Winner: Once Upon a Child
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Becky Finger owns and operates 20 units of Once Upon A Child, Plato's Closet and Clothes Mentor in and around Cincinnati. Like many operators, she finds her biggest challenge in the people business.
1. SafeSplash Swim School The lesson plan: While researching his industry a few years ago, Matt Lane discovered an eye-popping statistic: While only three out of 10 parents say it's important to teach kids how to dance, eight out of 10 say it is important to teach them how to swim. The void induced Matt and Lara Lane, with partners Paul and Tami Gerrard, to start SafeSplash Swim School in 2003. The Denver-based franchise has provided more than 2 million lessons over 10 years.
Sporting double-digit sales increases, Matco Tools, Pet Supplies Plus and Once Upon A Child led the franchise retail category in 2014 with the largest gains in a category seeing modest, 1.5 percent growth overall.
Apricot Lane stands out from the crowd as a franchised clothing store in the U.S. Will other brands follow suit?
