Tom DuFore: 0:01

Welcome to the Multiply Your Success podcast, where each week we help growth-minded entrepreneurs and franchise leaders take the next step in their expansion journey. I'm your host, Tom Dufour, CEO of Big Sky franchise team, and a very Merry Christmas week to you and your loved ones. And as we bring another year to a close, it's time to reflect and look back on the past year. Now, as this year is winding down, I always like to take a moment to think about the highs and the lows and everything in between. And for our podcast this year, we had 16 franchise-focused podcasts, and we decided to highlight nine of them and nine franchisors in this episode. You may remember some of our guests, which include the leaders of Caldwell Banker, Club Pilates, and Caring Transitions. And by the way, these nine guests represented more than 5,000 locations around the world. You're going to have to stay all the way to the end and just hear the little nuggets and great little snippets we share throughout this episode. So let's go ahead and jump right into our top franchise podcasts of 2025. So our first guest is from episode 251, and it's Ray Fabick, the CEO of Carrying Transitions with more than 375 locations.

SPEAKER_05: 1:28

I think the foundation of it all is you have to have successful franchisees who are supported and franchisees that are profitable. And I think, you know, for us it's about why do you want to grow? Do you want carrying transitions to be big just for the sake of being big? Because I'm not always a fan that bigger is better. I don't know that a 400-unit franchise ore is better than a 200-unit franchise ore unless you have a compelling reason to grow. And our reason for growth is we want to be where the client is moving from and where they're moving to. And that's really our number one spot because you can't give a caring transition in general if there's one company helping on one end and then there's a different company on the other end. So we know that if we grow and expand, we can help more clients. And that's really kind of what started it. So you get a few successful franchisees that feel supported and they're profitable. And then I think as we've expanded over the years, it's really become, you know, don't let anybody in who just who just has the money, who just has the franchise free money. And I think every franchise or goes through that at some point where you're reliant on the income coming in through franchise sales. And our goal was to always get to a point where we're okay if we don't sell any franchises. And we're okay if we don't sell any franchises, and then that helps you focus on support and grow the network internally. And we're far from the perfect organization, but I think we've we've shown that if we support the franchisee, pretend them to what they are, treat them as the customer, you know, as much as we possibly can, then they're gonna be happy and they're gonna tell more people, you know, and the brand will expand. And I think the best example I can give you, Atlanta, Georgia was always a struggle market for us. We could never get any traction there. And then along came two franchise or two franchisees, they were just terrific. They just came in, they built their businesses up, executed the model, they did great. They got off to two of our fastest starts ever, any of our new franchisees. And then three years later, we've got 15 franchisees in the greater Atlanta area, and it just shows that success is kind of great success. And we didn't advertise any differently in Atlanta or Georgia, but you just you meet referral partners and through our auctions and all those things, people just start to hear about you. So it is that if you do the right thing and get strong franchisees, you'll you'll grow organically at a really good pace.

Tom DuFore: 3:50

Our next guest is Mike Andes, who's the founder of Augusta Landscape and was our five-year anniversary episode at episode 262. And he had some very unique things that he does and a different approach to franchising.

SPEAKER_09: 4:05

Our franchise, the give back program, for example, where they get the franchise feedback, basically after five years, they can roll that initial fee into another location, or they can wait till the end of their term, 10 years, and just get the cash back, like literally a check back to them. And they just have to follow three systems pay for performance, they have to wrap their trucks correctly, and they have to do open book management with their team to be able to share the numbers with their team. As long as they do those three things, they'll get the money back. That being said, there's people who quit, there's people who give up, there's people who sell their business, and they're not gonna get that money back. And so I my incentive in this case is to keep them in business because they're gonna get, they're paying a flat monthly fee of$1,600. So like I just need to keep them in business. That's my objective. Whereas when when there's a royalty structure in place, I find that the franchise or has perverse incentive to inflate top-line revenue. So encourage people to spend overspend on marketing, overspend on salespeople, overspend on a lot of aspects because they're just trying to inflate top line revenue. They don't care about the bottom line profit. And so another thing that I like I was really adamant about too is like allowing people to leave the franchise at any time with their customers for no penalty. And no one does that. And I understand why, because it's like it's freaky. But bottom line is like it forces us as a franchise or to constantly improve the systems, constantly offer more value, constantly offer more training and support and serving the the owners. And so that is it's not easy. It's very difficult to run a system where people can leave at any time and take their business elsewhere, especially in a low barrier to entry market like lawn care. But it keeps us honest. And ultimately building a franchise, I think the number one thing that keeps this industry really held back is we build businesses and franchise or build business, the business in a way to sell it to private equity or a five, maybe a 10-year term. But if you were building that business over the course of 100 years, if you were actually asking yourself, what does this business look like in a hundred years? You would structure it differently. You'd go slower, you would listen a lot more, you'd think about the owners a lot more, you'd think about their the brand reputation in 20 or 30 years from now. And that's really why I think so many franchisors fail, why so many don't get to 100 locations, and that the vast majority of them will never become profitable because you usually have to get over 100 locations to become profitable. And I really hate the fact that the franchise or world gets such a bad rap when I think franchising is a beautiful thing in terms of following systems, having support, having back end, the ability to be able to use common practices, used across hundreds of locations, and then just follow the system and avoid all the pitfalls. I love it. But there are so many bad actors when it comes to franchisors. There are so many people that just think they can franchise their system. They don't support their franchisees, they take a royalty off the top without giving the support required to actually be successful, and it gives a bad rap to the industry, unfortunately.

