This is one of a few examples of Business Opportunity Watch Reviews which are available for the public to view on the public section of the website. The reason for making a small sample of the reviews freely available is to help potential customers decide if they want to subscribe, and also to communicate some matters of general interest arising in the case of some of the reviews. All the other reviews are available only to subscribers.

Review of Family Grapevine

Review from Business Opportunity Watch Reviews
April 2007 Issue 2

FAMILY GRAPEVINE
The Family Grapevine Ltd
Touchdown House
156 High Street
Wootton Bassett
Wiltshire
SN4 7AB
Tel: 01793 849928 
www.thefamilygrapevine.co.uk

Our top editors turn over in excess of £60,000

Our editors make money by selling advertising. Your main expense will be printing, followed by postage, telephone, other office expenses (stationery) and petrol. After you have covered all your expenses, anything left over is profit.

Typically a first edition can expect to break even on its costs. If you devote time and energy to your business you will eventually be able to achieve a substantial income. We cannot and will not guarantee your earnings. We will only tell you what can be achieved with dedication and enthusiasm. Only one person can make your business succeed, and that's you!

But what will I earn?

Have you spoken to any of our editors? We do not have any restrictions on who you talk to. Call a few for a chat! You'll find some working full time, others working part time, some earning big money with a turnover in excess of £60,000, others a more modest amount.

It is important that you get a proper picture of our group. What should shine through is how much we all care about our publications.

Why should I join a group?

Of course you could do it all on your own, but joining The Family Grapevine has lots of plus points. You will use our tried and tested business system.

You enjoy all the advantages of self employment, but also benefit from belonging to a well respected, established group. Using our group's brand and trademarks allows you to benefit from our reputation.

Our franchisees are stronger in the face of competition because we cooperate with each other and respect each other's territories. You can learn from your predecessors' experience and mistakes! You can potentially make faster progress and go into profit sooner. That's a combination which is hard to beat!

You should also bear in mind that working at home can be very isolating. Keeping motivated after a string of rejections can be gutting, so good personal support is invaluable.

Leads and referrals

The cooperation between editors which is a hallmark of the Family Grapevine group means that you will receive personal e-mails, messages from the Google Group and phone calls passing on leads, referrals, potential bookings and recommendations from other editors.

Why The Family Grapevine and not some other group?

We want you to be sure that joining our particular group is the right decision for you. There are several other magazines offering franchises and home publishing businesses such as Raring2Go, Families, Primary Times, Parents News, ABC and Parents Pages. It is important to choose the one which meets your preferences and ambitions most closely. Check for fees, royalties and hidden charges. Consider what will happen if you want to divert from the business system (is this allowed?) and check if you are allowed to continue in the publishing business locally, or indeed at all, if you leave the group.

This comparison table on our website will help you to compare what the different groups offer.

None of these businesses offers you a 'get rich quick' scheme or any guarantees. Whichever you choose you will have to work hard to reap rewards. However, one of the advantages of home publishing is that if you stick at it through the tough beginning stages it gets easier as you go along. Your skills will grow and if your publication is popular you will attract higher and higher levels of repeat advertising and unsolicited bookings.

What do I get if I join?

Just some of the benefits you get if you join Family Grapevine are as follows (for full details see the Prospectus):

An exclusive territory of 100,000 to 250,000
Your agreement gives you exclusive rights to operate within your territory and use one of our brands. We have invested in setting territories which have the right qualities to develop a viable and potentially lucrative business. The population in each territory is usually between 100,000 and 250,000. In your agreement you will promise to distribute copies and list businesses and services within your territory only.

Knowledgebase
You will be independent and self employed but you will not be on your own. You will get access to our fantastic Knowledgebase, an online guide which is packed full of useful advice, as well as access to our private editors' forum, a huge range of templates and reference documents.

Grapeworks
You will also be able to use Grapeworks, our amazing management application which runs every aspect of your business. You won't need any other accounting or contact management packages.

Your own independent website
A new benefit has been added for franchisees - you now have your own independent website for your Family Grapevine territory. We set up your Family Grapevine website for you with some starter pages ready to fill with your own content. You will not need to use a web design company as the site can be edited easily from your usual web browser. You will have complete freedom to develop the content of your website. You can add pages, posts, pictures and downloadable files. Most importantly, you can sell advertising in your website however you like.

What is it like being an editor?

Running your own publication can be a part time job or a full time job. It just depends on you and how much work you want to put in. The work is hardest at the beginning when there is lots of research to do and lots of cold calls to make. You will need to be self-disciplined, well organised and determined. The most challenging areas are usually selling and desk top publishing. When selling, you have to be very confident in your own product to cope with rejection - but that's easy with The Family Grapevine!

What skills do I need?

