Lollipops

Eugene, You are no stranger to investing in franchises. As you note, there were so many concepts for you to choose from. Can you tell us more about what got you interested in buying a Lollipop clothing franchise for Romania?

Just lookiing on the surface (Readers: This is not an endorsement), the fashion chain of hand bags and fashion accessories looks cute. I can see the concept catching on in major Asian and European cities. If their fashion catches on in Tokyo, one of the more homogenous and richest markets of the world, the world's second largest economy could easily dominate the small chain's revenues from the rest of the world. To really catch this trend on fire, they should look at New York, Milan, London, Berlin, and the small but influential Asian markets of Hong Kong and Singapore.

From a franchise operational point of view, the problem for Lollipop will be how they can support being so spread out, with their few franchised shops in such different retail and business environments.