April 4, 2024 • 38 mins
Get in touch with Chris at www.fmsfranchise.com
Owning a business is a challenge. Knowing how to keep innovating in your business is an even bigger one. Join restaurant owner, motivational speaker, and innovation expert Sara Frasca each week as she guides fellow business owners in taking the next step to level up their business. If you've ever pondered hiring a business coach but want a sample first, come along for the adventure!
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Sara Frasca is the founder and owner of Trasca & Co Eatery in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, an experienced and engaging motivational speaker, and the CEO of global business coaching firm Point NorthEast.
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Episode Transcript
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Unknown (00:00):
You're listening to level up your business, the
podcast where we talk tohardworking business owners and
leaders and help them solve realissues in real time.
I'm your host, Sarah Frascarestaurant owner,
keynote speaker and businesscoach. I've spent my career not
only in corporate America butalso as an entrepreneur,
(00:23):
carrying on my family's legacythrough my restaurant. Now a
business coach and consultant.
I'm helping other businesses touse creative problem solving and
innovative thinking to drivelasting change. Stay tuned to
hear some inspiring guidancethat will help you to level up
your business. Well, hello,everyone. Another Thursday here,
(00:46):
Sarah Frasca with the point,northeast team. We've got
another great guest for ourlevel up your business podcast,
and I'm really excited towelcome Chris Connor. Chris,
thanks for joining us.
Thank you, sir. So excited to behere. Thank you for having me.
Yes. So as you know, we alwayslike to have people that have
(01:09):
done something kind of, youknow, interesting, astounding,
have helped others. And, as youknow, and I know, and now our
listeners will know, you'vehelped me on the Trask aside, so
I figured it would be importantfor me to share with folks that
your business is the businessthat will take Tresca from you
(01:30):
know, coast to coast, hopefully,and get the panino to be a
household name eventually. Buttell us a little bit about your
past, kind of where you've comefrom, why did you choose to
build this company, I thinkthere's so many things I want to
know. SoI, I came from a family where
all I knew was was being anemployee working for a company
working on your 401k. And oneday, you could retire if you
(01:54):
worked at a place long enoughand saved up long enough, I
thought that was the only trackthat you could or were supposed
to take. When in 2001, I went towork for a franchise development
firm, I knew nothing aboutfranchising. I didn't know what
really what it meant. And I tooka job as an employee working for
a company. And I had theopportunity to work with some
(02:16):
some brands ended up becomingbig franchise brands like Jimmy
John's and Culvers, AuntieAnne's, and European wax center.
A, I learned what franchisingcould do and the possibilities
and how great this model couldbe for brands. But B, it also
opened me up toentrepreneurship. And it started
to expand my mind of what waspossible. And I would interact
(02:39):
with people who had taken therisk, done something innovative
stepped out of that, that careerpath of corporate America, or
whatever they're doing before.
And I was like, Man, I wouldlove to be doing this, whatever
it might be. And that just kindof got me started with the idea
of entrepreneurship. I workedfor that company for eight
(03:00):
years. And then the placebasically collapsed. So I, I got
laid off in 2009. And, and itwas that kick in the butt that I
needed to be okay, well, nowI'll start my business. And I
really do the same things I wasdoing before. Franchise
development. We also sellfranchises, that was a big
change from what my previouscompany was doing. But I I
(03:22):
started this in 2009. And atfirst it was scary. I was, you
know, super anxious and justfreaking out about everything
and worried about not having apaycheck. But it took about a
few months. And then I look backand I'm like, that was the best
thing that could ever happen tome. I'm so thankful that I had
that that push, and that kick inthe rear end to be like, start
(03:45):
your own thing do it. And andnow we've got 30 employees, and
we've we've been we've beendoing this for 15 years. So it's
been it's been a good run, it'sbeen a really good thing. That's
really great. And I mean, I fromone of your, you know, kind of
franchising brand. Clientperspectives, I mean, you have
such an amazing team that have areally deep service model are
(04:07):
really invested in in kind ofbuilding it. So thank you for
doing it. Right, I would saythank you. Yeah. So tell me I
mean, you know, have you. Imean, have you thought about
where you want to go in thefuture? Like what does FMS
become what what is the? What isthe goal or as we like to call
it in the point northeast world?
What's your summit look like?
(04:30):
What is it that you're trying toachieve? It's
an interesting time for thisdiscussion. And I always love
talking with you. Because youhave been on like all sides of
it you at the big corporateexperience. you've started your
own brand. And now you've been acoach and a consultant for all
(04:51):
these different companies.
You've got so much differentperspective which is which is
unique. I mean, not that manypeople have that. I am
definitely a little bit of acrossroads. The business my, my
intention, day one was to earn aliving, I had a mortgage coming
and it was like I need to earn aliving and pay my bills. My
second Why was my family was atthis really weird crossroads, my
(05:12):
dad was an alcoholic and wholefamily kind of fell apart. So
then my my second was to takecare of my family. And so my
brothers work with me and mymom, my aunt and cousin, we've
got a lot of family members. Andthen the third was to grow this
into a business where it wasn'tjust me or immediate family
(05:32):
members that that werebenefiting and helped by this.
And we've kind of done that with38 people that we have now. So I
am kind of trying to figure outwhat is my vision from this
point forward, I don't want tojust keep doing what we're doing
and not have any next levelgrowth. I have thought about
(05:54):
starting, like a private equityversion of what we do, where we
would own brands and, and bepart of brands on the on like a
true partnership level. Andthat's something that we've
taken some steps to look atdoing, I think that would be
our, our really big next levelgoal was to actually own parts
(06:16):
of the brands that we're helpingdevelop and be a partner in
them. And there's so manyopportunities out there that it
would make sense to do that tolook that direction.
So does that. I mean, I'm justthinking of it from again, all
sides, is it you know, anopportunity to kind of because
(06:41):
you have, again, such smartpeople that know what they're
doing and all of us, now you'veactually got a kind of an vested
interest in building toward thefuture in finding brands that
you believe in that your teamthinks that they can also be a
part of. Thatwould be the idea is to leverage
our current infrastructure, givethe people that we have on the
(07:03):
team now more opportunity. Mythought would be, I love the
idea of an employee ownedbusiness, where you basically
have like a, like a pool ofshares that the team owns part
of it. And that would be part ofmy vision also is just to give
everyone that bigger pictureopportunity. What we've created
(07:25):
with FMS is we have a greatbusiness, we've got a whole
bunch of people who have greatjobs and salaries and
employment. I think everyone Iknow me, I know myself, I love
what I do. I love working withentrepreneurs. I love the
franchise model. But there's notreally any long term equity in
(07:47):
what we do. We're like aconsulting group. And, and so
for this to have a really bigexit opportunity at some point
or some big end game to it, Ithink this equity play would
definitely be the route and thevision for it. We have started
to do some offshoots to thebusiness, which were something I
(08:07):
had intention to do for a longtime, it just now started to
take shape. We started a financearm to a mass where we can help
fund franchisees and help getthem the loans that they might
need or 401k, rollovers. For anew location when they use
financing for it. We also have areal estate arm, too. So we can
help find locations for people.
(08:31):
And there's some revenueopportunities that come from
that. But probably mostimportantly, as it helps us
support the entire deal fromfrom initial contact all the way
to close with a new franchiseowner because they'll need
funding, they'll usually want toknow where the location is going
to go before they'll sign afranchise agreement before they
(08:51):
commit to go to the next step.
