Franchise Sales and Marketing Trends April 2026

This is a recording of a live webinar recorded on April 24th, 2026, starting at around 1 PM Eastern Time USA.   

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Links from the episode are here:   

1. ISM® PMI® Reports
2. iw4r202603pmi.pdf
3. hrmzrob202603svcs.pdf
4. United States Unemployment Rate
5. United States Inflation Rate
6. chicsh.pdf
7. Two Thirds of Franchise Prospects Say AI Impacts Their Interest in Business Ownership
8. Franchise Development Prospects Believe They Possess The Strengths To Own Their Own Franchises
9. Solutions to the Enigma of Failed Initial Contact With Prospects
10. Small Business Startup Sentiment Rebounds for Second Month
11. Business Formation Statistics Press Release
12. Top Ten Business Opportunity Categories

This episode is powered by Big Sky Franchise Team.
Big Sky Franchise Team is consistently recognized as one of the best franchise consulting firms in the United States, helping entrepreneurs franchise their businesses through a proven 3-Step franchise process rooted in ethical principles, hands-on guidance, and customized deliverables.  If you are ready to talk about franchising your business you can schedule your free, no-obligation, franchise consultation online at: https://bigskyfranchiseteam.com/. 

The information provided in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only and should not be considered financial, legal, or professional advice. Always consult with a qualified professional before making any business decisions. The views and opinions expressed by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the host, Big Sky Franchise Team, or our affiliates. Additionally, this podcast may feature sponsors or advertisers, but any mention of products or services does not constitute an endorsement. Please do your own research before making any purchasing or business decisions.  References to external data sources, studies, statistics, or other third-party content are not claimed as our own unless explicitly stated. We do our best to provide proper credit and citation where due. If we unintentionally fail to cite or credit a source, please let us know, and we’ll gladly ...

