March 15, 2025 • 23 mins
In this full episode of the Franchise Freedom Podcast, Giuseppe Grammatico interviews Spike Albrecht, Director of Development for Art of Drawers! Learn all about this exciting franchise opportunity in the booming home organization and renovation sector. Discover the ideal owner profile, growth potential, and support systems that make Art of Drawers a standout franchise. Considering franchising? This episode is a MUST-WATCH! Choose the right path at https://ggthefranchiseguide.com
DISCLAIMER: The information on this podcast is for general information purposes only. Franchising involves risk and careful consideration should be given before making any decisions.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Well, I guess we can startthere.
(00:01):
My real name is not Spike justfor everybody listening.
My parents were not that crazy.
So Spike's a nickname.
Got the nickname when I was fiveyears old.
I got my first pair of baseballspikes growing up.
Loved them.
I was at that crazy little kid.
I had two older brothers.
So I was a wild child.
I wore my baseball spikes tolike school church out to eat.
Everybody just started callingme spike now.
(00:21):
I'm 32 years old and I justcan't shake it, man.
Now it may suck a little bitearly on when you're out there
in it, doing some of thoseappointments, but as I mean,
like anything worth having it,it takes time and there's some
hard work involved, but I dothink there's a great
opportunity to scale and removeyourself from the business
quickly so you can focus on X,Y, and Z to grow it.
Cause at the end of the day,we're not just trying to sell
(00:43):
people franchises.
We're awarding them.
And we need them to besuccessful in order for us to be
successful.
Welcome to the Franchise FreedomPodcast, where you can escape
the corporate trap throughfranchise ownership.
Here's your host, GiuseppeGrammatico, The Franchise Guide.
welcome to the Franchise FreedomPodcast.
(01:04):
I'm your host, GiuseppeGrammatico, your Franchise
Guide, the show where we helpcorporate executives experience
time and financial freedom viafranchising.
Thanks for joining us.
Super excited for our guesttoday.
But before I introduce my guestswanted to thank the audience and
everyone listening in we reallyappreciate your feedback.
I know you wanted to hear fromother people you know as opposed
(01:25):
to just me and we were bringingon franchise companies.
We're bringing on fundingAttorney CPAs to give feedback
as we know we polled theaudience and a lot of you have
told us that You are first timeor looking to be first time
business owner.
So super excited This is allabout education This is all
about, inspiring people to lookinto hiring themselves and
(01:47):
owning a business.
Go to the website,ggthefranchiseguide.
com, you can book a call there,you can listen to 220 previous
episodes.
Our guest today, I'm gonna bringhim on here, is Spike Albrecht
from Art of Drawers.
Spike, welcome to the show.
Yes, sir.
Yeah, thanks for having me, man.
I'm looking forward to it.
I'm really excited give theaudience maybe a little bit of a
background, a little bit of abio on how you got hooked up
(02:08):
with art of drawers and maybe alittle bit of background into
your kind of franchise journey.
Yeah, for sure.
Definitely an interestingjourney stumbled into the, to
the franchise space, like mostpeople.
But born and raised in NorthwestIndiana went to the university
of Michigan for undergrad didgrad school at Purdue
university.
I was actually fortunate enough.
I played basketball in college.
That was my first true love postcollege, bounced around was In
(02:32):
the business world for a littlebit, doing some medical sales,
then got back into coaching wasstruggling to figure out what I
wanted to do.
Hadn't really done much outsideof basketball for much of my
life.
So I reverted back to hoopscause that was really all I
knew.
And it was one thing I knew Iwas good at.
So I was coaching for like fouror five years, but ultimately
decided that.
And for those of you who arelistening, who don't know, like
(02:53):
college basketball is anabsolute grind.
It's nonstop.
So I knew that's not what Iwanted for the next 30 years,
late nights, weekends.
So I shifted to get back intothe business world.
I connected with a friend andmentor from the university of
Michigan called john Rachi.
John played football at michiganand he connected me with a group
called the rep him group.
Like he started introducing meto the franchise space.
(03:15):
He works for a company calledFran Worth.
So he had started connecting mewith some different franchise
consultants like yourself andthen the development firms,
after learning about the rolesand responsibilities and what
you were doing on the day to daybasis, I was like, okay, this is
something I could see myselfdoing and getting excited about.
So I connected with rep I'mabout a little over two years
ago.
We're a franchise developmentfirm.
(03:35):
We partner with emerging brandslike art of drawers, and then I
head up development for AOD.
Have been working with them forabout a year and a half now it's
been an awesome journey.
I love the space.
I love what I do.
I get to, work with great folks,probably like the many people
listening in right now comingfrom corporate America, but it's
just a really cool gig.
I mean, it's very gratifying.
I always say the who, not how,who do you know, Dan Sullivan
(03:57):
wrote a book from strategiccoach and it's who, it's
leveraging those relationships.
I have a son that's a junior inhigh school, looking to attend
college.
So introducing them to variouspeople, just for exposure to
learn about how do I, let melearn a little bit about
computer science or finance andthings like that.
So love, love that story.
I guess, tell us a little bitabout what is or what does art
(04:17):
of drawers the franchise do?
Yeah.
So I'm the director of franchisedevelopment for art of drawers.
AOD is a service brand.
So we specialize in custompullout drawers for kitchens,
pantries, and bathrooms.
We also do cabinet lighting andcabinet refacing.
So what I tell folks is, we'remerging two sectors.
We're merging the homeorganizational piece, which if
(04:39):
you can see my background, thedrawers retrofit into existing
cabinetry.
So we grow, we go in and helpfolks re imagine their space,
customers who are looking for,more organization, more
accessibility, more storage.
We help provide that through ourcustom solutions.
And then we also do cabinetlighting and cabinet refacing,
which is going to be more of theaesthetics that home renovation
space.
For folks who Want to get newcabinets or, transform the look
(05:01):
and feel of their kitchen, butdon't want to spend, 70, 80, a
hundred thousand dollarsrefacing is a really good option
along with lighting, because itjust spices up, your space gives
it a new look and feel, and it'susually a fraction of the price.
