How to Build a Franchise That Lasts Generations

Ready to build a true family business? This episode is your ultimate guide to franchise succession, ownership transfer, and long-term franchise growth. Discover the proven strategies that turn a single franchise into a multi-generational legacy. We've compiled expert insights from industry legends and financial gurus to give you a complete blueprint for building a business that doesn't just survive—it thrives for generations.

Full conversations with our featured experts:
Rocky Lalvani (Profit First): https://youtu.be/RgDsfhVSaUw
David C. Barnett (Franchise Warnings): https://youtu.be/euUb3Dmio0o
Jeff Elgin (FranChoice CEO): https://youtu.be/mn33kZLQi8o
Dan Claps & Natalie Gold (Advisors): https://youtu.be/__MOAS26brw

DISCLAIMER: The information on this podcast is for general information purposes only. Franchising involves risk and careful consideration should be given before making any decisions.


00:00 256 Franchise Freedom Podcast (Legacy)
01:04 Intro: The Blueprint for a Franchise Legacy
01:55  The FOUNDATION - Conquering Fear & Adopting Success Habits
14:27 The SMART DECISION - Buying vs. Starting a Franchise with David C. Barnett
21:16 The #1 MISTAKE - Why Top Franchisees Follow the System with Jeff Elgin
27:40 The FINAL PIECE - Choosing Your Advisors & Building Your Legacy
41:39 Conclusion: Your Legacy Journey Starts Now!

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The Franchise Freedom: Discover Your New Path to Freedom Through Franchise Ownership, Book by Giuseppe Grammatico https://ggthefranchiseguide.com/book or purchase directly on Amazon.

Transcript

0:00

Sometimes we spend two, three calls on a franchise to decide not to move forward. That's not a step in the wrong direction. It's not even a step back. You're making progress. And at the end of the day, the big litmus test that I always say people should be asking is. What are the different fees I'm gonna pay and what should I be getting for that money, right? What will I get for that money? Yes. I'll tell you the biggest mistake that most people make, and it was true of me when, when I first became a franchisee, is they focus on the wi yes, on the product or service that the business is delivering to customers. And, and that's the last thing you should be looking at. My advice, though is to talk to people that are in that industry. So if you're thinking about getting into the technology industry, talk to it. Technology buys. Think we're getting into franchising. Talk to a franchise advisor, not your neighbor, Welcome to the Franchise Freedom Podcast, where you can escape the corporate trap through franchise ownership. Here's your host, Giuseppe gr, the franchise guide.

giuseppe_1_08-28-2025_151154: 1:04

Welcome to the Franchise Freedom Podcast. I'm your host, Giuseppe Grammatico, your franchise guide to show where we help corporate executives experience time and financial freedom. Thanks for joining us today. We really appreciate it. And don't forget, feel free to visit our website, ggthefranchiseguide.com click on that book a call. I'd love to chat with you, answer your questions in regards to business ownership, franchise ownership, if you're potentially a good fit. Book a 20 minute call with me today. There's no cost, no commitment, and I would love to help you out in any, way we can. today I'm joined by industry experts who have helped countless families build franchise empires that last. Whether you're planning to pass your business to the next generation or building your first franchise with Legacy in mind, you'll get real world stories and expert insights right here. let's dive into what really takes to create a franchise that just doesn't just survive, but thrives for generations.