No, I think that's a really goodpoint. I mean, I am selfishly
but also thinking of kind of thepoint northeast model two which
is surrounding them with thebusiness acumen because that's a
little bit of our, our valueproposition. I mean, we find and
we work with a lot ofprofessional service
organizations that have greatartistry, right, a great command
(09:16):
of the legal space or oforthodontics or of architecture
and what's needed and what whatare the laws and what are the
restrictions and all thosethings, but they don't have the
acumen of how to leverage HRprinciples and keep themselves
out of trouble or how toleverage data effectively to
manage their business makedecisions. So I'm just sort of
(09:36):
thinking, you know, I know thatyour team does some of this, but
that might be a good componentto to surround a new franchisee
with, how do they do this theright way, which offers a little
bit more of a success, I wouldthink kind of chance of success.
I completely agree and Inreality, the kinds of things
(10:01):
that you do with point ne the,the depth and the and the value
prop, that most franchises thatI've worked with even the big
ones, they're not doing thatlevel of full scope, business
consulting and advice forfranchisees, they're giving them
the critical things, themarketing side, the branding,
(10:21):
how to get the location open,usually, but there's a there's a
huge space there for it in thefranchise market to
Yes. Well, are you? You know, Ithink that's hopefully one of
the reasons why people will wantto be a part of Trask is there's
that back end kind of supportnetwork, you know, support
system, network, etc. Okay, tellme, I'm going to switch gears a
(10:43):
little bit. Tell me what isgoing on in the franchising
space? I mean, what is excitingyou what is making you nervous?
What are the trends? Like justtalk a little bit about your
industry for a minute?
Yeah. So I think the start withthe bad news first, everyone
right now has some anxietyaround the economy. I think we
(11:07):
have for a long time, it's beena little bit of a awkward middle
ground of being since COVID. AndI think everyone probably
expected some significantFallout well, before now, yet,
things have been pretty darngood. So it's like Where, where
are on How stable is our footingnow. So there is some anxiety
(11:29):
around that the franchisebusiness is enormously based on
emotions and level of positivitylevel of confidence in the
market. So those things doimpact what we're doing, we do
hear that when we're sellingfranchises, when we're growing
brands. So there, there is alevel of that. I do think that
(11:52):
it's also, I think it'scontained a little bit by
geography. When you look atmarkets like Florida, where
Trask is based, Florida is in asbig of a boom time as any market
has ever been Texas, Tennessee,Georgia, North South Carolina,
these really business friendlystates, so much movement of
(12:14):
people and capital and resourcesto those markets, I think we're
feeling a whole lot less of thatanxiety. In other markets, you
know, or maybe hearing a littlebit more of it. But on the good
side COVID. And the pandemicreally pushed people into
entrepreneurship, the statisticsfrom the SBA, last time I looked
(12:35):
at them, we broke records fornew business startups in the US
in 2122 23, and 21, and 22 arelike double what the highest
amount had been before. Now, notall those people are buying
franchises, but a percentage ofthem are. And that has really
fueled the market, the franchiseindustry in it overall has
(12:57):
exploded since our business hasgrown by almost four times
three, four times since thestart of COVID. And the reality
is, we haven't really changedthat much, it's just been that
many more people coming into themarket and investing in
businesses. It's been a greattime to be in the franchise
(13:18):
industry, this year looks to beanother year of continuation of
that. election year. So it's alittle bit who knows what's
gonna happen here. But Butoverall, it's a very good time
to be in the business. Peoplewant to own their own thing,
they want to be an entrepreneur,there's a good section of people
who are looking atentrepreneurship, who are not
(13:40):
comfortable with the idea oftaking the risk like you did,
and coming up with your ownmodel your own idea, without
having someone to be there tocoach you. And that's where the
franchise model comes in. Andright. A lot of people really,
really like the idea of, of giveme a blueprint, give me a plan,
show me what you've done wrongand right, and make sure that
(14:01):
I'm avoiding the wrong and doingthe right, worse. And that
that's that's where the wholefranchise model comes in. And I
think there's a good chunk ofthe of the franchise market. I
know there is people that arelike corporate refugees, who
left a big company, they left anemployee position as employee.
(14:22):
And for that profile, thefranchise model fits
exceptionally well, right?
They're used to structure theyuse the guidelines, they see the
value in a brand. And that's Ithink, in large part who we're
selling a lot of franchises toand who we've seen a lot of
growth with.
That's great. I mean, that inall honesty is a little bit of,
you know, a kind of a parallelof my profile. I really loved my
(14:45):
days at General Mills almost,you know, 15 years, but I was
ready, I was ready to run my ownworld and be my own boss and do
things, you know, in a differentmanner. And so I was able to
have that great foundation, butkind of, you know, make it What
I wanted so I can I can relate,I think that's a great model.
Are you seeing any trends interms of franchising of whether
(15:10):
it's retail or restaurant orhospitality? Or, again, I don't
even know what all the kind ofverticals are that you've
served. But is there anythingthat's like, hugely popular or?
Yeah, you know, food foodservice will always be one of
the biggest segments. It is. Imean, people know franchising in
general, because of foodservice, they associate it with
(15:32):
food service. So it will alwaysin my 25 years doing this, it
will always be something between30 and 40 45% of the market.
Wow, okay, really big piece.
When COVID happened, it didnegatively impact the segment,
as you might imagine, peoplewere concerned with buying a
(15:52):
business that had the potentialit could be impacted or not even
opened COVID. So we did see adrop in 2021, I think it
probably still was sort of down.
But it picked up significantly,again, in 20 to 23. Again, and
now I think food services is isreally on a growth curve. And
(16:18):
services really became the topsegment. So like painting,
roofing, landscaping, mosquitocontrol, anything you could
think of, right? Because ofthose reasons. People didn't
have to get a location. Therewasn't a huge upfront
investment. There werebusinesses that weren't impacted
negatively by COVID. But butfood food service now I think is
(16:42):
coming way back services kind ofgot saturated too. So I think
we're seeing a level ofcompetitiveness that makes it a
little tougher. Yeah, you'refine. But the but the the
foodservice space has reallybeen coming back full swing.
There's definitely some pocketswithin foodservice that have
have like, grown faster, and Ithink are showing more
(17:05):
opportunity. Anything offpremise, delivery, catering,
carry out, all of those spaceshave absolutely exploded and
enter spaces that anyone in foodservice should be looking to.
Quick service simple, smallerfootprint quick service has done
really well also. So Idefinitely would recommend that
(17:27):
that's been for true for awhile. But in general
foodservice is a great space tobe into. So I think we're gonna
see this year, I think we'll seefood service, again, be 40% ish
of the overall franchise market.
And, and you can see it at theshows, you see it in the deal
flow, and the brands that wereselling a huge percentage of
them are, are in the food space.
(17:49):
That's wonderful. You know, Imean, I think of the franchises
that I remember, as a kid, andI'm just sort of curious,
there's some that are stillaround, and then there's some
that aren't. And so, you know,how, how much does innovation?
Or how much does kind of theimportance of change factor into
(18:15):
kind of a franchise or a brand'slongevity? I mean, there's so
many different evolutions, but Ithink of some that, like, didn't
change. So mean, does thatfactor in? Are you coaching
people on that?
