Franchise Storytellers

You Call it Religious Freedom; I Call it Discrimination: Brad Ritter Quoted in Franchise Times

From Franchise Times,
Published: 

Never have so many franchise execs made themselves so scarce as when I called around to get comments about the new North Carolina and Mississippi laws passed in early April. Supporters call them religious freedom laws; protesters call them discriminatory—and a rash of CEOs were suddenly “unavailable” or “out of the country.”

But then Tom Lewison, CEO of Wild Wing Cafe, agreed to an interview, and his thoughtful comments made me think in a more nuanced way about what franchisors should do when such a controversy arises in states where they do business. (And it’s coming—the American Civil Liberties Union says nearly 100 bills have been proposed in legislatures in 2016 invoking religious beliefs as justification for refusing services to gay people, for example.)

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