Greg Muzzillo – Go Buy a Mirror!

Bloody here,

I invite those who stop by the blog to help Mr. Muzzillo with his most recent post here at Bloody (crying like a little piss ant that he’s been attacked personally) to help him out and explain to him why this blog is here and just what Mr. Muzzillo cannot see with how he runs his (excuse me, YOUR) businesses into the ground …… (note the guy is so effing stupid that he cannot use punctuation or spell his own company correctly – is this a franchise owner you’d want to be in control of your livelihood?)

greg muzzillo

hello, greg muzzillo here. i am not sure why you choose to attack me personally or the organization i have taken 30 years of my life to build.

your attack is anonymous. your words are filled with lies and misrepresentations.

the fact is that our suppliers are encouraged to pay some money into a preferred supplier fund. and that money is used to benefit the suppliers and the franchise owners.

we use that money to pay for credit insurance. all our franchise owners receive free credit insurance from the preferred supplier fund. the franchise owner benefits. and the supplier does, too. because in the proforma system, both the franchise owner and their supplier knows that they will get paid…even if the franchise owner’s customer doesn’t pay them.

this year that fund and the insurance program has paid millions of dollars to the franchise owners and their suppliers. in fact, i know of a few franchise owners that would not have survived without the credit insurance proceeds.

proforma has been recognized by inc. magazine, forbes magazine, the wall street journal, success magazine, blue mau mau and many others for its accomplishments.

i am proud our system and our people. i regret that you have taken to anonymous slander, name calling, lying and misrepresentation about proforma.

i am proud of proforma. i am proud of the result of my 30 years of hard work. that said, i admit that we are not perfect and invite you to directly address with me any legitimate issues you have with proforma.

we are committed to helping the dreams of our franchise owners come true. in the spirit of that commitment i invite you to an open and honest dialog.

dream big!

greg muzzillo
founder & co-ceo
proforam

Greggy, you might want to go back to school and learn how to spell and type or at least let one of your peons type for you because your default to defense and your imbacile Rah! Rah! statements further prove to all those watching that you haven’t a clue and you don’t own a single mirror!

Bloody

Jim Press – Gee, Great Name for a Zor Capo

Enter the infamous Mr. Nardelli to Chrysler Corporation.  You see, Bobby has never gotten over getting passed over for the much smarter and younger Mr. Immelt (even though Jack never knew Jeffrey would be so liberal in his ways).  He left GE in a huff and took out all of his aggressions on Home Depot.  After the board at HD finally figured out Bobby hadn’t a clue and Jack was right, Bobby weaseled his way into Chrysler declaring GE and HD were all wrong about him.

Once aboard at Chrysler, he steals Toyota’s hatchet man, Mr. Jim Press.  Now how do you think Mr. Press has figured out how to make the Toyota engine run so well?  With threats and manipulations of course!  After all, dealerships are nothing but a bunch of wussy malcontents and once you threaten them within an inch of their lives, they back off and sink themselves even further in debt.

A group of Chrylser (Jeep and Dodge) dealerships experienced Mr. Press’ wrath on a conference call in the spring when he shared openly that he knew the 30% who were holding out and where their kids went to school and where the dealership owners lived.  Yes, that’s right.  Mr. Press said those very words when 30% of the dealerships refused to sign for millions of dollars worth of inventory because they had lost faith in Chrysler, Chrysler financing and the economy.  Yet, Mr. Press is making money hand over fist, selling 15 million dollar condos in NYC and living the life of Reilly.

Don’t be fooled folks.  The elite have their ways and many of them cannot be discussed in the open.  Mr. Press was picked up by Fiat in a heartbeat due to his ability to threaten, coerce and otherwise bring in sales of inventory, force dealerships out of business (losing their livelihood set up by generations of hard work and labor) and make others buy those franchises thus sinking them into debt they will never see relief from in their lifetimes.

Recently, Mr. Press actually sent out a letter asking for the dealerships who weren’t forcefully closed to team up against those who were to throw them under the bus!  Shame on you Mr. Press.  The law should do a full court press on you and put you on the street or better yet in prison for destroying so many lives under the guise of  “it’s just business”.

I have one question for you Mr. Press.  Have you ever in your life had to lie awake at night not knowing where your next dollar or sale will come from because you were a legitimate business man living with the ups and downs of having to bear the long term responsibility for your actions?  NO!  You haven’t the intestinal fortitude to bear the consequences of your actions.  You’d rather take a huge salary and live like a playboy at the expense of hard working small business owners who pay your salary while you threaten them and their children.  Where I come from, that’s referred to as La Cosa Nostra or mafioso.  It’s not legitimate business and you, Mr. Press are a disgrace to this land, this marketplace and this nation.

