As we bring another year to a close it is time to reflect and look back on the year. There has likely been some misses and makes for you this year, but take a moment to pause and look back on what you have accomplished and what has changed. In today’s episode, we reflect back on our podcast. This year we had 11 franchise focused podcasts and we decided to highlight 7 franchisors that shared their wisdom. In total, these 7 guests represented more than 3,400 franchises! You have to stay to the end to see what they have to say.
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TRANSCRIPT
Dr. Tom DuFore (00:01):
Welcome to the Multiply Your Success podcast, where each week we help growth-minded entrepreneurs and franchise leaders take the next step in their expansion journey. I’m your host, Tom DuFore, CEO of Big Sky Franchise Team, and a very Merry Christmas week to you and your loved ones.
(00:19):
And as we bring another year to a close, it’s time to reflect and take a look back on the past year. And there’s likely been some misses and makes for you this year, but let’s take a moment to pause to look back at what you’ve accomplished and what has changed over the last year.
(00:39):
In today’s episode, we reflect back on our podcast. And did you know that this year we had 11 franchise-focused podcasts and we decided to highlight seven of those, which were seven interviews with franchisors that shared their franchise wisdom.
(00:57):
Now in total, these seven guests represented more than 3,400 franchises. You heard that right? Let me say it again. These seven guests represented over 3,400 franchises in total. So you’re going to have to stay all the way to the end to remember these little clips and snippets of what each of these guests had to say.
(01:21):
You may remember some of our interviews with guests like Charles Watson, the CEO of Tropical Smoothie Cafe, Brad Sugars, the founder of ActionCOACH International, David Graham with FranchiCzar, Jeff Minder with Top Tier K9, Charles Bonfiglio with Tint World, and Brian Miller with Patrice & Associates. And we listed them as best as we could tell in order in terms of number of total franchises they have, so from smallest to largest or largest to smallest. And let’s see if you can guess what that order might be.
(01:55):
So let’s go ahead and jump right into our summary and recap of the top franchise podcasts of 2024. So the first episode we recap is episode 187 with Jeff Minder from Top Tier K9, and he shares with us some of his franchise experience.
(02:14):
What led you to think about franchising?
Jeff Minder (02:17):
What’s called a force multiplier. I was an old special forces guy in the military, and one of the things that we would do is go in behind enemy lines or go into different locations, and our job was to teach other people to do what we do. So I could go in by myself or with a small team and come out with 300 trained people ready to do things behind enemy laws, let’s say. That’s just as an example.
(02:40):
And so what I did was in building Top Tier K9 as a school to train other people, I started seeing ways that I could build a pattern or a process where pretty much anybody who followed that formula or that project process, if they follow what I taught them, they could launch a successful dog training business. And then what would happen is once they were successful, they would be off on their own and I would get calls a year later, two years later, they would need help or they would need business development or need help in some way, whether they wanted to go to another level for service dog training or protection dog training.
(03:18):
And so what I wanted to do was find a way to make that a known entity, a known process. Well, what better way to do that than to take a successful program with I’d say 150 certified dog trainers around the world and say, look, instead of everybody come through the school, learn all these great techniques to be a dog trainer, you can also let me help you with your business. And if you do that, you’re going to be successful two years faster than if you try to do it as Joe’s Dog Training in a garage or Betty the dog trainer. If you’re just Top Tier K9, you can carry my processes, my brand, my quality assurance programs and really make money quicker.
(04:00):
And so I didn’t understand franchising at all until I called you. And then you guys made me and helped me understand franchising in such a rapid fashion and a controlled learning fashion for me, it took the fear of franchising out and allowed me to really say, “Okay, I’m going to see what part of this Top Tier K9 I can really carve out to help people be successful and do it legally through the franchising process.”
(04:29):
And so I think I sold my first franchise maybe three months after meeting with you guys. And by the way, I did get my trademark on Top Tier K9, ’cause remember we started and you said, “Jeff, it would really be wise to trademark the name because there’s going to be states that you can’t sell in if you’re not trademarked.” And so I think I applied the day you told me and you said, “Boy, I’m not used to people doing this right away.” I’d say maybe two weeks ago I got the federal trademark for Top Tier K9.
(05:00):
So that’s what led me into franchising and I’m so thankful for you guys. So glad I did it. It gives me an exit strategy for my original business because now I can help other people with their business and each one I make a percentage on. And so after 10 franchises, that’s pretty much what I can make on my own if I just run my own business. So 20 franchises, 30, 50 franchises, that’s a heck of a retirement.