I bring a lot of franchisecompanies on this is not
necessarily to promote thebrands in that, this is the
brand you have to look at.
(05:22):
It's really to give an outlineas to the different types of
franchise models.
Not everyone, as we're going todive into here in a second, is a
good fit for every brand.
Each franchise company islooking for an ideal franchise
avatar.
For example, that may be someonethat needs to be full time in
the business versus part time.
(05:42):
So can you talk to us about, sosomeone is just new to
franchising who is the idealfranchise candidate?
For sure.
Yeah, that's, I think that's themost important thing as you're
evaluating brands, right?
For us, it's definitely moreowner operator or full time,
right?
meaning we want you to beinvolved in the day to day.
I would say the differentavatars and personas, we're
looking for, it really comesdown to two things because of
(06:05):
the way that our business modelis structured.
You have to be comfortable andenjoy building and managing
teams as an owner with art ofdrawers.
You're putting together, a minicrew per se of designers and
installers.
They're both 1099, typically ourowners start out, they run
design appointments or salesappointments.
And then you bring on aninstaller that is 1099.
(06:25):
They're typically, a localhandyman, kitchen and closet
guy, whatever it is.
But you're managing that crewand then there's also a sales
and networking component.
So for folks out there, if thisspace is of interest to you and
you love getting out in thecommunity, right?
Attending networking events andworking home shows, trade shows,
art festivals.
Farmers markets, things likethat.
This is a really greatopportunity as with most service
(06:47):
brands, being able to get outand do some of that networking
and grassroots efforts on yourown is in my opinion, I think
that's what separates the topperformers from the rest of the
system.
I love that.
And I always tell people whenyou're looking at a franchise
company like AOD Look at yourrole initially, but then look at
your role, six to 12 months downthe road.
Initially, it's that learningcurve, especially if you've
(07:09):
never owned the business.
You're just trying to figure outhow to read maybe a profit and
loss.
Maybe that's somethingcompletely new to you or running
a, a campaign on Facebook oroverseeing marketing or whatever
the case may be.
So look into kind of what thatinitially looks like and then
later on.
What do you see?
A year down the road what doesthe life of a franchise owner
look like?
Yeah, it'll look a lot differentfor sure.
(07:30):
It's a very scalable businessand most of the people that
we're bringing on now and just aquick, background.
Like we're at about a year and ahalf in, we got 27 franchisees
for right around 95 locations.
I've worked with them all andtaken them through the process.
So you're starting to see someof those traits and tendencies,
the first three to six months,everyone's starting out involved
in the business, learning andunderstanding our products,
(07:50):
process solutions.
Getting out and getting theirhands dirty, but nine, 12, 15
months in, the ultimate goal isto step out and build the
business.
It's the old saying, spend time,on the business and not in it.
And that's where we're gettingto right now with a couple of
our more tenured folks in thesystem.
In 12, 15, 18 months in, it'smore so managing and overseeing
your team.
Right.
(08:10):
Doing like observationappointments, ride alongs,
giving constructive feedback,things like that.
But it's really getting out anddoing some of the networking,
connecting with realtors, homebuilders, countertop companies,
flooring companies, creatingyour referral network, doing
some of those things on the bizdev side, that's what we deem
more of our empire builders.
Like those are the folks whoreally want to get out and buy
(08:31):
three, four, five, sixterritories, because they see
the scalability.
In the vision here, two, three,four years down the road.
Now it may suck a little bitearly on when you're out there
in it, doing some of thoseappointments, but as I mean,
like anything worth having it,it takes time and there's some
hard work involved, but I dothink there's a great
opportunity to scale and removeyourself from the business
(08:51):
quickly so you can focus on X,Y, and Z to grow it.
there is something to say.
I ran my business full time.
My franchise, when I first gotstarted.
And you tend to learn thebusiness much faster, managing
it from afar.
Just learning every aspect.
Maybe I wore the hats, all thehats too long.
And that's a mistake I made 20years ago.
(09:11):
I got a better appreciation ofhow long a job should take and,
the different types ofmarketing, I've worked for a
major investment firm.
I never had to do marketing.
It was all done for me.
We just worked with the clientsassigned to us.
It was really nice and you getthat better appreciation, but I
think you most importantly, youget to figure out.
I have certain skill sets, butthese are the roles I really
(09:32):
enjoy in the business.
Like some people, maybe theydon't like going on a sales
appointment.
They'll do it the first year toget it up and running, but they
love the networking aspect.
Yeah.
The chamber of events and thingslike that.
So are you seeing that peoplegoing and maybe envisioning one
role and then switching over anddoing something else?
Yeah.
I think, until you get in, younever really know, Until you
start playing around with it andfiguring out what you like, what
(09:53):
you don't like.
With our model, a lot of thefeedback I've gotten early on
from franchisees it's soimportant, I think with any
business, is finding good peopleand how do I hire and keep in
retain top talent.
So a lot of people early on,with art of drawers, they're
like, all right, I want toremove myself as quickly as
possible.
Let me just go out and grab acouple of designers installers.
Cause it's a fun gig.
People are interested.
(10:13):
So you'll get.
These 1099 folks but until youdo a little bit of your, of it
yourself, and you really knowand understand the business, you
might not know what you'relooking for.
So I do think to your point,like getting out there, doing
it, whether that's design, ourfolks aren't doing installs.
Like we're not having our ownersinstall drawers and whatnot, but
(10:34):
they come to training along withtheir installer.
They learn it, right.
It just helps from a credibilitystandpoint.
And it just changes, itdrastically improves that
learning curve and it just helpsyou recruit, that much better
in, in my opinion, based on whatI've seen.
Right.
That makes a lot of sense.
Conversations that I have, soI'll tie in.
So for everyone, anyonelistening in, I like to tie in,
I don't, I, everything isprivate.
I don't give people's namesobviously, but share
(10:57):
conversations I have because noteveryone is you think you're
isolated.
I'm the only one with thisquestion, for example, I
listened to the president of theIFA.
I did a podcast, I think it wasabout a month ago and he was
talking about, I think threequarters of people out there
have expressed interest inowning a business.
