Hope you're still doing this.
I actually have a lawyer but I'm riddled with anxiety and don't want to bother (and pay!) him for silly questions.
I bought into a fledgling franchise 5 years ago. They seemed to be going places, had grown massively in just a few years to be making about 700 000 a year and they were looking for their first franchisees. I didn't have any money but made my interest known and they hired me as an employee with an eye to buying a franchise. So I earnt commission (65%) and out of that I took the bare minimum I could live on and put the rest into buying the franchise. 2.5 years later I'd paid off about half the franchise fee and they transitioned me to full franchisee status, earning 100% instead of 65% but paying all expenses myself, as well as royalty fees, which I've since found out we're 2-4 times more than other franchises in the same industry. I still paid off the other half of the franchise fee in about a year, that was 15 months ago.
Around the same time I became a full franchisee the company itself started going downhill. The owner went through a lot of personal stuff and ended up selling to her brother. Since then they've sold their only bricks and mortar premises, 5 out of the 9 franchisees who signed up after me broke their contract and left, they've stopped supplying goods, the business phoneline went down for lack of payment while they were on a cruise and uncontactable, they've stopped training, meetings, marketing, advertising etc. we've gone from top Google choice to page 9. Clients are unhappy, remaining franchisees are very unhappy and I'm still paying 25-30% of my net profit in royalties.
The franchise is up for renewal in a week and I'm not crazy, I'm not re-signing. They haven't even talked to me about it, not sent any paperwork or anything. They just assume I'll sign up again because I love the job/clients. My lawyer is telling them I'm out tomorrow and I'm freaking out. I'm planning on keeping my clients even though they could sue because they've broken a lot of the clauses of the franchise agreement and the franchising code of conduct. My lawyer doesn't think they'll sue and I know you can't know either, but my stomach is in my throat and I could really do with some reassurance or some unbiased opinions.
What do you think the chances are that they'll sue? Or worse, win? :-/