Rick Barber spent many countless hours at our store telling us one fabricated story after another. We often wondered what world he is living in and soon realized it’s “the World According to Rick”. In this world, everything and everyone else is to blame but him. It seemed harmless in the beginning. He would ask us to tack his orders onto ours with the explanation that he missed the cutoff. He promised to pay when the products arrive. These requests started to come in more frequently through time. It also involved more and more vendors. We became suspicious of his explanation and questioned him. He begrudgingly told us that vendors are forcing him to buy in larger volumes because the other franchisees aren’t ordering. Since we maintain good relationships with all the vendors, we decided to ask them. Each vendor consistently informed us that they cannot send products to Rick because of too many unpaid invoices.

As the economy started to weaken, we went to Rick for help. THE MAN DID NOTHING. Instead, he would come up with these grand ideas, all untested of course, that would cost us a great deal of upfront money. Everyone around us helped in anyway they could, this included vendors, landlords, fellow franchisees and neighboring businesses. Rick continued to demand his weekly royalities and took it religiously. He would come into the store and rip us apart for the decrease in sales and made us take things off our shelves that were actually selling.

All current and former owners did not know one another prior to joining this franchise yet we all have the same justifiable reasons and concrete examples indicating that this whole thing is a scam. If anyone in the legal field is following this, please reach out to us with some advice or direction. Rick Barber ruined too many families and he needs to be stopped.

http://www.unhappyfranchisee.com/rickys-candy-whyd-the-princeton-store-close/

The story states that the Princeton store’s rent was more than $175,000 and required a deposit of $75,000. It was raised to $188,000 per year.

Could a 3000 sf candy store in Princeton ever sell enough candy to be profitable with that rent, or was this just a PR & franchise sales showcase used to sell the story and harvest franchise fees?

The one flaw of the article is the idea that the economic conditions were a factor in the fall of Ricky’s. NO, IT WAS NOT…… Court documents from the Ch 11 attempt clearly showed that even when the economy was roaring and Toll Brothers couldn’t build a McMansion fast enough Ricky’s was not making any money and the only income supporting the shell was the franchise fees and royalties paid by people who thought they were buying into a successful business model. The house of cards began to crumble once the store owners began to communicate directly and the fact checking began.

We are very sorry to hear that you were forced to close your store. It will take a little time, but trust me when I say, you will feel much better mentally and physically not dealing with the everyday stress of a store with a failing concept. If you ever need any advise you can call any one of us former owners.

According to the Almighty Richard C. Barber all the franchisees were stupid, inexperienced, did not have enough inventory, were not advertising, or they were trying to steal his million dollar concept from him.. He would tell tales to one franchisee about another franchisee. He would do anything in his power to keep the franchisees from talking and comparing notes with each other.

His two wives that he is divorced from are another whole story. I would love to hear the truth from them one day. You can imagine what he had to say about his old girlfriends, He is a pig and a pathological liar. I remember one time when he told us that his store sold hundreds of frozen bananas, he would say another store was selling all kinds of baskets, another store was doing tons of parties. He would play this game over and over again with diffeent stories to different owners to make them feel like they were not doing a good job. The whole time it was just a pack of lies. None of the stores were selling much of anything and that is a fact since there are only two stores left.

He has even had numerous lawyers.

I wonder who he is blaming for the big eviction notice on his Princeton Store. THE LANDLORD.

Hope you are sleeping well these days, Mr. Barber.

MORE LIES I’M SURE