1:55

Coaching and part of our coaching is getting through fear and doubt and things like that, and part of that is, is just walking you through of what a franchise truly is. What are the risks involved? There's a risk involved with the franchise. Absolutely. There's a lot of things we can't control, but there's a lot of things we cannot control. We can't control the economy. We can control our attitudes. We can control our dedication to the business. We can't control, we can't control terrorists, we can't control ai. We can accept it, we can work with AI incorporate into the business, but fear takes off and we just did a, an entire episode on 15 fears and concerns that we should try to link here to this episode. But those are things to consider as well. But fear is kills a lot of deals and I think part of fear and anxiety is that people don't go far enough. I had someone that was very fearful after the first call with the franchise. They had a million questions. And I laughed and said, that's completely understandable. And they said, what do you mean? I'm thinking about maybe passing on franchising. And I said, you don't know what you don't know. You don't know much about the brand. You haven't talked to franchisees. You don't know what the average day in the life is. You had a 30 minute call intro call. You know what the company does. You had a general overview, but there's so much more to learn. Take the time to figure out what the franchise offers. What's the day in the life? What's your role? What's the expanse expansion strategy of the brand? What's the exit strategy of the brand? Those are things to consider. So people are just getting eng golfed with feel fear and anxiety. Go old school, get a piece of paper, write down your questions and concerns, check'em off every call, I guarantee. Or you're gonna get your questions and concerns for the most part answered. And there's gonna be a new list. That's okay, that's progress. Sometimes we spend two, three calls on a franchise to decide not to move forward. That's not a step in the wrong direction. It's not even a step back. You're making progress. You've got to realize, I wanna, I prefer brands in B2B. I'd rather have these longer relationships, these maybe senior care, these referral offerings in water and smoke damage with the plumbers and insurance companies. So you make progress. You start to learn the things you like, the things you don't like. And one, and one thing you've helped me with, and, and this was a, a game changer, just, you know, it's budgeting and, and ROI. So with budgeting, I never had a systematic way to kind of budget. And with, with profit first we talked about, well, you should put aside, you know, every dollar that comes in, you know, 20% or whatever the number is, goes to marketing, paying yourself first. And I never in my entire career had a, a system. It was basically, you know, in my last business if there was money in the account. But that's how, that's how I paid myself because we were always. Charging and, and then getting paid hopefully within 15 days. So, and paying our subcontractors after the fact. But it was based off of cash flow, which was actually the, the wrong way of doing things.'cause we didn't have, at the time, a monthly p and l. So that was super helpful. And then, and then ROI, it's like, okay, this is my, my 20% and that 20% is, we'll make up a number, 50,000 bucks. Well, okay, of that 50,000, what is the ROI, should I be 3, 4, 5, Xing? That type of, you know, those numbers in order that, for that to be sustainable. And that was never taught to me as a franchisee, not a knock against a franchisor. It's just not, yeah, we just said, you know, this is kind of the average spend per month, not percentage, but the, the dollar amount. So that was super, uh, helpful. Can you, can you elaborate a little bit? Any recommendations, you know, a along those lines. So here's the thing. Budgets are like diets. Everybody hates'em. Let's, let's talk about setting a target and measuring how we are against the target, right? And then creating a system for cashflow management. That's what you're talking about. When I started this franchise, I'm supposed to have a 15% profit margin. Well, okay, every time a dollar comes in, let's put 15% aside. That's your profit margin. If you can't run the business on 85%. Why not? Where is, where are you overspending, right? And where are you wasting money in the business? I mean, the reality is running a business is just like people, you know when you were in your twenties, maybe you got a job paying 30, 40, 50 grand. You know, today if you're in your forties or fifties, you're making six figures, and it seems like there's less money. It's'cause of lifestyle creep, right? People own businesses. And so those same financial things that people experience in their personal business owners experience in their business. And we get business lifestyle creep, right? Oh, we need to do this, and oh, we need to do that, right? And then the other part of that is employees don't understand finances. So if you haven't taught your employees to be financially savvy. They're just gonna waste your money.'cause that's what they've been trained to do. They don't think about, Hey, every time I waste something or do something wrong, or let that slide, it's money out the door. Yeah. And so you gotta change the way you focus. That's a, that's a great point. And part of that is on, you know, is on the business owner as well. Something I learned years