countries. While business format franchising is the
industry standard for developed countries, it remains
an aspiration for many developing countries. Despite
the attraction for developing countries of systems,
training, and support and despite the economic and regulatory
infrastructure being in place for the development
of business format franchising, a range of commercial
and socio-cultural factors may conspire to prevent its full
expression.
This paper addresses franchising development in
Vietnam, a developing country. It considers strategies
to bridge the gap between Vietnamese franchise practice
and franchising best practice. It proposes that in
Vietnam’s current state of development, the product
and trade name model may be the appropriate starting
point with a move to the business format model only
when, and in places where, the socio-cultural, commercial,
and economic factors and the legal environmentcan accommodate more sophisticated business format
franchise arrangements.