Johnny's Italian Steakhouse works to defy the norm and become a destination restaurant in a hotel setting. Can an established franchisee make a go of it as franchisor?

The good old punch card has grown up to become a complicated, expensive digital hodgepodge of apps, APIs, cloud-computing and social media. It's a grab bag of buzzwords that get marketers excited and developers seeing dollar signs.

Reducing your carbon footprint is not only acceptable today; it's expected. Here are ways for any business, even smaller chains, to make a step-by-step difference, and maybe even gain favor with customers in the process.

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.

As the lifeblood of a franchise, royalty fees are sometimes a sacred cow—never to be changed, let alone discussed. Times change, though, and in the wake of unprecedented competition for “sophisticated multi-unit franchisees” every franchisor covets, some brands are changing up their royalty programs or offering discounts to stand out from the herd.

You'd never guess based on his unassuming look, but Peter Bruce is not your average pedestrian. He's watching you walk down the sidewalk or through a shopping center, and taking notes—how fast you're going, what catches your eye, what storefronts you do or don't inspect and, more globally, how retailers, shopping center developers and city planners can do a better job appealing to us civilian street dwellers.

The captive audience of students and faculty at college campuses has long been viewed as an attractive target market. That niche is drawing even more interest these days thanks to a new class of millennials.

Jason and Carl LaVecke built a grand enterprise of almost 200 restaurants before landing in bankruptcy court this past summer—an event that drew widespread attention because their grandfather is the founder of CKE Restaurants. Even their own mother sued them.

Industry data show the restaurant world is still locked in a battle for market share.Traffic accelerated by 300 million visits in 2015, according to the market research company NPD Group. That's a healthy increase from 2014 when restaurant traffic increased by 100 million visits, but it's still down from pre-recession days.

As many operators know, the real estate market is extremely competitive right now and prices are as high as ever. But as this growth cycle comes to an end, distressed leases are set to become a boon and a bane for business owners.