Business View Magazine
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graph. For the same reason that people read The
Reader’s Digest, or the comics, or read their horo-
scope, they want something quick and easy to enjoy.
There’s eight minutes of reading material in Coffee
News and we don’t want to give them any more than
that. And, there’s no bad news in Coffee News; there’s
no agenda. We’re not about ‘news,’ we’re only about
fun and entertaining things to read while you’re eating
or waiting for service.”
Some of Buckley’s writers who work out of Canada
have been with the publication for 25 years. “I have
a writer in Bangor that’s doing about half the writing
now,” he says. “We put it all together in Canada and
then we post it on a giant webpage for our franchisees
who are in our system to download. As long as they
pay their royalty fees, they’re able to download the con-
tent from the website and have their local printer print
Coffee News for them. Here in the U.S., we have our
own print shop, so we do most of our own printing for
our franchisees. Essentially, the content is the same,
worldwide, every week, although there are some varia-
tions in certain countries.” Franchisees all have the
opportunity to wear customized shirts and sweaters
with the Coffee News logo imprinted on them, supplied
by Darter Specialties, Inc.
Today, because of the vision and determination of
Jean Daum, and the entrepreneurial dynamism of Bill
Buckley, Coffee News is both the world’s largest fran-
chise publication and the world’s largest restaurant
publication. “There’s nobody in the business any big-
ger than we are,” Buckley exults. “There are other fran-
chise publications, but they’re not anything like Coffee
News.”
Regardless of how big Coffee News may be on a global
scale, the company’s success still rests mainly upon
its business model of local businesses advertising
their goods and services to local people where they eat
and pass the time of day, locally. And as for the best
type of person to run a Coffee News franchise, Buck-
ley says that it is an individual who is able to sell and
“who loves people, and who loves being out there.” In
fact, many of his own clients, who have advertised with
him for the past 20 years, have become great friends
whose company he enjoys. “I can’t wait to go see them
and take them to lunch or take them golfing, or what-
ever,” he declares. Or maybe, in Bill Buckley’s world,
even just getting together for a cup of coffee and a
chat about the day’s news, is more than sufficient.
PREFERRED VENDORS
Darter Specialties, Inc.
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