FAQS

As a top franchise attorney in IL, we help people start businesses, buy and sell businesses (including franchises), and help existing, successful businesses become franchisors.

We review the Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) with candidates to understand the opportunity, financial, and legal requirements. For starting a new franchise of your existing business, we prepare the FDD and do strategic planning and consulting on your franchise system. Reach out today to start your FDD review in IL.

We support you by helping you evaluate the existing business through the due diligence process, which includes legal, operational, financial, and other review topics. We document the terms of the transaction and generally act as a quarterback and sounding board for any questions that you have to guide the transaction to closing. We ensure that you work with qualified professionals such as lenders, insurance brokers, real estate brokers, and others through our extensive, vetted network. Reach out to our franchise attorney in IL today!

While any component could be important to you, most clients find the key components are in:

• Item 6: Ongoing or recurring fees.
• Item 7: Estimated initial investment to get the business open.
• Item 12: Territory restrictions and where they can market or solicit customers.
• Item 17: Summarizes core legal terms about renewal, termination, and transfer of the business.
• Item 19: Financial performance representations to show how the franchise outlets are doing.
• Item 20: Includes the franchisee turnover rates for outlets that closed or outlets that have been recently sold.

Reach out today to start your FDD review in IL.

No, we do not. We are happy to refer you to other attorneys that we know who can help with that. Reach out to our franchise attorney in IL if you have any questions.

Yes, we manage every state's franchise registration and filing requirements each year.

Some states, such as Illinois, California, Virginia, New York, and others, have a review process through which a state examiner reviews the FDD and provides the required changes that we have to implement before you can sell in that state.

Other states, such as Texas, Florida, Wisconsin, Indiana, Utah, and others, have a filing process or a process through which to claim an exemption from filing, but they do not actually read the document or require changes.

Reach out to FRANLAW today for an FDD review in IL.

Yes, as a top franchise attorney in IL, we commonly assist with franchise negotiations.

How much leverage any particular franchisee candidate has varies; we evaluate what to negotiate, if anything, with every client.

Some topics that are commonly negotiable are related to territory boundaries, some types of renewal rights, and caps on certain types of fees. Typically, the initial franchise fee and the royalty rate are not negotiable.

Key factors include:

• Preparing your financial statements for review by third parties and banks.
• Potentially hiring a business broker to assist with marketing the business for sale and managing the sales process.
• Starting early, so that you can make any changes in order to increase your bottom line and take home more revenue from the sale.

Our franchise attorney in IL can help you get started. Call today!

We manage our franchisors' ongoing state and federal compliance continuously, as much (or as little) as clients choose.

For example, some franchisor clients have us run their entire sales process to provide the FDD and sign the agreement, whereas others only have us manage their state registrations and renewals while they work with the candidates on their own.

Reach out today to work with a top franchise attorney in IL.

Combined, our attorneys have over 50 years of experience working for both franchisors and franchisees.

Our attorneys have extensive experience helping clients buy and sell existing franchise businesses, whether for smaller or larger transactions. Reach out to our franchise attorney in IL today.

According to the American Bar Association, there are over 1.3 million lawyers in the United States. We are proud to employ some of the top franchise lawyers in the area.