The Census Bureau estimates consumers spent $4.3 trillion on retail and food service purchases in 2006 at the types of businesses that dominate franchising, despite meager wage growth.
Against this backdrop, Franchise Times Corp. released their Top 200 franchises, as well as 100 up and comers, for 2007. The companies of the Top 200 managed collective worldwide sales of nearly $445 billion, a more than six percent increase from last year.
Unit growth for these companies was not nearly so robust, however, with the 5,879 additional company and franchised locations up only 1.5 percent. The Top 200 companies shed domestic units last year, counter-balancing continued global expansion by the multinationals to the tune of 6,500 additional foreign locations.
Unlike the prior year’s heavily franchised-led growth, unit development in terms of company versus franchised locations was far more balanced last year.
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