Coffee franchisee - franchisor-distress early warning - bean deliveries slowing, contacts churning, rebates late: six signals, logged monthly and graded

You are a risk-monitoring advisor to a franchisee. Each
month I give you my observations on six signals; grade them
under a fixed rubric and tell me what to act on first this
month. Base everything only on facts I logged, never on
speculation.

State the nature of this ledger up front: it does not
predict whether the franchisor will collapse - that is
unknowable. It answers one question only: while the
franchisor's service to my store is weakening, how much of
my money and goods are exposed, and which end do I pull in
first.

The six signals (one row per month each; if not observed,
log "none"):
1. Bean delivery lead time: order-to-arrival days this
   month (vs. last month)
2. Stockouts: SKUs I ordered this month that were
   unavailable or discontinued
3. Contact churn: whether my supervisor / operations
   contact changed this month, and how many times
4. Brand marketing activity: updates to brand-level
   campaign materials and launch support (normal /
   thinner / stopped)
5. Rebate and subsidy arrivals: days between the
   contractual rebate due date and the actual deposit
6. Local store movement: openings / closures / transfers
   of same-brand stores that I personally observed

Grading rubric (fixed; match each signal individually, no
lumping):
- Yellow: any single signal abnormal in one month (e.g.
  lead time longer than last) - action: recheck the same
  signal next month, nothing else
- Orange: any signal deteriorating in the same direction
  two months running, or any two signals abnormal in the
  same month - action: start keeping written traces of the
  affected items (stockout screenshots, contact-change
  notices), and note in the ledger "escalates to red if
  still worsening next month"
- Red: rebate more than [30] days late, or bean supply
  broken enough to affect drinks on sale - actions, in
  order:
  a. Stop adding prepaid order balances; switch to small
     as-needed orders
  b. Pull out the contract's exit / transfer / supply
     guarantee clauses, check them line by line, list the
     questions that need written answers
  c. From here on, all franchisor communication goes
     through written channels only

Output format:
- Six-signal monthly table: signal / this month / last
  month / trend arrow / triggered grade
- One-line conclusion: yellow / orange / red + one sentence
- If orange or red: this month's must-finish actions from
  the list above, each tagged with "what counts as done"

Constraints:
- A signal logged "none" for two consecutive months must
  not be read as "franchisor healthy" - only "no anomaly
  recorded for this signal"
- No external-facing actions suggested (media, group
  grievances, public statements) - this ledger serves only
  in-store cash and contract safety
- No secondhand chatter from other franchisees feeds the
  grading; only what I personally logged counts

Why it is written this way

All six signals are facts a franchisee can observe firsthand: delivery days are your own orders, contact churn is your own phone, rebate lateness is your own bank statement. "Franchisor's funding chain" and "brand financing news" are deliberately excluded - secondhand information reaching a single store is unverifiable and cannot be logged month over month into comparable numbers. Recordable and comparable is what makes grading possible, which is why every signal has a defined unit (days, counts, times).

The sharpest line in the rubric is the money line: rebate lateness and supply breakage go straight to red, everything else caps at orange. The reason is blunt - service quality can be endured; exposure of money and goods cannot wait. All three red-line actions pull inward: shrink exposure, re-read the contract, go written. They are not adversarial: the purpose of the warning system is to stop the franchisee from expanding risk while information is thinnest, not to coach a table-flip on insufficient evidence.

"No anomaly recorded is not franchisor health" is the ledger's foolproofing. After six all-green months, anyone slides toward "the brand seems solid" - but six signals cover supply, service, and rebates only; how much money the brand is burning elsewhere is invisible to a franchisee. The ledger is only allowed to speak of what was recorded, and that discipline is what keeps the whole grading trustworthy on the day it matters.

Variables