Franchising: Commercial Marriages from Heaven or Hell?

Franchising has boomed in Australia, now the world's most franchised nation per head of population. But the collapse of franchise chains – most recently booksellers Angus & Robertson and Borders – highlights that there are considerable additional challenges to the popular business model. What happens when a franchisor fails to move with the times or when franchisees and franchisors fall out? There are numerous upsides to these popular "commercial marriages", but – far from cookie-cutting – franchising is one of the most intricate and complicated ways of doing business, argue experts at the Australian School of Business.