You will be responsible for every aspect of your local phone book including research, assessing the competition, building up leads and contacts, selling and designing adverts, preparing each edition for press, administration, accounts and distributing copies. You will need plenty of common sense and you may need to learn new skills.

For those of you without desk top publishing experience

We have an optional desk top publishing service which must be booked when you join the group. The service costs £1000 plus VAT per issue and includes preparation of your media pack and layout and design of adverts and publications up to a maximum of 24 x A4 pages. This service is available for up to three issues during your first year of membership.

How do I make money?

You make money by selling advertising. Your main expense is printing. After you have covered all your other expenses such as stationery and phone bills, anything left over is profit.

Can I do my own thing?

There are very few rules, but if you follow our format closely your business is more likely to succeed. You are welcome to try out your own ideas and develop your publication to suit your area. We encourage editors to share their ideas and experiences with the rest of the group.

What does it cost?

The initial franchise fee is £2,000 plus VAT and the ongoing fees are £500 plus VAT a year.

Of course, you may also need to invest in computer hardware and software. There is a full list of requirements in the prospectus. That's it. We will never ask for any other money.

What do I do next?

1. Have you seen a copy of one of our directories? You can download an example from our website or ask one of our editors to send you one. You should certainly look at any publications within or adjoining your proposed area. You can find all our editions listed on the website.

2. Have you spoken to any of our editors? We do not have any restrictions on who you talk to. Call a few for a chat! You'll find some working full time, others working part time, some earning big money with a turnover in excess of £60,000, others a more modest amount. It is important that you get a proper picture of our group. What should shine through is how much we all care about our publications.

3. Find out from our website whether we have an edition in your area.

4. Give us a call to have a chat about the area you are interested in and to ask for a copy of our Prospectus.

What Editors Say about our Group

When I decided to join the Family Grapevine Group and set up my directory, I knew nothing about the process or where to start, but the level of support and help from everyone has been amazing. It does give a real family feel that you can just contact another editor and they do their best to help!
Alison

It's good to know that as a mum I'm helping other mums in the local community find all the information they need for their families, especially new mums dealing with the transition from being a "singleton" to "motherhood", via being a Family Grapevine Editor. It's also reassuring to know I have the back up of The Family Grapevine name which is well respected plus the help and support of my Grapevine neighbours when needed.
Debbie

Review:

This is one of the most transparent and honest opportunities that it has ever been our pleasure to review.  And the price is very reasonable at £2,000 for the franchise plus an annual fee of £500.

There is always a good demand for well-targeted, good-value local advertising in good times and in bad times, and Family Grapevine is clearly flourishing.  When I looked at it in April 2007 there were 26 Active Areas, with a further 7 in the course of preparation.  As at January 2008 there were 33 active areas with a further 4 in preparation. By October 2008, this had grown to 40 areas.

As a franchisee, you would have three main jobs - selling advertising, producing your magazine and distributing it. Many people do not like the idea of selling advertising, but in the case of Family Grapevine the idea becomes quite attractive if you view it as helping local businesses to get more customers. (And see the Feedback produced below from the December 2007 edition.)

Producing your magazine is something that anyone can master, even if you have little computer experience.

Distributing your magazine is a much less onerous task than you might expect because you don't have to deliver thousands of copies door-to-door: instead, you distribute in batches of between 30 and a couple of hundred magazines to one or two hundred outlets.

With Family Grapevine, you have strong and experienced support to help you to get started and on an ongoing basis. This support takes the form not only of head office but also the lively network of existing franchisees.

The management of this group comes across as very creative and energetic, but at the same time very careful.  Everything is tested before launch, and you can see that this applies to new software just as it does to their enterprising new titles.

We think that you would be in good hands if you joined this group.  Essentially, though, your success would be down to you: the group provides a successful structure and it is up to you to work it.

At the moment, most of their editors seem to be young mothers, but with the increasing range of their titles this opportunity is open to all.

Follow the company's advice to download a copy of the publication and the prospectus and contact some of the editors.  If you like what you see and hear, then contact the company.

It is very rare for us to give a rating as high as a 9, but we are giving it to this company because their offer is presented in a very thorough and business-like manner and they make it very clear what you need to do in order to succeed, they are totally transparent about your contacting existing editors and the business clearly works for those who work at it.

Rating:

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Feedback published in BOW December 2007 Issue 10

Feedback Received
Family Grapevine
www.thefamilygrapevine.co.uk

Family Grapevine is a franchise which produces local magazines in hard copy, aimed at families.  I rated it at 9 out of 10 in the April 2007 issue.  The opportunity has gone from strength to strength - they published over a million copies in 2007 and they now publish in over 30 local areas.

