Ryan is an attorney and valuation specialist residing in Chicago. He chronicles his thoughts and research on FranchisePundit.com. You may reach him by email ryanknoll@gmail.com or mobile telephone 312-212-3423.
I’ve always thought that the best way to grow a franchisor is not to have the best product or service offering, but to offer the best franchising arrangements with flexibility. It look like some hotel franchisors are taking that exact route and it is working.
A spokesman for Wyndham, Richard Roberts, said that all of the company’s brands require franchisees to sign up for a minimum of 15 years, except for Knights Inn, which offers three-year agreements. Asked about Ms. Sanders’s properties, Mr. Roberts said: “We consider details of our relationships with individual franchisees to be a private business matter. Anyone who wants to affiliate with Wyndham does so at their own initiative. The fact is there are 6,500 hotels in our system for a very good reason: We deliver value to our franchisees.” The brands also include Days Inn, Ramada and Howard Johnson.
Ms. Sanders, though, has moved 17 of her 18 hotels to a new brand, Americas Best Value Inn. The company has broken ranks with its competitors by offering franchise agreements that are renewable each year.
Offering an alternative to the industry’s traditional 20-year contracts has helped make Americas Best Value one of the fastest-growing lodging chains. Nine years after it was founded, its name is on some 800 hotels — nearly all of which once waved other companies’ flags.
The company’s chief executive and president, Roger Bloss, sounds a populist message, calling Americas Best Value “a membership association” and allowing franchisees to vote on company policies, from what kind of shampoo to offer to how much they will pay in fees.
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