American Family Care is a leading provider of affordable and convenient urgent care services. Our mission is to provide the best healthcare possible in a kind and caring environment while respecting the rights of all patients, in an economical manner, at times and locations convenient to the patient.
The American Family Care team is here to support you through each step toward starting your healthcare franchise. Through strong initial training or ongoing support, AFC helps our franchisees find a great location, manage their records, run their day-to-day business, and more.
By joining AFC in a franchise partnership, you will be tapping into an industry that experiences robust annual growth. The urgent care industry has a market size of over $45 billion, having increased by around 7% per year on average since 2017. This means that the market size of the urgent care industry alone has grown faster than the economy overall.
Here is a step-by-step guide to owning and operating a healthcare franchise.
Steps to Starting Your Healthcare Franchise
Owning and operating your urgent care franchise center couldn’t be easier when you franchise with AFC. At AFC, we’re dedicated to making the process as simple and transparent as possible for our franchisees. Here is a step-by-step overview of our process:
- Get in Touch: Start by reaching out to us by filling out our interest form on our website or calling us at 205-419-6721. We’ll review your information and set up a time to talk.
- Initial Interview: In our first conversation, we’ll get to know more about you and give you a little more information about our business. We’ll be looking for certain qualities in you that we consider ideal for our franchisees.
- Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) review: While we’re reviewing your financials, you’ll have two weeks to review the FDD. The FDD is a comprehensive document that covers everything you’ll need to know about our business: our history, our growth, and our earnings are just a few things that will be covered.
- Speak to AFC Franchisees: Validation is an excellent opportunity for you to learn all about our business and the company culture, operations, ROI, profit margins, etc. from existing franchisees.
- Attend AFC Discovery Day: Join us at our Headquarters in Birmingham, AL and meet with our executive leadership team. If approved, we will then begin the awarding process.
- Sign our franchise agreement: Once we’ve reviewed your background and financials and you’ve gone through the FDD and agreed to its terms, the next step will be to officially become a franchisee by signing a franchise agreement.
- Pay the franchise fee: At this point, you’ll pay your franchise fee, officially starting the next steps in your journey toward opening an AFC franchise.
- Initial training: The next step will be to take advantage of our training resources. At AFC, we work to stay on the cutting edge of the healthcare field and offer our franchisees the newest and best methodology and procedures. New franchisees will participate in a two-day training session to comprehensively review our policies and procedures.
- Find your location and generate a buzz: You’ll work with our experts to identify the right location in your community. Together, we’ll find a site that’s ideal for attracting customers. We’ll also help you generate a buzz by supporting you in developing a marketing campaign designed to spread the word about your new location in your community.
Operating Your Healthcare Franchise Location
Congratulations! Your doors are open; now it’s time to manage the day-to-day business. AFC provides you with top-class ongoing support throughout your journey with us. Here are some ways we will help you.
- Technical and clerical support: One meaningful way we support our franchisees is by providing technical and clerical support. For example, billing services offered by our approved vendors will make managing the revenue cycle transparent and feasible. Partnering with insurance companies can seem intimidating at first, but our years of experience and time-tested systems will help you process and record these transactions with as little hassle as possible.
- Electronic Medical Records (EMR) support: We partner our franchisees with an excellent EMR software platform supported by a vendor that truly understands urgent care. With our EMR system, you’ll be able to streamline multiple areas of your clinic. Our EMR simplifies patient intake, scheduling, and charting on patient medical records. AFC’s years of experience in franchising have taught us what our franchisees need in medical record-keeping. We provide ongoing training and support through consultants and a learning management system, ensuring this system performs at the highest standard. We believe you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the versatility of this software.
- FranConnect: You’ll also have access to our private intranet site, FranConnect, which contains plenty of information and resources on management, marketing, and operations. FranConnect is an engagement tool to keep franchisees up to date on topics such as marketing materials, policies and procedures, and more. Networking on FranConnect is a great way to find solutions to your questions virtually anytime.
By learning and mastering these systems, developed over our years of experience, you’ll be able to keep your urgent care center running smoothly. These are just a few of our tools. AFC will continually support you as you partner with our franchising professionals, who specialize in areas needed to support your business in your region.
Serve Your Community
Now that your AFC clinic is up and running, you can start to enjoy the benefits. Your community will appreciate the presence of an affordable, caring urgent care clinic right in their neighborhood. They can come to you and your team for various health issues, from colds and allergies to insect bites. Your presence will help save space in your local emergency rooms for true emergencies and provide access to affordable medical care to your community.
You’ll also reap benefits in your personal life, as franchising provides ample support while offering a level of autonomy and flexibility in terms of how and when you work. You will be making executive-level decisions that impact your business immediately while being backed by the support of a franchisor that is experienced in providing guidance that will help your business grow.
You’ll be amazed at how much freedom you’ll enjoy while simultaneously serving your community and being part of a national brand that patients have grown to recognize.
Join the AFC family today! Contact us to get started on your healthcare franchise journey.
