NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Thursday, April 11, 2013

We all know what franchising is. We’re surrounded by successful examples from fast-food restaurants to coffee shops. They work because companies give the franchisees a template to work from to establish a high-quality successful business quickly.

Social franchising operates on exactly the same principle: a proven social change project is turned into a ’franchise’ and then quickly replicated. The difference here is that rather than creating profits for shareholders the aim is to create benefits to society. Even better, it encourages innovation because of the large number of motivated people tackling the same issues – and in some cases the power of the shared brand influences policy far beyond that of an individual organisation.