Bloody

Freddy Crosses Over to the Dark Side…

It was all innocent at first.  Freddy borrowing money ($1,000) from Dr. Peter to start a sub shop.  Try as he did, Freddy couldn’t make it work.  Maybe two would work instead of one?  So Freddy labored all day and all night to become the quintessential entrepreneur.  But just as one didn’t work, two didn’t work.   Just like throwing your last wad of cash onto a single number at the roullette wheel, Freddy opened a third store.  Voila!  It worked.  Three was a charm!  After a number of years, Freddy knew there had to be a better way.  The hours were too long, payroll was tough and working to manage the whole mess was a juggling act at best.

So Freddy learned about the most lucrative business model ever conjured up by man – where you could use other people’s money to grow your business!  It’s called FRANCHISING!  So it was in 1974 that Freddy moved over to the dark side.  On the shirt tails of Ray K, Freddy started selling franchises to any and all who would show.  He especially loved immigrants who were entering the country with their life savings.  Freddy never told them his model wouldn’t work for just one store. But then, Freddy wasn’t running sandwich shops, he was selling franchises.  And should they figure it out, he could sell them more.  The ones that didn’t, could be sold to new marks.

Interestingly, the Reagan administration relieved the entrepreneurial establishment from common law and allowed arbitration to be the governing entity.  This gave Freddy and his band of merry con men the final authority on any and all contract negotiation and interpretation.  If things went wrong, the arbitration firm could be paid off.  And God forbid anyone sue Freddy.  Should that happen, Freddy simply uses their own royalty fees and vendor kickback monies to nail their puny little pitiful sorry asses to the unemployment line.  Don’t eff with Freddy or he’ll take you to the poor house in a body bag.  Who needs a mafia when one can use the government and one’s own money against him!

And so you have it.  The day the richest man in South Florida decided working to make a legitimate business was for the birds.  Taking advantage of the unkknowing and trusting immigrant and displaced corporate schmuck is a far easier way to become a billionaire and playboy.  And just remember Mr. Schaden, Freddy’s war chest makes yours look like a kindergartner’s piggy bank stash.

Bloody

Who Pays for TV and Radio Advertising?

Turn your television on and for a single hour, jot down the commercials you see on any of the major broadcast or cable channels (ABC, NBC, CBS, ESPN, CNN, etc.).  On major channels, there are three main categories of advertisers.  (Check the bottom of this post to find out what those three are.)

Though it cannot be proven, franchising advocates continuously quote that 40 to 50% of all retail is franchised.  (The data is owned by too many people and influenced heavily by pro-franchisor predatory bigots.) When you analyze the data of your one hour’s worth of major network advertising, it will become apparent just what the three verticals are that spend the lion’s share of advertising dollars with Madison Avenue agencies.

But that’s not the question or the purpose of this post.  The question is: Where is the money coming from?  First of all, some history.  McDonald’s ignored all conventional wisdom over three decades ago when they surpassed the 100 million dollar mark in advertising spend in a single year.  Most could not fathom the thought of such.  How did they justify it?  Simple, it wasn’t their money!  It is the money of hard working franchisees who pay exorbitant royalties to franchisors who spend it freely and with reckless abandon.  McDonald’s practices are truthfully depicted in in Fast Food Nation, author Eric Schlosser.  They pioneered the principle of going after your children, the pester power method.  But that again, is not the issue.  The real issue is that many franchises are B2B and not B2C.  Nearly all of the franchises that are offered at low entry fee are B2B.  These predatory franchisors have no intention of doing anything with the hard-earned  money they collect for advertising from your profits.  When asked the question of where that money is spent, or better yet when reading an FDD or UFOC, it is up to the sole discretion of the franchisor whether or not those funds are even earmarked for advertising.  Read an FDD and if you can even find the subject covered, you will see that the money can be used for advertising or any other thing the franchisor chooses.  Many simply use if to fund their playboy lifestyles.

