Thread: July the 1st 2018 GST On Low Value Imported Goods

Originally Posted by Beardy

Franchises are not for everyone, but they are particularly ideal if you are not business or entrepreneurilly minded and need to be schooled and guided.

Perhaps people who are "not business or entrepreneurilly minded" should be schooled before they even consider taking up any business let alone a franchise. The reason many franchises appear to stay afloat seems to be so the owners of the franchise name can bleed the franchisees to the point where they don't quite fail.

Originally Posted by Beardy

Sure there are horror stories you hear about but there are many more success stories of people carving a good living out of a franchise.

Is that an evidence based statement, or is it your estimation or perhaps anecdotal? If evidence based, then what is the evidence?

So much salt !!!!!

Jeez there is a lot of glass half empty going on around here.

Bob it takes a certain type of person to be able to run their own business and if you don’t have it it probably can’t be taught, same goes for sportsman, musicians and tradesman.......I am sure you would know people that have a hand full of thumbs and would never become competent in woodwork but no doubt have other talents .
A franchise allows people who lack those skills and confidence to be able to be assisted by a franchisor by following their successful formula to do what they couldn’t do themselves, it is not for everyone as Chris stated but not everyone has the abilities of the Chris type to be able to do it on their own.

Fencefurniture, you could google that question and easily see the answer or just have a look around the place where you live and you will see them for yourself, here is a couple but there is plenty more
The local realestate agent (LJ Hooker, Raine and Horne etc)
The hardware store ( Mitre10, Home Hardware etc)
The grocers ( IGA, Foodland etc)
The bottleshop ...
The local Retravision, The Good Guys, Harvey Norman
The lawnmower, chainsaw shop
The fast food outlets including Macdonalds
The new car dealers of most brands
Maybe your post office ( I know mine is)
The lawnmower man like Jim’s Mowing and all the other Jim’s .......

The list goes on, all these franchisors including big bad Jim’s Mowing are apparently bleeding all the franchisees slowly to death according to what I am hearing here.
Doesnt even make sense that that would be their plan, if the franchisee goes out of business then they stop making money too so it is in their interest to keep them profitable and if they get a reputation for sending them broke they won’t get any more investors so that is bad for business as well.

I had a franchise for about five years ( no it was not Hardly Normals) but parted ways as I did not like doing things the way they wanted me too and their way was not the best fit for the area I operated but I know others who are still there and happy with the results
My father in law had one for twenty odd years and there was always food on the table when I went there
And I know of a HN franchisee who recently purchased a property over 10 million so he can’t be traveling too bad either

any more evidence needed? You only hear the doom and gloom stories on A Current Affair

Originally Posted by Beardy

The list goes on, all these franchisors including big bad Jim’s Mowing are apparently bleeding all the franchisees slowly to death according to what I am hearing here.
Doesnt even make sense that that would be their plan, if the franchisee goes out of business then they stop making money too so it is in their interest to keep them profitable and if they get a reputation for sending them broke they won’t get any more investors so that is bad for business as well.

And the other side of the coin are "opportunities" like this: Buy A Job - Yellow Express

They're literally advertising this "opportunity" as "Buy yourself a job" (note the emphasis isn't on a business, or opportunity etc - it's buy yourself a job).

The other side of the "Why would a franchiser want to make a franchisee bleed to death and close down?" is simply that by doing so, another takes their place, paying the same up front fee.

It might be morally bankrupt, and even might be labelled corrupt, but I'd be betting it is happening.

My humble opinion only, but running a franchise really isn't you running a business and owning what you build, you're doing it on someone else's patch, on their terms, and ultimately, you don't own much of anything.

The argument can be raised "But running a business isn't for everyone, so a franchise solves that problem", and to a point, that might be true. But if one doesn't have the talent to sing, should one pursue the possibility of making an income singing? Running a business is no different, those that have the talent for it can choose to pursue that opportunity, those that don't might be better off seeking more suitable opportunities for the talents they have?

Yes, I know, the above comes across in a very smart-alec way, it's not intended to be - forgive me if it does.

Originally Posted by Beardy

Fencefurniture, you could google that question and easily see the answer or just have a look around the place where you live and you will see them for yourself, here is a couple but there is plenty more
The local realestate agent (LJ Hooker, Raine and Horne etc)
...snip...
The lawnmower man like Jim’s Mowing and all the other Jim’s .......

Ok, so your actual factual "evidence" is based upon your personal experience, your FIL's experience, and a guy you know who has a HN franchise.

3 actual examples.

