive in Korean franchise system. Fourth, this study suggest that managing the Gapjil of the franchisors was a important antecedent factor in maintaining long-term relationship between the franchisors and the franchisees. Therefore, this study will help franchisors formulate effective symbiotic marketing strategies to satisfy relationships with franchisees and consequently enhance long-term orientation.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.1-18
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• 2017

This study focuses on the recent case held as to control in franchising. On the basis of analysis of the recent case, it examines the validity of the decision and suggests practical advice. The extensive judicial precedent has held that the franchisor and the franchisee possess the independent contractor relationship. But Williams v. Jani-king of Philadelphia Inc. suggest the conversion of the franchisee's status to an employees instead of an independent contractor. Franchisees allege that they were wrongly classified as independent contractors instead of employees because Jani-King had the ability to control the manner in which franchisees perform their day-to-day tasks. The appeal court held that Pennsylvania law does not distinguish between controls put in place to protect a franchise's intellectual property and controls for other purposes, and a franchisee may be an employee or an independent contractor depending on the nature of the franchise system controls. However, some degree of controls by the franchisor over the franchisee is inherent in the franchise and may even be mandated by the federal and state laws. Moreover, the appeal court affirmed that the franchise agreement, policies manual, and training manual alone could be sufficient to resolve the employment status. But it seems appropriate that the right to control on the documents is considered with the actual control.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.21-40
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• 2006

Small and middle sized Franchise system channels experience conflicts because of constant interaction between franchiser and franchisee. However, it is rarely that attempt has been made to identify causes of conflicts in distribution of franchise industry. The purpose of this study was to explore cause of conflicts from the franchisee. For the study, data were collected from the owner or the shop-manager with a contractor in franchise systems. By means of in-depth interviews with multiple informants, their statement was analyzed qualitatively. From analysis of the resulting data, the causes of conflicts were associated with two broad sets, attitudinal and structural differences between franchisers and franchisees. First, attitudinal sources of conflict were identified as perception of subordinated relationships between channel members, delayed announcement on order changes, difficulties in communication by doing irresponsible behavior, different expectations between channel members in market territory and lack of consistent-supporting. Second, structural sources of conflict involved unilateral decision on interior, payment method, unreasonable delivery issue, treat franchisee with discrimination by the sales, in controlling against free management. There are limitations on generalization due to the results based on interview, but this study will be a useful exploratory step before designing a large scale survey.

• 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.

• 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.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.61-118
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• 2008