(05:29):
And so that’s kind of what led me into the franchising, was to take that technical skill, the business savvy, the hardcore marketing, the hardcore branding, and say, how can I make money from that in the future so that as I physically am unable to do all this work, I can still make a living for myself, my family, my employees, the folks around me I love.
Dr. Tom DuFore (05:52):
Next up is episode 193 with David Graham, who’s the founder of FranchiCzar. If you recall, he also was the founder of Code Ninjas. He since exited that business and Code Ninjas has over 350 franchises right now. He currently has his own franchise venture that has more than 100 franchises between all of his brands. And here’s a snippet from his interview.
David Graham (06:15):
Well, I learned that I personally don’t want to work 18 hours a day, 7 days a week for 2 years. I mean, that was untenable. I definitely learned that I need to scale my team a lot faster and broader. And fortunately, we kind of did it the other way this time. We were able to have a really great team in place already and then we built brands around that.
(06:38):
But I learned the value of having that team fully trained and fully engaged. And with that culture of success building and supporting each other all the time. And these people, you’re spending so much time with them, probably more than most of your kids or something, you’ve got to be here for each other and really taking advantage of all of our strengths and supplementing each other’s weaknesses.
Dr. Tom DuFore (07:05):
Why have you gravitated toward the franchise business model? What have you found are its benefits and challenges there?
David Graham (07:13):
Well, initially I thought I could go to a private equity group with my idea that has zero units open and just pitch this idea about coding for kids or whatever and whatever the idea is, and try to open up conventionally, I guess just corporate owned locations everywhere. And I just thought, no matter what I hire or who I hire in that market, there’s nothing like an owner spending his own money in his own space. I mean, when you do that, you’re mining your dollars and cents and you’re making sure that the optimal output for your customer experience is there. And so I just think it really aligns everybody perfectly.
(07:57):
If I was to raise that money and do it, I couldn’t hire that person, not quite the same person. And so even if you have an owner that is not an owner operator, they’re there present in the business enough to see, “Hey, my manager’s not working out,” then you can fine tune it on the ground there a lot better. And so I just thought that was the best way to allocate capital, was to get buy-in from a larger group of people who are actually going to be owners and most of the time operators, just because the closest money is usually the best money spent.
Dr. Tom DuFore (08:34):
I’ve seen that as well. And as you mentioned that with these franchisees being the local owner operators and having been a franchisor and supported and helped franchisees grow their business, what are some things that you found, maybe some secrets or tips that you found that you think every franchisee that’s opening up might want to know to be successful?
David Graham (08:56):
Well, I don’t even know if it applies to franchisees specifically, but in the franchising space, follow the model. I mean, I can’t say that enough. Somebody built that model. A team of people thought about it. The plan is there. You didn’t buy into a franchise to go off the happy path. That’s what we call it around here. You’re on the happy path. Think of it as a wine laid highway. There’s a line on this side and a line on that side. You can drive between those lines, but when you get off the lines, it makes it basically impossible for us to help you out.
Dr. Tom DuFore (09:28):
The next guest is from episode 218 where we interviewed Charles Bonfiglio, the CEO of Tint World that has approximately 126 locations. And here’s what he had to say.
(09:40):
What advice might you give to someone that’s launching their franchise system and looking to get to maybe their first 25 or 50 franchises?
Charles Bonfiglio (09:49):
So that is really a good question, and I actually do coach a lot of other startups. I don’t mind telling them everything that they need to know ’cause I was lucky enough and fortunate enough to have the learnings that I did from the people around me.
(10:00):
So I would say number one, realize in franchising when you’re starting, it’s completely, if you’ve started a business and maybe had a couple locations or you want to start franchising it, you’re really not going to make money as far as in the franchising until you get to at least minimum 50 units.
(10:19):
And why do I say that? ‘Cause royalties range from 5 to 7% on average, so that’s small percent. To be able to build a team, to be able to help people grow when they get in the 50 is really difficult. And building the brand, building the website out, building the marketing, building the relationship with the vendors, the buying power, all the systems that have to be put in place, it takes time to build those. You can’t do them with 3, 5, 10. It takes at least 50 to start that igniting point where you could start really seeing things mature.
(10:48):
And then even then, you still have always growing. You always have to hire one operations guy for every 25 people. Every 40, 50 people you have to hire a franchise, I should say, you have to hire another person and maybe the accounting or the marketing. So there’s a lot of these people you’re adding on.
