We are delighted that our National Franchise Forums are up and running again this year, albeit virtually at the moment! They have been well received and it has been great to see everyone participate in what are valuable sessions for sharing knowledge, experience and best practice in our industry. We are also thrilled to have such great Chairs for all our forums too, who help us select relevant subjects for discussion and keep everything to time! We would like to acknowledge their hard work and introduce you to them and hope that you will join us at our next forums;
Northern Forum Chair
Claire O’Connor, Babyballet
Mum of four, Claire O’Connor founded multi-award-winning pre-school dance company, babyballet®, in Halifax in 2005, which is now enjoyed across 100 franchised schools in the UK, New Zealand, Australia and Singapore.
Southern Forum Chair
Louise Harris, Mathnasium
Louise Harris has been in Franchising for many years and brings a wealth of experience that she is always happy to share, having been both franchisee and franchisor. Louise is the Franchise Operations Manager at Mathnasium.
Midland Forum Chair
Ben Brookes, Agency Express
Ben Brookes is the Managing Director at one of the UK’s most established and reputable van-based franchises, Agency Express. Ben has worked within the franchise industry for well over a decade, after building extensive experience in both business and sales across the property and service sectors.
If you have a subject that you would like to see discussed, please do email us at events@thebfa.org
New for 2021, the bfa have been running pop-up Think Tanks!
These events are free to attend for our members and we have had some great subjects so far this year. The Think Tanks are hosted by Industry Professionals that have championed a passion for a subject and would love to hear from the industry around these areas, so far this year we have had Think Tanks on
Diversity & Inclusion
Paul Courtman-Stock, McDonald’s Restaurants
Paul has worked for McDonald’s for over 20 years and has a broad experience in Franchising and Operations. For the last six years he has been responsible for recruiting and on-boarding new franchisees for the UK & Ireland system.
Technology in Franchising
Simon Wise, FranRec
Simon celebrates a career in franchising spanning over 20 years. He worked at the bfa as Deputy Director General; has been a franchisee for Driver Hire and following the successful sale of the franchise, established a dedicated staff recruitment agency for Franchise brands both in the UK and in Australia.
