As a franchise sales consultant and an individual who grew up with a franchise business (my family owned a Dunkin Donuts for over 2 decades) I am often asked what type of franchise business I would personally recommend to buy. Although all franchise business categories have their inherent advantages and disadvantages, my personal preference would be to buy a service related franchise concept for a number of reasons.

Better Life style:

Service franchises in my opinion can generally offer the owner/operator a better life style, less stress, and more freedom for a number of reasons including the following. They generally require less operating hours, most can be operated on 5 day work week, they usually have lower staffing requirements with less employee headaches, they have no inventory spoilage concerns, and overall they are generally easier to manage.

Lower Investment:

Because they generally do not require the expense of building out a retail location or store front in a high traffic area, or have the equipment requirements of a food or restaurant franchise, service franchises on a whole generally require lower overall start up costs. You can get a general idea of the investment level of some service franchises for sale here. 

Easier To Grow:

Unlike retail franchise businesses that are confined to a specific location and are dependent on foot traffic, service businesses offer the owner the opportunity to go out and generate new business in a large geographic area through a number of different marketing options. Expanding a service business to new markets is also generally a lot less capital intensive or expensive than adding a new physical retail unit. 

Easier To Manage: 

I can assure you from personal experience that managing a service business is generally a lot easier as compared to a retail food or restaurant franchise. Most small businesses today have challenges with finding reliable employees to fulfill their staffing requirements. But for a number of reasons retail businesses, particularly restaurants, have more employee turnover and headaches than most.

Better Success Rate:

Although all categories of business franchising have a statistically higher rate of success than non-franchise business start-ups, It’s been my observation that the success rate of service related franchises is generally higher than retail franchises. I believe this can be contributed to a number of factors including lower start up and operating costs, less staffing requirements, better profit margins, generally less overhead, and an overall better life style that can be maintained operating a service related business.

Ray Haiber has 10 years experience as franchise sales consultant as well as a professional small business broker in Arizona.
Source: AZFranchises   http://www.azfranchises.com/Franchise_articles/why-service-franchise.htm