If you are serious about buying a franchise than you should take the time to do your homework before you make the jump into franchise ownership. Below are 5 Must-Read books that anyone interested in buying a franchise should read:

1. Street Smart Franchising - Joe Matthews, Don DeBolt, and Deb Percival
2. Franchising for Dummies - Michael Seid and Dave Thomas
3. The Educated Franchisee - Rick Bisio
4. Tips and Traps When Buying a Franchise - Mary Tomzack
5. The Franchise Fraud: How to Protect Yourself - Robert Purvin & Robert L. Purvin Jr.

Click Here to learn more about each book.

Last week we introcued you to Mary Tomzack, author of the widely read "Tips & Traps When Buying a Franchise" and Advisory Board Chair of FranchiseHelp.com. Mary has helped us identify the top 5 signs you aren't a born entrepreneur.  The first step in starting your own business or franchise is learning if you have what it takes! Below are Mary's 5 signs:

1. You have a hard time staying focused.
2. You expect overnight success.
3. You think the Internet is all you need.
4. You're obsessed with administration tools.
5. You have to spend money to make money - and spend it, and spend it...

To learn more read the full article here.

Mary Tomzack, is the author of the widely read "Tips & Traps When Buying a Franchise." She is also the Advisory Board Chair of FranchiseHelp.com, a leading resource for information on franchise opportunities and business opportunities. FranchiseHelp was recently named by The Wall Street Journal as one of the most useful sites for entrepreneurs.

Mary has just become a quest author for About.com and will be contributing some great articles!

Learn more about  Mary Tomzack

The Chick-fil-A franchise has made quite a bit of hay with its poor-spelling cows holding up signs trying to convince people to stop eating beef, saying "EAT MOR CHIKIN." But the company doesn't seem to think a variation on their tagline is all that funny.
 
Bo Muller-Moore, an artist from Vermont, has been boosting home-state farmers by producing T-shirts saying, "EAT MORE KALE." Chick-fil-A claims that these shirts' slogan "is likely to cause confusion of the public and dilutes the distinctiveness of Chick-fil-A's intellectual property... "We must legally protect and defend our 'Eat mor chikin' trademarks in order to maintain rights to the slogan." Muller-Moore calls it "corporate bullying."
 
The State of Vermont has about 625,000 people, not much more than Chick-fil-A's corporate headquarters city of Atlanta, and no Chick-fil-A restaurants.  Since the T-shirts are not being sold outside the State, they seem unlikely to eat into Chick-fil-A's profits.  (There are currently only three Chick-fil-A restaurants in all of the six-state New England region.)
 
Muller-Moore has rallied his home State to his cause: "There are certainly the purists and they think of kale as this superfood.  I think other people see it as more of this local food movement. I think, in Vermont, other people see it as a shirt printed by Bo down the road... I think I've given away enough stickers and shirts around here that Vermonters take this very personally."