The purpose of this research is to construct research framework for international franchising based on existing literature and to identify research components in the framework. Franchise can be defined as management styles that allow franchisee use various management assets of franchisor in order to make or sell product or service. It can be divided into product distribution franchise that is designed to sell products and business format franchise that is designed for running it as business whatever its form is. International franchising can be defined as a way of internationalization of franchisor to foreign country by providing its business format or package to franchisee of host country. International franchising is growing fast for last four decades but academic research on this is quite limited. Especially in Korea, research about international franchising is carried out on by case study format with single case or empirical study format with survey based on domestic franchise theory. Therefore, this paper tries to review existing literature on international franchising research, providing research framework, and then stimulating new research on this field. International franchising research components include motives and environmental factors for decision of expanding to international franchising, entrance modes and development plan for international franchising, contracts and management strategy of international franchising, and various performance measures from different perspectives. First, motives of international franchising are fee collection from franchisee. Also it provides easier way to expanding to foreign country. The other motives including increase total sales volume, occupying better strategic position, getting quality resources, and improving efficiency. Environmental factors that facilitating international franchising encompasses economic condition, trend, and legal or political factors in host and/or home countries. In addition, control power and risk management capability of franchisor plays critical role in successful franchising contract. Final decision to enter foreign country via franchising is determined by numerous factors like history, size, growth, competitiveness, management system, bonding capability, industry characteristics of franchisor. After deciding to enter into foreign country, franchisor needs to set entrance modes of international franchising. Within contractual mode, there are master franchising and area developing franchising, licensing, direct franchising, and joint venture. Theories about entrance mode selection contain concepts of efficiency, knowledge-based approach, competence-based approach, agent theory, and governance cost. The next step after entrance decision is operation strategy. Operation strategy starts with selecting a target city and a target country for franchising. In order to finding, screening targets, franchisor needs to collect information about candidates. Critical information includes brand patent, commercial laws, regulations, market conditions, country risk, and industry analysis. After selecting a target city in target country, franchisor needs to select franchisee, in other word, partner. The first important criteria for selecting partners are financial credibility and capability, possession of real estate. And cultural similarity and knowledge about franchisor and/or home country are also recognized as critical criteria. The most important element in operating strategy is legal document between franchisor and franchisee with home and host countries. Terms and conditions in legal documents give objective information about characteristics of franchising agreement for academic research. Legal documents have definitions of terminology, territory and exclusivity, agreement of term, initial fee, continuing fees, clearing currency, and rights about sub-franchising. Also, legal documents could have terms about softer elements like training program and operation manual. And harder elements like law competent court and terms of expiration. Next element in operating strategy is about product and service. Especially for business format franchising, product/service deliverable, benefit communicators, system identifiers (architectural features), and format facilitators are listed for product/service strategic elements. Another important decision on product/service is standardization vs. customization. The rationale behind standardization is cost reduction, efficiency, consistency, image congruence, brand awareness, and competitiveness on price. Also standardization enables large scale R&D and innovative change in management style. Another element in operating strategy is control management. The simple way to control franchise contract is relying on legal terms, contractual control system. There are other control systems, administrative control system and ethical control system. Contractual control system is a coercive source of power, but franchisor usually doesn't want to use legal power since it doesn't help to build up positive relationship. Instead, self-regulation is widely used. Administrative control system uses control mechanism from ordinary work relationship. Its main component is supporting activities to franchisee and communication method. For example, franchisor provides advertising, training, manual, and delivery, then franchisee follows franchisor's direction. Another component is building franchisor's brand power. The last research element is performance factor of international franchising. Performance elements can be divided into franchisor's performance and franchisee's performance. The conceptual performance measures of franchisor are simple but not easy to obtain objectively. They are profit, sale, cost, experience, and brand power. The performance measures of franchisee are mostly about benefits of host country. They contain small business development, promotion of employment, introduction of new business model, and level up technology status. There are indirect benefits, like increase of tax, refinement of corporate citizenship, regional economic clustering, and improvement of international balance. In addition to those, host country gets socio-cultural change other than economic effects. It includes demographic change, social trend, customer value change, social communication, and social globalization. Sometimes it is called as westernization or McDonaldization of society. In addition, the paper reviews on theories that have been frequently applied to international franchising research, such as agent theory, resource-based view, transaction cost theory, organizational learning theory, and international expansion theories. Resource based theory is used in strategic decision based on resources, like decision about entrance and cooperation depending on resources of franchisee and franchisor. Transaction cost theory can be applied in determination of mutual trust or satisfaction of franchising players. Agent theory tries to explain strategic decision for reducing problem caused by utilizing agent, for example research on control system in franchising agreements. Organizational Learning theory is relatively new in franchising research. It assumes organization tries to maximize performance and learning of organization. In addition, Internalization theory advocates strategic decision of direct investment for removing inefficiency of market transaction and is applied in research on terms of contract. And oligopolistic competition theory is used to explain various entry modes for international expansion. Competency theory support strategic decision of utilizing key competitive advantage. Furthermore, research methodologies including qualitative and quantitative methodologies are suggested for more rigorous international franchising research. Quantitative research needs more real data other than survey data which is usually respondent's judgment. In order to verify theory more rigorously, research based on real data is essential. However, real quantitative data is quite hard to get. The qualitative research other than single case study is also highly recommended. Since international franchising has limited number of applications, scientific research based on grounded theory and ethnography study can be used. Scientific case study is differentiated with single case study on its data collection method and analysis method. The key concept is triangulation in measurement, logical coding and comparison. Finally, it provides overall research direction for international franchising after summarizing research trend in Korea. International franchising research in Korea has two different types, one is for studying Korean franchisor going overseas and the other is for Korean franchisee of foreign franchisor. Among research on Korean franchisor, two common patterns are observed. First of all, they usually deal with success story of one franchisor. The other common pattern is that they focus on same industry and country. Therefore, international franchise research needs to extend their focus to broader subjects with scientific research methodology as well as development of new theory.

• 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.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.17 no.9
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• pp.67-81
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• 2019

Purpose - The overarching aim of this study is to empirically test the effect of ex-post control mechanisms on multi-dimensional trust and channel performance in franchise systems. Although the franchise system is a vertical marketing channel based on trust between the franchisor and the franchisees, issues related to franchisee's opportunistic behavior have persisted and thus requires research into the effective control system of franchise headquarters. Research design, data, and methodology - In this study, data was collected from 150 franchises to identify the effect of two types of franchising headquarters' control system on the multi-dimensional trust and franchise channel outcome between franchisor and franchisee. To test the hypotheses intended to achieve this aim, structural equations modeling technique is utilized. Results - The results of this research reveal that among the two formal control systems studied (output and process control), output control positively and significantly affects multidimensional trust. Additionally, among the three dimensions of trust employed in this study, only expertise has a positive and significant effect on contract compliance. Equally, only expertise and integrity have a negative and significant effect on opportunistic behavior. Conclusions - The study provides managerial and theoretical insights into understanding ex-post control mechanisms, trust, compliance and opportunistic behaviors in franchise systems.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.87-104
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• 2015

This study, based on theoretical and practical understanding of franchising, aims to conceptualize franchising in terms of marketing mix and proposes new paradigm of franchising. New schema of the franchise marketing mix involves both customer gap and franchisee gap by including customer and franchisee contacts and sets activities that include components of franchise system as the factor of marketing mix. So we could suggest the franchise marketing mix, '4F' by introducing conventional marketing mix concept into this assumption. The 4F schema consist of four sub-dimensions: 'Format', 'Fee & Royalty', 'Franchising Process', and 'Franchise Communication', which correspond to '4P'. In perspective of marketing mix, we could divide the franchise system into primary activity and support activity, then we also could categorize the fundamental activity into four-classification system, 4F schema. We expect that franchise marketing mix, 4F can be useful both theoretically and practically as it not only is not too different from the conventional marketing mix, but it also proposes franchise value chain by including unique characteristics and contents of the franchise system.