Innovation in franchising: Some illustrations from the French franchising

In many countries, franchisors have to face an increasing competition and a progressive saturation of the market. A way for them to face these problems, differentiate their offers from these of the competitors and survive is to innovate. Nevertheless, innovation within the particular context of franchising has not been explored in depth. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to work on the three following questions using the French franchising market as the source of our illustrations. What are the main features of the innovations within the franchising sector? Are there real innovations in the franchising industry as suggested by the franchisors in their advertisement? And, which actions can favour the innovations within the franchising chains? The concept of "Orchestrated Solutions", which recently appeared in the retailing sector, will also be analyzed within the case of franchising in order to see if it can lead to a competitive advantage.