After over 20 years of sponsoring the franchising module annual prize at Lancaster University Management School, The Bardon Group has been afforded the ultimate accolade – to be the subject for this year’s award essay.

Part of the university’s BSc Hons in Management and Entrepreneurship programme, the ENSI311 Franchise Module gives students the opportunity to look at franchising’s place in the global economy and critically examine the management issues involved in founding and developing a franchise network.

Each year, Dr Lola Dada, senior lecturer within the department of Entrepreneurship and Strategy at Lancaster University sets the students a subject for the academic essay which forms part of the assessment for the annual franchising module prize.  For 2020 the title was ‘Why the Bardon Group has been able to achieve success as a leading franchise company’ and the quality of the papers has been impressive.

Said The Bardon Group managing director Nigel Toplis: “It was a real honour for me to learn that our great company itself was the subject for this year’s award essay. It was interesting to see how the students have applied an academic approach to evaluating our success and I enjoyed reading their work.

Franchising plays such a vital part in the UK economy, yet Lancaster is alone in including a module on this business model in its curriculum. I am committed to helping publicise the importance of franchising and the success it brings to a wider audience and engaging with students at the beginning of their business life is a key part of this.”

Face to face contact with students has ceased as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, but  assessment of group work and final judging will take place remotely. it is hoped that the formal presentation of the prize to  the winning students will be made by Mr Toplis as soon as possible once the University re-opens.

 

Published on: April 6th, 2020