This is a survey done, I believein the U S I'm not sure if it
(11:19):
included Canada, but we'll justsay the U S.
And then three quarters of thosepeople never actually move
forward because they don't evenknow where to start.
And so I like to tie thesethings in and say, Hey, there is
a process to learn, but if theprocess is not to learn, if the
brand is a good fit for you, weneed to make sure a franchise is
(11:39):
a good fit.
Right.
And then if a franchise is agood fit, what is this?
Ideal business look like.
And we talked about expectationsfrom your brand, who is a good
fit and things like that.
So in all the conversationswe're having it's all about
reverse engineering, figuringout what you want, why you want
the business, your access tocapital, the time you can spend
(11:59):
in the business.
So I want to just encourageeveryone to take that step back
and really, give that somethought and.
Use going back to who, not howspeak with, if you're speaking
with a, another franchise, heasked them about their feedback
or whoever your franchiseconsultant is, if you're working
with a consultant ask thosequestions.
I always like to ask, where thebusiness is going.
So can you talk about anythingnew and exciting?
(12:22):
I'm not sure what you can share,but I always ask, talk to the
captain steering the ship whereis the brand kind of moving
towards anything you can sharewould be great.
Yeah, for sure.
Up till about last year.
Our core products and I wouldsay most of our sales and
revenue came from, the custompullout drawers that you're
seeing in my background.
So we added the refacing and thelighting.
(12:43):
About a little over a year ago.
So that's definitely still alittle bit new, still working
out some kinks and fine tune inthat process, but that's really
new and exciting.
For folks who aren't familiarwith refacing and what that is,
that's the drawer fronts alongwith the hardware and hinges.
That's much bigger tickets.
It's a much more popular sectoras well.
So that's something thatfranchisees are really excited
about.
Obviously more money, less jobsgets people pretty excited.
(13:06):
But also the technology.
So our founder, Alan Young isvery forward thinking when it
comes to tech.
So we just rolled out a new 3ddesign software that we'll use
for our in home consultations toimprove the customer experience.
It's interactive.
We rolled that out in Q4 of lastyear.
So that's built into ourproprietary software.
And I know he's super into AIand leveraging chat GPT and all
(13:27):
those sorts of things.
That's a little bit over myhead.
I'll leave that to Alan toexplain, but we are, having, we
are leaning heavily into AI andchat GPT in terms of sales calls
and, role playing from a salestraining aspect.
I think we got a lot of new andexciting things on the brink
moving forward.
And Alan's an innovator, likehe's always looking to implement
and test out the latest andgreatest.
So we'll see what he's gotcooking up for the remainder of
(13:49):
2025.
I love that, reinvesting back inthe brand, helping the
franchisees become moreprofitable.
And those additional revenuestreams I think is big in any
brand Some people are alreadytalking about second brands and
I said, well, you may not needthat second brand if you're able
to, there's so much more tooffer.
You already have that customer.
The upsell is much easier thanbringing something completely
(14:09):
different.
Build, building thatrelationship is going to be
priceless.
And then obviously thatcustomer, if there's less
vendors, less touch points, lessinvoicing, it just makes the the
experience so much morepleasurable makes it much
simpler.
what advice would you give topeople in that initial stage,
trying to figure out if afranchise ownership is the right
fit.
Yeah, not just trying to plugyou here, but in all honesty, I
(14:32):
would start with, you got to usea franchise consultant in my
opinion.
I mean, there's just so manydifferent brands and so much
information to sift through.
I was new to the franchise spacetwo, two and a half years ago,
and I was probably in the sameboat as a lot of people.
I didn't know what the heck itwas, Like I didn't understand
the franchise consultant sidedevelopment, all the different
brands and concepts out there.
(14:52):
So I do think you guys do agreat job working with
candidates and helping themnarrow down their search based
on, strengths and weaknesses andgetting them aligned with the
right brands.
that's the most important thing,at the end of the day to help
them be successful.
But then as you start goingthrough the process, you guys
will get them lined up with acouple different brands I always
tell people this when I'm takingthem through our process with
Art of Drawers.
I think the most important thingis you got to talk to current
(15:15):
franchisees and then you got totalk to the leadership team,
right?
Like I, I think we have a greatgroup of franchisees, but you
got to hear from them.
I tell people, obviously, I'mthe sales guy, I'm heading up
development.
I love art drawers.
I'm going to tell you thebrand's great, but you got to
talk to the current franchiseesto hear.
What they like, what they don'tlike.
Was there anything, that theydidn't realize going into, the
(15:35):
conversations leading up tobuying the franchise, I think
those are all super helpful,conversation.
Cause at the end of the day,we're not just trying to sell
people franchises.
We're awarding them.
And we need them to besuccessful in order for us to be
successful.
And I know that's how I think ofit.
I know that's how you think ofit, Alan and the leadership team
at art of drawers.
So I would just take your time,do your due diligence.
Hone in on a couple of brandsand then just really do a deep
(15:57):
dive and see if this is theright business for you.
Yeah.
I like that.
And it's everyone's situationsdifferent.
It's not just one size fits all.
You want to make sure that thefits there really, a lot of
people get really fixated on thewidget.
What's the shiny object outthere.
I always try to bring peopleback and say, don't worry about
the widget.
Let's figure out what ideallythat business looks like from
(16:18):
the standpoint of.
Do I want a retail location ordo I want to, work this from
home?
Do I want, a hundred employeesor a big group or something
smaller?
So what would be your advice forpeople looking at the widget or,
they're looking at and sayingart of drawers and kitchens.
I have no experience.
I worked, I was, I'm a doctor orI worked on wall street.
(16:39):
What do you say to those peoplethat just are so fixated on the
widget or feel like they needexperience?
Yeah, I would say, I mean, Ithink most importantly, what do
you want your day in the life tolook like and then what's
important to you in terms of,freedom and flexibility, do you
want a business with brick andmortar or low overhead, do you
want full time employees or1099, right?
(17:00):
I think there's pros and cons toboth.
So that helps with the riskassessment in terms Of what
you're looking for.