Transcript

Welcome And How We Help

Tom DuFore 0:02

All right, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us for another edition of our franchise your business podcast and webinar series. My name is Tom Dufour, and I'm the founder and CEO of Big Sky Franchise Team. Where if you're thinking about franchising your business, we can help you with that. We take care of all of your franchise needs to franchise your business with a three-step proven process that we take you through. And if you happen to be in franchising already and you're a franchise or and would like another set of eyes to take a look at what you're doing, how you're doing it, or maybe just need some help, please let us know. We're here to help. You can schedule a free, no obligation consultation, whether you're looking to franchise your business or help with your current franchise system. Go to our website at bigskyfranchise team.com. That's BigSkyFranchise Team.com. Uh so glad for you to join us here today. Today is our April franchise sales and marketing trend session. And it has been a little while since we've done one of these. It's been two months, maybe three. And so I'm so glad to be back and sharing this and going through this information with you. So thank you for joining us. Uh for those of you that are able to tune in live or are listening to this as a recording. So I am going to go ahead and share my screen and get this show started to start talking about some of this economic data and starting to make a little sense of it. So uh the first uh report that we like to take a look at is the Institute for Supply Management. They produced two reports. They have produced the Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index and the Services Purchasing Managers Index. Uh, if you've been on our session in the past, you may have noticed that uh they used to have three reports. So for many, many years they had just these two. Then they added a third in the healthcare segment a couple years ago and recently stopped producing that. So let's jump into the manufacturing PMI. And as you can see here, for the last couple of months, manufacturing PMI has really taken quite a big jump here. So it says manufacturing PMI at 52.7%. And this report was uh analysis was done by Susan Spence, and she's a chair of the Institute for Supply Management Manufacturing Business Survey Committee. And the paragraph reads the U.S. manufacturing sector expanded in March for the third straight month following a 10-month period of contraction, registering 52.7%, a 0.3 percentage point increase compared to February's reading of 52.4%. Of the five sub-indexes that directly factor into the manufacturing PMI, three new orders, production, and supplier deliveries were in expansion territory, the same as in February. So, what can we make of this? Well, this is what I have found over and over and over again. When we see uh we've got three data points now, this is a trend. We're seeing that in 2026, manufacturing purchasing PMI is up above that 50th percentile, and that 50% is the manufacturing break-even line. And the significance of that is I view uh manufacturing PMI as a leading indicator, leading indicator. So this is telling us where things are headed. So this should mean, in my opinion, that uh we should start seeing uh uh if you're a small business and things have felt uh a little tight or a little tough here for the last couple of years, take a look at 24, 25 for manufacturing PMI. It's below that 50% for break for uh the uh manufacturing economy, and then the overall economy breakeven line at 47.5% on this dotted line, which means that uh we were hovering just below or just above for uh the manufacturing PMI for the last two years for 2024 and 2025. So this popping up means that uh you should start to see a little bit more grip and a little more traction in your businesses to get things going, to get things back, uh, and maybe even getting some decisions on a yes a little bit sooner. So uh, and and when will that happen? Well, we tend to see this as a leading indicator. So it could be three months, could be six months, could be a year or 18 months down the road. But uh you you uh should start seeing something like that, assuming this trend continues. Next up is the services PMI, and this analysis was done by Steve Miller with the and he is a chair of the Institute for Supply Management, the Services Business Survey Committee. And here on this report, this is the March 2026 report, it reads services PMI at 54%. So in March, the services PMI registered 54%, 1.7 percentage points above its 12-month moving average. A reading above 50% indicates a services sector economy is generally expanding. Below 50% indicates that it is generally contracting. A services PMI above 48.1% over time generally indicates an expansion of the overall economy. Therefore, the March services PMI indicates the overall economy is expanding for the 70th straight month. So we can see a nice uh incline and uh uh uh in in this uh reading here, really dating back to about September of 25. It looks like maybe August, September, uh, where you see this uh nice uh upward cycle here um on this. So 2025 was interesting because you had this kind of falling from 2024 highs uh to about mid-year or so in 2025, and then it started ramping back up and at the end of 2025, coming into 2026. So uh all in all, a good indicator for us. Next, let's take a look at the unemployment rate. Um and the unemployment rate, uh, this is from TradingEconomics.com, the United States unemployment rate, and it says the US unemployment rate fell to 4.3% in March 2026 from 4.4% in February, below market expectations of 4.4%. The number of unemployed decreased by 332,000 to 7.239 million, while total employment fell by 64,000 to 162.85 million. Labor force declined by 396,000 to 170.09 million, pushing the participation rate down 0.1 percentage point to 61.9%. Meanwhile, the broader U6 unemployment rate, which includes discouraged and underemployed workers, rose to 8% from 7.9%. And the source is from the U.S. Bureau of Labour Labor Statistics. So you can see here, 4.3% that uh