Business Strategy and Franchising: Game Truck Case Study

This case study examines the Game Truck business, focusing on its franchising model, website design, and competitive positioning. It begins by defining franchising and analyzing the benefits and challenges for a business considering this strategy. The study then explores the skills needed for a small business team to become a successful franchisor, using the Game Truck as an example. It includes an analysis of arguments for becoming a Game Truck franchisee, website strengths and weaknesses, and suggested improvements. The study further applies Porter's Five Forces model to analyze Game Truck's competitive position and assesses the potential of the corporate sector as a new market. Finally, it identifies challenges to international expansion and proposes strategies to address them, providing a comprehensive overview of the Game Truck's business strategy and potential for growth.

Game Truck Case Study 1
Game Truck Case Study
Name
School

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Franchising
1. According to the case study Game Truck has become a franchisor. Provide a
definition of franchising?
Franchising is a term used to define a business relationship between an
established business proprietor and a dealer. In franchisor-franchisee relationship, the
franchisor provides the authority to other party, i.e. franchisee to conduct business under
the trade name of an established franchisor. The franchisor charges a particular amount of
annual payment along with some percentage amount of the total revenue or profit as a
royalty from the franchisee for the trade name
Under franchisor-franchisee agreement, both the franchisor and franchisee is
motivated by mutual gains; the franchisor is motivated to expand its overall business
without investing further capital and franchisee is motivated to use the brand name of an
established business based on the notion that starting from scratch involves lots of risks
and is a time consuming affair.
2. Business considering becoming franchisors must consider a number of possible
benefits and challenges of this strategy. Explain two possible benefits and two
possible challenges and provide an explanation for each benefit and challenge
identified?
Businesses considering becoming franchisors have to consider both challenges
and possible benefits. Possible benefits and challenges and vary accordingly with
different types of businesses.
Following are the challenges:

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i) Products and services offered by the franchisors become a reputed trade
and brand name by the time franchising is considered and franchisors have
to make sure that the franchisee does justice to the brand name by
adhering to the quality norms. Adhering to the quality requirement is an
ongoing process and not limited to one time quality check generally done
at the time of providing franchisee license. This becomes challenging at
times as it is not possible to monitor every activities of franchisees on a
daily basis.
ii) Franchisors are required to make sure that internal competitions among
franchisees are avoided to invite franchisee application. An individual
considering franchisee business would not want to engage itself in a
competition with any business holding the same franchise. This at times
becomes challenging for franchisors since they must maintain a particular
distance from one outlet to another and they also have to consider the
business prospect of an identified area involving lots of market analysis.
Following are the possible benefits
i) Franchisors can expand their businesses without having the need to invest
manpower and capital once their brand name are well established
generating profits in the form of franchisee fee and monthly royalties.
ii) The franchise system allows the franchisors to access human capital of the
franchisee and bring them under the purview of the brand that helps to
foster innovation and further development of the business.

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3. What skills are needed by a small business team in order to become a successful
franchisor?
Becoming successful franchisors needs skills to identify sellable concepts,
opportunities and threats to the prospective franchisors’ business. In the game
truck business case it is clearly seen that Novis, the owner of game truck at first
came up with idea that is consumable in the market with patented rights. Once
that patented rights are secured and the business becomes initially successful, the
next process of identification opportunities begin where Game Truck identifies
accessible locations and interested participants in purchasing the trade mark and
brand name of the business.
Identification of threats involves probable deterrence to franchisees in
initiating the deal and mitigates those threats. Game Truck headquarter base at
Arizona constantly evolves to bring innovative cutting edge technology and make
the gaming experiences cost effective for both franchisee and consumers. One
must keep in mind that innovations are always vulnerable to upcoming radical
innovations especially in the field of business that is technology dependent.
4. Imagine that you are considering becoming a franchisee of game truck. Identify
and critically appraise two arguments in favor of becoming a franchisee in Game
Truck?
Having imagined always as a businessman and in born technocrats in me,
Game truck franchisee is a big opportunity for me to involve myself with the
brand name that has redefined the gaming concepts in US. Starting a business

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from scratch with unique concept and identity can always be a challenging and
motivating at the same time. This is the world where businesses are not only
about radical innovations and requires their model to keep changing from time to
time. I believe that a franchise agreement with Game Truck would give me an
opportunity to showcase my talent as an equal beneficiary in the Game Truck
family as they always work towards betterment for their business and I as a
contributor can be an important part of it (Khan, 2016).
E-commerce
1. Using the knowledge that you have of Game Truck (gained from the website and the
case study) outline ways in which you feel that the design of the website reflects the
image of the firm?
The design of the Game Truck Website reflects the gaming passion of the
children and shows its concern for recreational activities of children. The website though
starts with a zip code bar where users can access their nearest dealer for subscribing the
game truck for weekend or holiday parties. The case study says that the Game arcades
comes with game instructor and the website shows that the Game Truck is committed to
providing game instructor. The concept of Game Truck is based on integrating the indoor
and outdoor experiences for recreation of children while keeping the essence of digital
video gaming alive and dominant. The website shows that it is dedicated towards its
constitution under taglines of Video Games, Laser tag and Bubble Soccer. Overall, the
design of the website reinforces its marketing concepts and assures that users would are
guaranteed full intended benefits as promised by Game Truck.
2. Critically assess the strength and weakness of the website?

