Which industry sector is the largest, which one is growing the fastest, and which one is the hottest? These are questions we are asked almost every day.

We track franchise systems in 30 primary industries and 230 sub-industry sectors (see a complete listing of our industry and sub-sectors). In the past ten years, we have identified and obtained information on 3,696 unique franchise concepts. We know there are more out there, mostly small, local businesses. We know that, over the decade, hundreds are no longer actively franchising. We have seen some subsectors grow in prominenance and others fall away.

Currently , the top five industry categories with the highest number of active franchise concepts are:

Each of these industries has a number of subsectors. The changes seen comparing the most prominent subsectors today to the most prominent 5 years ago sheds more light on shifting trends in franchising and the greater marketplace.

Franchising By Industry (FBI) Tracker

The following is a comparison of the top 5 subsectors by number of unique concepts for the largest 5 industries (Maintenance Services was tied with Sit-Down Restaurants for secondplace):

As we have previously reported, 2004 saw significant numbers of new franchise concepts in the Pizza, Commercial/Residential Cleaning, and Business Consulting sectors. The FBI Tracker also shows:

• The number of Mexican Fast Food concepts have surpassed the number of Traditional Hamburger establishments


• Direct Mail Advertising concepts have fallen relative to other business service concepts


• There are more Health Foods (Retail) systems than Liquor Stores and Services

FRANdata is the only company able to talk about franchising as a whole, but we realize that many of you are concerned mainly about a particular industry. With information products such as our Industry Report, Company Profiles, Benchmarking and Competitive Analysis, FRANdata can help you understand franchising in any one of the more than 200 sectors we track.

Which franchisor of seven(7) food concepts, ranging from tex-mex to salad and BBQ, just started franchising a family entertainment and party facility named Monkey Joe's? Email Me your response quickly and be entered to win a free Company Profile Report.

Mr. Filiere is Manager of Franchise Planning and Finance for Circle K. Circle K is one of the nation's largest chains of company-operated convenience stores with more than 2,400 stores located in 23 states, including nearly 600 franchised locations. Internationally, there are approximately 4,100 stores operating under the Circle K brand in six foreign countries