ago at my last business is we would talk about profitability, but we never showed the the employees so. We would have quarterly meetings to say, because, you know, they, sales were up, they saw business was, was going well and they expected bonuses and, and, and things like that, which we always tried our very best in order to take care of everyone. But I said, well, just because sales was up doesn't mean profitability is up. So we would talk about, okay, sales are up. We're actually making less money because of X, Y, and Z. So I think having, you know, being transparent with the staff, and you don't have to give them access to your QuickBooks, but I think giving, letting them know this is kind of where we stand on a quarterly basis. We are, we are making more money, but we, that being said, we need to make cuts here, here and there. My general manager, I even gave him some phantom equity every quarter he would get a distribution, the profit. So, so he was cognizant, he was aware. The spend, do we really need another employee? Do we really need extra marketing or should he go out every Friday and, and, and, and network at the Chamber of Commerce events and things like that. So I think part of it to, to your point, is yes, they, they, they're not aware, but we also are not empowering them to, to, to be aware, right. With the, with the data, with the information. So that was a big change and I, and I think people realize like. Wow. We're, we're, we're losing money and sales are up. What, what changes? You know, how do we, you know, we're a team. How do we make the changes together? And I'm a big fan of rewarding employees who can help you lower operational costs or efficiency. So if an employee comes up with an idea that saves the business owner$10,000. Give them a grand. Yeah. Give them two grand. Mm-hmm. Right. Create the atmosphere of everybody going, Hey, how do we make more money? Because at the end of the day, a purpose of the business is really simple to make more money and, and we add in while working less, because I don't want people to kill themselves. You didn't start this business to kill yourself. You shouldn't. There are ways to do this and, and you've already got a system with a franchise of how to deliver your operations. Now you just need a system on the financial side in and how to really maximize and spend time thinking about the business instead of being stuck in the business. Right? And if your employees now, just look around the room, wherever you're working and ask yourself, is everyone in here making the company more profitable? Or there are a bunch of people here who are just taking up space, right? And, and when you own a business, you're gonna have the same problem. You gotta ask yourself, is this person taking up space? Where is the return on what they're supposed to do? How do I improve it? Like right now, you see with fast food, right? They're getting rid of people galore and they're putting in ordering screens and apps and ways to, to cut employee costs. And I, I'm not against people and workers, but you've gotta do it right. That's why I love Costco versus like Sam's Club, you know? Costco pays its employees a lot more than Sam's Club does. But when you go there, you get a very different experience. And so you gotta think through that. How am I gonna build my culture, my values? How am I gonna run this business to be the type of place that people love to come to and do business with, versus ones that it's, it's friction to do business with you and, and I don't think business owners realize how much friction they put. In place to do business with them. The easier it is, the easier it is. Look at Amazon one click bye now. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, uh, simple. The Amazon is the perfect model, right? I mean, you have, you have everything. I, I, I follow up Marcus Sheridan from They ask you answer any, and he said, Amazon, you go there, you get reviews, you get, so you can do your research. It's easy. It's one click. Your data saved. If you wanna look at competitors and other, you know, I'm looking at a wireless mic, for example. I just purchased, I purchased two, two mics to, to bring to our conference next week. And they gave comparisons and you can test them out. They're easy to return. It's, you know, go, go to Amazon and then go to your website. And I jokingly say, pretend like you're a customer. I go to your website. Do I know what the heck you even do? And that, and that's sometimes a mystery. What do you do? Give, give us an idea on pricing. If you're$50,000 minimum to meet and, and, and that's the cost. You know, maybe, you know, you, you're giving some data, but that's gonna rule, you know, rule people out and just say, well, I don't have that, that type of of funds. Maybe I need to go a different route. But just being open and transparent will help. Will it increase or decrease lead flow? It could, it could be both, but that the quality of lead at the end of the day should increase. So absolutely shop yourself. Just see, just see, like, you know, maybe have someone else, someone not biased, a friend, kind of maybe, you know, search the site and, and give you some, open, some, some advice as said where, you know, areas of improvement. So, so true. What else, what other advice did you have? So a lot of the audience listening in, is our corporate execs looking to make that, that first move to entrepreneurship? Any, what other advice do you have for them? And many of'em have never