Got Junk Franchise?!

[Steve]

WOW this new business owner pulled in $120,000. What do you think? Is this a franchise that is going places? Would you want one of these?

Don’t Go West, Young Man. Buy Yourself a Franchise Instead. (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/26/business/smallbusiness/26sbiz.html?ref=smallbusiness) - Clay McGee was soon to graduate from Arizona State University with a degree in marketing when he realized that the corporate world wasn’t for him. He wanted to be his own boss and run a business, though he had little experience or cash.

Then it hit him: franchising.

“I pretty much knew I didn’t want to go and apply for jobs and fight against the rest of the working class and try to stand out above it,” Mr. McGee, 24, said. “So I started shopping for a franchise because I figured it would be a good opportunity for someone to hold my hand through the whole thing.”

Today he owns a 1-800-gotjunk? franchise in Springfield, Mo., that brought in about $120,000 last year and has four employees. And he plans to buy a second one in Branson.

[Steve]

Ouch if you read on, you see how much it cost to buy into the franchise. $150,000 WOW! How many kids just out of college are going to have $150,000?

Can you imagine buying into this and then having losses for the first couple of years? That would drive me crazy. Maybe I would buy a junker truck for cheap and start my own business called 1-800-Trash-It.

Mr. McGee said he needed about $150,000 upfront to pay for the 1-800-gotjunk? franchise start-up fees and the trucks to run the hauling business. But at his age he had little credit history; he approached 11 banks before he was able to secure the loan he needed.

Adam J. Siegelheim, a franchise lawyer based in Lawrenceville, N.J. “They need money to sustain losses during the first few months, or even years,” he said.

[Little's]

Thats as much as my home cost! ouch! http://www.gophergraphics.com/forum/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/mad.gif

[Steve]

I guess if you are sitting on a pile of money and you have no idea what you want to do or how to do it, then maybe this would give you direction. But it really seems quite expensive for what it is.