Tom DuFore: 6:38

Our next guest is David Berg, the CEO and co-founder of Redirect Health, and he shares with us how joining up with experienced professionals to help him along the way has made a difference.

Dr. David Berg: 6:51

Well, this is a franchise show, and uh it seems like we talked very little about franchise. So, you know, when I thought about this before, I was like, okay, what's the main, like a main lesson or message or something I want to leave with the audience? We haven't even come close to talking about it, which is which is interesting to me because I I I had this preconceived notion that we're gonna talk about franchising, of which I know very little about. So I had a little anxiety about that. I'm going, I am the last person to say there it have any kind of expertise on franchising. You know, you got me started in this. I had this idea and I came to you to learn a little bit about franchise. And when we started, Tom, I thought you were gonna teach me everything I need to know about franchise in about three hours, maybe three days, maybe 30 days, maybe three months, and then I would be able to go run with it. And what I learned very quickly, you got me there fast, is the people who do this, they've got 20 years of experience. Just like I've got 20, 30 years of experience, 40 years now. I started working at a mental hospital when I was uh 18, 19 years old. So that's how far back in healthcare I go. But but you made me realize fast that this is a different discipline. This whole the franchise business is different. And that is why I went out and I got Matt Hill and I talked to him about what I want to do. And there's a little bit of cat and mouse where he's trying to avoid me a little bit, and I'm trying to like get him in. And it's it's we got about a year, and he's like, okay, I get it. Let's do it let's do this. And then he brought in Jesse Curry, who had very instrumental in massage envy's success. And then uh we got Pete, who I think you know, a bunch of different brands too. So I've seen Matt, Jesse, and Pete with so much franchise knowledge. It was even, I realize now how silly it was when I came to you and said, teach me about franchises. I want to be a franchiser. Like I want to build a franchise on our platform. I realize now how silly it was. If there is a lesson there for somebody who might want a franchise, is you can do it yourself, I'm sure. That might be the slow boat. There is a faster boat, which is go partner with somebody who has already done it, had the successes, understands the nuances, can make the pivots.

Tom DuFore: 8:53

Our next guest is Robin Gagnon from episode 270, and she's the CEO of We Sell Restaurants, and she shares with us some insights about franchise resales.

SPEAKER_08: 9:04

Tom, so many brands don't really think about franchise resales as a strategy, a strategic move for the future. And so what's happening right now, demographically across America, is that we're undergoing what's known as the silver tsunami. I don't know if you've heard that language, but 10,000 baby boomers every single day are turning 65. And so then they look at, well, who am who is going to take over my business? What is my succession plan? And often they look to family, but young children, well, they're not even young anymore, right? So the children of baby boomers are often Gen X or even millennials, and they're highly educated and honestly off in their own space. And so when mom or dad says, hey, take over the restaurant, they're like, oh no, not so much, right? So that leaves this franchise owner in a position where they're trying to figure out who's going to take over. Can I maximize value? And sometimes franchise owners don't even realize that there is residual value, that the business that they think, oh, I've I paid it off. It's making me some money, but the lease is over and the franchise is over. Maybe I should just, you know, shut down. And meanwhile, so that's the franchisee layer. On the other side, we have the franchise or and the franchise or is, you know, shoveling money out the door with friend dev and bringing these new franchisees in. But those franchisees that those would-be franchisees live in a different pool than the ones who want a resale, right? We don't cross over those worlds. We don't do anything with new franchise development. And we feel like it's absolutely a different customer. That customer who wants a resale, they want something open and operating. They maybe won't have the courage or sometimes the capital to start from the ground up. And so they come to us and they want something that's been open, that has cash flow, it's on the books, and we can have different sorts of conversations. Then they might buy another development right, but they want to take over something that's already operating. And so I really talk to franchisors and franchise communities about net restaurant growth. Be sure that as you are bringing new units in, you're not ignoring the signs that succession planning may not be taking place. Because, you know, that item seven on your FDD is going to show the ones that are coming in and the ones that are going out. And you want to make, or excuse me, your item 20, you want to make sure that there's a balance there. You don't want to have subtractions outnumber your additions. And that's powerful and easy to do when you have a partner like We Sell Restaurants, where we specialize in keeping those doors open, bringing new and excited franchisees in to take over existing locations.