(11:03):
If you can go through 50 to 100 and get there and still be good, that’s when you’ll start making money of course, ’cause you’re actually be able to get multiple revenue streams, you’re selling licenses, you’re getting royalties in, but at the beginning, it’s difficult. So if you’re going to go into this, you want to know that you don’t want to focus on having to make money while you’re trying to build a brand, a franchise brand. If you have to focus on how much can I make, well then you better find a partner that’s got the funding or have a really light living style because you’ve got to pour that money back in and grow it if you want to do it organically.
(11:39):
Another way would be to get some PE and the money in. Private equity may be able to do it. Know that when you do that, you really lose control of your vision and your growth. They want you to do it in a different way. And so now you’re almost like working for them and you don’t really have freedom.
(11:53):
I was fortunate enough to get over the hundred, approaching the 150, and we have about another 100 units in the pipeline growing. So with that, I’m able to be and still create what I want to do for our franchisees without too much outside control.
Dr. Tom DuFore (12:08):
The next guest we had on is from episode 189 with Brian Miller, who’s the President of Patrice & Associates. They have nearly 200 franchises, and I had the good fortune of originally working with Patrice & Associates and knowing them way back when they first launched their franchise. And here’s what Brian had to say.
Brian Miller (12:28):
I think there’s an old Zig Ziglar quote that, trying to remember exactly what it is, that if you help enough other people get the success that they desire, you’ll get the success that you desire as well. I think what we do every single day in our business is we help individuals and we change their lives. What I do when I go to bed at night, I can put my head on the pillow and rest easy is I know we’re changing people’s lives.
(12:53):
There’s very few things that mean something to people as much as their career or what they do on a daily basis. It can either make or break your environment, right? If you’ve been in a bad job before, you have a stressful situation, it can have negative effects on your psyche, it can have ripple effects on your family. But when you put somebody in a great opportunity with a great career path that maybe even have ripple effects in their community, wonderful things happen.
(13:20):
So success means to me is helping other people achieve the success that they desire, because I do really believe in that Zig Ziglar quote that if you help enough other people achieve the success that they desire, you’re going to achieve the success that you desire as well.
(13:35):
And that’s what we do at Patrice & Associates every single day. That’s what our franchisees do. We have an amazing home-based franchise model. We help franchisees get off on the right foot by giving them customers from the start. But at the end of the day, the people that join us, of course, they want to make money, of course, they want to have a return on investment. They do it because there’s something in them that strikes a chord about helping other people achieve the success that they desire.
Dr. Tom DuFore (14:04):
Our next franchise guest is from episode 223 and it’s Mike Stone who’s the President of CertaPro, which has nearly 400 franchise owners in over 500 territories currently. And if you recall from that episode, Mike and I found out right before our interview that we have a common friend that we both had worked with, which is always kind of one of those small world moments. And here’s what Mike had to share.
Mike Stone (14:31):
There’s a lot of misconceptions about franchising. Franchises are locally owned businesses who are making an impact in the community, and over 92 cents out of every dollar stays in the community. A couple percent goes into a general advertising fund. The other 5% goes to our royalty collection.
(14:51):
So the reality of what a franchise owner represents is local community. It’s not Starbucks. It’s not Walmart. It’s not Target, these big corporations. These are locally owned businesses. And sometimes franchising gets a bad name because people don’t really understand that these people are making a true impact.
(15:12):
And to be frank, our very best franchise owners, they are rooted in the community. They’re sponsoring little league teams. They’re giving back with social purpose and donating to charities and painting things that the community needs to make it a more beautiful and attractive place. And that’s the beauty of painting in itself. You take something that’s dull and lifeless and you make it beautiful again, and it’s the most cost-effective way to beautify and protect someone’s home or business.
Dr. Tom DuFore (15:41):
One of the things that I find interesting when we think of painting and just in general, it tends to be a fragmented industry nationally. I’d love for you to maybe share a little insight into growing ’cause you’ve been involved with the company for 25 years now on growing this national organization, this national footprint in a highly fragmented business.
Mike Stone (16:04):
Yeah. You’ve talk to Sherwin-Williams. They sell $20 billion worth of coatings. In the repaint space, the space that we thrive in, a typical painter buys about $10,000 worth of paint a year from Sherwin-Williams. $60 billion is our footprint that we chase, and we own 700 million, so we have less than 2% market share. So there’s 5,000 Sherwin-Williams stores and each one has, I don’t know, 20 to 50 accounts that are buying 10 to $20,000 worth of paint.