But yeah, I mean, I wouldn't getfixated on the shiny new object.
Take your time.
Do your due diligence and thenreally go through the process.
So we touched on a little bitabout, what, you want your roles
and responsibilities to bewithin the business.
And then for the other part, youmentioned about, people who are
(17:20):
worried about not havingexperience, within that certain
industry or sector.
That's why you franchise, right?
Like we have all the systems andprocesses.
We have the playbook to supportyou.
I can tell you with Art of Wehave 27 franchisees.
I'm not sure if any of them camefrom the home service space or
have a background in design or,in installing drawers, right?
(17:41):
Like that's part of putting thatteam together.
I can't speak for every brandout there, but I know with Art
of Drawers.
If you're passionate abouthelping people get now in the
community and networking andyou're comfortable building and
managing teams, right, that's agreat fit for us because we
don't want you to be the world'sbest designer or the world's
best installer.
We want you to learn it in thefirst 2, months to really get a
(18:04):
firm grasp around the business,but then, you recruit, you help
coach and train and mentor folksand you put the pieces in place
and focus on what you're goodat, which is typically, managing
folks, managing teams, and thensales and networking in the
community.
Yeah.
And that's crucial, management.
And that's something thefranchisor is going to teach
you.
You're going to come with thatskillset sales.
(18:24):
It depends on the role thatyou're going to be playing in
the business, but that's superimportant.
And you'll notice.
Just from working with othercompanies and speaking with
them, when you look at afranchise and you back away six,
six to 12 months, a lot of theroles are going to be similar.
It's going to be oversight of ateam.
You may have a general managerin place.
It's reviewing KPIs.
It's networking at chamber.
(18:45):
So you're going to see a lot of.
Similar kind of characteristicsas to what your role is going to
be.
Not saying the brands are goingto be similar, but just your
role in general, some brandswill offer you more, some will
offer turnkey marketing withouta call center, So those are
things that to dive into andsay, what is going to be,
because that's going to alsoaffect your investment.
It's going to affect your headcount, how many people you're
(19:06):
going to need in the office, ifthere's an office involved.
for us, we're not brick andmortar.
So art of George is definitely alittle bit of a lower overhead
type investment.
There's very few fixed costswithin our model.
We do have the turnkey marketingthat you mentioned.
We do have the call center, sowe help run their digital and
print, we do all the SEO PPC, werun their print campaigns.
We have the call center that'sin house that handles lead gen
(19:27):
customer service.
The model's built for you guysto focus on sales and growth,
right?
And then it's done veryintentionally so that we handle
a lot of those day to dayoperations.
So you guys don't get boggeddown with that.
That folks can get out there andgrow and scale their business.
And do what they want to do,which is make money.
I'm going to go to training, getsuper excited.
(19:47):
And I get back to the office andall of a sudden I'm like, wait a
second, What do I do here?
All right.
I need retraining.
So what does support initialsupport, ongoing support look
like?
Yeah, we do the initial supportand, pre training, probably
similar to a lot of differentcompanies out there.
We'll get them queued up fortheir onboarding.
They'll come out to Atlanta.
They spend five full days withus in person.
(20:08):
That's franchise partnertraining.
We do three days of installertraining.
So that's also in person.
They have to go through thesales training, all the
different design and processesthere.
And then there's the ongoingvirtual training.
So we do a weekly huddles or,zoom calls within the whole
system.
And then there's bi weekly checkins with the marketing team, but
considering, and I know, thisconsidering that Art of Drawers
(20:29):
is still more of an emergingbrand.
They're getting a ton of supportfrom the corporate team.
And home office in Atlanta.
Folks in our system aren't justa number like they have direct
access to Alan Young, who's afounder in the whole C suite
team, Leslie Josh, who's ourchief marketing officer.
So there's a ton of supportthere.
And then, it's nice that ourfounder, this is his second time
(20:50):
building a very successfulfranchise brand.
he started a similar conceptback in 2008.
Similar to art of drawers grewthat to over 200, 250 locations
and then sold it.
So this is really his secondventure in the franchise space
within a home service sector.
Having a a leader and a founderwho understands how to grow and
scale, but most importantly,support franchisees and make
(21:12):
sure that they're successful.
He's willing to go above andbeyond to make sure that we
provide the support need there.
I love that.
Yeah.
I always say, learn about thecaptain steering the ship and
this is not the first rodeo.
And they've done this before.
Looking into track record, evenwith an emerging brand has done
it in a very similar space.
The end of these shows, I alwayslike to wrap up and to end off
(21:33):
with a fun fact.
Oh boy, fun fact.
We'll keep it PG.
Yeah, I'm just kidding.
I'm just kidding.
No, for sure.
Fun fact about Spike.
Okay.
Well, I guess we can startthere.
My real name is not Spike justfor everybody listening.
My parents were not that crazy.
So Spike's a nickname.
Got the nickname when I was fiveyears old.
I got my first pair of baseballspikes growing up.
(21:54):
Loved them.
I was that crazy little kid.
I had two older brothers.
So I was a wild child.
I wore my baseball spikes tolike school church out to eat.
Everybody just started callingme spike now.
I'm 32 years old and I justcan't shake it, man.
So I'm still going by spike.
Hey, it's memorable.
It stands out.
Right.
Yeah.
And I didn't, I mean, obviouslyyou send us the notes, but yeah,
(22:14):
it's like, I didn't know, Ididn't know that story prior to
us scheduling the podcast.
That's funny.
Well, listen I hope everyonefound this super helpful.
As I mentioned, I'm bringing onother franchise companies.
We're going to have brick andmortar concepts.
I want you to experience exactlya day in the life, what it looks
like, your roles and just abouteverything else.
And I hope everyone finds thissuper helpful.
(22:35):
we poll, and ask questions toour audience.
Instead of me figuring out whatI think is important, I want to
know what your questions are.
This show was created because ofthat.
We really appreciate yoursupport.
Spike.
Thank you again.
For joining us today maybe we'lldo a follow up with updates end
of year.
And yeah, really appreciateeverything and we'll definitely
talk soon.
