Hemp Franchising and the Future of the National Market

Caroline Fichter Related Seminars and Products

Partner

Bundy & Fichter, PLLC

Caroline Fichter is a partner at the Bundy & Fichter PLLC. She is passionate about helping small business owners because she’s a second-generation small business owner herself. She specializes in representing franchisees and franchisors in creating, managing, and exiting the franchise relationship.

Growing up with four siblings, Caroline learned early to be a vocal and tenacious advocate. She honed those skills as a prosecuting attorney where she learned to present her case clearly using plain English.  As a franchise attorney, she puts those skills to work for her franchise clients making complex legal ideas seem simple and offering straightforward legal advice.

On behalf of franchisees, she has helped prospective franchisees review franchise disclosure documents and franchise agreements, create business entities, and negotiate leases.  She has helped franchisees exit the franchise agreement.  At trial and in arbitrations, she has represented franchisees in claims for breach of contract, fraud, breach of duty of good faith and fair dealing, and franchise law violations. She has helped franchisees terminate their franchise agreements, get out of non-competes, return the franchises to the franchisor, and recover monetary damages. She has recovered more than ten million dollars of damages for defrauded franchisees.

On behalf of franchisors, she has helped franchisors draft franchise disclosure documents and franchise agreements. She has represented franchisors in disputes with state franchise examiners and in court including negotiating consent orders.  

In addition to representing franchisors, franchisees, and other small business owners, Caroline publishes and speaks extensively on franchise issues. She regularly presents at the American Bar Association Forum on Franchising and publishes in the Franchise Law Journal and the Franchise Lawyer. She is the Director of the Litigation and Alternative Dispute Resolution section of the American Bar Association Forum on Franchising and has previously served as the Director of the Small and Solo Committee.

Kirsten Nordstrom Related Seminars and Products

Associate Attorney

Garner, Ginsburg & Johnsen, P.A.

Kirsten is an associate at Garner, Ginsburg & Johnsen, P.A. Her practice focuses on franchise and distribution law.

Kirsten is a 2020 cum laude graduate of the University of Minnesota Law School, where she was the recipient of the Dean’s Distinguished Scholarship and the Lloyd Peterson Scholarship. During law school, Kirsten worked as a student attorney in the University’s Environmental and Energy Law Clinic and contributed to the Silha Bulletin, the quarterly publication of the Silha Center for the Study of Media Ethics and Law. She did her undergraduate work at Colorado State University, where she earned both a B.A. and a B.S. and was honored on the Dean’s List.

Michael Levitz Related Seminars and Products

Attorney

Drumm Law, LLC

Michael is an attorney with Drumm Law. Before joining the firm, he spent 21 years working for major food companies, Pillsbury, General Mills, Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream, and most recently Nestlé. Michael is proud of the fact that he was hired as a contractor by Pillsbury in 1996 to support the Häagen-Dazs U.S. franchising business for two weeks; and ended up supporting that business as in-house counsel for more than two decades under various ownership structures. Before then Michael spent seven years with boutique construction litigation firms in Boston, during which time he was able to cross an item off his bucket list, being the obtaining of a favorable decision of first impression in United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Michael is continuing much of the work he was doing as in-house counsel on an external basis, and routinely drafts commercial contracts related to product supply and distribution, including direct store delivery (DSD) distribution; and provides legal advice on franchise, distribution, licensing, dairy promotional law compliance, and various other commercial matters.

Michael obtained his law degree from New England School of Law, in Boston; and obtained a B.S. in Industrial Construction Management from Colorado State University. Michael is admitted to the state bars of Massachusetts, New York, and Minnesota. From time to time Michael has had the honor of being a speaker at the American Bar Association Forum on Franchising, and the International Franchise Association Legal Symposium.

Michael lives in Minnesota and is admitted to practice law in Massachusetts, Minnesota and New York.