So the next time you see David Brandon bragging that he’s giving money back to Main Street, don’t believe it.  He’s spending the money of the franchisees as though it is his.  When you watch a Subway commercial, remember that Fred DeLuca is the slimiest franchisor in the world, fighting more lawsuits than McDonald’s, Dunkin Donuts and Pizza Hut combined.  Fred gladly sells single franchises to unsuspecting immigrants (all they need is a pocket full of cash) when he couldn’t make it until he owned three!!!  When you see a Quiznos (seedy and poorly thought-out million sub giveaway campaign), know that Rick Schaden and his staff of flunkies approved the campaign and then fired the VP of Marketing (who came from telecommunications – how ignorant and cheap is Schaden for even hiring her) as a scapegoat.  (It’s only a matter of time until Quiznos loses the pricing game, thus driving all of their franchisees out of business.  Freddy D. has 6 or 7 times the number of franchisees, thus a war chest of over 400 million dollars a year at his disposal (pun intended).  Ricky hasn’t a chance of winning a price war.

So the next time you watch a Nascar race (if you can stand the fact they never learned to turn right;), count the number of advertisers who sponsor a car and then see how many are franchises.  Then realize that Ricky and Freddy and Davey are all spending 4 to 5 MILLION per car to put their brand on the hood of a race car!  That’s right, the hard-earned money of your relatives or friends or immigrants (who are unaware because they’re probably working 7 days a week just to make ends meet) is being spent so Ricky and Freddy and Davey can sit in the infield or in VIP boxes,  get special privileges at the expense of those who labor just to scrape by.

The three vertical leaders in advertising are auto, beverage and food.  (Yes, they are all franchised; GM not for long – they are soon to be owned by you and your Commander-in-Chief, who by the way, operates just like a franchisor.  He spends your money and you have absolutely not one damn iota of say in any of those decisions!)

Bloody

SureSlim: “We are not a Cult?”

This a line from the owner of SureSlim.  See the full article here:  Big Losers in SureSlim row head to court

What’s wrong with this picture?

The franchise started in Australia (it is now in receivorship).

They moved to New Zealand and started selling franchises there, now 17 of 21 franchises they sold have failed.

How about a “royalty and marketing fee”  of 29%!!!!  Let’s do the math.  Assuming one’s business is at the top of the food chain and one of high profit, say 50% markup before payroll, overhead and taxes.  You make $50.00 USD.  It costs you $50 to deliver the goods and services (this is way over the top folks!). Now you pay your royalty fee of $29.00 to corporate?  You have yet to pay taxes!  Are the people that bought these pink elephants really that stupid! (I’m not letting the owners off the hook here, but for all the promises in the world, I’m not giving some gypsy who sells snake oil a 29% gross profit for the rest of my days!)  So, even if you’re a genius and you’re making 50 cents on the dollar, that only leaves you with a Net Profit before taxes of 21%!  No accountant in their right mind would ever approve a business model like that!  After suffering through a year of that, I’d make the franchisor put up my family, feed my kids until he let me out of the contract.  If that’s a cult, then so be it!

The governments of the US, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Canda and others cannot and will not be bothered to keep this from happening!  They don’t want to hear about it, which is why the FTC took over the reins in the 80s during the Reagan administration.  Now it just goes to arbitration.  The rich and the scheming are all in bed together.  They will fleece you, piece you and hang you in the rafters if you are so naive to believe the gypsies and con men who call themselves “franchisors”.  And when their best friends are bankers, mortgage criminals from Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, would you expect anything less?  Who do you think funds these stupid ventures?  Securitizing  franchising loans is a hot investment area now that real estate is worthless.

A word to those who are entertaining any type of franchise:  Ask two lawyers, an accountant, your wife and anybody else who has a brain at least three times whether buying a franchise is a good thing.  And don’t do it unless you have a 100% majority “YES!”.  In essence, stay the hell away from franchising.  Stop the bleeding.

Bloody

Steinfort Gone

Damn, real data does tell the true story!  (See previous Bloody post.)  Rumor has it that Ms. Steinfort has been let go.  On Bluemaumau, a recent anonymous commentor claims Ms Steinfort has been used as a scapegoat by Mr. Schaden.  I doubt that!  If one checks her background, one can tell that she doesn’t have a clue on how to market, nor a record worth putting into print (might be why her LinkedIn profile lists Level 3 as a restaurant concern when it’s a telecommunications company – and a very unhealthy one at that).  Feel free to comment if you have more info!

Getting the Zor’s attention

Visit BlueMauMau and you can read rants and arguments all day.  Sad to say, they are one of the few sites that encourage the criticism as opposed to so many others that spin franchising as an entrepreneurial venture (not!) and somehow are still able to sleep at night selling more and more displaced corporate or vets down the river with their silver tongues.  If you’re a franchisee who’s been destroyed, what else do you have to do?  You can bitch and moan and the lawyers will simply tell you you’re effed up because you signed the freakin’ document, idiot!  