Yes, sir.
I appreciate it.
Thank you.
Take care.
(22:57):
If you want to learn how to makethe transition from corporate to
owning your franchise, joinGiuseppe on the next episode.
You can also follow on allsocial media platforms and
achieve financial and timefreedom today.
Well, I guess we can startthere.
(00:01):
My real name is not Spike justfor everybody listening.
My parents were not that crazy.
So Spike's a nickname.
Got the nickname when I was fiveyears old.
I got my first pair of baseballspikes growing up.
Loved them.
I was at that crazy little kid.
I had two older brothers.
So I was a wild child.
I wore my baseball spikes tolike school church out to eat.
Everybody just started callingme spike now.
(00:21):
I'm 32 years old and I justcan't shake it, man.
Now it may suck a little bitearly on when you're out there
in it, doing some of thoseappointments, but as I mean,
like anything worth having it,it takes time and there's some
hard work involved, but I dothink there's a great
opportunity to scale and removeyourself from the business
quickly so you can focus on X,Y, and Z to grow it.
Cause at the end of the day,we're not just trying to sell
(00:43):
people franchises.
We're awarding them.
And we need them to besuccessful in order for us to be
successful.
Welcome to the Franchise FreedomPodcast, where you can escape
the corporate trap throughfranchise ownership.
Here's your host, GiuseppeGrammatico, The Franchise Guide.
welcome to the Franchise FreedomPodcast.
(01:04):
I'm your host, GiuseppeGrammatico, your Franchise
Guide, the show where we helpcorporate executives experience
time and financial freedom viafranchising.
Thanks for joining us.
Super excited for our guesttoday.
But before I introduce my guestswanted to thank the audience and
everyone listening in we reallyappreciate your feedback.
I know you wanted to hear fromother people you know as opposed
(01:25):
to just me and we were bringingon franchise companies.
We're bringing on fundingAttorney CPAs to give feedback
as we know we polled theaudience and a lot of you have
told us that You are first timeor looking to be first time
business owner.
So super excited This is allabout education This is all
about, inspiring people to lookinto hiring themselves and
(01:47):
owning a business.
Go to the website,ggthefranchiseguide.
com, you can book a call there,you can listen to 220 previous
episodes.
Our guest today, I'm gonna bringhim on here, is Spike Albrecht
from Art of Drawers.
Spike, welcome to the show.
Yes, sir.
Yeah, thanks for having me, man.
I'm looking forward to it.
I'm really excited give theaudience maybe a little bit of a
background, a little bit of abio on how you got hooked up
(02:08):
with art of drawers and maybe alittle bit of background into
your kind of franchise journey.
Yeah, for sure.
Definitely an interestingjourney stumbled into the, to
the franchise space, like mostpeople.
But born and raised in NorthwestIndiana went to the university
of Michigan for undergrad didgrad school at Purdue
university.
I was actually fortunate enough.
I played basketball in college.
That was my first true love postcollege, bounced around was In
(02:32):
the business world for a littlebit, doing some medical sales,
then got back into coaching wasstruggling to figure out what I
wanted to do.
Hadn't really done much outsideof basketball for much of my
life.
So I reverted back to hoopscause that was really all I
knew.
And it was one thing I knew Iwas good at.
So I was coaching for like fouror five years, but ultimately
decided that.
And for those of you who arelistening, who don't know, like
(02:53):
college basketball is anabsolute grind.
It's nonstop.
So I knew that's not what Iwanted for the next 30 years,
late nights, weekends.
So I shifted to get back intothe business world.
I connected with a friend andmentor from the university of
Michigan called john Rachi.
John played football at michiganand he connected me with a group
called the rep him group.
Like he started introducing meto the franchise space.
(03:15):
He works for a company calledFran Worth.
So he had started connecting mewith some different franchise
consultants like yourself andthen the development firms,
after learning about the rolesand responsibilities and what
you were doing on the day to daybasis, I was like, okay, this is
something I could see myselfdoing and getting excited about.
So I connected with rep I'mabout a little over two years
ago.
We're a franchise developmentfirm.
(03:35):
We partner with emerging brandslike art of drawers, and then I
head up development for AOD.
Have been working with them forabout a year and a half now it's
been an awesome journey.
I love the space.
I love what I do.
I get to, work with great folks,probably like the many people
listening in right now comingfrom corporate America, but it's
just a really cool gig.
I mean, it's very gratifying.
I always say the who, not how,who do you know, Dan Sullivan
(03:57):
wrote a book from strategiccoach and it's who, it's
leveraging those relationships.
I have a son that's a junior inhigh school, looking to attend
college.
So introducing them to variouspeople, just for exposure to
learn about how do I, let melearn a little bit about
computer science or finance andthings like that.
So love, love that story.
I guess, tell us a little bitabout what is or what does art
(04:17):
of drawers the franchise do?
Yeah.
So I'm the director of franchisedevelopment for art of drawers.
AOD is a service brand.
So we specialize in custompullout drawers for kitchens,
pantries, and bathrooms.
We also do cabinet lighting andcabinet refacing.
So what I tell folks is, we'remerging two sectors.
We're merging the homeorganizational piece, which if
(04:39):
you can see my background, thedrawers retrofit into existing
cabinetry.
So we grow, we go in and helpfolks re imagine their space,
customers who are looking for,more organization, more
accessibility, more storage.
We help provide that through ourcustom solutions.
And then we also do cabinetlighting and cabinet refacing,
which is going to be more of theaesthetics that home renovation
space.
For folks who Want to get newcabinets or, transform the look
(05:01):
and feel of their kitchen, butdon't want to spend, 70, 80, a
hundred thousand dollarsrefacing is a really good option
along with lighting, because itjust spices up, your space gives
it a new look and feel, and it'susually a fraction of the price.
I bring a lot of franchisecompanies on this is not
necessarily to promote thebrands in that, this is the
brand you have to look at.
(05:22):
It's really to give an outlineas to the different types of
franchise models.
Not everyone, as we're going todive into here in a second, is a
good fit for every brand.