(16:40):
CertiPro, what we’re trying to do is we give somebody a business model. We don’t want you to have any painting experience. We’ll teach you everything you need to know about the painting industry. That’s our religion. This is a people business. This is a leadership business. We’re about big, profitable operations that are growing and achieving consistent market penetration by delivering an extraordinary experience to the customer.
Dr. Tom DuFore (17:05):
Our next guest is from episode 210 and it’s Brad Sugars who’s the founder of ActionCOACH International that has approximately 1100 franchises operating in 83 countries, and he shared just a wealth of information. If you recall, this was our extra special four-year anniversary episode. And Brad just shared phenomenal insights into franchising and some of the things he’s learned along the way.
(17:34):
But are there any lessons or things you might be able to share that you recall on how you went from zero to the first hundred in your system?
Brad Sugars (17:42):
Yeah, I get that because ActionCOACH is the company I’m most known for, but I’m a partner in many other franchise companies, commercial cleaning, recruiting business. Now, our recruiting business literally started franchising in the end of last year. So it’s going from its number one franchise last year to this year, we guess we’re going to allocate about 22 new franchises.
(18:07):
Here’s the biggest challenge for that breakthrough, ’cause when I say breakthrough, I mean when royalties are paying for all the bills. Where it’s not new franchise sales paying the bills. It’s royalties are paying the bills type thing. And so you go through, we sort of see three phases. Phase one is learning how to sell the franchise. That’s phase number one on limited lead flow. Now, if you’ve got a burger chain, people can come in and try the burger and therefore they buy. If you’re like you guys and us in white collar, someone doesn’t try the thing. It’s a different way of doing it.
(18:48):
Then you’ve got to learn to market it. And marketing today of franchises is mostly about information provision, provide the information. If someone was looking for a franchise with us, they can go to our YouTube channel and there’s a line there called about ActionCOACH franchise. There’s nine videos at the start of that that explain everything from how we do our marketing, how we train you, how we do our sales. It explains it all. Someone buying the franchise can see all of that.
(19:19):
Interestingly enough, Tom, that shortened our sales cycle by about a third, by having that information available to them on video rather than it through a salesperson. All of those videos, by the way, are also turned into eBooks, so the people that like reading can read it and those who like viewing can view type thing.
(19:39):
So selling it, marketing, and then once you’ve done that, actually scaling. The problem with a lot of it is you get used to selling 5 to 20 a year and you think that’s the right number. No, you should, once you’ve learned how to sell it and learned how to market it, then it’s scale time, then it’s time to really go big, build a team, do it. Don’t do it yourself. You’ve got to build a sales manager, all of that sort of thing.
(20:06):
And I think, Tom, you see this more than I do, obviously, that learning that you are actually in the franchise business, not the business coaching business or the coffee business or whatever it is, that’s what that business does. You are no longer in that business. You are in the franchising business, and you’ve got to learn those skills as opposed to just the skills of the coffee shop or the burger or the cleaning or whatever the franchise is.
Dr. Tom DuFore (20:37):
That’s exactly right. I often will tell our clients, while we may be helping you turn your business into a franchise system, what we’re actually doing is teaching you how to think and act like a franchisor. That’s really what we’re doing is, it’s almost really a paradigm shift to go from this operator or in many cases, company owned mindset to a franchise, sell, train, support, help others use your system to grow the business they want to grow with it.
Brad Sugars (21:07):
Yeah. You don’t sell coffee anymore, dude. You sell dreams and goals. So stop selling coffee, start selling dreams and goals ’cause that person coming to you. And even back to know, like and trust, with my team the other day, I said, “Okay.” I just went through their prospect list. I said, “How many kids that guy got?” And someone said, “I don’t know.” “Well, you’re not getting that sale. Does that person have a dog or a cat?” “I don’t know.” “Okay, not getting that sale.”
(21:32):
So a lot of those things that apply just in any business apply to this most definitely. But someone joining a franchise, I always say there’s five sales for someone joining a franchise. Number one, you’ve got to sell them on having their own business. If they’ve already had their own, then you don’t have to do that as much. You got to sell them on the franchise concept, the idea, the industry of franchising. And if they don’t believe in franchising, they’re not buying.
