I don't endorse it, just describe it. I agree with you. I'm not saying I like the franchise idea, just describing its existence. Matt
I have heard rumblings of an expansion, but taking over the USSD seems a bit lofty. I am interested to see if anything happens. Who was the source of this information? We don't need a name, just how they would know.
The source is someone in the organization. I think fred villari would have 2.5 million around, remember he's been around since 1970 runing schools. Mattera left in 1988 so fred allready had 18 years worth of franchise money ahead of mattera so he probably has the money. Also mattera's schools have a revolving door of insturctors going threw it. Just because you get some sucker to drop $150,000 for a school doesnt mean you know how to run one. Villari sells the school to the instructor straight out. So the instructor stays and doesnt quit and gets a real job. There prices are very competitive to the competition, so people dont run out the door when they open up. Ussd schools have an average of 50 students while villaris has 120 per school. If you can afford lessions you dont quit as often right? Thats one of the problems with ussd. $185 for a year cotract is too much!! I wouldnt pay some brown belt that much for lessions! Ussd has some quality control problems with the organization. One of the district managers territori is under investigation for tax fraud.Some ussd schools have no sales tax license. Several district managers beatup a rival kempo school owner in there area and got arrested.How do you teach kids to look up to masters when they are bullys? Another district manager got a student pregnant and harassed a breakoff school whos chief instructor was mystery jumped outside his house and crippled and this brought a lot of heat to the company. Grandmaster fred villari is about quality controll and thats why the district managers will be replaced. Now tell me who runs schools better?
$150,000 for a martial arts franchise? that's alot of money. what's the norm for martial art franchises?
Back from a weekend out of town that included some training with a couple of Villari masters and this thread has come back from the dead.... I did catch up on some of the latest gossip from the masters, but didn't hear anything directly on this (I didn't ask them about it either). I did hear a couple of things that would imply to me that the national Villari org is in the process of coming back from being on life support, but this whole thing still sounds a little far fetched to me.
I TOTALLY AGREE!! one instructor w/ USSD in livermore tried to get me to sign up for $165/month, no contract. i live about an hour north of livermore myself and i dont have the time, nor the money to pay for gas, and lessons!
Ive heard of some of the things ussd does. And I am glad grand master fred villari will be taking over. When he does I'll come back.
Be careful what you wish for, cause your wish may come true. I've never been impressed with either Mattera's organization or Villari's. But one has to wonder if Villari's was so great, why did the masses leave to join up with the USSD, Masters of Self Defense, Etc, etc. ?
I think mattera was just greedy.I thought mattera stole 40 schools from villari not joined him? I was told he was working with villari and opening schools on the side and not telling villari.So he stole them they didnt join him. IMHO he is a thief.
How does one steal schools? My understanding is that these schools are basically franchises. So that means that they had to "join". In fact most or all of them had to pay for the priviledge of joining. I think the word "greed" applies to all of these McDojo chains.
Hi Mr Bishop, This is what I heard, charles mattera was paid by fred villari to go out to california and open schools for him. He then started some ussd schools and grand master fred villari didnt find out about it tell 87-88? My point being he was being paid by grandmaster fred villari to open villari's schools when he was opening these dojos on the side and that investor money came from some where? (Probably from a student or instructor from a villaris school) He was not being paid to open his own. So that money was grandmaster fred villaris not charles mattera's, so he is a thief IMHO. www.villarisonline.com
See post #449, if anyone thinks Villari has the money or financial backing to buy out USSD, or any other chain. http://martialtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13470&page=45
Well, I was there, and I didn't actually see Mr. Mattera opening schools under the USSD name, what I saw was a lot of the former FV schools moving over to USSD and seemingly on a particular date. All the schools that I was aware of, at that particular time, were being opened as FV schools and yes, there were a lot of them. I trained at three of them, Orange, which moved to USSD; Riverside, which closed down; and Mission Viejo, which stayed as a FV school, eventually closing. My sensei in Mission Viejo, sold his school and moved to San Diego County. So, as for the comment of stealing schools by using others money to open schools under a different name, I didn't see that happening. Not saying that it couldn't have, I just didn't see it.
Sorry I havent replied back in a while. My friend told me they are going to buy afew schools from each territiries at a time. Mattera changed everything and so each area will take time.
USSD going bankrupt and being bought out by Villari? Who comes up with this crap? First off, USSD is expanding to new states plus canada and ireland. Something alot of companies don't do if they are going bankrupt. I think this rumor may have started because USSD East Coast operations lost *alot* of schools, and hasn't of yet bounced back. I don't know how exactly their east coast operations lost the schools, but if you jump online and look for former schools, you'll see that they are still open, with the same instructors, operating under different names, and having nothing to do with the franchise, and alot of them have re-established relationships with Villari, Karazenpo, or other high ranking Shaolin Kempo masters. Be assured, USSD (at least the West Coast operations) isn't going anywhere for a very, very long time. There is an article from the lates 90's about Demasco and his operations with USSD, and how the East Coast operations differed from the West Coast. The way it breaks down is that USSD West coast is a public franchise, meaning that anybody can contact the corporate headquarters to obtain information about investing in a school. While the East Coast operations were private franchises, meaning that all the school's were owned outright by USSD East Coast. I have heard many horror stories and experienced USSD first hand myself for a few years. Personally, if somebody asked me which schools to check out locally in Southern Nevada, USSD would be low on the list, deffinitely not last (you should see some of the yahoos here who have opened schools), but I wouldn't rule them all altogether.
I've heard that Steve DeMasco has started running his own studios, under the name "Steve DeMasco's United Studios of Shaolin Kung Fu." I think he's breaking away. Anyone know any info?
I didn't run a school actually, I definately helped run classes at both. FV from 87-92 and USSD from 2004 to present. Wow, that took a long time to answer ... who woke up this thread ... LOL
14 Kempo: sorry to come late to the discussion.....But I just have to ask: What your opinions regarding each of the systems being discussed (FV & USSD)? Have you seen the Villari "white to black" video series? If so, what do you think of them? Nupe357