Each franchise company islooking for an ideal franchise
avatar.
For example, that may be someonethat needs to be full time in
the business versus part time.
(05:42):
So can you talk to us about, sosomeone is just new to
franchising who is the idealfranchise candidate?
For sure.
Yeah, that's, I think that's themost important thing as you're
evaluating brands, right?
For us, it's definitely moreowner operator or full time,
right?
meaning we want you to beinvolved in the day to day.
I would say the differentavatars and personas, we're
looking for, it really comesdown to two things because of
(06:05):
the way that our business modelis structured.
You have to be comfortable andenjoy building and managing
teams as an owner with art ofdrawers.
You're putting together, a minicrew per se of designers and
installers.
They're both 1099, typically ourowners start out, they run
design appointments or salesappointments.
And then you bring on aninstaller that is 1099.
(06:25):
They're typically, a localhandyman, kitchen and closet
guy, whatever it is.
But you're managing that crewand then there's also a sales
and networking component.
So for folks out there, if thisspace is of interest to you and
you love getting out in thecommunity, right?
Attending networking events andworking home shows, trade shows,
art festivals.
Farmers markets, things likethat.
This is a really greatopportunity as with most service
(06:47):
brands, being able to get outand do some of that networking
and grassroots efforts on yourown is in my opinion, I think
that's what separates the topperformers from the rest of the
system.
I love that.
And I always tell people whenyou're looking at a franchise
company like AOD Look at yourrole initially, but then look at
your role, six to 12 months downthe road.
Initially, it's that learningcurve, especially if you've
(07:09):
never owned the business.
You're just trying to figure outhow to read maybe a profit and
loss.
Maybe that's somethingcompletely new to you or running
a, a campaign on Facebook oroverseeing marketing or whatever
the case may be.
So look into kind of what thatinitially looks like and then
later on.
What do you see?
A year down the road what doesthe life of a franchise owner
look like?
Yeah, it'll look a lot differentfor sure.
(07:30):
It's a very scalable businessand most of the people that
we're bringing on now and just aquick, background.
Like we're at about a year and ahalf in, we got 27 franchisees
for right around 95 locations.
I've worked with them all andtaken them through the process.
So you're starting to see someof those traits and tendencies,
the first three to six months,everyone's starting out involved
in the business, learning andunderstanding our products,
(07:50):
process solutions.
Getting out and getting theirhands dirty, but nine, 12, 15
months in, the ultimate goal isto step out and build the
business.
It's the old saying, spend time,on the business and not in it.
And that's where we're gettingto right now with a couple of
our more tenured folks in thesystem.
In 12, 15, 18 months in, it'smore so managing and overseeing
your team.
Right.
(08:10):
Doing like observationappointments, ride alongs,
giving constructive feedback,things like that.
But it's really getting out anddoing some of the networking,
connecting with realtors, homebuilders, countertop companies,
flooring companies, creatingyour referral network, doing
some of those things on the bizdev side, that's what we deem
more of our empire builders.
Like those are the folks whoreally want to get out and buy
(08:31):
three, four, five, sixterritories, because they see
the scalability.
In the vision here, two, three,four years down the road.
Now it may suck a little bitearly on when you're out there
in it, doing some of thoseappointments, but as I mean,
like anything worth having it,it takes time and there's some
hard work involved, but I dothink there's a great
opportunity to scale and removeyourself from the business
(08:51):
quickly so you can focus on X,Y, and Z to grow it.
there is something to say.
I ran my business full time.
My franchise, when I first gotstarted.
And you tend to learn thebusiness much faster, managing
it from afar.
Just learning every aspect.
Maybe I wore the hats, all thehats too long.
And that's a mistake I made 20years ago.
(09:11):
I got a better appreciation ofhow long a job should take and,
the different types ofmarketing, I've worked for a
major investment firm.
I never had to do marketing.
It was all done for me.
We just worked with the clientsassigned to us.
It was really nice and you getthat better appreciation, but I
think you most importantly, youget to figure out.
I have certain skill sets, butthese are the roles I really
(09:32):
enjoy in the business.
Like some people, maybe theydon't like going on a sales
appointment.
They'll do it the first year toget it up and running, but they
love the networking aspect.
Yeah.
The chamber of events and thingslike that.
So are you seeing that peoplegoing and maybe envisioning one
role and then switching over anddoing something else?
Yeah.
I think, until you get in, younever really know, Until you
start playing around with it andfiguring out what you like, what
(09:53):
you don't like.
With our model, a lot of thefeedback I've gotten early on
from franchisees it's soimportant, I think with any
business, is finding good peopleand how do I hire and keep in
retain top talent.
So a lot of people early on,with art of drawers, they're
like, all right, I want toremove myself as quickly as
possible.
Let me just go out and grab acouple of designers installers.
Cause it's a fun gig.
People are interested.
(10:13):
So you'll get.
These 1099 folks but until youdo a little bit of your, of it
yourself, and you really knowand understand the business, you
might not know what you'relooking for.
So I do think to your point,like getting out there, doing
it, whether that's design, ourfolks aren't doing installs.
Like we're not having our ownersinstall drawers and whatnot, but
(10:34):
they come to training along withtheir installer.
They learn it, right.
It just helps from a credibilitystandpoint.
And it just changes, itdrastically improves that
learning curve and it just helpsyou recruit, that much better
in, in my opinion, based on whatI've seen.
Right.
That makes a lot of sense.
Conversations that I have, soI'll tie in.
So for everyone, anyonelistening in, I like to tie in,
I don't, I, everything isprivate.
I don't give people's namesobviously, but share
(10:57):
conversations I have because noteveryone is you think you're
isolated.
I'm the only one with thisquestion, for example, I
listened to the president of theIFA.
I did a podcast, I think it wasabout a month ago and he was
talking about, I think threequarters of people out there
have expressed interest inowning a business.
This is a survey done, I believein the U S I'm not sure if it
(11:19):
included Canada, but we'll justsay the U S.
And then three quarters of thosepeople never actually move
forward because they don't evenknow where to start.
