Charles Batt, a franchisee for MBE Business Service Centres in Parramatta, Sydney, talks about why he chose franchising and what that decision involved.

I used to work as the commercial manager for a large IT distribution company with a $2 billion sales turnover. I’ve been in marketing too, and I was a buyer before that at Big W, for a duty free company, and way back with Waltons. I was a typical corporate guy.

But there were two reasons why I wanted to get out of that world; I was overly frustrated with the politics, and the process of getting things done. I wanted to live or die by my own decisions.

The problem was affording my own business. Then when I got a redundancy payment I had enough cash to buy a business but I lacked conviction. I didnÕt believe I had the right skill set to start up from scratch. And in corporate life there is a huge raft of resources to hand.

Franchising seemed to offer the best half way house and support structure; there are some resources available and buying a proven model is buying into a known quantity.

To find out more I went along to a franchising expo. I had no knowledge of MBE until I heard Melbourne franchisee talking about how it worked for him, and his experience was very comparable to mine. MBE is more about problem solving for small businesses, not just selling print and I enjoy helping people and finding solutions.

I liked what I saw so I spent a lot of time speaking to and visiting lots of new and established franchisees. I signed the agreement within three months, six months later I opened up.

The longest process was finding the right premises. I had assistance from MBE and I looked at Parramatta and the north-west as two promising areas. Parramatta offered a much tighter area based on foot traffic. I trudged the streets, negotiated over property and this took about three months.

Product knowledge was a challenge to get to grips with, learning what will suit customers’ needs and realising I was the only person I could delegate to. The big question was: how do I run the equipment better than my customer can, otherwise there’s no benefit to them.

I got advice from franchisees and the franchisor; I worked in the Neutral Bay franchise before opening and the store manager worked for me in the opening up stage. I’ve found all the franchisees are very helpful.

The biggest challenge was generating business because customers don’t just appear and I must admit the process took longer than I expected. It took a while to understand I’m not geared up for cold calling. I’m better off getting someone else to do it. I think business development is a separate profession.

So much of the business is driven by me and I just didnÕt take the appropriate action to each my goals. I should have invested in a business development manager earlier.

So I’m the front man in the store and now have two other staff.

For my business the support network that comes with franchising is very important. If I can’t do something then I get half a dozen answers from fellow franchisees. That’s the beauty of franchising – knowledge gathering.

When it came to making a decision about buying hundreds of thousand of dollars of equipment I had experienced advice on hand to assist me. And even though I pay royalties, the buying power is a greater benefit; I pay less than an individual business would, even allowing for the royalties.

For me franchising is all about more control of your own destiny. I have two young kids, and my wife has her own business. Our premises have space so the children can be there. One son has even bought a new bike with pocket money from doing odd jobs around the office.

The financial rewards are not as good as the in corporate world but I wouldn’t swap it. I feel it is my choice whether to respond to clients at 6pm and I have the freedom to make that decision.