Beyond expectations

It’s many people’s dream – to be your own boss – but in reality, it takes a combination of preparedness, training, skills, commitment and support to run a business that will meet and even exceed the personal and financial results you expect. That’s where buying a franchise can give you a competitive advantage from day one. You’ll not just be provided with a business model that gives you the framework you need to succeed – you’ll be taught to operate the business to maximise its potential and guided as you learn to get the most benefit for yourself and your family out of it. 

Of course, no franchise is a guaranteed success, and a potential franchisee must always be cautious, but there is no doubt that – provided you choose well – buying a franchise significantly increases the chances of getting what you want – and more – out of owning your own business.

A long-term lens

Looking at their businesses and lives through a long-term lens, we asked three women from franchised businesses in different industries to share how their experiences as franchisees have elevated their lives beyond their expectations.

After several years as the owner of a Jean Jones clothing franchise, Shirley Buxton swapped coat hangers for coffee, choosing to go into ownership of a Muffin Break franchise. Taking the reins 17 years ago at Muffin Break Coastlands in Paraparaumu, Shirley had to learn the ropes in an entirely new industry, but still under the familiar auspices of franchising.

“Back then, I saw the Coastlands franchise opportunity in a newspaper advert the size of a postage stamp. I’d previously thought ‘no’ to cafés but realised that, irrespective of the weather, the economy, or whatever else is going on in life, people still want coffee.”

Trust and trepidation 

When you buy a franchise, you’re buying a ready-made business format that someone else has researched and developed for you. Your own business may not yet exist in the location you want, but all the product design, service parameters, business systems and profitability studies have been carried out already. You buy the franchise and it’s up to your own efforts to make it successful in your area.

Shirley explains just how scary that can be, “Not having a café background, I was very nervous about going into this. But I knew that being part of a franchise, your hand gets held to a certain extent.”

Buying the franchise with husband Mark, Shirley ran the business herself, with Mark concurrently running his own business venture. Shirley was well supported from the outset by the Muffin Break franchise system, she says. However, she still recalls the sense of trepidation she felt once the initial training period was over.

“I think anyone who buys a business knows it’s easy to run the business until you get the keys!

 “I remember the feeling when the trainer left. It was an ‘oh my goodness’ moment! It had been a managed site previously, and I don’t mind admitting it was difficult to get it established in the early days. But we got through that first year!”

From year one to now, 18 years later, Shirley has come much further than she ever anticipated in the hospitality industry she stumbled upon when skimming that print newspaper. “I didn’t think of this, or anything for that matter, as a long-term career,” she says. “Though it’s ended up being the longest held ‘job’ I’ve ever had.”

Multiplying move

Two years after moving into the Muffin Break franchise, Shirley became a multi-unit franchise owner when she bought Muffin Break Palmerston North 15 years ago. Rather than seeing this as doubling her workload, she embraced not only the financial potential of dual franchise ownership, but the opportunity for sharing resources between the two for mutual benefit.

“We seem to have been quite lucky; if one site is having issues, the other is running smoothly. It has had its challenges. I didn’t know where to put myself, to begin with. But I was very lucky with the staff members I had at the time; I could rely on one of them to basically run it for me when I wasn’t at that site.”

She now has a staff of 15 and stresses the importance of building a team consisting of ...

This article is published in full on page 6 of the Winter 2025 (Year 34 Issue 2) issue of Franchise New Zealand magazine.

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