in in general, we see uh uh this is starting to move down. We can take a look at the 10-year trend here, which is helpful to see back in 2016, you see a slow, steady decline in the unemployment rate up through about uh February of 2020. Then uh COVID hit in March of 2020. We see the big spike, all of the activity starting to happen in unemployment, um, and then it dropping down and uh looking to kind of bottom out in early 2023 at about 3.6%, and then slowly coming up over the last few years. And it looks like it's maybe starting to trend down just a bit here for the unemployment rate. So, to me, all in all, I think this is overall uh uh tends to be a positive uh sign. And it also means that it might be harder for your franchisees to be finding and recruiting quality people. Uh, so keep that in mind. We have the US inflation rate, and in March, that inflation rate bumped up three point to 3.3 percent from 2.4 percent. So a pretty substantial jump. And it said this is from tradingeconomics.com about the United States inflation and CPI. It says the annual inflation rate in the US jumped 3.2 jumped to 3.3% in March of 2026, marketing the highest, marking the highest level since May of 24, and a sharp increase from 2.4 percent in February and January. Figures came in line with forecasts, with the rise primarily driven by higher energy costs, 12.5%, mostly gasoline, which was up 18.9%, and fuel oil up 44.2 percent due to the war with Iran. So we see that this this increase is largely driven from um uh global uh issues and and uh uh international uh relations issues here that we see impacting this. Uh so you may be seeing that, feeling that definitely at the uh at the gas pump uh when you're filling up, or uh and if you run a business that relies on fuel, uh just be mindful. Uh just uh something worth noting if you're selling franchises or working with your franchisees, it might be worth noting that they may need to put a temporary surcharge in uh just to help uh adjust their prices uh during these uh higher increased fuel cost uh windows. So just keep that perspective in mind and uh have a plan for your franchisees if if you have a uh a service services business, commercial or home services, where maybe you're driving or commuting or you have a mobile business. Uh, just know to be have a plan or to be talking about that. Okay, next up here is the uh uh uh surveys of consumers from the University of Michigan, and there's the index of consumer sentiment, and we'll just take a look at the last 10 years here, and you can see as I zoom in, you know, the survey uh sentiment is at uh really some of its lowest levels. It looks like it's almost equal to where it was at the in the middle of 2022, which is the lowest point it had been at in 10 years. And then if we look at the 50-year cycle, we're basically about as low as the survey of consumer sentiment was around 19. Uh this looks like around 1980 or so. It's kind of hard to tell get precise on this uh chart here because it's 50 years out, but uh it looks like right around 1980 or so is when that that bottomed out. So hopefully, uh, you know, uh it looks like based off of this chart, it's it it's uh a rare territory that it's been this low. Um, and it's rare that it's been this low for uh any extended period of time. So hopefully that means the only place where we can go is up, hopefully. Fingers crossed, you know, and uh get that consumer sentiment up and moving. Okay, next up is from the U.S. Census Bureau, and this is for new business formation statistics. This came out in on April 8th of 2026. And when you click in on this, it shows the number of new business uh applications that have been filed across the country. And it reads US business applications, total US business applications in March of 2026 was 491,000, which was down 0.9% from uh February of 2026. But all in all, you can see how new business applications is surging, and uh just over the last even uh four years or or so, three years or so from uh uh dating back uh to around uh 20 middle of uh right around 2024. So I guess the last two, two and a half years, you can see it was around 400, maybe 20,000, 425,000 or so. Uh and now you see the surge, it's trending just under 500,000 the last few months, just under just over 500,000 new business applications. So, why does this matter? Well, to me, what does it that this says that if you are uh uh if you if you're in franchise sales and you're talking to prospects, know that uh uh entrepreneurship and the startup mindset is on the hearts and minds of the people you're talking to. So keep that perspective in mind as you go through it. So they are likely thinking about seriously starting their own business, whether they buy your franchise or start their own. Uh that that to me is a big indicator of what's happening there. Okay, let's take a look at some of the franchiseinsights.com data and information that's come out. So this is from uh April 1st, 2026, by Michael Alston for Franchise Insights. And the heading reads: two-thirds of franchise prospects say AI impacts their interest in business ownership. So two-thirds of franchise prospects say AI impacts their business ownership. Uh 34% said it has no impact. Uh, 30% says it makes me favor businesses that would be less likely to be displaced by AI. 26% said it boosts their desire to control their own destiny rather than losing their current occupation to AI. 24% said it makes them want to find a business enhanced or enabled by AI. 12% said it reduces the amount of capital they have to invest. 6% said they've put their ambitions on hold and wait to uh see how things unfold. And 6% said other. So, bottom line is people out there that are thinking about starting a franchise, starting a business, buying a franchise, uh, you know, about a third are saying it's gonna have no impact, and two-thirds are saying it's gonna impact them in some way. Uh, and from reading this, it it looks like the majority uh this is going to make them want to buy into a business or a franchise to take control of their own destiny. So the second report we're gonna look at is um was released on Wednesday this week, April 22nd of 2026. And this uh heading is franchise development prospects believe they possess the strengths to own their own franchises. So this is a these are franchise prospects top three self-reported strengths for franchise ownership. So the number one highest percentage was grit, persistence towards a goal despite obstacles. 