Waterloo Marble Slab franchisee takes company to court after being locked out of her own store

They say there’s no sense crying over spilt milk, but spoiled product and lost profits may be a different story.

The owner of a Marble Slab Creamery in Uptown Waterloo says she’s been locked out of her own store for almost two months in violation of her contract with the company, and her lease.

“I haven’t even received sufficient information to understand why the locks were changed,” said Andrea Schlegel-Parsons. “[But] this is not an issue with my landlord or my lease, this is an issue that the franchisor has chosen to impose.”

Schlegel-Parsons said someone from the company posted a letter terminating her contract as a franchisee to her store window on June 19 and a bailiff came, escorted by police, to change the locks.

“[Marble Slab] has accused me of being in default on [contract] issues which I do not agree with,” she said, adding the proper process would be for the two sides to go to court and figure it out. “Which I am prepared to do because I do not believe I am rightfully in default on anything in my franchise agreement.”

Up until last year, Schlegel-Parsons said she was essentially a perfect franchisee, even winning awards and recognition for her store’s success.

“At conventions, I was given top operator awards. My store is one of the top ten stores in sales in the country. When I bought this store, up until now I have more than doubled its revenue. We’ve created community partnerships with Lutherwood, the women’s shelter, and the homeless shelter across the street,” she said. “Wherever we can, we try to find ways we can help other people, other charities, and different organizations.”

She said all that success and good will seemed to spoilt, at least with her corporate owners, the moment she helped launch a new franchisee association.

“I started that association as a way for [franchisees] to openly and collaboratively work together with the franchisor to make the brand better,” she said. “As soon as I started that franchisee association, I received negative retaliation from the franchisor.”

Schlegel-Parsons said she wound up filing a small claims case against the company to try and recoup some legal fees accrued while defending herself and her store against that alleged retaliation.

She also said she later launched a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all franchisees, “on issues we share collectively together.”

“These issues were issues I brought to the franchisor on behalf of the members [who are] part of this association asking for clarity with how this complies with our franchise agreement and I was ignored, we did not receive proper information or responses back, at which point I served them a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all the franchisees.”

She said it was about four weeks after that, “without any notice, they broke into my store before anybody was at the plaza and changed the locks and tried to shut me out of my own store.”

Since then, Schlegel-Parsons said she hasn’t been allowed back inside even to salvage product now locked away. She also said the fridges and freezers have been running ever since resulting in a “mountain of bills stacking up.”

“It’s frustrating to know that my livelihood and the livelihood of my staff that work there has been stolen away from me without any notice,” Schlegel-Parsons said.

“This would be our busy season,” she added. “This is when an ice cream store makes their revenue in order to make some profit.”

She said the courts have agreed to fast-track her case challenging the decision to change the locks on the basis it’s her name, not the company’s, on her lease.

That is slated to be heard August 11.