Yeah, it is kind of scary what has become of those UPS stores. I thought it was such a good idea too. The corporate branding and uniformity of a well run retail outlet is nice brand recognition, especially to the folks that aren't exposed to our drivers on a consistent basis. But the press that we have suffered as a result of this has been terrible. These latest charges are none too pretty either, I wonder where it will lead.
Franchising has been around for a while now, and it is certainly a litigous environment, even though it is regulated by the federal government, there is a great deal of legal risk on both sides when you enter into franchise contract with someone.
It is things like this that kill us. FedEx paid huge money for Kinkos in response to the UPS purchase of MBE. Not only are the Kinkos stores more profitable, but they have enjoyed great success in the cobranding of the two entities. But the real inherent strength of the realtionship between FedEx and Kinkos is that it is another piece of the puzzle as to why Wall Street loves FedEx. They just seem to get it together better than us. This UPS store morass is just another strike against us as far as Wall Street is concerned.