Well, it that you would knowmore about the space than I
would add, and it's definitely acritical factor to a brand's
(18:37):
longevity. And I, the franchisemarkets interesting because the
consumer sees these franchisebrands as as in some cases,
global brands, I mean, they're,they're in every market. In a
certainly so many examples ofbrands that are in every market
across the US or Canada. Most ofthese franchise brands are owned
(18:58):
by one person. So there's a veryprivately owned section of
franchising, where it's a lot oftimes it's one person, it's a
family that started this thingand then a franchise out. And
when you have that dynamic, Ithink you are probably more
susceptible to not lookingforward and not thinking hey, we
(19:22):
can't just rest on our laurelshere. We can't just do the same
things we did interesting in1985 and still get the same
response and engagement. Why?
Every once in a while you see afranchise brand that has done
it. They've beaten the theinnovation, risk or threat of
not innovating. Brands likeHoliday Inn, McDonald's Dairy
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Queen. There's a lot of themthat have withstood the test of
time. They have come out withnew menu items, new ways of
doing business, they've requiredfranchisees to invest in
locations and come up with withnew model because you're seeing
it in like Wendy's now, forexample, with all the self order
kiosks, and a completely newrestaurant design, the
(20:05):
franchisor has the right todictate that to the franchisee.
And if it's a good franchisewhere they're investing in these
things, and then pushing it outto the system saying, Hey, guys,
we, we found a new technology,we found a new product line, you
have to do it now. Level. Butyou do see a lot of brands that
that were at one point, majornames and super successful. And
(20:28):
then they just kind of fade. Andmaybe we're kind of seeing that
with subway now. You know, we'reat one point they dominated,
right, the space and now you'vethey've kind of been dipping a
little bit I think they couldcertainly resurface here, but
yeah, I've actually beenimpressed lately with their
(20:49):
advertising of their footlongpretzels and cookies and things.
And I thought that's kind offun. But I'm not an avid subway
eater. Owning a, you know,restaurant business of my own.
Hmm, interesting. Yeah, I mean,it is it I've I've, you know,
certainly I am passionate aboutinnovation and thinking forward
(21:13):
and challenging the status quo.
But I mean, I think about like aQuiznos, I don't even know if
they exist anymore. I loved themwhen they first came out. They
were innovative, they had these,you know, hot and toasty,
sandwiches, and then it kind ofvanished as far as I know. So,
and Quiznos is a good example ofwhat what we were just talking
(21:35):
about where they had the largestclass action lawsuit in
franchise history. Now, it'sprobably been 15 years ago or
so. But you had privateownership, making decisions that
that serve them and not thefranchisees, you had to buy
products through them at adrastically increased cost. And
(21:57):
ultimately, like, like, itsounds like you feel to I felt
like the product was better thanreally anyone else out on the
market. Like I always chose togo there, too. But literally
overnight, a 5000 unit franchisesystem basically disappeared,
you'll see in a while, but thatcomes back to just ownership
making the right or wrongdecisions. And in franchising,
(22:20):
you have to make sure that thefranchisee is winning, if
they're not winning, then thisis short lived success. And
really, what what happenedthere?
Yeah, you know, it's aninteresting, I would say, game
or plan or get, you know,thinking about it strategically,
it's not a short term, you know,get rich scheme, in my opinion,
(22:40):
it's a long term, like youplanned for your very planful
for the things that you want toinfluence, which is, in my case,
you know, really goodingredients, really good service
in a restaurant that justhappens to be my family's food.
But, you know, I think if you'retrue to your brand, and if
you're true to your kind of corevalues, I think it can work
(23:02):
really well. And then thenimbleness is, again, the key,
but I really, I, every time I gopast the noodles and company, I
shake my head now. I mean, Iused to seek them, I used to
love them. And I think you know,again, they've been, in my
opinion, diminished by chasingprofit, which I think is again,
(23:26):
a short term fix drug addict, ifyou're only searching that next
quarterly profit, you're notmaking good decisions for the
long term of your team, yourbusiness, your brand, your cell.
I don't know how you feel aboutit, but I'm very biased.
Well, I mean, I love the Treskastory. I think when you have a
(23:48):
family legacy, where there'shistory, there's there's there's
there's blood, sweat and tearsthat have been poured into this
brand over decades. Not justyours, but but your whole
families and, and a greathistory behind it. We've got
unique products, we've got aplace that people can come to
(24:09):
for lunch or dinner multipletimes a week because a wide menu
selection and product selection.
And and we're in a space that tome can work in just about any
market that we have the rightgraphics, the right income
levels and traffic count andthings your work and what you
have done and what you are doingoutside of Tresca is absolutely
(24:30):
to me the kind of the silverbullet here where you are
interacting with 1000s of peoplethrough your speaking
engagements and your coaching.
You're also front and center andlooking and being involved in
what company is doing forinnovation. So not not just the
long term but short term, thereare opportunities that you will
(24:51):
be able to help people see newmenu items, new ways of doing
business, that if they wereworking with another company,
they wouldn't have thatopportunity to so I think
there's a huge advantage to it,we need to get the first
franchisees in. That's right, toprove that there's duplicates.
But I know once we do that themarket opportunity and the
upside for the brand isenormous. Yeah. Well, thank
(25:14):
you, Chris. I certainlyappreciate all of your kind
words, they think we've beengood partners on this so far.
And I, I'm very optimistic it'sgoing to be fun. Okay, back to
you and FMS, you, you know, isthere anything that you see
coming up that you could usesome help on or want me to kind
(25:36):
of think about and the way thatI tee this up for folks is,
what's keeping you up at night?
What are the challenges thatare, you know, on the tip of
your brain? Or, Oh, I wish Icould come up with this. And I'd
love to even in the moment, seeif I can help you with those.
I love it. I love it. So I thinklike every business on the
(25:56):
planet in the history ofbusinesses, I'm always worried
about continuing to drive thetop line. You know, how do we
how do we keep that funnel ofbusiness working and going. And
new opportunities to drivebusiness into that funnel, and
then also new services and valuethat we can give to the people
(26:18):
that we work with to potentiallyhave more revenue streams. I
mentioned the funding, Imentioned the real estate, but I
am always looking for other waysthat we can add value to someone
that we're working with. So thatwould be one. Two, I am not a
great leader. I am a I'm a doer,you know, I'm if like Michael
(26:42):
Gerber, the E Myth, I'm the guythat is still digging the ditch.
And you know, in it so far, it'shard for me sometimes to step
back and give the team theresources, the time, and the and
the tools that where they coulda take some off my plate, but be
(27:02):
be more successful and, and haveand be more empowered, I think
would be the right word for it.
Yeah. So that's something thatweighs on me and I, I'm
constantly aware of it andconstantly trying, but I, you
know, I just end up usuallydoing it.
But that's, that's aninteresting challenge, I want to
(27:24):
address both of both of thethings that you brought up. But
I would say on the, you know, EMyth perspective, which is great
book, by the way, we're maybehaving a hard time kind of
driving the, the team forward.
And I think you probably are abetter leader than you're giving
yourself credit for, by the way,but you know, it might, it might
be beneficial to bring insomeone that could almost be,
(27:48):
you know, a CEO, and then youend up as kind of a chairman.