Or maybe you’re a lawyer and you’ve finally come to the realization that you’re the one who is effed because by the time the franchisee figures out he needs help, he’s broke and you have no market!  And if you play both sides of the fence, then you have no say.  Pick a side or get the hell out of the way lawyers!  For you to continue taking even prospective franchisee money in exchange for due diligence on a single company is a travesty!  As I said in a post on BlueMauMau, what happens if the company is not worthy of investing in, do you then charge your prospective franchisee client another $5,000 to vet a second company to come to the same result?  

Maybe you’re a broker who is bottom surfing for that stupid bloke who is vulnerable and gullible and stupid enough to be so tight that he won’t pay a lawyer to do his due diligence for him and he believes you are dealing in “good faith”. Ha!  You’re all missing the boat and for those of you who are too stupid to figure out that there is no traditional recourse for the injustice, poor poor pitiful you!  If you’ve read this far and you’re not one of the three above, then there is still great hope.  The truth hurts like hell, but real people don’t let that stop them.  It doesn’t come without great sacrifice.  Put your passion to work in fighting the system the same way you fight to keep your business in spite of the wickidness of the franchisors we all have come to know so well.  See what Eric Schlosser says in the epilogue of Fast Food Nation:

page 268…When McDonald’s demanded ground beef free of lethal pathogens, the five companies that manufacture its hamburger patties increased their investment in new equipment and microbial testing.  If McDonald’s were to demand higher wages and safer working conditions for meatpacking workers, its suppliers would provide them.  

page 267…The right pressure applied to the fast food industry in the right way could produce change faster than any act of Congress. The United Students Against Sweatshops and other activist groups have brought widespread attenton to the child labor, low wages, and hazardous working conditions in Asian factories that make sneakers for Nike.

Are you getting it yet people?  No franchisor can abuse those who refuse to be abused when they show up in force and refuse in a position of unity and solidarity.  To continue trying to fight these things in the courts, class action lawsuits, contract negotiations or arbitration allows all the wrongdoers to hide in the shadows and continue their acts of evil against all franchisees.  If franchisees were to stop listening to those who point them at the court system or lawyers or other conventional stupidity, and start finding ways to expose the franchisors for what they are – con artists – and expose this to the press and the media with validity, there is traction!

Wake up America.  We didn’t earn our freedom trying to argue in the British courts, we took it by force and cunning.  Nothing short of this type of action will ever bring justice to a system that is corrupt, insolent, insulated and sheltered by politicians, lobbyists and government officials.   Reason doesn’t work for those who love their money.  The threat or the act of taking their money is the only option left in getting their attention!  

 

Bloody

Mr. Proforma’s (inaquest) response to BloodyFranchise on Bluemaumau

Note the comment placed on BlueMauMau.com by us at Bloody and the “inaquest” response.  The truth hurt so much that “inaquest” (my my, he hasn’t revealed himself while accusing us of being shameless to remain anonymous?) reacted somewhat vehemently with the standard “malcontent” argument.  Mr. Proforma, you know who you are and so do I.  The truth is painful and when it has the potential to touch your wallet, your reaction was quite predictable! 

You might want to listen to your in-house counsel, Mr. Kordel and be careful in the future.  Your character flaws and your temper are going to get you into trouble!  Your trademark email behaviors are well known amongst your Kool-Aid drinkers, as well as those who are sick and tired of making you wealthy for doing nothing while they work their asses off to make ends meet.

 

With regards to your comment: “he/she seems to be hell-bent on trying to destroy the institution of franchising”.  You are partially right.  We are hell bent on destroying the abuses of franchising of which franchisors of the lowest character (you and Mr. DeLuca) have concocted and executed at the expense of the indefensible over the last 30+ years.  I suggest you find an alternative before it’s too late because your fat ivory-tower days in the penthouse are numbered.  Your IQ is half of Bernie’s and they had no problem putting him away!

Franchising 2009  

Submitted by bloodyfranchise on Tue, 2009/02/24 – 17:46.

Mr. Wilkerson,

You have never seen what is going to happen to the franchise market in 2009! Things will happen even you with your vast knowledge will not have predicted. And quite frankly, I don’t know how you think financing opportunities will be difficult? With all of the predatory lending and illegal “capital equipment lease” contracts disguised as financing vehicles, there will be plenty of honest people losing their lives and their homes and their retirements to this fine industry which has fueled your existence we refer to as “franchising”.

