Rising Student Loan Debt and Low Startup Costs Make Launching a Class 101 College Planning Franchise a Smart Venture
In 2007, Class 101’s founder Tom Pabin realized that the college application preparatory system was broken, and he sought to create a business to help millions of parents and their college-bound teenagers navigate the costly, and often confusing, college application process. What Tom created was a stunningly simple business model, with a low cost of entry and high potential returns. Today, Class 101 franchise owners are thriving in a rewarding field with virtually no competition.
Class 101 is a national college planning franchise that helps high school students get into better colleges and qualify for higher amounts of scholarships and financial aid. The college application process is complicated, competitive and stressful, resulting in students who don’t get enough, or any, financial aid and often end up at the wrong school. Class 101 can help.
“You don’t have to have an education background to run a successful college planning business, but you do need to have a passion for working with young people, and experience running a small business is helpful,” Tom says. “Our franchise owners have varied backgrounds and bring with them a wide variety of education and job expertise. Some are former educators; some have worked in colleges. Others have served as youth ministers or are parents who have been through the college admission process themselves. They have seen the frustrating and unnecessary challenges that American students and their parents face when it comes to finding the perfect college at the right price.”
Class 101 Is an Easy-To-Run Business With a Potentially Steady Revenue Stream
The Class 101 business model is a simple, but effective, model to launch. You can launch your business venture alone and choose to add employees as you grow or remain as a single owner; we offer flexible business models, which are all for the same low franchise fee. We guide you through the launch process and provide you with all the materials needed to provide Class 101 services to your community and market your business effectively. There is wide-open opportunity in the United States to launch this service that is desperately needed by families in almost every market.
Through our one-on-one college planning sessions with students, ACT and SAT preparation classes, seminars and organized campus visits, Class 101 offers a potentially steady stream of income for franchisees. We don’t stop at improving our students’ test scores or composing the perfect college entrance essay. Because our main focus is to forge mentoring relationships with our students, our college planning advisors are uniquely positioned to help students define what we at Class 101 call “separators,” those standout skills or talents that help high school seniors stand out among their peers, and shine brighter to the college administrators who are poring through thousands of applications every semester.
“Our business model is so successful because we help our kids double their chances of getting into the right school and earning scholarships and aid,” Tom says. “It doesn’t take many students to make a college planning franchise owner successful. We aim for 100 client referrals a year, with a goal of 40 to 50 students. The average sale for a consulting retainer is $2,800, and our average closing rate is 90 percent nationwide.”
Class 101 Is Meeting the High Demand for College Planning Services in Markets Across the Nation
Millions of high school students enroll as college freshmen each fall. Too often, they miss out on tens of thousands of dollars of scholarship and grant money, and they end up unhappy and unsatisfied with their college experience. As college tuition and college debt continue to rise, so do the stakes of choosing the right school, the right major and the future career path of our nation’s college-bound teenagers.
The average college tuition and fee bill was 40% higher in 2015-16 at public four-year institutions than it was in 2005-06, and it was 26% higher in the private four-year sector, according to the College Board. More than 40 million Americans are saddled with student loan debt — collectively amounting to a staggering $1.3 trillion, and that figure is growing at the terrifying rate of nearly $3,000 per second, according to Experian.
With college costs rising at a rate of 6% above the rate of inflation (long-term), the time invested in hiring a Class 101 counselor offers an incredibly attractive ROI. The typical transfer rate for college freshmen is around 30%, but Class 101 students transfer less than 5% of the time. Why? Because we work one-on-one with students to make sure they have laid the groundwork for a successful college career. Class 101 has helped students gain access to hundreds of millions of dollars in scholarship money.
“There is a tremendous market for the services Class 101 provides,” says Winni Van Gessel, a Class 101 franchise owner in Lexington, Kentucky. “Most people, upon hearing about our services, hire us on the spot. I make more money than I did, I work fewer hours than before and I’m happier. The success rate among my colleagues is tremendously high.”
The Time Is Now to Open a College Planning Franchise in Your Community
Costly franchise fees can often deter qualified people from going into business. With an affordable franchise fee of $27,500 and low initial investment of $40,400 to $57,600, our premier college planning services franchise offers a low-cost investment opportunity with a high potential return. Class 101 has locations in Kentucky, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Ohio, Florida and Indiana, all of which have experienced explosive growth during their opening year.
“Class 101 meets a growing need in communities across the country,” Tom says. “With plans to expand to 100 locations by 2020, we offer an excellent opportunity for business-minded people who have a passion for helping high school kids and their families.”
Learn More About Class 101
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