And on the seat of doers. Youmay be, you know, kind of the
board that the CEO ultimately isresponsible to kind of come back
and make sure there's buy in andthose sorts of things. Because
in my understanding, you're theowner, is that right? Yeah,
(28:08):
that's what I thought 100%equity. And yeah, so I mean,
ultimately, the CEO, isresponsible and reports up to
you. But that might be a reallyinteresting way of, you know,
continuing to find the growthcontinuing to kind of bring on
people that can help to kind ofpush the strategy forward. I
(28:29):
find in a lot of, again, in alot of these organizations,
that, you know, the owner or thefounder has to make a decision.
And so this actually is ananalogy that I did not come up
with, but I'm going to use it inthis moment, which is, are you
an hourglass leader, or a tophat. And so if you think about
(28:52):
an hourglass, the sand, ofcourse, starts in the top. And
if you are the bottleneck thateverything has to flow through,
it's a really slow moment. Imean, it takes a long time for
all the sand to go through. Soif you think about work,
product, work, output, etc. Buta top hat, you flip it over and
everything falls out. And so inthis kind of moment of you
(29:15):
reflecting on how can I grow mybusiness, it might be important
for you to get yourself out ofthat hourglass bottleneck, and
just be a doer and have someonethat can orchestrate the type of
communication. Again, just kindof you know there the orchestra
(29:36):
leader that is telling all thedifferent teams what they need
to do and you're just you know aperson on that whether you're
doing business development orcoaching on the strategy of the
franchising in your ops team oron the HR side or whatever. So I
think it's a really like a thatis a very vulnerable you know,
kind of comment, but I reallyAppreciate it, I think that
(30:00):
humility will take you very far.
And there's some things that youmight look at doing.
And no, and I totally appreciatethat. And I don't think I have
have an ego. I've never feltlike I was one of those guys,
but, but thank you for saying.
And it's, that's something thatdefinitely weighs on me, you
(30:20):
know that. I guess I lose sleepover, but
well keep thinking because theremight be someone in your midst
that's like ready to take thatspot, and they might be a good
partner for you, you know,however, on the ideas front of
how to build top line revenue, Iwas just thinking through and
(30:42):
this is like, in the case of,kind of, you know, it would
almost be an interesting modelto bring in a team of folks. And
again, I've worked with so manyof your folks. So I know they
could do this. But a suite thathelps to surround a franchisee,
especially in the beginning. Andso I think of, you know, the
functional areas that they needto develop a sustainable
(31:07):
business. So you think aboutmarketing, business development,
you think about, you know,there's an operations leader
that's necessary to make sureit's efficient and effective.
There's a finance leader, or,you know, a finance component.
There's HR, there's technology,there's innovation, there's
facilities, and these are allhats worn by an owner when they
(31:31):
start a new business. Yeah. Soif you are, and I'll just again,
use my example, I came fromGeneral Mills, where I didn't
have to know finance, I justliterally said, Hey, finance
person helped me with this, or,you know, hey, HR person, I need
help with this. And so all of asudden, you're thrust into this
moment where you have to wearall the hats. So FMS could come
(31:53):
with, hey, you know, FMS, HRperson, what do I do in this
case? Or, you know, what do I dotechnology leader, and maybe
they have a, you know, a phoneand an internet service or So
those might be some, you know,components that you could bring,
that would be, again, a nicesupplement to your revenue,
helping the franchisees to bemore successful, which again, is
(32:16):
just, I call it the snowball oflove.
I love that the snowball, I loveit. We do get that that is
requested. Because, yeah, wewill facilitate getting the
franchisee in, you know, takingthem all the way to that finish
line. And then they sign up. Andthen the client that the brand
(32:40):
owner, if they're certainlycapable, I mean, they've they've
they're experienced, they'reintelligent, smart business
people, but they don't have ateam in place yet. We first
start franchising so that thatdefinitely could be a great
value prop to save, let us bethat team, at least in the in
the intermediate stages, duringyour in house people in at some
(33:02):
point, but that'd be a greatidea.
Maybe it's like a subscriptionmodel for the first year or
something, you know, it's likeleverage just as much as you
need for making this up $10,000a month, and then we'll wean you
off of it will be your trainingwheels and weaned off as you,
you know, continue to develop.
And I'm curious to know how manyfolks start out with just one
(33:26):
franchise location? Or are theystarting with multiple?
All the above? And we have somethat? Not very many, but some
that will start with lots oflocations. Okay. And, and others
that start with one? Yeah, andthe whole, the whole range of
(33:47):
spectrum. The, I would say themajority, the brands that we
work with only begin with one,they had one good location that
we use as the prototype typethat's flagship that we're
basing our model off of, that'swhat we're selling off of.
Right. And, and using that asour, you know, our pitch point
and, and selling off that singleunit. Okay,
(34:10):
I think maybe I stated thequestion wrong, but that was
helpful, too. How many of thenew franchisees coming in want
one? How many want many?
Got it? So the majority of whatwe're selling is units one
through 50. Okay, that's wherewe are heavily involved is those
initial early stage ramp ups.
And in that range, the majorityof the people that buy are
(34:37):
single owner operators, it's onelocation. A lot of times it's
it's a husband and wife, it's ait's an operator who's going to
work in the business, they lovethe brand, they love the food
and they want to they want to bepart of it. As these grow that's
when we tend to see more multiunit investors come in and when
we have validation we have proofwe have sure versus under a
(34:58):
belt. That's where we've seenmore of a multi unit deals come
together. With we've definitelysold them. But it's usually been
at the later stage a little bitthat next level of maturity,
they have some track record,then I found new see multiunit
buyers come in and okay, we'vehad some by countries, if it's
on by whole states, and thenyeah,
(35:22):
I was still trying to thinkthrough whether the kind of the
suite of offerings would behelpful, because presumably,
presumably, if they're buying 50units, they've got a little bit
more sophisticated kind of frontoffice, but it's the single or
the, you know, they're buyingtwo or three locations, they
just might not have, you know,the capital and the capacity to
(35:44):
have the leadership at thefunctional areas. So, anyway.
Yeah, definitely, the majorityof the people that we are
selling to would not have anyreal resources behind them. So,
right, that that point? Yep.
Makes sense. Well, okay, I'llkeep thinking about your
(36:05):
challenges. But I think thoseare two, you know, good ones
that again, you know, Idefinitely don't think you have
an ego, you are such a humbleperson. And, you know, it's,
it's a little bit of, I thinkthe right thing will happen to
help you, especially in thatkind of CEO role. I think, keep
(36:25):
thinking, look around theoffice, kind of see if there's
somebody that might be able totake that. Take that home. So
that's cool. That's really neat.
Well, thank you for I mean,everything. You're trusting me
with the task of business, butalso coming on to the podcast to
share with folks kind of whatyou're up to what you're
thinking about. It's reallyinteresting part of kind of the
(36:45):
business world is thisfranchising space, and thank
you. Well, I absolutely adoreyou. Thank you, and your whole
team, James and the whole team.
And I love your brand. And it'sjust been so great to work with
you. I think we will have somany wins here in our future
(37:08):
together. And I it's awesome tobe part of this. I haven't seen
you it outside of our Treska.
Roles andnametag on Yeah. Well, thank
you. Yeah. I look forward to thefuture to Chris. I'm very
optimistic, very excited. And ifyou end up with this kind of
(37:29):
equity position, if you'rethinking about it, then Tasker
wants to be on your list ofconsiderate consideration. So
you let me know. That's great.
All right. Well, have a greatrest of the day. And good luck
with your travels. And thank youagain for being on the show.
Thank you, sir. All right.
