Laid-off workers take control of their careers by becoming franchisees - Business First of Louisville:

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For many people, finding a comparable positionn elsewhere in corporate America is not the only Some entrepreneurial-minded professionals like the idea of being their own boss and have pursuesd that goal in the form of franchising. Therre are more than 900,000 franchised businesses in the United Franchises directly and indirectly provided 21 million jobs and contributed anestimates $2.3 trillion in economic outputy in the U.S. private sector in according a report releaserd last year bythe . The “Economic Impact of Franchised reviewed data from 2001to 2005, which was the last In this recession, the D.C.
-based trade group expects to see “modesg declines” in the number of new franchiseesz because of a lack of available said Alisa Harrison, vice presidentt of communications and marketing for the Internationalk Franchise Association. But she expects franchisinv to remain a popular career alternative fordownsizedd people, especially those who have severance pay, savings or funds that can be used to covef startup costs. “You can go into businesd for yourself, but you aren’t by yourself when you go into Harrison said. Last July, Donald “Dee” DeMutuh came back from vacation to find that he was bein laid off from his IT jobat LLC.
Althoug h he knew layoffs were coming, DeMuthh thought his managerial role withithe company’s four-person IT support department would be safe. Instead, he lost his $68,500-per-year salary, and the compant kept an employee hehad trained. Despite his initiapl surprise, DeMuth figured his 20 yearsx of experience in the IT industry would give him leverage in thejob market. What he founed in the ensuing months was that employers were looking for a very specializedskill set. Unfortunatelyt for DeMuth, he was more a which landed him interviews but notjob offers. “oI was getting frustrated, feeling as though the doorsz weren’t opening,” he said.
His dissatisfaction with technical recruiters promptef him to consider starting an IT recruiting business DeMuth believed franchising was the best routefor him, so he researchedd various IT recruitment and suppor t franchises online. He also met with the , which providexd free advice about questions to ask and what stepse to take as anew entrepreneur. As part of that exploratorty phase, DeMuth discovered , a Canadian-base d franchise that provides managed IT service for smalland medium-sized businesses. The Utilitty Co. provides full-service support for anything relatedd toa client’s network, includin g switches, routers, servers, PCs, laptops, phone systems and mobilse devices.