(21:59):
Third, you’ve got to sell them on the industry that you’re in. The actual, our profession of business coaching, we have to educate them as to what is the profession. How is it growing? What’s happening? What’s the market size? What’s the numbers? Where’s it moving to, et cetera.
(22:13):
Fourth is you got to sell them on the company. And then the fifth, you got to sell them on the territory that they’re getting, ’cause they might not like that site or that territory or that spot.
(22:25):
There’s a lot of selling in franchising that people miss. And I think a lot of people lose sales ’cause they just try and sell the franchise and they forget about the fact that this person has to learn to have their own, have to want their own business, have to want to be in franchising.
Dr. Tom DuFore (22:43):
And our final episode we wanted to highlight, drum roll, is number 191, Charles Watson, who’s the CEO of Tropical Smoothie Cafe and has become a franchise friend of mine over the years, and someone I’ve come to just kind of follow and watch and have the opportunity to see all the great things he’s been doing. And he shared in this episode how Tropical Smoothie Cafe went from 400 to over 1400 franchises over about a 10-year period. And here’s a little clip from that interview.
(23:17):
One of the things I find interesting is a slight name change that you went to. Now it’s been several years going from Tropical Smoothie to Tropical Smoothie Cafe. And I’m just interested how that kind of transition occurred with franchisees, customers, internal. Just talk through that a little bit ’cause I’m sure other franchisers or other entrepreneurs may see a name change in the future for them, or product line addition.
Charles Watson (23:43):
Tropical Smoothie might even see something even newer in the future. You never know, Tom. But Tom, there’s more that meets the eye, because guess what? There’s been more than one name change. We have been in business 26 years. The business started as Tropical Smoothie. Then the next name was Tropical Smoothie Cafe and Deli. We had about four years of that.
(24:05):
Our two founders, Eric Jenrich and David Walker. Eric was a Blimpie subs and salads franchisee. David was a Subway franchisee. So at one point in time, Tropical Smoothie Cafe and Deli looked like a modern day Jersey Mike’s next to a modern day Smoothie King under the same roof. So we had a little run like that, but obviously we continued to progress the menu and get into a little bit more of an ownable space in terms of our products, et cetera.
(24:31):
The cafe piece, probably eight years ago, something like that. And it doesn’t matter what you tell the consumer. They’re going to call you whatever they want. I’ve heard us called Trop Smoothie, Tropical Smoothie, TSC, right? TSC would be good, but there’s a company called Tractor Supply Company that doesn’t like it when we say TSC.
(24:49):
The cafe piece, and if you look at our logo, the cafe is bigger. Why? We’re trying to … Tropical Smoothie, you know we have smoothies, right? We really wanted to accentuate the food aspect of our menu. Our business mix right now is 60% smoothie sales, 40% food sales. Guess how much that’s changed over the past five years? Not at all. Not at all. So we got it up to 40%, and that seems to be about the mix that really works for us, right? At the end of the day, we are a smoothie first brand. That is what people know us for, that is what they come for.
(25:21):
But our innovation and some of the things we do on the food side, we think adds a lot of value. And guess what? The whole reason Eric and David as founders added food was because when they started Tropical Smoothie, they had the same issue they had back in the day with Subway and with Blimpie, they couldn’t drive enough sales. And when they were just doing smoothie, they couldn’t drive enough sales. So they added the food component, and we’re now modern day Tropical Smoothie Cafe.
(25:45):
So the only advice I would have to other entrepreneurs that have brands, early is better than late. The more units you have, and the more franchisees that have to change out a $10,000 sign, the better. So try to think through that as best you can. But there is no way over the course of 15, 20, 25 years there won’t be changes to your brand that make you think about should we do a name change or at a minimum, how do we change the branding? And that’s a challenge that we all face to stay top of mind and on point with our guests, our consumers.
Dr. Tom DuFore (26:17):
And so that’s our final clip as we wrap up our top franchise podcasts and brings our episode to an end. So I’m wishing you and your families a very Merry Christmas and as well as a Happy Hanukkah. And I hope that as the year draws to a conclusion, you take a moment to reflect on your wins or your makes and misses and accomplishments throughout the year.
(26:46):
And finally, please make sure you subscribe to our podcast and give us a review. And remember, if you or anyone you know might be ready to franchise your business or take their franchise company to the next level, please connect with us at bigskyfranchiseteam.com. Thanks for tuning in, and we look forward to having you back for our very final episode of 2024 as we look to enter into the new year. Have a great holiday, everyone. Take care.