(37:50):
Thanks so much for tuning intothis episode of level up your
business with me, Sarah Frasca.
If you have a problem in yourbusiness that's keeping you up
at night. Please join us in afuture episode so we can help
get you unstuck. Just clickingthe link in the show notes and
send us a message. Pleaseremember, stay innovative
friends.
You're listening to level up your business, the
podcast where we talk tohardworking business owners and
leaders and help them solve realissues in real time.
I'm your host, Sarah Frascarestaurant owner,
keynote speaker and businesscoach. I've spent my career not
only in corporate America butalso as an entrepreneur,
(00:23):
carrying on my family's legacythrough my restaurant. Now a
business coach and consultant.
I'm helping other businesses touse creative problem solving and
innovative thinking to drivelasting change. Stay tuned to
hear some inspiring guidancethat will help you to level up
your business. Well, hello,everyone. Another Thursday here,
(00:46):
Sarah Frasca with the point,northeast team. We've got
another great guest for ourlevel up your business podcast,
and I'm really excited towelcome Chris Connor. Chris,
thanks for joining us.
Thank you, sir. So excited to behere. Thank you for having me.
Yes. So as you know, we alwayslike to have people that have
(01:09):
done something kind of, youknow, interesting, astounding,
have helped others. And, as youknow, and I know, and now our
listeners will know, you'vehelped me on the Trask aside, so
I figured it would be importantfor me to share with folks that
your business is the businessthat will take Tresca from you
(01:30):
know, coast to coast, hopefully,and get the panino to be a
household name eventually. Buttell us a little bit about your
past, kind of where you've comefrom, why did you choose to
build this company, I thinkthere's so many things I want to
know. SoI, I came from a family where
all I knew was was being anemployee working for a company
working on your 401k. And oneday, you could retire if you
(01:54):
worked at a place long enoughand saved up long enough, I
thought that was the only trackthat you could or were supposed
to take. When in 2001, I went towork for a franchise development
firm, I knew nothing aboutfranchising. I didn't know what
really what it meant. And I tooka job as an employee working for
a company. And I had theopportunity to work with some
(02:16):
some brands ended up becomingbig franchise brands like Jimmy
John's and Culvers, AuntieAnne's, and European wax center.
A, I learned what franchisingcould do and the possibilities
and how great this model couldbe for brands. But B, it also
opened me up toentrepreneurship. And it started
to expand my mind of what waspossible. And I would interact
(02:39):
with people who had taken therisk, done something innovative
stepped out of that, that careerpath of corporate America, or
whatever they're doing before.
And I was like, Man, I wouldlove to be doing this, whatever
it might be. And that just kindof got me started with the idea
of entrepreneurship. I workedfor that company for eight
(03:00):
years. And then the placebasically collapsed. So I, I got
laid off in 2009. And, and itwas that kick in the butt that I
needed to be okay, well, nowI'll start my business. And I
really do the same things I wasdoing before. Franchise
development. We also sellfranchises, that was a big
change from what my previouscompany was doing. But I I
(03:22):
started this in 2009. And atfirst it was scary. I was, you
know, super anxious and justfreaking out about everything
and worried about not having apaycheck. But it took about a
few months. And then I look backand I'm like, that was the best
thing that could ever happen tome. I'm so thankful that I had
that that push, and that kick inthe rear end to be like, start
(03:45):
your own thing do it. And andnow we've got 30 employees, and
we've we've been we've beendoing this for 15 years. So it's
been it's been a good run, it'sbeen a really good thing. That's
really great. And I mean, I fromone of your, you know, kind of
franchising brand. Clientperspectives, I mean, you have
such an amazing team that have areally deep service model are
(04:07):
really invested in in kind ofbuilding it. So thank you for
doing it. Right, I would saythank you. Yeah. So tell me I
mean, you know, have you. Imean, have you thought about
where you want to go in thefuture? Like what does FMS
become what what is the? What isthe goal or as we like to call
it in the point northeast world?
What's your summit look like?
(04:30):
What is it that you're trying toachieve? It's
an interesting time for thisdiscussion. And I always love
talking with you. Because youhave been on like all sides of
it you at the big corporateexperience. you've started your
own brand. And now you've been acoach and a consultant for all
(04:51):
these different companies.
You've got so much differentperspective which is which is
unique. I mean, not that manypeople have that. I am
definitely a little bit of acrossroads. The business my, my
intention, day one was to earn aliving, I had a mortgage coming
and it was like I need to earn aliving and pay my bills. My
second Why was my family was atthis really weird crossroads, my
(05:12):
dad was an alcoholic and wholefamily kind of fell apart. So
then my my second was to takecare of my family. And so my
brothers work with me and mymom, my aunt and cousin, we've
got a lot of family members. Andthen the third was to grow this
into a business where it wasn'tjust me or immediate family
(05:32):
members that that werebenefiting and helped by this.
And we've kind of done that with38 people that we have now. So I
am kind of trying to figure outwhat is my vision from this
point forward, I don't want tojust keep doing what we're doing
and not have any next levelgrowth. I have thought about
(05:54):
starting, like a private equityversion of what we do, where we
would own brands and, and bepart of brands on the on like a
true partnership level. Andthat's something that we've
taken some steps to look atdoing, I think that would be
our, our really big next levelgoal was to actually own parts
(06:16):
of the brands that we're helpingdevelop and be a partner in
them. And there's so manyopportunities out there that it
would make sense to do that tolook that direction.
So does that. I mean, I'm justthinking of it from again, all
sides, is it you know, anopportunity to kind of because
(06:41):
you have, again, such smartpeople that know what they're
doing and all of us, now you'veactually got a kind of an vested
interest in building toward thefuture in finding brands that
you believe in that your teamthinks that they can also be a
part of. Thatwould be the idea is to leverage
our current infrastructure, givethe people that we have on the
(07:03):
team now more opportunity. Mythought would be, I love the
idea of an employee ownedbusiness, where you basically
have like a, like a pool ofshares that the team owns part
of it. And that would be part ofmy vision also is just to give
everyone that bigger pictureopportunity. What we've created
(07:25):
with FMS is we have a greatbusiness, we've got a whole
bunch of people who have greatjobs and salaries and
employment. I think everyone Iknow me, I know myself, I love
what I do. I love working withentrepreneurs. I love the
franchise model. But there's notreally any long term equity in
(07:47):
what we do. We're like aconsulting group. And, and so
for this to have a really bigexit opportunity at some point
or some big end game to it, Ithink this equity play would
definitely be the route and thevision for it. We have started
to do some offshoots to thebusiness, which were something I
(08:07):
had intention to do for a longtime, it just now started to
take shape. We started a financearm to a mass where we can help
fund franchisees and help getthem the loans that they might
need or 401k, rollovers. For anew location when they use
financing for it. We also have areal estate arm, too. So we can
help find locations for people.
(08:31):
And there's some revenueopportunities that come from
that. But probably mostimportantly, as it helps us
support the entire deal fromfrom initial contact all the way
to close with a new franchiseowner because they'll need
funding, they'll usually want toknow where the location is going
to go before they'll sign afranchise agreement before they
(08:51):
commit to go to the next step.