The long list you quote is supposition that they are all doing ok, and you don't know that at all. They may well be, but my point is (in this instance) that you are not quoting actual evidence except in the 3 examples. You know not whether the conditions of the franchises are heinous or not, you are just supposing that because they have a presence, they are ok. Maybe, maybe not.

Anyway Beardy, whatever happened to this:

Originally Posted by Beardy

I am am not going to continue banging on about it

Quoted from the other identical thread, on the identical subject of Gerry Harvey, a statement that you made on 5th June. I would suggest that you are indeed still banging on about it, 19 days later.

No offence taken, didn’t come across as smart Alec
I pretty much agree with you but the franchise might be seen as the middle ground between running your own business outright and working on wages
With the franchise system you are getting financially rewarded for the extra effort you put in that an employer most likely won’t do. You can build value in your franchise that you can sell
You get the opportunity to be in a sector of business that you are not be able to do in your own. Like running a Maccas ( forgot to note on my last post my brothers ex has a Macdonald’s franchise)
Some franchises take your bookings for your jobs and collect the money from the client and deposit it into your account less their fee, I know some of the Car detailing ones do that which makes life easy for you not having to look for work and chasing money

You can continue to point out the negative aspects of them which of course there is but you can likewise do the same for being an employee or running your own business so they definitely have a place in the market and are not run by the devil like being portrayed. I guess people will believe what they want to believe but that doesn’t change the reality of the situation
Have a chat to a few of the local ones I mentioned and I don’t think you will need to lend them your handkerchief

Any discussion about the virtues (or not) of franchises is completely off-topic anyway. The thread is about GST on import changes, brought about almost single handedly by a guy who happens to be a franchisor, albeit one of the very large ones.

Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

Ok, so your actual factual "evidence" is based upon your personal experience, your FIL's experience, and a guy you know who has a HN franchise.

3 actual examples.

The long list you quote is supposition that they are all doing ok, and you don't know that at all. They may well be, but my point is (in this instance) that you are not quoting actual evidence except in the 3 examples. You know not whether the conditions of the franchises are heinous or not, you are just supposing that because they have a presence, they are ok. Maybe, maybe not.

Anyway Beardy, whatever happened to this:


Quoted from the other identical thread, on the identical subject of Gerry Harvey, a statement that you made on 5th June. I would suggest that you are indeed still banging on about it, 19 days later.

Ok so I have quoted real life examples including my own personal experience and you can look at the other examples for yourself in your local comunuty, what car they drive, where they live, do they look hungry? This will give you a pretty good idea on how they are fairing.
Where are your examples to show that they are not doing ok except for a few Tracey Grimshaw shock horror journo stories and your automatic assumption they are all getting ripped.
So what about you, what is your experience? have you ever run your own business or had a franchise or are you an employee maybe even further removed from reality in the public sector ?
Is all your evidence just heresay or stubble talk at the pub? Do you have any skin in the game?

For the record I am not a franchisor, but I did try one about 15 years ago and who said it was a large one? and I didn’t start this aspect of the thread just responded to your and others posts when I had a different view but I do note you are trying to finish it/ change the subject when it doesn’t go your way

Beardy, I haven't said one way or the other about how well or not the franchises are doing - at any point. How about you quote where I have said they are not doing ok. All I have done is ask you if your statements were evidence based. As it turns out the broad statements that you made are based on some very localised evidence (3 examples) and then a whole bunch of assumptions.

I am not going to engage any more on the subject of franchises - it is irrelevant to the main discussion.

Your position on the topic was pretty clear as was mine.
I will leave it go at that.

Ian's post #67 was way ahead of the news.... He must have a secret back-channel.

Here's some more on the issue... It is becoming INSANELY complex: https://m.slashdot.org/story/342508

How any online retailer in the US (or those outside of it selling to their residents) will sort out the evil complexity of so much jurisdictional mayhem boggles the mind.

(Apologies for interrupting the fight...).

Spoke to a friend who works for a large e-commerce company whose system is the backend for some large overseas company's. It took them 4 weeks to develop test and release the changes required for the ecommerce solution to accommodate the GST reporting requirements.

Would have taken Amazon 2 days with the amount of resources available.

Suspect it's just an excuse to direct people to Amazon.com.au.

What peeves me if why they can't offer the full us catalogue.

Sent from my Moto G (5) Plus using Tapatalk

How exactly does Amazon AU work, do they sell some product themselves as well as being a portal for other retailers?
There are plenty of companies that already won’t ship outside of the US so maybe part of the limitation on product selection is that Australia is not worth the hassle to deal with as they have another business at home?
Would sellers on the AU version also be subject to Australian consumer laws which might also be a deterrent

I might be way off mark, just a thought