Well, it dosint have to be a franchise right off the bat, you just buy some proporty in a place that has good demand for fish.
I live here in texas next to a lake, with tons of "rich" people, the closest lfs is a good 20-30 maybe 40 miles away, the next best thing is Petsmart and Petco. an exaple would be my uncle, his business is just going up right now becuase, well he owns a natural gas company, BUT THATS NOT THE POINT! he's been wanting a nice reef tank for years, but has always been to busy to make one, nor do i think he knows were to get the stuff for it.
If we build a store, in a place that really has no other fish store there, around abunch of rich, and middle class people, we would get some business.
I think business would be, moderate at best, may not be able to get a few more stores up and running for awhile, atleast because of our large user base, we would already have people willing to expand the franchise when the time is right.
This is all about location, location, location. you build it in a neighboorhood with 5 lfs's already in it, we will go down, you build it in a neightboorhood who's best fishstore is petco... you should get some business.
But what do i know, i only 16...