Top 20: Award for International Achievement

The franchise model is used extensively to expand overseas, by brands operating franchises in the UK as well as high street names that don’t use the model domestically. The advantages of having committed, local business experts to grow a brand in different cultures and legal frameworks are many, and significant.

This award recognises the impressive practice being used to diversify into new markets and successfully adapt overseas operations. Two brands were shortlisted for their achievements on a multinational scale: one demonstrated fast-paced growth across multiple countries on a truly global scale; the other transformed a difficult trading history by adapting in every way to local culture, with impressive results that will shape its future foreign expansion plans.

Both highlight the power of franchising when taking a business overseas.

InXpress
Started at home by John Thompson and his daughter and franchising in the UK since 2001, InXpress now operates across 15 countries, six continents and has global head offices in Manchester, Salt Lake City and Singapore. Entering the notoriously difficult market of the US franchise sector in 2006 has proved the catalyst for rapid expansion that shows no signs of slowing down in coming years.

Put simply, InXpress uses bulk buying power and its agreements with major courier firms to secure preferential rates for international and domestic shipping costs, reducing postage rates for SMEs. Transactions are all done via ecommerce using world-class software, which receives significant investment in every market – there are separate software specialists for their English and non-English speaking markets.

Partnering with global carriers has been the key to aggressive worldwide expansion, developing new markets with the backing of major brands, to the benefit of both. That level of growth in a short space of time – an average of two new countries per year since they began international franchising eight years ago – would be easy to get wrong, but InXpress is clear that it is rapid but controlled expansion: there are developed systems in place alongside highly tailored strategies.

Every country has its own unique challenges, and the company says it’s important to understand those challenges and tailor the business accordingly. Local cultural and legal knowledge is retained in each country, with a support centre being set up prior to operations launching in a new market ensuring that franchisees have the right back-up and structure in place from day one.

Training is recognised as central to success, with manuals reviewed and updated frequently and an international training specialist travelling the world to meet with franchisees. Existing markets are growing too, showing that the company emphasises its support for existing networks as well as developing new ones.
InXpress is a UK brand that’s becoming a worldwide force through a robust franchise model – not bad for a family business started in a bedroom.

For more information on this franchise opportunity, please click here

Pirtek
Pirtek, provider of fluid transfer solutions and hydraulic hose repairs, have operations across several European countries. But it’s not always been smooth sailing, as the company is quick to admit, with difficulties in Belgium, France and Germany in particular giving them challenges.

Germany is known as a tough market with a very different corporate culture to the UK; some of the biggest overseas franchise brands have struggled. After 13 years, Pirtek’s turnover in Germany was only similar to that of the Benelux countries – but Germany has four times the population.

The company knew it had to revise its strategy there and in Belgium, where revenue was falling. Chairman Kelvin Roberts admits that with hindsight, Pirtek treated different countries too autonomously, too separately. The German arm of the business felt isolated at both a franchisee and franchisor level, and needed to change.

And change it did. A German sales expert was bought in to focus on metrics; German directors joined the Pirtek Europe board; pan-European meetings were frequently held there; Pirtek Europe’s chairman and several board members attended regional and national meetings.

Most remarkably of all, the chairman and two other senior directors learnt to speak German so that they could converse with franchisees and colleagues in their mother tongue as well as conducting interviews with the media. Local franchisees began to feel included in something much bigger.

The extraordinary lengths the company went to for its German division had instant and long-term dividends: in the first two years of the new inclusive strategy, sales went up 25 percent and turnover in 2013 more than doubled previous levels, having grown exponentially throughout the recession.

Perhaps most importantly, the lessons learned in Germany on the importance of localising a pan-European strategy have been adopted elsewhere in Pirtek Europe, positively impacting results in Belgium and in France (which also benefited from directors learning the language) and paving the way for Austrian expansion.
They’ll also ensure that the company knows how to flourish – and remain inclusive – when it enters new foreign markets.

Interested and want to know more about InXpress?

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