After almost six months of research and enough data entry to make any assistant’s fingers tingle with fright, Entrepreneur Magazine has just released their highly anticipated Franchise 500.
Jan 19, 2010 – After three decades of perfecting their system, Entrepreneur Magazine has become the most trusted name in franchise rankings around the world. Aspiring business owners rely on their objectivity when considering the prospect of buying a piece of the franchise pie.
Entrepreneur Magazine’s Franchise 500 listing for 2010 ranks ACFN, the only ATM franchise business in the US, #1 in category “Miscellaneous Financial Services”.
ACFN the innovative ATM Franchise Business based in Silicon Valley, is North Americas only ATM franchise focused on providing ATM services to hotels and other travel and entertainment based businesses
Although they are only a small portion of the research needed to become a franchise entrepreneur, this ranking prides itself on being both strict and objective.
The leading judgment factors are stability, financial strength, growth rate, and size. Credibility is certainly not an issue.
Companies competing for the top spot face fierce competition from the two franchises that have held the #1 spot interchangeably for the last 15 years, Subway and McDonalds.
Most companies can only hope to be named #1 in their subcategory, usually a fairer competition.
Since debuting on the list in 2008, ACFN has been creeping up the charts over the last two years, finally reaching the ultimate spot in their category. A smaller business, ACFN is an everyman franchise.
With lower startup costs than most of their competitors on the list, they offer entrepreneurship to everyone able bodied enough to work a few hours a week managing machines and fixing the occasional technically difficulty.
Franchisees vary largely in age, race, location, and income, with their most successful machine belonging to a retired California schoolteacher who operates her business with the help of her only daughter.
President and Founder Jeff Kerr shared his elation over this year’s rankings, “Entrepreneur Magazine is the premier publication for business and being recognized by them is significant”.
“The ranking has already prompted many calls from qualified prospect inquiring about our business and we expect will result is many new franchisees joining”
“Being included in the Franchise 500 and earning the #1 rank in our category is a great achievement that we continue to work hard to protect and maintain in future years – we are just getting started” says Kerr
With ambitious and triumphant words from Kerr, ACFN looks to increase their franchisees steadily as they have in the past, targeting an increase in their 1200 locations by four to five hundred this year.
ACFN’s 30k startup fee includes 1 ATM, a 3 day training program, customer service, and product placement assistance.