No, I think that's a really goodpoint. I mean, I am selfishly
but also thinking of kind of thepoint northeast model two which
is surrounding them with thebusiness acumen because that's a
little bit of our, our valueproposition. I mean, we find and
we work with a lot ofprofessional service
organizations that have greatartistry, right, a great command
(09:16):
of the legal space or oforthodontics or of architecture
and what's needed and what whatare the laws and what are the
restrictions and all thosethings, but they don't have the
acumen of how to leverage HRprinciples and keep themselves
out of trouble or how toleverage data effectively to
manage their business makedecisions. So I'm just sort of
(09:36):
thinking, you know, I know thatyour team does some of this, but
that might be a good componentto to surround a new franchisee
with, how do they do this theright way, which offers a little
bit more of a success, I wouldthink kind of chance of success.
I completely agree and Inreality, the kinds of things
(10:01):
that you do with point ne the,the depth and the and the value
prop, that most franchises thatI've worked with even the big
ones, they're not doing thatlevel of full scope, business
consulting and advice forfranchisees, they're giving them
the critical things, themarketing side, the branding,
(10:21):
how to get the location open,usually, but there's a there's a
huge space there for it in thefranchise market to
Yes. Well, are you? You know, Ithink that's hopefully one of
the reasons why people will wantto be a part of Trask is there's
that back end kind of supportnetwork, you know, support
system, network, etc. Okay, tellme, I'm going to switch gears a
(10:43):
little bit. Tell me what isgoing on in the franchising
space? I mean, what is excitingyou what is making you nervous?
What are the trends? Like justtalk a little bit about your
industry for a minute?
Yeah. So I think the start withthe bad news first, everyone
right now has some anxietyaround the economy. I think we
(11:07):
have for a long time, it's beena little bit of a awkward middle
ground of being since COVID. AndI think everyone probably
expected some significantFallout well, before now, yet,
things have been pretty darngood. So it's like Where, where
are on How stable is our footingnow. So there is some anxiety
(11:29):
around that the franchisebusiness is enormously based on
emotions and level of positivitylevel of confidence in the
market. So those things doimpact what we're doing, we do
hear that when we're sellingfranchises, when we're growing
brands. So there, there is alevel of that. I do think that
(11:52):
it's also, I think it'scontained a little bit by
geography. When you look atmarkets like Florida, where
Trask is based, Florida is in asbig of a boom time as any market
has ever been Texas, Tennessee,Georgia, North South Carolina,
these really business friendlystates, so much movement of
(12:14):
people and capital and resourcesto those markets, I think we're
feeling a whole lot less of thatanxiety. In other markets, you
know, or maybe hearing a littlebit more of it. But on the good
side COVID. And the pandemicreally pushed people into
entrepreneurship, the statisticsfrom the SBA, last time I looked
(12:35):
at them, we broke records fornew business startups in the US
in 2122 23, and 21, and 22 arelike double what the highest
amount had been before. Now, notall those people are buying
franchises, but a percentage ofthem are. And that has really
fueled the market, the franchiseindustry in it overall has
(12:57):
exploded since our business hasgrown by almost four times
three, four times since thestart of COVID. And the reality
is, we haven't really changedthat much, it's just been that
many more people coming into themarket and investing in
businesses. It's been a greattime to be in the franchise
(13:18):
industry, this year looks to beanother year of continuation of
that. election year. So it's alittle bit who knows what's
gonna happen here. But Butoverall, it's a very good time
to be in the business. Peoplewant to own their own thing,
they want to be an entrepreneur,there's a good section of people
who are looking atentrepreneurship, who are not
(13:40):
comfortable with the idea oftaking the risk like you did,
and coming up with your ownmodel your own idea, without
having someone to be there tocoach you. And that's where the
franchise model comes in. Andright. A lot of people really,
really like the idea of, of giveme a blueprint, give me a plan,
show me what you've done wrongand right, and make sure that
(14:01):
I'm avoiding the wrong and doingthe right, worse. And that
that's that's where the wholefranchise model comes in. And I
think there's a good chunk ofthe of the franchise market. I
know there is people that arelike corporate refugees, who
left a big company, they left anemployee position as employee.
(14:22):
And for that profile, thefranchise model fits
exceptionally well, right?
They're used to structure theyuse the guidelines, they see the
value in a brand. And that's Ithink, in large part who we're
selling a lot of franchises toand who we've seen a lot of
growth with.
That's great. I mean, that inall honesty is a little bit of,
you know, a kind of a parallelof my profile. I really loved my
(14:45):
days at General Mills almost,you know, 15 years, but I was
ready, I was ready to run my ownworld and be my own boss and do
things, you know, in a differentmanner. And so I was able to
have that great foundation, butkind of, you know, make it What
I wanted so I can I can relate,I think that's a great model.
Are you seeing any trends interms of franchising of whether
(15:10):
it's retail or restaurant orhospitality? Or, again, I don't
even know what all the kind ofverticals are that you've
served. But is there anythingthat's like, hugely popular or?
Yeah, you know, food foodservice will always be one of
the biggest segments. It is. Imean, people know franchising in
general, because of foodservice, they associate it with
(15:32):
food service. So it will alwaysin my 25 years doing this, it
will always be something between30 and 40 45% of the market.
Wow, okay, really big piece.
When COVID happened, it didnegatively impact the segment,
as you might imagine, peoplewere concerned with buying a
(15:52):
business that had the potentialit could be impacted or not even
opened COVID. So we did see adrop in 2021, I think it
probably still was sort of down.
But it picked up significantly,again, in 20 to 23. Again, and
now I think food services is isreally on a growth curve. And
(16:18):
services really became the topsegment. So like painting,
roofing, landscaping, mosquitocontrol, anything you could
think of, right? Because ofthose reasons. People didn't
have to get a location. Therewasn't a huge upfront
investment. There werebusinesses that weren't impacted
negatively by COVID. But butfood food service now I think is
(16:42):
coming way back services kind ofgot saturated too. So I think
we're seeing a level ofcompetitiveness that makes it a
little tougher. Yeah, you'refine. But the but the the
foodservice space has reallybeen coming back full swing.
There's definitely some pocketswithin foodservice that have
have like, grown faster, and Ithink are showing more
(17:05):
opportunity. Anything offpremise, delivery, catering,
carry out, all of those spaceshave absolutely exploded and
enter spaces that anyone in foodservice should be looking to.
Quick service simple, smallerfootprint quick service has done
really well also. So Idefinitely would recommend that
(17:27):
that's been for true for awhile. But in general
foodservice is a great space tobe into. So I think we're gonna
see this year, I think we'll seefood service, again, be 40% ish
of the overall franchise market.
And, and you can see it at theshows, you see it in the deal
flow, and the brands that wereselling a huge percentage of
them are, are in the food space.
(17:49):
That's wonderful. You know, Imean, I think of the franchises
that I remember, as a kid, andI'm just sort of curious,
there's some that are stillaround, and then there's some
that aren't. And so, you know,how, how much does innovation?
Or how much does kind of theimportance of change factor into
(18:15):
kind of a franchise or a brand'slongevity? I mean, there's so
many different evolutions, but Ithink of some that, like, didn't
change. So mean, does thatfactor in? Are you coaching
people on that?
Well, it that you would knowmore about the space than I
would add, and it's definitely acritical factor to a brand's
(18:37):
longevity. And I, the franchisemarkets interesting because the
consumer sees these franchisebrands as as in some cases,
global brands, I mean, they're,they're in every market. In a
certainly so many examples ofbrands that are in every market
across the US or Canada. Most ofthese franchise brands are owned
(18:58):
by one person. So there's a veryprivately owned section of
franchising, where it's a lot oftimes it's one person, it's a
family that started this thingand then a franchise out. And
when you have that dynamic, Ithink you are probably more
susceptible to not lookingforward and not thinking hey, we
(19:22):
can't just rest on our laurelshere. We can't just do the same
things we did interesting in1985 and still get the same
response and engagement. Why?
