Are you an entrepreneur at heart, eagerly planning on starting your own business? Maybe you don’t have to start from scratch with no customers, no brand familiarity, and no name recognition.
If you buy a successful franchise, you have adopted a recognized and accepted brand. That gives you a significant step up on your competitors. Look closer.
What Makes a Franchise Profitable?
If you’ve chosen the right franchise, it has a proven track record. It’s succeeded in dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of locations across the country (and maybe beyond). Here’s why.
Brand Recognition and Reputation
If you start a business with your own name and an unfamiliar logo on the door, you start from basically nothing. You must meet potential customers or clients, introduce yourself, and tell them what you do and why you do it better than the business owner down the street or in the next town.
You don’t have to do any of that if you invest in a successful franchise operation. Others who own franchises have already done that for you. If you own a Dairy Queen store or a Merry Maids house cleaning service, the performance and reputation of other Dairy Queen or Merry Maids franchisees have already made the introduction for you.
Your customers will do business with you because they’ve done business in the past with others who carry the same corporate name, logo, offerings, and ways of doing business that you have.
But that cuts both ways. If customers have been ill-treated by other franchisees, they’ll assume the same from you and stay away from your business. That’s why it’s critical to buy into a highly reputable franchise operation.
Initial Investment vs. ROI
You can buy a business franchise for a couple of thousand dollars — or for several million. Whatever you’re considering putting into the venture, you’re probably wondering when you’ll get your initial investment back.
You can determine your return on investment (ROI) by dividing your annual net profit by your initial investment and multiplying it by 100. So, if your initial investment is $250,000 and you make a net annual profit of $50,000, your ROI is 20%. The higher your ROI, the quicker you can expect to recoup your initial investment.
Until you actually go into business, you can only estimate your net profits based on the franchisor’s estimate or your own rough calculations.
Growth Potential and Market Demand
Does your market need and want the products or services you’re selling? Will the need be just as great in a year or five years? That’s what you must determine before laying your money down and buying a franchise.
By law, you’ll receive a copy of the franchisor’s Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) before you commit to purchasing a location. Among other information, this document will include a financial statement detailing the organization’s economic health. If you don’t know how to read this, let your accountant review it.
You might also talk to other franchisees to see what the bottom line really looks like.
Take your time, and never feel rushed to buy a franchise before you’re confident that you’re making the right move.
Support and Training From the Franchisor
The years — or decades — of success the franchisor has racked up is one of the key reasons you consider purchasing a franchise. It’s only over time that the logo becomes familiar and you receive a built-in consumer base. Your first customers trust you because they’ve come to depend on other franchisees of the same operation. That’s how trust gets built in this business model.
A good operation will be eager to train new franchisees on what to sell and how to sell it. After all, their reputation depends on their ability to carry on the traditions, processes, and procedures that made the franchisor large and successful enough to offer franchises in the first place.
Your franchise’s start-up training and ongoing support are especially essential if you’re a first-time business owner.
Profitable Franchises in Which to Invest in 2025
Now that you’ve learned some of the building blocks to franchise success, here’s a short list of franchising possibilities in various industries and at different cost points. Review it to get your search started.
1. McDonald’s
While Ray Kroc’s fast food restaurant wasn’t the first franchisor, it was — and still is — among the most successful and well-known. Today, there are over 40,000 McDonald’s franchises in more than 100 countries and territories. Now that is true brand recognition!
2. Freeway Insurance
Freeway is known for its comprehensive training program and ongoing support. Acting as independent brokers, Freeway insurance agents have access to numerous leading brands from name-rep insurance carriers. Freeway has a few hundred franchisees across the U.S. and plenty of territory for new franchisees.
3. Planet Fitness
Planet Fitness went from its first franchise in 2003 to more than 2,600 of them today. It now has impressive brand recognition and is one of the largest fitness club franchise systems in the country, both in terms of locations and member count.
4. Panera Bread
Sit-down restaurant, bakery, coffeehouse. However you want to refer to your local Panera Bread franchise location, it’s doing quite well. While the first franchise wasn’t sold until the late 1990s, there are now more than 2,200 franchise and company-owned locations in operation. The model makes it a deep-pocket investment. The company sells commitments to open six or more restaurants rather than selling single locations.
5. Great Clips
The largest hair salon in the world began — and exists today — with a focus on cheap, no-frills haircuts. The first franchise was sold in 1983, and today, the brand has grown to more than 4,400 locations in the U.S. and Canada.
6. Merry Maids
From modest beginnings in the late 1970s came a franchise organization that cleans some 120,000 homes in the U.S. and Canada through more than 500 franchises. Trust and a golden reputation are critical when you’re a franchisee seeking work in a person’s home, and Merry Maids has achieved that level of brand loyalty and acceptance.
Why You Should Consider Investing in a Freeway Insurance Franchise This Year
Some of the key reasons to become a Freeway franchise owner include top-tier training and ongoing support, brand loyalty, and the brands at your command.
Freeway is one of the nation’s largest personal lines insurance companies. We’ve established a coast-to-coast franchise system, and give our agents access to some of the best-known brands in the industry.
Want to learn more? Simply call your Freeway Insurance franchise representative at 877-822-3024 today.
Or give us your contact information online, and we’ll check in with you.
You’ll find investing in Freeway Insurance is your career pathway to success.