“profitable wonder machine” – that’s for damn sure! Wonder is about all it’s capable of creating!

“Mom and pop will gain plenty of attention from franchisors in the care industries, including home and health, entertainment, education and physical fitness” – yet another bunch of marks for you to sell down the river!

“The business of franchising is literally the yellow brick road” – with wicked witches and a little wizard behind the curtain too!

Your Kool-Aid machine goes 24/7 I see…..

https://bloodyfranchise.wordpress.com/

bloody

Submitted by inaquest (not verified) on Thu, 2009/03/05 – 10:59.

hello all….bloody franchise is a nameless, shameless liar and malcontent. he/she seems to be hell-bent on trying to destroy the institution of franchising with malicious and false attacks on franchisors and their people at his blog and with persistent emails to people in organizations he wants to attack.

he/she attacks real people with real words but all the time refuses to expose hie/her real identity. my caution to you is to be very wary of any communications you have with him/her. his/her ONLY agenda is to destroy all who are part of the franchise family of franchisors and service providers.

hello bloody….we will find you. we will find out who you really are. and because of your malice, libesl and other counts we will seek all remedies the courts allow. you are a coward to hide behind an alias and attack real people. we will find you. and we will crush you. you are a coward. you are a liar. you are a loser. and if you have anything left to lose…you will lost it, too. that’s a promise.

Reply to Inaquest

Submitted by bloodyfranchise on Thu, 2009/03/05 – 16:55.

Did we touch a nerve? Reactions like yours mean we hit the mark…The truth really hurts doesn’t it?

Getting exposed for what you really do to people’s lives will be even more painful. Maybe they’ll have a cell next to Bernie or Mr. Stanford for you after sentencing.

Sincerely,

Bloody

2nd reply to Inaquest

Submitted by bloodyfranchise on Sat, 2009/03/07 – 14:27.

Hey Mr. Proforma…..yeah, we know you are behind inaquest – btw – another failed venture back in ’99 –

http://www.inaquest.com
What it offers: Business cards, letterhead, and other standard products; forms; gifts and promotional products.
What it’s good for: Customized marketing giveaways, like T-shirts and phone cards; graphic-design consultation.
Don’t waste your time on: Trying to figure out the site’s odd name, which panelists called meaningless, confusing, and hard to remember.  What our panel had to say: Some found inaQuest.com easy to use and appealing. “This site makes me want to buy something with a logo on it — and I don’t even need anything!” one panelist remarked. But another tester called the site “frustrating” and “a waste of time,” with sluggish page loads that slowed down his system.

http://technology.inc.com/internet/articles/200009/20135.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Quiznos – Bad Franchise – Good Sandwiches

Borrowed from Franchise Fool’s exclusive post of today….

To “Churn” is to wealth as “franchisee” is to ruin

churn [churn] noun

1.	a container or machine seemingly legitimate business venture in which cream or milk franchisee is agitated to make butter create more fake wealth.

2.	any of various containers or machines seemingly legitimate businesses vehicles similar in shape or action to a legitimate business butter churn, as a device for agitating franchisees mixing beverages.

3.	British. a large milk can unregulated marketplace.

4.	an act of churning stocks marks (naïve blokes) by a franchisor stockbroker.

–verb (used with object)

5.	to agitate in order to make into butter drive out of business: to churn cream franchises.

6.	to make (butter) room for more marks by the agitation of cream existing franchisees.

7.	to shake or agitate with violence or continued motion: The storm franchisor churned the sea franchises (chum).

8.	(of a stockbroker franchisor) to trade discount/devalue/distress (a customer’s franchisee’s  securities investment, retirement, savings, 401K [livelihood]) excessively (often to ruin) in order to earn more in commissions.

–verb (used without object)

9.	to operate a churn franchise.

—Verb phrase

12.	churn out, to produce mechanically, hurriedly, or routinely drive a franchisee into ruin in an unconscionable manner: He was hired to churn create revenue by selling out verses marks for greeting cards franchisors.

Prese release proposing CHURNING as guarantee!

Midas – the king of CHURN in Australia ending up in a franchisee suicide – truly bloody

Why have 1 successful franchisee when 2 failures add up to more!  You do the math!

Whether it’s intended failure or predatory behavior – the franchisee never wins

denial from the Franchise Council of Australia that it exists!

Victims of multiple franchises discuss how they were churned!