Every once in a while you see afranchise brand that has done
it. They've beaten the theinnovation, risk or threat of
not innovating. Brands likeHoliday Inn, McDonald's Dairy
(19:43):
Queen. There's a lot of themthat have withstood the test of
time. They have come out withnew menu items, new ways of
doing business, they've requiredfranchisees to invest in
locations and come up with withnew model because you're seeing
it in like Wendy's now, forexample, with all the self order
kiosks, and a completely newrestaurant design, the
(20:05):
franchisor has the right todictate that to the franchisee.
And if it's a good franchisewhere they're investing in these
things, and then pushing it outto the system saying, Hey, guys,
we, we found a new technology,we found a new product line, you
have to do it now. Level. Butyou do see a lot of brands that
that were at one point, majornames and super successful. And
(20:28):
then they just kind of fade. Andmaybe we're kind of seeing that
with subway now. You know, we'reat one point they dominated,
right, the space and now you'vethey've kind of been dipping a
little bit I think they couldcertainly resurface here, but
yeah, I've actually beenimpressed lately with their
(20:49):
advertising of their footlongpretzels and cookies and things.
And I thought that's kind offun. But I'm not an avid subway
eater. Owning a, you know,restaurant business of my own.
Hmm, interesting. Yeah, I mean,it is it I've I've, you know,
certainly I am passionate aboutinnovation and thinking forward
(21:13):
and challenging the status quo.
But I mean, I think about like aQuiznos, I don't even know if
they exist anymore. I loved themwhen they first came out. They
were innovative, they had these,you know, hot and toasty,
sandwiches, and then it kind ofvanished as far as I know. So,
and Quiznos is a good example ofwhat what we were just talking
(21:35):
about where they had the largestclass action lawsuit in
franchise history. Now, it'sprobably been 15 years ago or
so. But you had privateownership, making decisions that
that serve them and not thefranchisees, you had to buy
products through them at adrastically increased cost. And
(21:57):
ultimately, like, like, itsounds like you feel to I felt
like the product was better thanreally anyone else out on the
market. Like I always chose togo there, too. But literally
overnight, a 5000 unit franchisesystem basically disappeared,
you'll see in a while, but thatcomes back to just ownership
making the right or wrongdecisions. And in franchising,
(22:20):
you have to make sure that thefranchisee is winning, if
they're not winning, then thisis short lived success. And
really, what what happenedthere?
Yeah, you know, it's aninteresting, I would say, game
or plan or get, you know,thinking about it strategically,
it's not a short term, you know,get rich scheme, in my opinion,
(22:40):
it's a long term, like youplanned for your very planful
for the things that you want toinfluence, which is, in my case,
you know, really goodingredients, really good service
in a restaurant that justhappens to be my family's food.
But, you know, I think if you'retrue to your brand, and if
you're true to your kind of corevalues, I think it can work
(23:02):
really well. And then thenimbleness is, again, the key,
but I really, I, every time I gopast the noodles and company, I
shake my head now. I mean, Iused to seek them, I used to
love them. And I think you know,again, they've been, in my
opinion, diminished by chasingprofit, which I think is again,
(23:26):
a short term fix drug addict, ifyou're only searching that next
quarterly profit, you're notmaking good decisions for the
long term of your team, yourbusiness, your brand, your cell.
I don't know how you feel aboutit, but I'm very biased.
Well, I mean, I love the Treskastory. I think when you have a
(23:48):
family legacy, where there'shistory, there's there's there's
there's blood, sweat and tearsthat have been poured into this
brand over decades. Not justyours, but but your whole
families and, and a greathistory behind it. We've got
unique products, we've got aplace that people can come to
(24:09):
for lunch or dinner multipletimes a week because a wide menu
selection and product selection.
And and we're in a space that tome can work in just about any
market that we have the rightgraphics, the right income
levels and traffic count andthings your work and what you
have done and what you are doingoutside of Tresca is absolutely
(24:30):
to me the kind of the silverbullet here where you are
interacting with 1000s of peoplethrough your speaking
engagements and your coaching.
You're also front and center andlooking and being involved in
what company is doing forinnovation. So not not just the
long term but short term, thereare opportunities that you will
(24:51):
be able to help people see newmenu items, new ways of doing
business, that if they wereworking with another company,
they wouldn't have thatopportunity to so I think
there's a huge advantage to it,we need to get the first
franchisees in. That's right, toprove that there's duplicates.
But I know once we do that themarket opportunity and the
upside for the brand isenormous. Yeah. Well, thank
(25:14):
you, Chris. I certainlyappreciate all of your kind
words, they think we've beengood partners on this so far.
And I, I'm very optimistic it'sgoing to be fun. Okay, back to
you and FMS, you, you know, isthere anything that you see
coming up that you could usesome help on or want me to kind
(25:36):
of think about and the way thatI tee this up for folks is,
what's keeping you up at night?
What are the challenges thatare, you know, on the tip of
your brain? Or, Oh, I wish Icould come up with this. And I'd
love to even in the moment, seeif I can help you with those.
I love it. I love it. So I thinklike every business on the
(25:56):
planet in the history ofbusinesses, I'm always worried
about continuing to drive thetop line. You know, how do we
how do we keep that funnel ofbusiness working and going. And
new opportunities to drivebusiness into that funnel, and
then also new services and valuethat we can give to the people
(26:18):
that we work with to potentiallyhave more revenue streams. I
mentioned the funding, Imentioned the real estate, but I
am always looking for other waysthat we can add value to someone
that we're working with. So thatwould be one. Two, I am not a
great leader. I am a I'm a doer,you know, I'm if like Michael
(26:42):
Gerber, the E Myth, I'm the guythat is still digging the ditch.
And you know, in it so far, it'shard for me sometimes to step
back and give the team theresources, the time, and the and
the tools that where they coulda take some off my plate, but be
(27:02):
be more successful and, and haveand be more empowered, I think
would be the right word for it.
Yeah. So that's something thatweighs on me and I, I'm
constantly aware of it andconstantly trying, but I, you
know, I just end up usuallydoing it.
But that's, that's aninteresting challenge, I want to
(27:24):
address both of both of thethings that you brought up. But
I would say on the, you know, EMyth perspective, which is great
book, by the way, we're maybehaving a hard time kind of
driving the, the team forward.
And I think you probably are abetter leader than you're giving
yourself credit for, by the way,but you know, it might, it might
be beneficial to bring insomeone that could almost be,
(27:48):
you know, a CEO, and then youend up as kind of a chairman.
And on the seat of doers. Youmay be, you know, kind of the
board that the CEO ultimately isresponsible to kind of come back
and make sure there's buy in andthose sorts of things. Because
in my understanding, you're theowner, is that right? Yeah,
(28:08):
that's what I thought 100%equity. And yeah, so I mean,
ultimately, the CEO, isresponsible and reports up to
you. But that might be a reallyinteresting way of, you know,
continuing to find the growthcontinuing to kind of bring on
people that can help to kind ofpush the strategy forward. I
(28:29):
find in a lot of, again, in alot of these organizations,
that, you know, the owner or thefounder has to make a decision.
