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A franchisee’s work is important. It goes beyond just hiring and training and filling out the time schedules. As one UniShippers franchisee is showing, franchisees can actually enhance their employees’ health.

Wanda Sieber, who is a multi-unit franchisee with Unishippers, graces the cover of the latest issue of Franchise Times thanks to her fascinating commitment to workplace fitness. As the story explains, Sieber took a rather unorthodox method to launch her 13-week wellness regime. It started with asking her employees in Green Bay, Wisconsin to wear a 10 pound bag of sugar around their waist.

As Sieber sees it, promoting wellness is the best employee wellness scheme and something that can save the business huge sums in health care costs:

“This isn’t about fitting into your jeans anymore. This is about keeping your employees alive,” she says.

If you’re interested in implementing a similar wellness program, here’s the kind of the changes that Sieber has introduced to the workplace:

Employees have both ergonomic chairs and exercise balls to sit on in front of their two monitors. Five hours on a stability ball can burn up to 260 calories a day, plus strengthen your core and improve your posture, Sieber says.

While they say you can’t put a dollar value on employee health, it seems that this Unishippers may just reap the rewards of keeping their staff fit.

The Small Business Administration is a big player in American small business. We’ve been doing a good bit of thinking on what the SBA can do for franchises in recent weeks.

You’ve might have watched the interesting video that Joel Libava produced for Franchise Direct about our SBA-approved franchises. It’s a really topical discussion for anyone on the verge of investing in a franchise. Then Monday, Entrepreneur magazine published a long interview with Susan Mills, the head of the SBA, who was marking her second year in the position.

If you’re interested in the politics of small-business funding, this interview will appeal to you. Of all the jobs that President Obama was handing out after his election, head of the Small Business Administration was certainly one of the more challenging ones, and despite the difficulties, Mills seems to feel that the SBA is making strides towards delivering results for entrepreneurs seeking funding.

She was asked in particular about the boosted guarantees that expired:

“As those guarantees ended, we had the highest quarter of lending ever in SBA history. In the quarter ended Dec. 31, we helped facilitate $11 billion worth of loans. And after that, we were concerned that we would see a fall-off. But, in the past several weeks, we’ve continued to rebound. At the SBA, we are back at 2008 lending levels.”

It’s great to see lending levels back to ‘08 levels. The challenge is meeting that the demand for funding like the IFA saw is out there. We hope Susan Mills can help get franchisees there.

I think sometimes franchisees don’t realize the power they have to affect change within their franchise operation.

Just take a look at what a number of Taco Bell franchisees have done to change how their franchise was being marketed. Their franchisee council Franmac has been dissatisfied with how their business was being represented in a recent advertising campaign and so lobbied Yum! Foods to bring about some changes.

Here’s an excerpt from a 14-point email that was leaked on the internet recently:

“Ads in the past 12 to 18 months have been largely ineffective, and we believe that an agency review should take place. Taco Bell Corporate, in conjunction with Franmac should immediately undertake an agency review. Without a doubt, we will learn new things, obtain fresh ideas, and be further ahead, even if we decide to stay with the incumbent agency.”

Taco Bell is having some struggles at the moment, and it’s interesting to see franchisees, via this council, lobbying for direct changes to their marketing strategy.

Franchisees have power, too, as this story proves.

A new study shows that receiving credit continues to be a challenge for aspiring franchisees.

Frandata, in conjunction with the IFA, has conducted a study on franchise financing. They have found that banks will lend about $8.4 billion to new and existing franchisees this year. That’s a big number in and of itself, but the study finds that it is actually $2 billion short of the total amount that franchisees will require this year.

Frandata claim the deficit exists because banks are still suffering from the subprime crisis. The Wall-Street Journal has profiled the survey in a recent story, and all told, the data shows how much franchising contributes to the US economy – and how much more it could if more funding avenues were made available. Frandata state that America’s 35,000 franchises will “create or maintain more than 250,800 jobs and generate $32.5 billion”. The funding shortage means the lack of “8,000 unit transactions” as well “82,000 jobs and $10.7 billion in annual economic output this year” that won’t be created.

$10.7 billion. It’s a staggering amount. Hopefully the government or some third-party can step in to fill this void that the banks have left. Because, as this study shows, all of America loses when franchising is sidelined.

The number of adults that are overweight in the U.S. is currently 100+ million, or more than 55 percent of that population. Millions of Americans are trying to lose weight and get fit.

As things start to warm up, (temperature-wise) more and more of us will be getting outdoors. That’s a good thing; fresh air does wonders for the soul.

The other thing that happens every spring is that lots of adults are putting on clothing that’s been stored away in a closet or cedar chest for several months. (Or, they’re trying to put their clothing on.)

Sometimes, these articles of clothing don’t quite fit the same way they did only a few months earlier. That can be a bit depressing. But, a funny thing happens; all of a sudden, these folks feel that they had better “get in shape,” so they take walks, swim, and find other physical activity that can help them get back to their ideal weight, once again. But, it’s usually not enough. Maybe you can help.

Fitness franchises have been experiencing pretty consistent growth the past 4-5 years; the recent down economy didn’t seem to affect new franchise sales as much as some of the other sectors. Part of it may have to do with our country’s demographics. People are living longer, and they want to remain mobile. The other part of it may have to do with having really good operators.

Today’s fitness franchises are not one-size-fits all types of businesses. There are stand-alone children’s fitness franchises, and even mobile fitness franchises for kids that bring fitness to them for birthday parties and other special events.
Fitness franchises with 24/7 access for today’s crop of busy, time-starved adults is quite popular, and should remain so for quite some time.

Some of the newer offerings in the fitness franchise sector include concepts that specialize in strength training, and franchises that feature automated training systems that offer you a different workout every time you come in to the fitness center.

For the most part, franchises in this sector are designed for multi-unit ownership, so if you’re someone who’s interested in businesses that can provide growth opportunities, this area of franchising may be worth a look.

Franchise Direct has a special section of the website devoted to fitness franchises, so stop by and request some information from these franchises.

(This post was written by The Franchise King®, Joel Libava. Joel is the King of straightforward franchise information, and a strategic marketing partner of ours. You can find him at http://www.thefranchiseking.com)