When considering international franchising, many national franchisors usually only think about their nearest neighbours, and in Germany this is no different. German franchisers first look to Austria and Switzerland for cross border expansion, and it is not surprising that 70 per cent of all of German franchisor foreign activities are aimed at these neighbour countries.

What is the reason for this? The language, business mentality, market requirements, distance? A little bit of all, plus perhaps a kind of indolence of dealing with new challenges. Most brand owners are so integrated in their everyday businesses in their own country that there is not so much room for planning for tomorrow. But that's a great mistake which can miss the overall global trend.

The Deutsche Franchise-Verband (DFV -the German Franchise Association) has taken care of these facts and thought about a practicable way to help our members forge their way into foreign markets. German goods and services have an excellent reputation around the world. They stand for reliability, state-of-the-art technological development, sophisticated logistics and the utmost quality.

German franchise companies also offer this high standard. The German franchise industry has now been developing successfully for 40 years. There are currently 850 systems in Germany, of which 90 per cent originated in Germany, including renowned brands such as Foto Quelle, OBI and Paulaner. All of these systems embody typical German characteristics such as quality consciousness, professional organisation, sophisticated network development and a high technological standard.

As an initiative of the DFV, which was founded in 1978 and now has 250 members, the systems that are qualified for expansion abroad and which comprise conditions for a successful transition to international markets have pooled together and a division for foreign affairs within the board of the association was established. This department has two responsibilities:
• to help German franchise systems to find partners in foreign countries and to expand the system into global markets;
• to help franchise systems from abroad to enter the German market.

The association will be the first address to turn to if someone is looking over the borders. The DFV represents the slogan 'Franchise Made in Germany' on several occasions all over the world at franchise expos, symposiums and other events in the global franchise industry, not only in Europe but in Asia, the Middle East and North America.

On the other hand we know that there are a lot of franchise brands looking to break into the German market who have not been successful due to a number of reasons. Shortage of market know-how, deficiency in legal aspects and financing issues and an overall lack of suitable partners being prime. The DFV gets many inquiries from foreign systems looking for a master partner in Germany. As a neutral association we only can recommend the well selected partners within our association, which are the best in the industry. There are professional recruitment agencies, specialised lawyers and consultants for building the system in our country. A short e-mail to the association's head office should provide a satisfactory answer.

Franchising should be a global matter for all franchisors and should not stop at the country's boundaries. All interested people, investors, foreign franchisors are invited to contact us if they need any help.

Rolf G. Kirst holds the Master Franchise license in Germany for Uniglobe.