Co-founders Anton Skarlatov and Rune Sovndahl
Fantastic Services is a technology-backed property maintenance franchise which prides itself on its forward thinking. It views itself at the forefront of a new generation of franchises, where technology and sustainability are key.
Co-founders Rune Sovndahl and Anton Skarlatov, who recently made a promise to create 1,000 millionaire franchisees over the next decade, have revealed that the pandemic saw a huge boom in demand for home services, such as cleaning, gardening and other property services, and this has led to several of its area developer franchisees passing the £1m mark. They have seen a real spike in entrepreneurial people wanting to open franchises rather than starting a new business entirely on their own. This makes sense in that new franchisees get the benefits of running their own business while being protected from a lot of costs, risks and uncertainty.
Fantastic Services recently conducted a survey of 2000 UK adults, where it found that approximately 3.5 million Brits have opened up a second business since the beginning of lockdown. This trend is particularly prominent among millennials aged 24-34, with one in six claiming to have started a side business. This obviously lends itself very well with the Fantastic Services business model.
Investment in Technology
Investment in technology is one of the keys behind the company's success. It has invested more than £20 million in building a bespoke CRM system and state-of-the-art booking apps, making the business resilient against lockdowns and recessions.
Rune Sovndahl, Chief Executive and co-founder, explains: "We know that managing a business is hard, and that's why we've built an app that makes it easy for franchisees to see jobs in real-time and the fastest route you can take to your next customer. We have also created an award-winning app for customers, enabling them to book more than 100 services in just under thirty seconds. Even more, we have a full back-end system allowing you to manage your teams efficiently and keep track of everyone's performance."
Fantastic Services was recently named one of the top franchises in the UK. It was ranked number seven in the Franchise Direct 2021 Top 100 Franchises in the UK, beating franchise giants such as Subway, Burger King and Starbucks. It was also ranked one of the TOP 25 Best franchises according to Elite Franchise, and was named QFA's Franchisor of the year for 2021, also winning QFA's Franchisee of the year.
Co-founder and CEO, Anton Skarlatov, comments: "We always look at the franchise in a 360-degree view, which includes our staff, franchisees, and clients. The pandemic showed that we have a robust internal culture, and though we had to make some sacrifices, what we found was that clear communication with our staff was the number one thing that helped us to get through the initial stages of the pandemic.
"We learned that together with our franchisees, we are much stronger. We can do a lot together. We changed our services during the first wave of the pandemic and introduced a new antiviral sanitisation service. Our franchisees very quickly adopted this new service."
Sustainable Future
Fantastic Services sees itself at the forefront of a new generation of franchises, where technology and sustainability are key. It also places a high emphasis on community and giving back.
Skarlatov comments: "Sustainability is at the centre of our business, and has to be as we need to look after our long-term future. We use electric-based equipment instead of petrol-based, we only use eco-friendly detergents, and sometimes we don't use detergents at all; we do external window cleaning with purified water, so no chemicals are required at all. Our franchisees travel fewer miles thanks to our custom-built travel optimisation software. This allows us to save about 18% of travel time and significantly reduce CO2 emissions. We also started a tree-planting initiative in 2019, where property owners who have yards can have a tree planted for free.''
Skarlatov adds: "This is only the start., We will continue to evolve and adapt to ensure we lead the way in technology-backed ethical franchising. We will also continue to give back to society. We want to make our planet a better home. To achieve this, our main goal for the next decade and beyond is to turn even more towards sustainability and eco-friendliness."
Area Developer Franchisee
An example of an area developer franchise team which has boomed during lockdown is husband and wife team Julian and Lucy Fernando, who operate in Reading, Slough and Hemel Hempstead.The Fernando's were Fantastic Services - most successful Area Development franchisee in 2020, with ten times higher turnover compared to 2019. They have now increased the number of delivered services 14 times since launching, and now have a network of six working franchisees.
Lucy Fernando explains: "Since launching, things couldn't really have gone better, there is a real demand for our services and also a real demand from tradespeople or technicians in our area to join our growing franchise network. The investment in technology from Fantastic Services is one of the keys to our success. The app, which enables franchisees to see jobs in real-time and the fastest route they can take to their next customer, makes it so straight-forward to manage. The full back-end system helps us manage teams and keep track of everyone's performance is also very important."
Fantastic Services launched in 2009 and now has over 530 franchisees, stretching over three continents, with thousands of professionals delivering 100-plus services to over 50,000 clients each month. Unlike many franchises, Fantastic Services has a team of 500 experts at HQ who constantly generate sales leads for the franchisees so they can focus on delivering great customer service rather than worrying about sales. All franchisees follow a proven business model that grew Fantastic Services from a small cleaning company into a global franchisor.
For more information, please visit: Fantastic Services
