Frequently Asked Questions
Find the answers to our most commonly ask questions
That depends on how you account for your initial investment in the franchise. Ongoing monthly overheads are very low as a TAB franchisee, so you should be cash-positive once you have a handful of members paying an average of £630/month each.
To find out more about the investment, download our prospectus.
We provide fantastic training with hands-on support, proven marketing and sales strategies, and a supportive community of franchisees. This winning combination, along with your determination and hard work, will get your TAB franchise up and running.
We won’t lie to you, launching any business or franchise is hard work. But the rewards are well worth it. Along the way, you’ll deal with the inevitable highs and lows of being a business owner, and you’ll meet prospects who are hard to get over the line. However, you’ll have a whole community ready to support you every step of the way.
Minimum of 7 years business experience at director level, but as important is your resilience, drive to succeed and enjoyment of being part of a great community.
We began in 1990 in the US, and launched in the UK in 2009. We’re now in 24 countries around the world, working with thousands of business owner clients from a wide variety of sectors and sizes of business.
The biggest challenge when it comes to being a TAB franchisee is building great, high-quality boards. However, we've seen our franchisees do this time and time again, and our members stay for an average of 4 years. Therefore, with our strong support and training programmes, you'll be in an excellent position to tackle this challenge head-on.
You do not need to have worked as a business coach or consultant before joining TAB. We generally look for people with at least seven years’ experience at director or senior leadership level who can bring real-world business experience to the owners they work with.
You will receive training in the TAB approach to coaching, board facilitation and our wider range of services. What matters most is that you have the credibility to work with business owners, are comfortable challenging people constructively and genuinely enjoy helping others succeed.
At the heart of the TAB model is recurring monthly income from business owners who join a TAB peer advisory board and receive regular one-to-one coaching.
Franchise owners can then build on those relationships by providing additional strategic and leadership services to businesses through our programmes StratPro for senior teams and Hi-MAP for management training.
You can choose to build a profitable business around your own portfolio of clients or grow further by bringing in additional facilitators and coaches. This gives you the option to remain hands-on or build a larger business that is less dependent on you personally.
Peer advisory boards are an important part of TAB, but they are only one part of what franchise owners can offer. TAB franchise owners can deliver one-to-one business coaching, strategic planning and facilitation through StratPro, manager development training programmes through HI-MAP and a range of tools including Business Builder's Blueprint.
There are also opportunities to provide consultancy and other strategic support where appropriate. This means you can work with individual business owners as well as their wider leadership and management teams.
The investment required to start a TAB franchise covers much more than the right to trade under The Alternative Board name. It includes your initial franchise package, training and the support and marketing activity designed to help you launch your business and for the duration of your franchise.
We recommend looking at the full investment rather than the franchise fee in isolation, including the working capital you may need while building your initial client base. Our latest prospectus provides a full breakdown of the investment and what is included.
Yes. One of the strengths of the TAB model is that you are not reliant on a single service or source of income. Monthly peer advisory board membership and coaching provide recurring income, while franchise owners can generate additional revenue through services such as StratPro, HI-MAP, strategic facilitation and other consultancy or leadership development work.
As you develop trusted relationships with local business owners, you can identify which parts of the wider TAB offering will genuinely help them and their businesses.
Member acquisition is a major focus during the launch of your TAB business.
We help you develop your local marketing plan, prepare your LinkedIn presence and build the skills you need to turn conversations with business owners into members.
There is targeted support during your first 12 months, alongside practical training, group coaching and support from people who have already built TAB businesses themselves.
The aim is not simply to give you leads, but to help you build a repeatable way of developing your own pipeline.
TAB supports lead generation, but you are ultimately responsible for building your own business. Our central team provides marketing activity, tools, campaigns, data and training across areas such as telemarketing, LinkedIn, email, referrals, networking, events and content.
However, successful franchise owners do not wait for leads to arrive from head office. They build relationships and become known within their local business community, using the support and systems available through TAB to create a consistent flow of opportunities.
A TAB franchise can offer considerable flexibility, and some established franchise owners choose to operate their businesses on a part-time basis.
However, we would not recommend approaching the launch as a casual side project. Building your initial network, pipeline and first boards requires commitment and consistent business development activity.
As recurring membership grows and your business becomes established, you have much greater control over how you structure your diary and how large you want your TAB business to become.
Yes. A TAB franchise does not require a shop, office or other dedicated commercial premises, so much of the business can be run from home. You will naturally spend time out of the office meeting prospects and members, running boards, coaching and delivering workshops. That keeps fixed overheads relatively low and gives you considerable freedom over where and how you work.
Your support starts before you begin trading and continues throughout the launch of your TAB business, and beyond. Initial training covers how to find and recruit members, facilitate effective peer boards, coach business owners and use TAB's wider range of tools and services.
Once you launch, that training is backed up with practical support focused on turning what you have learned into real activity. This includes targeted client acquisition support, your own accountability coach and TAB peer board, regular contact with the central team and help as you prepare for and run your first boards.
An open territory is an area in which a new TAB franchise owner can build their business and stretches to around an hour’s drive from their base.
There are currently opportunities across the UK and because availability changes as new franchise owners join TAB, we recommend speaking to us about the areas currently available and which might work best for you.
Yes. In fact, we think speaking to existing TAB franchise owners is an important part of deciding whether the opportunity is right for you. They can give you a first-hand view of what it is really like to launch and run a TAB business, including the work involved, the support available and the things they wish they had known when they started.
Our recruitment process is about making sure there is a good fit on both sides, so we want you to have the opportunity to ask questions and carry out proper due diligence before making a decision.