Tom DuFore: 11:52

Our next episode was episode 272 with Keenan Fisher, the CEO of Tommy Gunn's barber shop. That's great advice. And, you know, actually, as you're you're describing that, I'm reading the sign behind you. So someone may not see the video of this, but over your shoulder, it says what you want now versus what you want most. So talk about that a little bit.

SPEAKER_00: 12:15

Well, the cool thing about that is I believe that wholeheartedly. And I I used to tell my kids all the time, I say, you either pay now or pay later, but you're gonna pay. So what do you want to do? Do you want to put in the work now for what you where you want to be or you know, not be where you want to be later and pay for it? I came into my office one day and my daughter was on a step stool with some markers, and she actually wrote that on there. So which was which was great. And I'm like, ah, you nailed it. I'm never taking that down. So that was like two years ago, and it stuck. But it but I'm a big believer in that, right? Like nothing's built in a day. Like there's there's very few overnight successes, and it it's built with consistency and doing things the right way and surrounding yourself with great people and putting in the work. Uh, there's very few successful entrepreneurs that I know that say, oh yeah, I was easy all the time, and I never had sacrificed, and all those things. So, you know, it's embracing that. You know, I was talking to um a friend of mine who's also in business, and we were talking about the early days where you're you're really grinding, right? And it feels like a grind. I feel like, you know, we're still grinding some, you know, most of the time now, too, because we love it so much. But that's some of the most fun you have too. And you talk to entrepreneurs, their best stories are when they were just like all in 24-7, just doing everything they can barely to barely make it work. So having a, you know, embracing that and focusing on like what your actual end goal is and view it as a positive, I think is a is a great approach to business.

Tom DuFore: 13:40

Our next guest is from episode 275 with Kristen Densner with Tierra and Cantata.

SPEAKER_07: 13:48

I would say one of the biggest lessons I've learned or misses, uh, and there's a really great quote that I love. Uh, it's don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it. I think in particular with like hiring, you know, you have someone that I think a lot of times people move very slowly on hiring changes, and you don't realize the impact that that has on not just your brand, but also the team. And I think, you know, in the earlier years, I definitely made mistakes around that that, you know, I would have, I would have, I wish I had that quote then that would remind me of that.

Tom DuFore: 14:27

Oh, that quote's amazing. I am going to be writing that down in post-production to set right next to my desk. I love, love that quote. It's so succinct and specific. Well, let's look at the other side. Have you had a a make or two a highlight that you'd like to share with us?

SPEAKER_07: 14:43

One is personal, one is more business. So personal, as a as a you know, young teenage girl, I would read Entrepreneur Inc. magazine, you know, and I would read about all the businesses. And a few years ago, Inc. named me as one of the top 100 female founders. And being like named that from my like childhood kind of fan magazine just was really cool. It meant a lot. And then the other moment that stands out a ton is a family shared in a review, a public review of us, that their child translated for them when they traveled to Central America. And just seeing like that sort of impact that you're having, where literally a five-year-old was translating for their family while they traveled, it's just really cool to like see the difference you're making to people's lives.

Tom DuFore: 15:34

Our next guests are Zach and Tyler Gordon, co-CEOs of Uptown Cheapskate and Kid to Kid Franchises, episode 286.

Tyler Gordon: 15:44

Yeah, I would say, in my mind, there should be a singular point of focus for any franchise or and then for a prospective franchisee coming in, which is the success of your franchisees. If that is your North Star, if everything that you do is to drive performance at your existing stores, at the new stores you're opening, everything else will solve itself. Conversely, if your franchisees are not happy, if they're not profitable, if they're not excited about growing with you into the future, nothing else matters. So sure, you could put a lot of dots on the map, but we've seen this unfortunately. It's it's really a travesty in these situations, just time and time again, where you'll have a franchise or I would say mess up the order of operations, which is one where I define success as number of dots on the map, how many locations I have. Whereas really what matters is again the individual success of each of those locations. And if you get that right, you'll be expanding for years and decades to come. And so it's really that orientation for the franchise or franchisee success. And then if you're in a franchisee seat, it's the same exact thing. Do you think that the franchiseur holds that as their core number one priority? Do you get that from your interactions? Do you hear that consistently referenced when you speak to existing franchisees? That's where I would always orient my time.