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The strength of the website is depiction of what it is meant for i.e. children’s
entertainment. It reinforces its marketing commitments to consumers. It is easy to access
and user friendly and can be managed by everyone. The website is plain and simple
overall as it aligns with the business objectives of Game Truck.
The web page on the other hand has some weaknesses too. The web page seems
to have forgotten its agenda of involving parents and in pursuit of simplicity; it has done
away with parents who according to the business objectives are an important part of the
children entertainment process. The educational motives of the Game Truck are also
missing from the website. Moreover, the children are shown in a jubilant mood ready to
defy their parents and this has the potential to ward off any business prospect of the
company (Costa, 2016).
3. Suggest two improvements that you would make to the website, providing
justification for why you have proposed these suggested changes.
I would like to suggest that the websites be changed in the following two ways for
better depiction of its business goals and objectives.
i) Websites can show three different animation video displaying children entering
the truck, engaging in outdoor activities, and dedicated to learn about the
computer gaming technology. The business objectives as seen in the case study is
to integrate the gaming concept by involving children in outdoor activities and
inspiring them to learn about ifs and buts of the gaming technology. The display
of outdoor activities would motivate parents to subscribe to packages as parents
seem to be wholeheartedly concerned about the growing child obesity in western
countries. This concern of parents could be addressed demonstrating that their

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children would come of the traditional indoor games that promote laziness and
lethargy among children.
ii) The website could further add to its value of it involves parents and children in a
friendly mood as Game Truck promises that their gaming concepts handover the
remote control
Growth and competitiveness
1. Game truck is currently a period of expansion. Using Porter’s five forces model
analyze its competitive position as it undertakes this strategy.
Porter’s business model is based on the idea five important forces acts as a
determiner of your business prospect. Let us analyze competitive position of Game Truck
with respect to five important forces of porter model as the company seeks to expand
further.
i. Supplier power: Game Truck mostly runs on equipments that are high on costs
such as laser tag equipments, tow vehicle, tow vehicle wrap, LCD equipments and
computers, and other technological gadgets. Suppliers of these items go through
intense competition in the market and moreover these are one time investments
franchisee has to make along with some other additional office equipments. Game
Truck always ensures that its franchisees are assisted in every possible manner to
set up their business. Hence, the supplier’s power is limited for further expansion

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of business as it has its own base at Arizona that invests in developing cutting
edge technology to enhance gaming experience for consumers.
ii. Buyer Power: Concept of the business model of Game Truck comes with patented
rights and hence the ultimate consumers so far have only one choice when it
comes to arcade gaming at home for children. The major concern however is the
franchisees who are prospective buyers of the Game Truck Franchisee model.
Franchisees though have no other options in similar business investments
however gets deterred due to high investments required to start a business.
Franchisees may consider other businesses to avoid risking huge investments
meant only for the super rich people.
iii. Competitive rivalry: The gaming industry has undergone considerably higher
instances of changes than any other industry. Global Revenues from mobile
gaming is set to surpass revenues generated from console gaming as mobile
gaming is turning out to be flexible for children enabling them to access games at
a low price. Android and IOS operating system are constantly upgrading their
gaming features to lure game maniacs. Literally Game Truck faces no competition
from other consoles as it works on totally different model that comes with
patented rights and there are high costs associated with providing similar gaming
experiences.
iv. Threat of substitution: Threat of substitution comes from none other than
consumer’s choice for android and IOS gaming experiences. The way Samsung,
Google and Apple have been constantly upgrading their features for gaming
experiences, you never know what they come up next to provide better

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community gaming experiences. Moreover, the high cost of hourly subscription
for consumers is also may act as deterrence for console truck gaming experiences.
v. Threat of new entry: Threat of new entry in case of Game Truck is not there as it
is a business that comes with patented rights and operates on a totally different
model. Moreover the costs of coming up with similar products and services by
others in the same console gaming seems too tall a task for any new entry as the
investment is too high and Game Truck continues to expand barriers of innovation
to retain its market (Thompson, 2013).
Having said all the points, I am optimistic that Game Truck business is there to
stay as it has redefined console gaming experiences and provided it a new dimension
fully. Console gaming is an altogether different experience for gamers.
2. In the case study it is suggested that the corporate sector might be a potential new
market for game truck. Assess the potential that this new market might have.
The new market in the form of corporate sector might be a better idea for Game
Truck Business as corporate parties have the potential to generate greater revenues and
can provide a decent marketing space for family subscriptions.
3. Game Truck faces a number of challenges as it expands internationally. Identify two
such challenges and, in each case, outline a strategy that could be used as a response
to the challenge?
The two challenges facing international expansion of Game Truck is the continuous
evolving Gaming Industry in the form of Android and IOS and the low cost outlets at
locations providing console gaming experiences.

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The threat of the evolving mobile gaming technology can be neutralized by creating
awareness among parents regarding how the Truck enables them to lure their children and
control their rising mobile use that has become concerns for many parents. Child obesity and
outdoor inefficiency of children are on the rise and Game Truck just needs to hit the nails
hard on these aspects to create markets.
Low cost outlets are unable to provide similar experiences for children parties but Game
Truck definitely needs to do more to cut down overall costs and it is for the Arizona based
headquarters to decide if it is high time they considered using tabs and mobile apps to make
their products and services cost effective for franchisees and consumers.

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References
Costa, D. (2016). Global E-commerce Strategies for Small Businesses. Mit Press.
Khan, M. (2016). Entry Modes: Franchisee. Virginia: Virginia Tech University.
Thompson, A. (2013). Crafting & Executing Strategy 19/e: The Quest for Competitive Advantage. Mc
Graw Hill Education.