Suffrage 125 - Celebrating women in franchising

The Hall family of Columbus Coffee Kapiti and Porirua celebrating last year's win with some of the Columbus team

Women have always been strongly involved in small business in New Zealand, and franchising both reflects that and helps more women into self-employment and business ownership. The 2010 Franchising New Zealand survey found that almost half of all franchise units are owned together with a spouse or partner, rather than by a male sole owner (29%) or a female sole owner (13%). Sadly, the 2017 survey didn’t ask this same question but a 2016 survey by MYOB found that women make up 44 percent of small-to-medium business (SME) owners, up from 30 percent in 2012.

But it’s not just about ownership – women can also claim to have out-performed the men in franchising. In the very first year of the Franchise Awards, back in 1995, one of the two top franchisees was Robyn Hulena of Wendy’s Supa Sundaes in Riccarton.  The following year, solo mum Tracey Houston of Lollipop’s took out the top franchisee title, then a series of husband-and-wife teams won up till 2002, when the winner was again a lone woman – Wellington’s Angela Ferguson of Mortgage Choice.

In fact, it’s not until the 11th year of the Awards, in 2005, that a solo man – Shiraz Hajee – was named New Zealand’s top franchisee, and it’s a feat that has been achieved only three times since. Karleen Hennessey restored women’s place at the top in 2006 and although Ivy & William Joe’s names are both on their record-breaking run of Supreme Awards from 2012-2014, it was Ivy who ran the business.

As the table below shows, women have been named as New Zealand’s top franchisees at the Awards in 19 out of 23 years so far. In 2016, a whole family won the title, with women in the majority there, too. On balance, it seems that a higher percentage of franchising’s top performers are women than men – and a couple can make the strongest team of all.

Realistic expectations

There was one finding in the MYOB survey that made fascinating reading – the comment that, ‘It has become apparent over the five years of the survey that the projections we get from women, both in terms of revenue growth and the overall economy, have tracked more closely to the actual results we can expect to see.’ If that’s true, it suggests that women are more realistic about business potential – always a significant factor in establishing the trust between a franchisor and franchisee that leads to better outcomes for all.

On board

And perhaps there’s another reason for the success of women in franchising. Right from the early days of the Franchise Association and its predecessors, there have been women on its board, many of them highly-successful franchisors in their own right. Estelle Logan of V.I.P. was the first woman elected as Chairman, and the current Vice Chairman is also female. While other countries' Associations have found it necessary to reserve a special seat on the board for a woman, that’s never been the case here – and it’s certainly never been necessary to set up a separate sub-section for ‘Women and minorities’, as was once the case in the USA’s International Franchise Association.

So today, let’s celebrate the 19th century campaigners who helped New Zealand lead the way, and celebrate all those women who have taken the opportunities they created to succeed in so many fields – including business. Cheers!

Awards winners

Here’s the list of all the top Franchisee Award winners to date. This year’s winners will be named on 10th November.

We found this poster in a private collection. We thought it was a joke at first, but Te Papa says it's real.