Does franchising have a bad name?

I went to a networking event the other day and met with a business owner who was explaining how he had expanded his business. The way he described it sounded exactly like franchising, but when someone said that it sounded like a franchise he was very quick to say that it wasn’t franchising.

This isn’t the only time that another business owner has said that how they’ve expanded is not franchising, despite sounding very much like one.

Anyone know why this is…does franchising have a bad name?