58.5% said that they have that skill. 55.4% said they have a willingness that they have a willingness to follow a proven system. 52.3% said team leadership experience. Those are the top three, and it's a top three by a pretty significant number. Uh 38.5% uh said that they uh have prior business ownership. Uh 33.8% said they have access to sufficient startup capital. 30.8% said they have a supportive spouse or partner, and 27.7% said they experienced that they have experience in business in the business segment they are pursuing. So the the thing I look at are these top three, and that half of the responses showed that they have grit, a willingness to follow system, and team leadership experience. Now, these are self-assessed results, but if you're choosing, these are three pretty good ones that you'd love to see at the top if you're selling franchises. Okay, next up here is a report from April 15th, 2026, that uh uh uh Michael Alston prepared for franchise insights, and it says solutions to the enigma of failed initial contact with prospects. It says, Were you contacted by the franchises you requested information from? So 40.2% of prospects said that they were contacted by all of the franchises that reached out to them. 16.6% said at least half, 14.2% said less than half, and 29% said none of them. So uh what does that mean? Well, that that means what we're seeing on here is that about 34%, roughly 34% uh or 33% of all 33.2% of all responders of all leads, according to the survey, 33.2% of franchise systems did not contact these buyers. And that means that uh you know, we're looking at uh let's see 50, what is that? 56.8%, 56.8% said that all of them or at least half had reached out to them. So that's that's pretty substantial. So you got uh and oh, I think I said 30 uh 33, it should be 43.2 percent. 43.2 percent were less than half or none, and then uh 56.8 percent said all of them or at least half. So just just worth noting, plenty of room for improvement for franchise ours and franchise salespeople. Uh, and uh if if maybe there's a good chance you did contact them or you did reach out to them, but still 43% are saying they were not contacted or less than half were contacted, which means maybe they didn't get your email, maybe it went to a spam, maybe they didn't check your text, maybe you didn't leave a voicemail, and they would have gotten that. So just some food for thought and things worth noting. And then on March 8th of 26, uh Michael Alston wrote, uh prepared this report for franchise insights. It says small business startup sentiment rebounds for second month. So uh it says uh March 8th, 2026, startup sentiment rebounded for the second consecutive month in March 2026. Surveys as business buyer surveys showed that 64.0% of persons exploring ownership agree or strongly agree that, quote, now is a good time for startup, unquote, up from a recent low of 30% in December. So what does that mean? Well, December was going to be a uh uh you know a bit of a challenging time where uh and even looking back at November, those numbers were pretty low, and it really dropped down in uh September, September of 25. It did pop back in November, but September of 25, uh there's really a consistent trend of going downward. And now we see the last two months with February and March, this is coming up. Uh, that that the sentiment is improving. So that that means it should be a little bit easier to be selling a franchise last month uh or in February in March, and hopefully that's continuing into the month of uh into the month of uh uh April. Okay, next up on our list here are the top 10 business opportunity categories. So the this is from franchiseinsights.com and it said it reads the following business opportunity categories showed the greatest inquiries in the last 90 days. And so I'm pretty sure this is the franchise list here, and it shows that home services accounted for 26.9% of all franchise inquiries or of all business opportunity inquiries. 20 uh business services accounted for 23.3%, senior and health care was 10.3%, clean in and maintenance 8.6 percent, food and restaurant 5.6%. Those are your top five. Then the next five are child related, 5.1%, retail 4.2%, pet services 3.1%, automotive 2.6%, and education 2.6%. So what does this mean? Well, to me, what it means is that uh what I found over the years is if you're in if your category is at or above 10% of category share, uh, it's gonna be easier, it should be easier to find leads. So home services, business services, senior and healthcare, those are above 10%. Under 10%, um, it's still a strong case, especially if you're in the top 10 categories. So these top 10 categories means if you're in a top 10 category in general, it should mean that it's a bit easier to find the number of leads you're looking for. So um that is our episode today, here, folks. Um, I'd love to ask for any questions if anyone has any questions. And while I'm waiting for those to come in, just a reminder if you have not subscribed to our podcast, please do so at franchiseyourbusiness or our second podcast, Multiply Your Success. Or if you're a YouTuber and you love YouTube, please like and follow uh our YouTube channel where you get updates on the content that we are regularly producing. I am so thankful that for everyone to have joined us here. Uh, please make sure if you are ready to have a conversation about franchising your business or growing your franchise system, reach out to us at BigSkyFranchise Team.com. We've got some great, great offerings going on right now that we'd love to share with you. You can visit us at BigSkyFranchiseteam.com to schedule your free, no obligation consultation. Thanks for being here, everyone. We look forward to our next session and seeing you all soon. Have a great weekend.