owned the business before. And I think, you know, this is the problem. People who don't own a business don't realize how much is involved and how difficult it can be to build everything yourself. So like I partnered with Profit First. Everything that's in that Profit First book is the way I built my wealth, understood it fully. And then I'm like, well, if I understand this fully, what do I need them for? And then I realized, well then I have to write my own book. I have to market it. I have to create the templates and the the different things that I'm gonna use for my delivery. And I'm like, wait a minute, I don't wanna do any of that. Right, right. By partnering, which is what a franchise is, they provided me all the templates. Profit first. That name of profit first has opened so many doors for me. Like think about it, when you're driving down the street and you see McDonald's. Or you know, Jojo's Burger Bar, where do you go? Right. You know, depending on where you are, the branding and all of that stuff, that might not be in your wheelhouse, and it might not be the parts of the business you love, right? Yes. You can go create it yourself, but it takes a lot of work and effort and so this is the shortcut. To, to get through all of that. And, and I think that's the big part. Until you, that's the problem. Yeah. Until you do it, you really don't get it. And this is an easy way to kind of get it without having to kill yourself trying to learn it all and, you know, figure out the marketing and the delivery and the production and the sourcing and the design and the layout and creating the user manuals for every employee. It's lot. It's a lot of work there. It's overwhelming. It's overwhelming. It's overwhelming. Yeah. And that like the, the people who are my clients who don't have franchises, we spend half our time talking about you need a system and a process, and they're like, I don't have time to build one. I'm like, yeah, well, hello. Need to make time. I also think there's real value in face-to-face conversations versus sort of electronic or telephone conversations. I think that when we are standing in front of each other, we are more apt to be open up and, and transparent and share things that we may not necessarily wanna share, you know, in an email, for example. Right. And you know, especially if the franchisee you're talking to is worried that something that they, you know, disclose might end up being shared with somebody else, that that could make them look bad. A hundred percent. Yeah. The, the, you know, in the recent updates to the book, I added some new sections. One of the sections was on ethical franchising, which is a conversation that you came and had over on my YouTube channel. And, but one of the other things that, that I wanted to point out is, is in the book I also talk about, you know, the. The the different ways that you can compare a franchise opportunity with other kinds of business. Mm-hmm. So there's an example in there, for example, of a pizzeria as a franchise resale versus an independent Fran Pizzeria and how, you know, the two different businesses. Are gonna have very different values, how the sort of franchise fees and everything plays into the valuation formula. And, and these are things that I think are just important for people to understand because you are making an investment when you get into one of these things. And at the end of the day, the big litmus test that I always say people should be asking is. What are the different fees I'm gonna pay and what should I be getting for that money, right? What will I get for that money? And in some franchise systems, there is tremendous value in that exchange. Mm-hmm. I agree. And I'll give you an example, and this is again from an update that we've done to the book, my own franchise experience, because when I was a business broker, I was part of a franchise system. And the way that the franchise was set up is it had a a flat monthly licensing fee. And with that membership in the organization, I got access to a whole bunch of services, like basically to these online websites. One of them I mentioned earlier, you know, biz Buy Sell, but there were a few others as well, and we got access to those websites, and we also got access to a really fantastic CRM. If I was an independent business broker and I was paying for all those things individually, they would've added up to more than the licensing fee, right. So, so I actually saved money by being a franchisee versus being an independent business. And, and so the point of the book is not to say, like you said, that all franchises are bad. It's to get people to think about in a critical way. How do I analyze this? How do I figure out if this is a good deal for me? You know, I, I like to point to sort of the large franchisors that are in markets where there's a continuous need for innovation and promotion and things like that. And when you get into those franchise networks, basically you've got those people at head office who are creating all that stuff. They're thinking, you know, months down the road of what the promotions are gonna be. They're creating the. Advertising and marketing collateral, they're probably preparing the online campaigns. They're, you know, taking care of maybe of the Google AdWords for you locally. They're doing a whole bunch of stuff that independent business owners have to try to curve time out to handle, and when people are busy. People don't, and this is, and, and this is, you know, where a lot