I hate franchises. I really do. I hate all of them but especially I hate the supermarkets. Why? Because every time I complain about anything, and I really don’t do it very often, I am told it is the fault of Head Office. If a favourite item is no longer being stocked, and this has happened to me several times, it is because a mandate has come down from Head Office. If a new, particularly stupid or irritating policy has been implemented, like the idiotic (though short-lived) Countdown decision to refuse to sell alcohol to anyone in the company of children, it is a Head Office decision. If most of the checkout counters are not being staffed, in spite of long customer queues, it is Head Office that has decided not to allow additional hiring. It is always the fault of Head Office. What a convenient cop-out for the local store. It cannot be held accountable for anything. Head Office has made the decision. Isn’t this a load of crap?

Invariably, Head Office is located in Auckland, though more often than not, controlled from overseas. Yet my local business, the one I deal with and spend money at, is not in Auckland; it is where I live. This is where local people buy their groceries, or tyres, or pizzas, or whatever. It has nothing to do with Auckland. Yet distant strangers in Auckland are making decisions about what we are allowed to buy, or how we are allowed to buy it. Why is this so?

Head Office will not permit my local Countdown to hire more personnel to staff the empty checkout counters. Well why the hell not? My own suspicion is that they are trying to force people to use the self-service checkouts. No doubt some genius in Australia has decided that profits can be increased if customers can be made to do the supermarket’s work for it.

This may seem fine to a bean-counter in Auckland, but what I see is a business sucking money out of my community and refusing to give anything back. If they hire more people, they also create local jobs and return a small share of their profits to the local community. Why is that such a terrible idea?

What really bothers me, though, is not being able to find products I like because Head Office has decreed they should no longer be stocked. Pak ‘n Save did this with a particular brand of organic milk (apparently they were not willing to pay a sufficiently large kickback), as well as the one single brand of sugar-free confectionary available (out of hundreds of brands containing sugar), and even Charlie’s orange juice. So I switched to Countdown (not much choice, but at least a little), and ran into the issues of unending queues and truly stupid alcohol regulations (not to mention the fact that they insist on signalling a supervisor with a very loud bell every time you buy grog or tobacco, thus announcing to the entire store that you are in the process of making a sinful purchase). As with their One Card, they do not have much regard for individual privacy.

I am really fed up with hearing about Head Office. I want the businesses I do business with to be accountable to the communities they do business in. If my local store is not willing to create jobs to improve service, or stock the items customers request, or do things the way customers want, then I want to be able to sit down with the manager of that local store and ask why. I want to be able to demand accountability. I am sick of being fobbed off with ‘Head Office has told us to do it this way’. That is not an answer.

Franchises exist because they can charge less through ‘economies of scale’ (i.e., muscling suppliers to sell at a loss, mafia-style) and because they are able to establish ‘brand recognition’ (though why identical orange-coloured premises with plastic fittings are an asset I do not understand). Why people see this as a good thing, or want to do business with companies that manipulate and exploit them, I also do not understand, and that is what this rant is about. Perhaps someone can enlighten me.

[Moderator edit (MF): fixed company name as per FUG]