How we know

What these pages are

Each brand page collects facts about one UK franchise brand from public registers. Every figure carries the register it came from, the date of that register data, and the date we read it.

The pages state register facts only. They give no scores, ratings or opinions of our own, and they are not advice. Franchisors do not pay to be listed.

We do not name directors, franchisees or anyone else. Companies named after a brand are counted, not listed.

Sources and dates

These are the register extracts behind the current pages. Each was filtered to the brands listed, and columns naming people were removed before anything was stored.

• Companies House: Companies House register: company profile, accounts filing history, charges and insolvency pages, and advanced company search results. Data as at 10 Nov 2026, read on 10 Nov 2026. Franchisor companies listed in data/brands.json; name searches for each brand term. Page header, navigation and scripts removed; company content kept. Filing history reduced to accounts (form AA) rows only. Charges reduced to the summary lines. Officer and insolvency pages not fetched (insolvency history read from the profile tab link).
• Ofsted: Childcare providers and inspections management information: registered childcare providers and latest inspections as at 30 June 2026. Data as at 30 Jun 2026, read on 10 Nov 2026. Rows whose Provider name contains (any case): banana moon; monkey puzzle; tumble tots; kumon. Registered person name, street address lines, postcode and web link columns dropped (some settings are run by individuals).
• Care Quality Commission (CQC): CQC care directory: HSCA active locations and deactivated locations. Data as at 2 Nov 2026, read on 10 Nov 2026. Rows whose Brand Name is one of: BRAND Bluebird Care; BRAND Home Instead; BRAND Caremark. Dates converted from the spreadsheet month/day/year display to YYYY-MM-DD. Registered manager, nominated individual, main partner, telephone and web columns dropped. Provider name blanked for individual or partnership providers, and for deactivated providers with no company or charity number.
• Food hygiene ratings (Food Standards Agency): Food hygiene rating scheme API: establishments search by business name. Data as at 10 Nov 2026, read on 10 Nov 2026. Every establishment the API returns for each food brand search term in data/brands.json. Phone, address lines, geocode, scores and local authority contact details dropped; outlet name, type, rating, rating date, scheme, local authority and postcode kept.

Brand to franchisor company

A brand often trades under a different name from its limited company. We match each brand to its franchisor company by searching the Companies House register, and record the match by hand. Where no UK franchisor company can be confirmed from the register, the page says so and gives the search date.

From the franchisor company we show: status, company type, incorporation date, registered office, trade codes, charges registered (secured lending), whether the register shows insolvency history, and the last three accounts filings: the year end, the accounts type Companies House records, the filing date and the whole months between them.

Where franchisors of different listed brands have the same registered office postcode, the page says so.

Companies named after the brand

We search the Companies House register for companies with the brand name in their name, then apply these rules in order. A company left out is counted against the first rule that removes it.

• The franchisor company itself is left out.
• Companies registered at the franchisor's office postcode, or at a group office we have recorded for that brand, are left out as head-office companies.
• The brand name must appear in the company name as whole words. For Driver Hire, the name must begin with "Driver Hire".
• Companies with no current trade (SIC 2007) code on the register are left out, because their trade cannot be checked. This removes, for example, a photography company that shares a nursery brand's name.
• Companies whose trade codes are all outside the brand's trade are left out.
• Status is as Companies House gives it: active; closed (dissolved, removed or converted); or in an insolvency process (liquidation, administration, receivership, voluntary arrangement).
• Median time to closure uses whole months from incorporation to dissolution.

Care brands: CQC

CQC's care directory tags each location with a brand. We count the locations carrying the brand, the registered providers running them, and each location's latest overall rating, as CQC publishes it. Dual-registered locations are counted once, as CQC advises.

Ended registrations are locations under the brand that CQC lists as deactivated. CQC notes that a service can carry on under a new registration after a change of provider, legal entity or address, so an ended registration is not always a closed branch. We also count providers that have an ended registration and no current location under the brand.

CQC data is used under the Open Government Licence, acknowledging CQC as the source. CQC is not responsible for this analysis of its data.

Childcare and education brands: Ofsted

Ofsted publishes every registered childcare setting. We count settings whose name contains the brand name, and the registered providers running them. Each Early Years Register setting is counted once, under its most recent inspection.

Inspections since November 2025 use a renewed framework that grades six areas and gives no single overall grade. For these we count settings with all six areas at Expected standard or above, settings with at least one area at Needs attention or Urgent improvement, and settings where safeguarding standards were not met. Earlier inspections gave one overall effectiveness grade (Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement or Inadequate), which we show as Ofsted gives it.

Ofsted registers settings on the Childcare Register without giving them inspection grades.

Food brands: food hygiene ratings

We search the Food Standards Agency ratings for each brand and count outlets whose business name begins with the brand name. Names that begin with the same word but belong to other businesses are reviewed by hand and left out; each brand page says how many.

Ratings are shown as the schemes give them: 0 to 5 in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and Pass or Improvement Required in Scotland. The register does not show whether an outlet is franchised or run by the brand's own company, so the counts include both.

• Costa: names matching ^costa(?![a-z]), leaving out ^costa (azul|chippy|del sol|fish|rica|verde|pastry).
• Greggs: names matching ^greggs(?![a-z]).
• Papa John's: names matching ^papa john'?s?(?![a-z]).

What the registers cannot show

• Franchisees who trade under their own company names, or as sole traders, cannot be found by brand name.
• No register says which outlets are franchised and which are run by the brand itself.
• Companies House does not check the accuracy of what companies file.
• Turnover and net assets from filed accounts are not shown yet.
• Register data changes daily. Each figure is as at the date given with its source; these pages were last built on 10 Nov 2026.