EIU’s Grünhagen Co-recipient of Arthur Karp Franchise Research Award
Mar-27-2018
Eastern Illinois University’s Dr. Marko Grünhagen, professor of marketing, Lumpkin Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship and director of the university’s Sustainable Entrepreneurship through Education and Development (SEED) Center, was recently named a co-recipient of the Arthur Karp Research Award by the International Franchise Association’s (IFA) Education & Research Foundation.
The Arthur Karp Research Award was established in honor of the Foundation’s first chairman, Arthur Karp, co-founder of the Great American Cookie Company, and is given for the best research paper on a subject of relevance and practical usefulness to the franchising community. This year’s Karp award and its recipients were recognized and honored at IFA’s Annual Convention, held last month in Phoenix.
The award-winning research paper, titled “Multi-Brand, Multi-System and Multi-Role Franchising: A Diversification Framework,” was co-authored by EIU’s Grünhagen, along with Dr. Manuel Gonzalez-Diaz, representing the University of Oviedo in Spain.
“We are pleased that our work in these areas has been recognized,” said Grünhagen. “To receive an international honor like this is a fantastic achievement for me and for Dr. Gonzalez-Diaz, and it reflects wonderfully on the quality of research each of our institutions is able to put forward as leaders in the fields of business and franchising.”
The International Franchise Association is the oldest and largest organization representing franchising worldwide. The IFA works through its government relations and public policy, media relations and educational programs to protect, enhance and promote franchising and nearly 733,000 franchise establishments that support nearly 7.6 million direct jobs, $674.3 billion of economic output for the U.S. economy and 2.5 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
The IFA’s Education & Research Foundation’s mission is to advance franchising and the free enterprise system by increasing the knowledge and professional standards of all members of the franchising community, educating the next generation of franchise practitioners, increasing recognition of franchising’s key role in the free enterprise system, and providing comprehensive information and research about important developments and trends in franchising.
PHOTO CAPTION: Eastern Illinois University School of Business professor Dr. Marko Grünhagen, captured here in a WEIU-TV clip, was recently named a co-recipient of the Arthur Karp Research Award by the International Franchise Association’s Education & Research Foundation for a research paper on franchising.