And so I like to tie thesethings in and say, Hey, there is
a process to learn, but if theprocess is not to learn, if the
brand is a good fit for you, weneed to make sure a franchise is
(11:39):
a good fit.
Right.
And then if a franchise is agood fit, what is this?
Ideal business look like.
And we talked about expectationsfrom your brand, who is a good
fit and things like that.
So in all the conversationswe're having it's all about
reverse engineering, figuringout what you want, why you want
the business, your access tocapital, the time you can spend
(11:59):
in the business.
So I want to just encourageeveryone to take that step back
and really, give that somethought and.
Use going back to who, not howspeak with, if you're speaking
with a, another franchise, heasked them about their feedback
or whoever your franchiseconsultant is, if you're working
with a consultant ask thosequestions.
I always like to ask, where thebusiness is going.
So can you talk about anythingnew and exciting?
(12:22):
I'm not sure what you can share,but I always ask, talk to the
captain steering the ship whereis the brand kind of moving
towards anything you can sharewould be great.
Yeah, for sure.
Up till about last year.
Our core products and I wouldsay most of our sales and
revenue came from, the custompullout drawers that you're
seeing in my background.
So we added the refacing and thelighting.
(12:43):
About a little over a year ago.
So that's definitely still alittle bit new, still working
out some kinks and fine tune inthat process, but that's really
new and exciting.
For folks who aren't familiarwith refacing and what that is,
that's the drawer fronts alongwith the hardware and hinges.
That's much bigger tickets.
It's a much more popular sectoras well.
So that's something thatfranchisees are really excited
about.
Obviously more money, less jobsgets people pretty excited.
(13:06):
But also the technology.
So our founder, Alan Young isvery forward thinking when it
comes to tech.
So we just rolled out a new 3ddesign software that we'll use
for our in home consultations toimprove the customer experience.
It's interactive.
We rolled that out in Q4 of lastyear.
So that's built into ourproprietary software.
And I know he's super into AIand leveraging chat GPT and all
(13:27):
those sorts of things.
That's a little bit over myhead.
I'll leave that to Alan toexplain, but we are, having, we
are leaning heavily into AI andchat GPT in terms of sales calls
and, role playing from a salestraining aspect.
I think we got a lot of new andexciting things on the brink
moving forward.
And Alan's an innovator, likehe's always looking to implement
and test out the latest andgreatest.
So we'll see what he's gotcooking up for the remainder of
(13:49):
2025.
I love that, reinvesting back inthe brand, helping the
franchisees become moreprofitable.
And those additional revenuestreams I think is big in any
brand Some people are alreadytalking about second brands and
I said, well, you may not needthat second brand if you're able
to, there's so much more tooffer.
You already have that customer.
The upsell is much easier thanbringing something completely
(14:09):
different.
Build, building thatrelationship is going to be
priceless.
And then obviously thatcustomer, if there's less
vendors, less touch points, lessinvoicing, it just makes the the
experience so much morepleasurable makes it much
simpler.
what advice would you give topeople in that initial stage,
trying to figure out if afranchise ownership is the right
fit.
Yeah, not just trying to plugyou here, but in all honesty, I
(14:32):
would start with, you got to usea franchise consultant in my
opinion.
I mean, there's just so manydifferent brands and so much
information to sift through.
I was new to the franchise spacetwo, two and a half years ago,
and I was probably in the sameboat as a lot of people.
I didn't know what the heck itwas, Like I didn't understand
the franchise consultant sidedevelopment, all the different
brands and concepts out there.
(14:52):
So I do think you guys do agreat job working with
candidates and helping themnarrow down their search based
on, strengths and weaknesses andgetting them aligned with the
right brands.
that's the most important thing,at the end of the day to help
them be successful.
But then as you start goingthrough the process, you guys
will get them lined up with acouple different brands I always
tell people this when I'm takingthem through our process with
Art of Drawers.
I think the most important thingis you got to talk to current
(15:15):
franchisees and then you got totalk to the leadership team,
right?
Like I, I think we have a greatgroup of franchisees, but you
got to hear from them.
I tell people, obviously, I'mthe sales guy, I'm heading up
development.
I love art drawers.
I'm going to tell you thebrand's great, but you got to
talk to the current franchiseesto hear.
What they like, what they don'tlike.
Was there anything, that theydidn't realize going into, the
(15:35):
conversations leading up tobuying the franchise, I think
those are all super helpful,conversation.
Cause at the end of the day,we're not just trying to sell
people franchises.
We're awarding them.
And we need them to besuccessful in order for us to be
successful.
And I know that's how I think ofit.
I know that's how you think ofit, Alan and the leadership team
at art of drawers.
So I would just take your time,do your due diligence.
Hone in on a couple of brandsand then just really do a deep
(15:57):
dive and see if this is theright business for you.
Yeah.
I like that.
And it's everyone's situationsdifferent.
It's not just one size fits all.
You want to make sure that thefits there really, a lot of
people get really fixated on thewidget.
What's the shiny object outthere.
I always try to bring peopleback and say, don't worry about
the widget.
Let's figure out what ideallythat business looks like from
(16:18):
the standpoint of.
Do I want a retail location ordo I want to, work this from
home?
Do I want, a hundred employeesor a big group or something
smaller?
So what would be your advice forpeople looking at the widget or,
they're looking at and sayingart of drawers and kitchens.
I have no experience.
I worked, I was, I'm a doctor orI worked on wall street.
(16:39):
What do you say to those peoplethat just are so fixated on the
widget or feel like they needexperience?
Yeah, I would say, I mean, Ithink most importantly, what do
you want your day in the life tolook like and then what's
important to you in terms of,freedom and flexibility, do you
want a business with brick andmortar or low overhead, do you
want full time employees or1099, right?
(17:00):
I think there's pros and cons toboth.
So that helps with the riskassessment in terms Of what
you're looking for.
But yeah, I mean, I wouldn't getfixated on the shiny new object.
Take your time.
Do your due diligence and thenreally go through the process.
So we touched on a little bitabout, what, you want your roles
and responsibilities to bewithin the business.