Zach Gordon: 17:05

I really do think that that is the North Star franchisee success. Uh, maybe the other component I would put out there is that there are no shortcuts, and that's a cliche. Clearly, you could apply that to so many different things. But when it comes to, especially if you're an emerging franchise or setting up systems that are repeatable, that people from all different backgrounds and different parts of the country can follow and be successful with, you got to start from square one and you got to build a really good process. Then you got to run that process, I don't know, a hundred times and see where it breaks, where there's variability in the outcomes, and re-engineer either that piece or something upstream of that piece of the process, troubleshoot your process over and over and over and over again until you got a process that just works perfectly. And at that stage, something that's almost ironic is if you were to then to evaluate the process, it would look very simple and elegant. Like, wow, this must have taken five minutes to come up with. However, there is a humongous amount of brain damage that goes into putting together a really simple and elegant process that works. So there's no there's no shortcuts. You gotta make sure that every step of every process that you're putting into place is not only something that you can follow, but that your franchisees can follow as well.

Tom DuFore: 18:20

Our next guest is the brand president of Club Pilates, Tiana Strademan, from episode 282.

SPEAKER_01: 18:26

I think early on, like those come up in those initial conversations about the brand, and you can identify pretty quickly if someone's going to be a right fit, you know, for this. And the business opportunity aside, that we really encourage that this is your responsibility to bring this to life in your community. And community doesn't just happen when you open your doors. It's something that has to be created and a lot of hard work that goes into that. And while you yourself might not be in your studio every day or that sort of franchisee, that's fine. But making sure then you have the tools and the resources in the team to really bring that to life. I think those real conversations are important to have up front and how important it is for us to protect the brand and make sure that franchisees that come into the system are aligned and excited about that. And like I mentioned, more of our newer franchisees are already members. So they already are huge believers in the brand. And I love when they come in and they tell me more about the brand than sometimes I even know because they're such believers and really truly love the brand. So that's really exciting for me.

Tom DuFore: 19:36

What advice might you give to someone that's new in having franchised their business as they look to launch and grow?

SPEAKER_01: 19:42

Stay true to who you are and your brand, what proof of concept that you are able to create to get to the point that you are franchising and really what that magic is. But then really be adaptable and pivot because if you stay so stuck in the mud, likely the business is going. Evolved, you know, beyond you, right? So trying to find that balance of staying true to what you know and what your offering is and all those details, but also being open to feedback from your franchisees and learning from them and the people, boots on the ground and those early adopters can really teach you so much that is critical for you to continue to scale and really partner with them to understand that and give them the tools and resources to help them be successful.

Tom DuFore: 20:30

Our final highlight of the top podcasts of 2025 is Jason Waugh, who's the president of Coldwell Banker with over 2,700 global offices and franchises around the world.

SPEAKER_06: 20:43

We have this thing internally freedom within a framework. And so certainly we want brand consistency in terms of our marks and look. But the people that we partner with, they want to be a premium provider and have a premium brand offering. So we don't get a lot of inconsistency there. And I think that's because you know we've got a profile of the entrepreneur that we want to partner with. But you you bring up an excellent point. We understand and acknowledge this is their business. And we want them to own their business. We're in partnership with them. So our objective is how can we partner with you to help you achieve your goals and help you achieve your agents' goals? And so we focus on growth through those, you know, years, but we also want to bring that relationship and business partnership full circle and focus on succession planning and focus on succession planning early, just to prepare for the what if event, not just retirement, but we want to create hopefully a financial event at the end of their career, but also create continuity for the business asset, continuity for the agents, continuity for the employees, smooth transition from predecessor to successor in leadership. So we look at these relationships and these partnerships holistically from beginning to end. It's not just sign up, hey, we'll help you grow. You know, we certainly do that, want to continue to do that, but we also have the end game in mind because we want continuity for everybody, but also hopefully create a good financial event at the end for the owner. But it's, I think for us, it's just, I place a premium on self-awareness. If I'm ever going to write a book, it's going to be on self-awareness. And we're self-aware enough to know that we're in partnership with business owners that want the freedom and flexibility to grow their companies in the way they want to locally for themselves. It's so we've got, again, this freedom within a framework type of type of strategy.

Tom DuFore: 22:51

All right. And so that's the episode. And our guests today totaled more than 5,000 franchises between them, including the Club Pilates brand president with over 1,400 locations, and Jason Waugh with Caldwell Banker with over 2,700 locations. Really, really impressive work and just great bits of information for them to share with us. And so that's the conclusion to our episode today. And I just want to wish you and your families a very, very Merry Christmas. And also thank you, dear listener, for being with us this year and prior and for what's to come ahead. So just grateful for you. That's the episode today, folks. So please make sure you subscribe to the podcast and give us a review. And remember, if you or anyone you know might be ready to franchise your business or take your franchise company to the next level, please connect with us at BigSkyFranchise Team.com to schedule your free, no obligation consultation. Thanks for tuning in, and we look forward to having you back next week.