Last week, the WorldFood Connect community hosted three webinars dedicated to franchises in HoReCa and food retail

The organizers of the thematic week were WorldFood Connect and RBC Franchises. During the webinars, experts shared their successful experience in creating franchises in retail and HoReCa, discussed the specifics of franchising in food retail, and talked about scaling franchise projects abroad.

Successful franchise cases in HoReCa and retail

On March 4, a webinar “Successful franchise cases in HoReCa and retail” was held, where speakers presented figures on the Russian franchising market and outlined trends in the catering and retail franchise sector.

Anna Afanasyeva said that over the past ten years, the franchising market in Russia has grown threefold. Today, there are about 4,000 franchises, and their contribution to GDP is 1.5%. The largest part of the market is occupied by services, followed by catering, retail and manufacturing. In addition, over the past few years, the number of entrepreneurs looking for franchises up to 1 million rubles has decreased. More and more often, they opt for projects worth 10 million rubles and perceive such franchises as a long-term and serious investment.

Speaking about trends in the franchising market, Alexander Melnikov identified 5 most promising niches: IT, catering with an emphasis on dark kitchen, low-price stores, projects related to children, and the beauty industry. The speaker also shared his successful experience of developing a franchise for the One Price chain of fixed-price stores and noted that it was developed in such a way that it could be launched by a person with or without experience.

Miroslav Zudin also took part in the webinar and told how to choose a high-quality and effective franchise with minimal risks. The expert emphasized that when choosing a franchise, you need to clearly understand what budget you are willing to spend on business development and what competencies you have. Important criteria when choosing a franchise are also the personal brand of the franchise founder and the support provided by the franchisor.

Franchising in food retail: increasing sales and attracting investment

The next day, March 5, WorldFood Connect hosted a webinar entitled “Franchising in Grocery Retail: Increasing Sales and Attracting Investments.” Together with industry experts, we discussed franchising as a tool for scaling a business, attracting investment, promoting goods and services on the domestic and foreign markets, and the legal aspects of this process.

According to Yuri Mikhailichenko, the Russian franchising market has increased 10-fold since 2010. It is expected that by 2030, up to 200,000 franchises will operate in Russia. The expert believes that the franchise market is very promising for business development, especially regional, since it is very difficult for local manufacturers to compete with large federal networks. Therefore, launching your own brand stores and using a franchise to promote them is one of the excellent options for developing a regional business. The speaker also noted that the Russian Franchising Association is currently completing the development of a GOST for franchises, which will set out the requirements and recommendations for the franchise business.

Artem Garden also spoke about the legislation in this area. The expert emphasized that within the framework of a franchise, the franchisor has the right to impose restrictions on its partner under the commercial concession agreement. In addition, the speaker analyzed in detail the differences between classic franchising and the reverse one. In the classic version, the franchisee independently manages the store, and in the reverse one, the franchisor makes most of the decisions. Thus, the second option implies less freedom, but also fewer risks.

Export through franchising: entering new markets

On the final day of the Franchise week, March 6, a webinar was held entitled “Export through franchising: entering new markets”, the key topics of which were the export of franchises through franchising, the development of franchises and tools for their promotion on the international market.

According to a joint study by INFOLine and WorldFood Connect, more than 60% of Russian food and beverage producers export or would like to export their products abroad. Among the main restrictions for this, they name logistics, special requirements of the importing country and sharp currency fluctuations.

During the webinar, Vasil Gazizulin noted that exporting goods or services independently is difficult and expensive, but this process can be simplified with the help of franchising. This model assumes the presence of a franchise partner who will ensure the presence of your brand in various distribution channels abroad, localize the language and marketing components, certify the product, pay for logistics and customs storage.

Marina Protasova added that from an economic point of view, exporting goods through franchising provides an opportunity to increase the company's profit by reducing the volume of production and cutting costs. But in order to export through a franchise, a preliminary thorough analysis of the market and adaptation of the product to it is required. At the moment, the most popular export destinations are the CIS countries, Asia and Africa. As for business categories, such areas as beauty, health, catering and manufacturing prevail here.

Yulia Romanchenko spoke about promoting a franchise on the international market. According to the speaker, first of all, you should designate your presence on the Internet using advertising on social networks, SEO promotion, email newsletters and other tools. In addition, you can use such channels as word of mouth and advertising in catalogs and through franchise brokers. The expert also noted that today the state actively supports the entry of Russian brands into the international market and provides subsidies for the export of goods or services through franchising through the Russian Export Center (REC).