U.S. Census Bureau Releases Franchise Data

The U.S. Census Bureau has released the 2007 Economic Census Franchise Report, which is the first comprehensive and detailed report released by this agency which includes information on the role of franchising in the economy. The inclusion of this data in the latest report has been a focus of the International Franchise Association, as previous census information only included information on franchising in limited-service and full-service restaurants.

Among the findings:

• Franchised businesses accounted for 10.5% of businesses with paid employees, in the 295 industries for which data was collected in 2007;
• 453,326 of the 4.3 million total establishments surveyed were either franchisee or franchisor-owned businesses;