And then for the other part, youmentioned about, people who are
(17:20):
worried about not havingexperience, within that certain
industry or sector.
That's why you franchise, right?
Like we have all the systems andprocesses.
We have the playbook to supportyou.
I can tell you with Art of Wehave 27 franchisees.
I'm not sure if any of them camefrom the home service space or
have a background in design or,in installing drawers, right?
(17:41):
Like that's part of putting thatteam together.
I can't speak for every brandout there, but I know with Art
of Drawers.
If you're passionate abouthelping people get now in the
community and networking andyou're comfortable building and
managing teams, right, that's agreat fit for us because we
don't want you to be the world'sbest designer or the world's
best installer.
We want you to learn it in thefirst 2, months to really get a
(18:04):
firm grasp around the business,but then, you recruit, you help
coach and train and mentor folksand you put the pieces in place
and focus on what you're goodat, which is typically, managing
folks, managing teams, and thensales and networking in the
community.
Yeah.
And that's crucial, management.
And that's something thefranchisor is going to teach
you.
You're going to come with thatskillset sales.
(18:24):
It depends on the role thatyou're going to be playing in
the business, but that's superimportant.
And you'll notice.
Just from working with othercompanies and speaking with
them, when you look at afranchise and you back away six,
six to 12 months, a lot of theroles are going to be similar.
It's going to be oversight of ateam.
You may have a general managerin place.
It's reviewing KPIs.
It's networking at chamber.
(18:45):
So you're going to see a lot of.
Similar kind of characteristicsas to what your role is going to
be.
Not saying the brands are goingto be similar, but just your
role in general, some brandswill offer you more, some will
offer turnkey marketing withouta call center, So those are
things that to dive into andsay, what is going to be,
because that's going to alsoaffect your investment.
It's going to affect your headcount, how many people you're
(19:06):
going to need in the office, ifthere's an office involved.
for us, we're not brick andmortar.
So art of George is definitely alittle bit of a lower overhead
type investment.
There's very few fixed costswithin our model.
We do have the turnkey marketingthat you mentioned.
We do have the call center, sowe help run their digital and
print, we do all the SEO PPC, werun their print campaigns.
We have the call center that'sin house that handles lead gen
(19:27):
customer service.
The model's built for you guysto focus on sales and growth,
right?
And then it's done veryintentionally so that we handle
a lot of those day to dayoperations.
So you guys don't get boggeddown with that.
That folks can get out there andgrow and scale their business.
And do what they want to do,which is make money.
I'm going to go to training, getsuper excited.
(19:47):
And I get back to the office andall of a sudden I'm like, wait a
second, What do I do here?
All right.
I need retraining.
So what does support initialsupport, ongoing support look
like?
Yeah, we do the initial supportand, pre training, probably
similar to a lot of differentcompanies out there.
We'll get them queued up fortheir onboarding.
They'll come out to Atlanta.
They spend five full days withus in person.
(20:08):
That's franchise partnertraining.
We do three days of installertraining.
So that's also in person.
They have to go through thesales training, all the
different design and processesthere.
And then there's the ongoingvirtual training.
So we do a weekly huddles or,zoom calls within the whole
system.
And then there's bi weekly checkins with the marketing team, but
considering, and I know, thisconsidering that Art of Drawers
(20:29):
is still more of an emergingbrand.
They're getting a ton of supportfrom the corporate team.
And home office in Atlanta.
Folks in our system aren't justa number like they have direct
access to Alan Young, who's afounder in the whole C suite
team, Leslie Josh, who's ourchief marketing officer.
So there's a ton of supportthere.
And then, it's nice that ourfounder, this is his second time
(20:50):
building a very successfulfranchise brand.
he started a similar conceptback in 2008.
Similar to art of drawers grewthat to over 200, 250 locations
and then sold it.
So this is really his secondventure in the franchise space
within a home service sector.
Having a a leader and a founderwho understands how to grow and
scale, but most importantly,support franchisees and make
(21:12):
sure that they're successful.
He's willing to go above andbeyond to make sure that we
provide the support need there.
I love that.
Yeah.
I always say, learn about thecaptain steering the ship and
this is not the first rodeo.
And they've done this before.
Looking into track record, evenwith an emerging brand has done
it in a very similar space.
The end of these shows, I alwayslike to wrap up and to end off
(21:33):
with a fun fact.
Oh boy, fun fact.
We'll keep it PG.
Yeah, I'm just kidding.
I'm just kidding.
No, for sure.
Fun fact about Spike.
Okay.
Well, I guess we can startthere.
My real name is not Spike justfor everybody listening.
My parents were not that crazy.
So Spike's a nickname.
Got the nickname when I was fiveyears old.
I got my first pair of baseballspikes growing up.
(21:54):
Loved them.
I was that crazy little kid.
I had two older brothers.
So I was a wild child.
I wore my baseball spikes tolike school church out to eat.
Everybody just started callingme spike now.
I'm 32 years old and I justcan't shake it, man.
So I'm still going by spike.
Hey, it's memorable.
It stands out.
Right.
Yeah.
And I didn't, I mean, obviouslyyou send us the notes, but yeah,
(22:14):
it's like, I didn't know, Ididn't know that story prior to
us scheduling the podcast.
That's funny.
Well, listen I hope everyonefound this super helpful.
As I mentioned, I'm bringing onother franchise companies.
We're going to have brick andmortar concepts.
I want you to experience exactlya day in the life, what it looks
like, your roles and just abouteverything else.
And I hope everyone finds thissuper helpful.
(22:35):
we poll, and ask questions toour audience.
Instead of me figuring out whatI think is important, I want to
know what your questions are.
This show was created because ofthat.
We really appreciate yoursupport.
Spike.
Thank you again.
For joining us today maybe we'lldo a follow up with updates end
of year.
And yeah, really appreciateeverything and we'll definitely
talk soon.
Yes, sir.
I appreciate it.
Thank you.
Take care.
(22:57):
If you want to learn how to makethe transition from corporate to
owning your franchise, joinGiuseppe on the next episode.
You can also follow on allsocial media platforms and
achieve financial and timefreedom today.
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