To be a successful Family Grapevine franchisee involves selling advertising in your magazine to local businesses.  I know that many readers are put-off by the idea of selling, and I therefore thought that it would be helpful to publish some feedback from Family Grapevine franchisees about how they overcame their fear of selling and became successful franchisees.  Here is feedback from three of them:

Hi Marian,

I took over the running of the Cambridge Grapevine while my sister-in-law had some extended maternity leave. I'd never done any selling before and didn't think I would be any good at it - it was a scary prospect. The first few calls I made were a bit tentative and probably not, in hindsight, very good calls.
But I was amazed at how quickly I got into it. People weren't rude and aggressive which was a bonus. And I realised it's nothing personal if they say no. You just move on to the next call. If you remain polite, friendly and professional you can't go wrong. I'm now considering buying my own Grapevine franchise!

Alice Valentine-Willis
The Family Grapevine, Cambridge

Hi Marian

I took on a Family Grapevine territory in July 06 having never done any selling before, bar standing on the occasional trade stand when pushed to do so. My background is in the travel industry where I have worked in tour operating: buying, packaging and pricing holiday products. We had sales teams to promote the product and this was not something I ever got involved in.

I have to say that the selling is really not unpleasant, even the first time around. The sales pitch is easy - would you like a free listing and by the way how about advertising? That's about as heavy as it gets. I've done four editions now and I have only once been told that I'm about as welcome as mud on the carpet. Everybody else has been unfailingly polite and positive.

Of course it gets easier as time goes on. I am now receiving unsolicited calls from potential advertisers which is most gratifying. Existing advertisers also recommend the Family Grapevine to colleagues. From edition to edition an astonishingly high % of advertisers stay with me - and of those that I lose, most have a very good reason which is rarely to do with lack of response.

I think the keys to success with the Family Grapevine are:

a) stick to your core market, don't try to solicit adverts from businesses that are not of direct and immediate interest to parents;

b) print as many copies as you can afford and can distribute effectively - it's a numbers game and you cannot afford to forget that; and

c) be flexible but firm about rates. Don't discount too much but accept that a contribution to costs is better than no contribution. Just make sure you have good grounds for giving a discount so that you have equally good grounds for raising prices later on.

Kind regards
Katherine
Editor, The Family Grapevine - Eastbourne and Wealden
01444 811368

Hi Marian

I came across the Family Grapevine as a business opportunity in 2004 when my daughter was attending a local Gymbobs class and I saw an advert in their magazine, RightStart. At that time I was poised on the brink of having to make a decision about my life - whether to go back to work now that my daughter had started school (probably as a low-paid secretarial temp) or to take the plunge and start my own business from home.

I had no background in business as I was the only child of two working class foreign parents and my self-confidence was low so the second option was a real step into the unknown for me and I had real worries that it would not work out. Thank goodness I came across the Family Grapevine.

My tentative investigations reassured me that the company was above-board, the opportunity seemed interesting to me and useful to the community at large and I could just about afford it as I had a computer and some software already and some DTP skills.

My main doubt was whether or not I'd be able to sell as the success of the business depends on this. I thought long and hard about it - I'd never sold anything in my life and didn't think of myself as being a particularly capable speaker (I thought all salespeople had to have the gift of the gab!) But it sounded like there would be plenty of help at hand if I was struggling, so I applied. 

The "interview" felt more like I was interviewing Sheridan & Nikki than the other way round, but I came away from it feeling that with their help, I COULD do it.

And so I started building up listings, the "bread and butter" of the Grapevine magazine. So far so good. But then came the day (and believe me, I put it off and put it off some more!) that I had to start selling - the words "cold calling" kept coming into my head and I'd freeze up - but there was no two ways about it - it had to be done.

I tried to think of it as simply "having a chat" with someone who might benefit from the service I was offering and this made it much easier. I was just building a relationship, not "trying to sell them something" and came to see every contact with a potential advertiser as positive - even if they didn't want to advertise (which most didn't of course), they would most probably be glad of a free listing at least.

I learned that "No" only means "not at this time" and it's not personal - they're not saying no to me, they're saying "not right now" to advertising in the Grapevine - all these little psychological ways of thickening my delicate skin!

All the way I benefited from advice and support from Sheridan & Nikki (plus a lot of grassroots support from my partner and daughter of course) and I've since been a "mentor" to a new-start Grapevine in Stockport, which seems to now be thriving. I only run my edition on a part-time basis as spending time with my family at home is very important to me and I shall probably never make my fortune from doing it, but I'm happy and it's changed my life for the better as I'm now much more confident.

I'm glad I took that plunge, and even more glad it turned out to be the right plunge for me.

Tina
Editor, Shrewsbury & Telford Family Grapevine
01743 351842

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Updated 1st November 2008