Leading greeting card publisher and franchisor, Card Connection has announced Midlands-based franchisee, Subramaniam Suganthan (Sugan), has grown his franchise by purchasing the Coventry territory. Sugan will now deliver the Company’s extensive range of quality greeting cards and accessories to around 340 retailers in the cities and surrounding areas of Birmingham, Leicester and Coventry.
“I joined Card Connection as a franchisee in 2014,” confirms former Card Connection customer and petrol forecourt manager, Sugan. “Since then I have been able to expand my franchised business by taking on the Leicestershire area last year and now I plan to capitalise on Coventry too!
“I have a purpose-built unit at home to store the stock,” explains Sugan. “To manage the additional 100 or so new retail customers I also have one full-time staff member who helps me with the merchandising, plus a part-timer who picks and packs the greeting cards each day, ready for delivery.
“My Card Connection franchise manager Darren Hawkins has been particularly supportive and we have worked together to ensure the hand-over to supply the new customers goes smoothly. The team at head-office are always friendly too and among the best I have come across over the years!
“However, at the end of the day it is the product that generates my income,” confirms Sugan. “Card Connection’s in-house design team are constantly upgrading designs and following the ever-changing trends in the greeting card market to ensure we always have the highest quality stock to offer our valued retail clients. I know we have more exciting product introductions just around the corner and so I’m looking forward to launching these to my existing and new retail customers very soon!”
Card Connection’s franchisees use a proven system to place quality greeting cards and gifts in retail outlets on a ‘consignment’ basis. This means the stock and display equipment are installed on free loan to the retailer. This is one step beyond ‘sale or return’ as Card Connection customers never have to buy the stock initially, only paying for what they sell.
Card Connection is part of UK Greetings, which is a subsidiary of American Greetings Inc., one of the largest greeting card publishers in the world. Since the franchise network in the UK is complete, the available opportunities now consist of acquiring an already-established territory from an existing franchisee. These vary in price according to their level of development, but start at £12,5k + Stock + Card Connection fee with earnings potential in excess of £50k per annum.
Territories currently available include: Fife, Edinburgh/Scottish Borders, Stirling, Brighton, Plymouth, Bath, Northampton, Liverpool, Macclesfield and South West Ireland.
For further information about franchises for sale, please email Hannah