And so this actually is ananalogy that I did not come up
with, but I'm going to use it inthis moment, which is, are you
an hourglass leader, or a tophat. And so if you think about
(28:52):
an hourglass, the sand, ofcourse, starts in the top. And
if you are the bottleneck thateverything has to flow through,
it's a really slow moment. Imean, it takes a long time for
all the sand to go through. Soif you think about work,
product, work, output, etc. Buta top hat, you flip it over and
everything falls out. And so inthis kind of moment of you
(29:15):
reflecting on how can I grow mybusiness, it might be important
for you to get yourself out ofthat hourglass bottleneck, and
just be a doer and have someonethat can orchestrate the type of
communication. Again, just kindof you know there the orchestra
(29:36):
leader that is telling all thedifferent teams what they need
to do and you're just you know aperson on that whether you're
doing business development orcoaching on the strategy of the
franchising in your ops team oron the HR side or whatever. So I
think it's a really like a thatis a very vulnerable you know,
kind of comment, but I reallyAppreciate it, I think that
(30:00):
humility will take you very far.
And there's some things that youmight look at doing.
And no, and I totally appreciatethat. And I don't think I have
have an ego. I've never feltlike I was one of those guys,
but, but thank you for saying.
And it's, that's something thatdefinitely weighs on me, you
(30:20):
know that. I guess I lose sleepover, but
well keep thinking because theremight be someone in your midst
that's like ready to take thatspot, and they might be a good
partner for you, you know,however, on the ideas front of
how to build top line revenue, Iwas just thinking through and
(30:42):
this is like, in the case of,kind of, you know, it would
almost be an interesting modelto bring in a team of folks. And
again, I've worked with so manyof your folks. So I know they
could do this. But a suite thathelps to surround a franchisee,
especially in the beginning. Andso I think of, you know, the
functional areas that they needto develop a sustainable
(31:07):
business. So you think aboutmarketing, business development,
you think about, you know,there's an operations leader
that's necessary to make sureit's efficient and effective.
There's a finance leader, or,you know, a finance component.
There's HR, there's technology,there's innovation, there's
facilities, and these are allhats worn by an owner when they
(31:31):
start a new business. Yeah. Soif you are, and I'll just again,
use my example, I came fromGeneral Mills, where I didn't
have to know finance, I justliterally said, Hey, finance
person helped me with this, or,you know, hey, HR person, I need
help with this. And so all of asudden, you're thrust into this
moment where you have to wearall the hats. So FMS could come
(31:53):
with, hey, you know, FMS, HRperson, what do I do in this
case? Or, you know, what do I dotechnology leader, and maybe
they have a, you know, a phoneand an internet service or So
those might be some, you know,components that you could bring,
that would be, again, a nicesupplement to your revenue,
helping the franchisees to bemore successful, which again, is
(32:16):
just, I call it the snowball oflove.
I love that the snowball, I loveit. We do get that that is
requested. Because, yeah, wewill facilitate getting the
franchisee in, you know, takingthem all the way to that finish
line. And then they sign up. Andthen the client that the brand
(32:40):
owner, if they're certainlycapable, I mean, they've they've
they're experienced, they'reintelligent, smart business
people, but they don't have ateam in place yet. We first
start franchising so that thatdefinitely could be a great
value prop to save, let us bethat team, at least in the in
the intermediate stages, duringyour in house people in at some
(33:02):
point, but that'd be a greatidea.
Maybe it's like a subscriptionmodel for the first year or
something, you know, it's likeleverage just as much as you
need for making this up $10,000a month, and then we'll wean you
off of it will be your trainingwheels and weaned off as you,
you know, continue to develop.
And I'm curious to know how manyfolks start out with just one
(33:26):
franchise location? Or are theystarting with multiple?
All the above? And we have somethat? Not very many, but some
that will start with lots oflocations. Okay. And, and others
that start with one? Yeah, andthe whole, the whole range of
(33:47):
spectrum. The, I would say themajority, the brands that we
work with only begin with one,they had one good location that
we use as the prototype typethat's flagship that we're
basing our model off of, that'swhat we're selling off of.
Right. And, and using that asour, you know, our pitch point
and, and selling off that singleunit. Okay,
(34:10):
I think maybe I stated thequestion wrong, but that was
helpful, too. How many of thenew franchisees coming in want
one? How many want many?
Got it? So the majority of whatwe're selling is units one
through 50. Okay, that's wherewe are heavily involved is those
initial early stage ramp ups.
And in that range, the majorityof the people that buy are
(34:37):
single owner operators, it's onelocation. A lot of times it's
it's a husband and wife, it's ait's an operator who's going to
work in the business, they lovethe brand, they love the food
and they want to they want to bepart of it. As these grow that's
when we tend to see more multiunit investors come in and when
we have validation we have proofwe have sure versus under a
(34:58):
belt. That's where we've seenmore of a multi unit deals come
together. With we've definitelysold them. But it's usually been
at the later stage a little bitthat next level of maturity,
they have some track record,then I found new see multiunit
buyers come in and okay, we'vehad some by countries, if it's
on by whole states, and thenyeah,
(35:22):
I was still trying to thinkthrough whether the kind of the
suite of offerings would behelpful, because presumably,
presumably, if they're buying 50units, they've got a little bit
more sophisticated kind of frontoffice, but it's the single or
the, you know, they're buyingtwo or three locations, they
just might not have, you know,the capital and the capacity to
(35:44):
have the leadership at thefunctional areas. So, anyway.
Yeah, definitely, the majorityof the people that we are
selling to would not have anyreal resources behind them. So,
right, that that point? Yep.
Makes sense. Well, okay, I'llkeep thinking about your
(36:05):
challenges. But I think thoseare two, you know, good ones
that again, you know, Idefinitely don't think you have
an ego, you are such a humbleperson. And, you know, it's,
it's a little bit of, I thinkthe right thing will happen to
help you, especially in thatkind of CEO role. I think, keep
(36:25):
thinking, look around theoffice, kind of see if there's
somebody that might be able totake that. Take that home. So
that's cool. That's really neat.
Well, thank you for I mean,everything. You're trusting me
with the task of business, butalso coming on to the podcast to
share with folks kind of whatyou're up to what you're
thinking about. It's reallyinteresting part of kind of the
(36:45):
business world is thisfranchising space, and thank
you. Well, I absolutely adoreyou. Thank you, and your whole
team, James and the whole team.
And I love your brand. And it'sjust been so great to work with
you. I think we will have somany wins here in our future
(37:08):
together. And I it's awesome tobe part of this. I haven't seen
you it outside of our Treska.
Roles andnametag on Yeah. Well, thank
you. Yeah. I look forward to thefuture to Chris. I'm very
optimistic, very excited. And ifyou end up with this kind of
(37:29):
equity position, if you'rethinking about it, then Tasker
wants to be on your list ofconsiderate consideration. So
you let me know. That's great.
All right. Well, have a greatrest of the day. And good luck
with your travels. And thank youagain for being on the show.
Thank you, sir. All right.
(37:50):
Thanks so much for tuning intothis episode of level up your
business with me, Sarah Frasca.
If you have a problem in yourbusiness that's keeping you up
at night. Please join us in afuture episode so we can help
get you unstuck. Just clickingthe link in the show notes and
send us a message. Pleaseremember, stay innovative
friends.
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