An opportunity to create jobs through franchising

Ireland is missing a huge opportunity to strengthen the economy and create thousands of jobs through franchising.

That’s according to serial entrepreneur and franchisor Paul Teahan, who is calling on Government to proactively support the country’s budding franchise sector, ahead of Ireland’s first franchise expo - The Franchise Show - in more than three years.

Franchised businesses employ approximately 24,350 people through 2,975 different franchise units, across the Republic of Ireland according to a 2015 study by Ipsos MRBI for AIB and the Irish Franchise Association.

However, figures from the latest Irish Franchise survey, suggest the figures could be a lot higher, with 4,086 operating units on the island of Ireland, providing 42,927 full-time equivalent jobs and contributing €2.4 billion to the Irish economy to the economy.

While the outlook for franchising in Ireland remains strong, with 60% of franchise owners planning to hire more staff over the coming year, Mr. Teahan, Area Developer of The Interface Financial Group (IFG) franchise, believes it is only a fraction of the potential growth achievable if similar resources to those given to start-ups and foreign businesses, were applied to franchising.

The Interface Financial Group will be exhibiting at The Franchise Show in the RDS on 9th and 10th September.

Mr. Teahan states,

"With little or no support from Government, franchising in Ireland demonstrated its resilience through the downturn and is now poised to grow strongly over the coming years. We are missing a huge opportunity to create potentially thousands of jobs because of a lack of support to the sector."

He added,

"There’s no reason why we couldn’t double the size of the sector, but more needs to be done to raise awareness of franchising as a viable business option for entrepreneurs and would be business owners, if we’re to make that a reality."

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