ALEC HOGG: Mark Rose is the divisional head of the new business development section at Nedbank.
Mark, it’s all to do with franchising at the moment, and I guess a lot of South Africans are trying to find franchising as a way to get into the business arena. But from a broad perspective, how does franchising promote South Africa’s economic growth?
MARK ROSE: The last stat that I’ve got is that the industry contributes around 11% of our GDP. It represents around 30 000 outlets and, if you look at the employment stats, I think it employs about 500 000 people. It’s still relatively small when you compare that to the likes of the US and European markets. I understand that in the US about 50% of all their retail sales come from the franchise segment. Continue reading this interview here.