In my opinion, text to HTML ratio is meaningless. You should do your best to have substantive content but it is highly unlikely that a search engine is going to evaluate you this way.

Information about Google using OCR...  Use this link to see an example of how google extracted and highlighted "wrigley swim" from this newspaper scan.

Google can determine the color of an image...  image files are actually characters and google can extract the colors.   If you go into image search there is an option limit the results by color.  Some of that is done via context (such as words in the file name or words near the image), however, some is done by extracting data from the image file.

...Google cannot read images or colors...

Are you willing to bet a month's pay on that?

I want to make sure that Google sees each one of these sites as unique sites...

I don't think that there is an inexpensive way to get this done and have high quality results.  If you want unique content you gotta pay the price... but you could consider.

Hire several writers to reauthor the content - will cost a lot less than starting from scratch.

Get an article spinner program - that will be cheap but you will probably not like the results.

Make a enthusiastic sales pitch to each franchisee with incentives to write their own content.

...templated content approved by corporate...

There is another problem - maybe bigger than Google's desire for unique content.

Good luck.

I think that a lot of people using THEIR BRAND in the title tag are simply lazy or egotists.

... but it's OK with me. 

Gap is lucky to have such a short brand name.

In a lot of cases we are talking about egos that are enormous compared to the size of a brand as widely known as Macy's.

For my sites at least I think that the opportunity to grab extra sale through the title tag is more important than trying to communicate a weak brand when I am head-to-head with a Macy's.   I'd rather use my title tag to shout value propositions, elicit clicks and reach for more keywords.

When we are talking my brand vs Macy's I need to get my foot in the door with value and then impress them with service and quality.

Lots of people are hung-up on using their brand name in titles.    I think that they should consider some of the examples below.... and use their imagination to appeal to the searcher. Let's be honest... brand names make a really sleepy title tag...

Product Name | KickA$$ Price

Product Name | Free Shipping

Product Name | A Phrase that Elicits Clicks

Product Name | Most Popular Uses

Product Name | Immediate Shipping

Product Name | What the Competition is Keeping Secret

Product Name | Buy Now and Get Free Beer