Mrs. Fields

The vendor opportunity at Mrs. Fields

Mrs. Fields operates a system of 121 franchised locations with no company-owned stores. The brand reported an average unit volume of $378,232 in its 2025 FDD. The franchise network is composed entirely of single-unit operators—114 mapped operators run approximately 114 located units, with no franchisees controlling two or more locations. This structure means a software vendor is selling into a system where the franchisor holds centralized purchasing authority, but the end users are independent small business owners. The royalty rate is 6.0%, and the initial franchise term runs for 10 years. Year-over-year unit growth was not disclosed in the filing.

The brand’s geographic footprint is limited, with New York hosting the highest concentration at just 3 units and Michigan at 1. The remaining locations are thinly distributed, making a field-sales motion impractical. Any go-to-market strategy must rely on influencing the franchisor at the corporate level in Utah, then driving adoption downward to a fragmented operator base.

Who controls software purchasing

The 2025 FDD lists five key executives at the franchisor level. Joe Lewis serves as President and Chief Executive Officer, making him the ultimate authority on enterprise-wide technology decisions. Corie King, Director of Marketing, is the most relevant stakeholder for the one mandated technology category—social media. Brian Mooney, Senior Director of Franchise Operations, would be the buyer for any operational or training platform that touches store-level workflows. Richard T. Hankins, Senior Director of Development and Real Estate, and Stacey Bertke, Director of Supply Chain Planning, round out the named leadership team.

Because the system has zero multi-unit operators, there is no secondary buying center at the franchisee level. A vendor’s path to 121 units runs exclusively through this small HQ team. The absence of a parent company means there is no larger enterprise software agreement to leverage; Mrs. Fields appears independently owned.

Mandated and current tech stack

The only technology explicitly mandated in the 2025 FDD is a Social Media Technology Platform. The filing does not name a specific vendor for this platform, nor does it disclose any required point-of-sale, inventory management, loyalty, or operational software. This is unusual for a retail food franchise of this size and may indicate either a hands-off approach to store-level tech or a gap in the FDD’s Item 11 disclosures.

For a vendor selling POS, scheduling, or supply chain software, the absence of a named incumbent is both an opportunity and a risk. It means there is no entrenched competitor to displace, but it also means the franchisor has not publicly committed to standardizing these tools. Any pitch must start by building the business case for system-wide standardization before positioning a specific product.

Procurement, renewals, and timing

Item 8 of the FDD does not provide an extract describing the franchisor’s procurement or supplier approval process. Without this signal, vendors must assume an ad-hoc procurement model and should request a copy of the operations manual or supplier approval procedures during discovery.

Renewal conditions, outlined in Item 17, require franchisees to provide 90 to 180 days’ notice, sign the then-current franchise agreement—which may contain materially different terms—execute a general release of claims, refurbish the premises at the franchisor’s request, and pay a renewal fee. The renewal term is 10 years. These staggered, individual renewal cycles mean there is no system-wide technology refresh window. A vendor’s best entry point is likely a new franchisor initiative—such as a brand-wide social media compliance push—rather than a calendar-driven upgrade cycle.

How to read the Mrs. Fields FDD

The full 2025 Franchise Disclosure Document is embedded below. Focus on Item 11 for the franchisor’s complete technology obligations, including any updates to the social media mandate or additional systems not summarized here. Item 8 should be reviewed directly for any supplier restrictions that may not have been extracted. Item 19 contains the financial performance representations that underpin the $378,232 AUV figure. For a ranked target list of franchise systems matched to your software category, FranCloud can help you prioritize outreach based on technology gaps and decision-maker accessibility.