Knights of Labor: collective opposition to workplace abuse

Matching the right organization to the needs of franchisees is important.

Advisory councils are lapdogs of the franchisors as much as Independent Franchisee Associations tend to be captured by their legal advisors. Both toothless because of their agendas are captured by others.

An Attorneyless Franchisee Network, AFN is a franchisee-led, non-legal approach to work toward a more sustainable business model. It is not a union but it is group designed to forward specific principles.

One interesting example is the Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor, or simply, the Knights of Labor

Knights of Labor (K of L),

… was the largest and one of the most important American labor organizations of the 19th Century. It was established in 1869 and reached a peak membership of nearly three-quarters of a million members by the middle of the 1880s, before beginning a period of rapid decline in size and influence, being supplanted by the American Federation of Labor in the 1890s.

Origins
In the 1860s, the tailors of Philadelphia attempted to establish a union of their trade. This effort was met forcefully by the employers of the city, who frequently forced their employees to choose between their union and their jobs. In these circumstances, it was deemed best to dispense with typical open forms of organization and to instead take their union underground, using the methods of secret societies. Wikidpedia

Some have said:

If you like your 8 hours of work day, thank the Knights of Labor.