of people fall down in independent businesses is they, they're always busy in their business and they don't have time to quote unquote work on the business doing these sorts of things. But in a lot of these franchise networks, yeah, there were people that had office doing that sort of thing. And that's, and that's a, and that's part of, you know, asking, I always call it a speak with the captain steering the ship. I call it a. The third stage in due diligence, the The discovery day. Confirmation day, talk to the captain. Where the hell is this ship going? If they don't give you a clear understanding of where this ship is going, what they're working on, you know, it could be simply nothing. We have everything nailed down and we are focusing on national accounts. Great. Spoke with another brand the other day. You know, we're embracing ai, we're not renting it, we're owning it. So we've invested a million dollars in ai. Speaking of which. The transcript from this episode is gonna get dumped into our system, which is gonna create not just marketing content, but it's gonna create content for our technicians when they're out in the field. It's gonna be content to, to respond to customers. So I think you have to be innovative people that are constantly fighting it. No, I'm gonna be old school. I'm not gonna embrace ai. That's fine. But there's gonna be a big, I think, a massive shift. I'm, I'm not saying, you know, there may be some jobs going away. What are the brands like, especially home service brands where you really can't outsource cleaning or mosquito spraying or roofing, but what, what can they do differently? And if AI can help with automating things and you know, hopefully cutting back your, your expenses, then, then you, you really embrace it. But yeah, you want, you wanna know what's, what's going on and if they can't give you that answer. And that's really, you know, a lot of brands I'm, I'm finding are, are the founders are, are more involved as opposed to waiting until the end. Because this is all about the match. So in my opinion, if the founder's on, we have founders that, that sometimes do all the calls, sometimes, you know, they get in, in the middle. But if the match isn't there, why drag this on until the end, the this confirmation, discovery day to find out maybe the match isn't there. Let, let's find out sooner than later. Or if there is a concern like, Hey, you really need to be a, a, you know, an extrovert in sales, but you know, maybe that's someone you, you hire. Are you open to that? Great. We can, you know, we can move forward. So, yeah, it's very, very important. There's a difference in telling people what to do. You know, they've, you know, read the book. I, I send videos. I feel like in my years of doing this, there's this enforcement. So Did you talk to franchisees? Yes, I talked to one, talk to another. I feel like there's this constant, like, you have the guide, but let's, let's, let's stay on top of it. Did you talk to enough people? So I think there's a combination play there. Get the book. Then you need that person to con, constantly remind you. But you know, ask the questions. Don't, don't feel bad. Don't hold back. If a concern comes up speaking with the franchisee, bring it up. If you don't like the answer, you don't like the direction. No one's tying your hands, no one's telling you you have to sign a franchise agreement. You can say, I respectfully walk away. Maybe this isn't the right match for me. And that's okay. It's you, you, you, you made that decision. You did that due diligence. You realize the fit wasn't there for that brand, but maybe you wanna look at a different brand in that same industry. So that choice at the end of the day, is always yours to make. No one is gonna ever force you to sign that agreement, but just get educated, get comfortable before, before signing. Yes. I'll tell you the biggest mistake that most people make, and it was true of me when, when I first became a franchisee, is they focus on the wi yes, on the product or service that the business is delivering to customers. And, and that's the last thing you should be looking at. What you need to be looking at is what is the franchisee's role. And what am I going to be doing if I become a franchisee in this business? And because in a lot of franchise businesses, you're not the one delivering the product regular service. So what difference does it make, what that product or service is? But, but on the other hand, if you, if you say, I don't want supervise a whole bunch of minimum wage employees that turn over all the time, it eliminates about 70% of all franchise businesses right there. If you say, I don't wanna work any nights or weekends. Perfectly reasonable request that eliminates a whole lot of other ones. And, and that's what we really do with people. We ask questions that allow us to narrow down very rapidly and, and think. He spent eight years building a company called Great Clips the haircut place. And, and I'll tell you, there wasn't a single franchisee and that entire eight years that look up one morning thinking, gee, I gotta get in the haircut. In business, yes. Wasn't that way at all. What would attract them was the lifestyle. The franchisees who had been in that business, say three years or longer, they were all multi-unit owners. They all had managers. They were supervising the managers. They weren't cutting hair, they weren't in the salon on a regular basis. It was an executive franchise. When people understood that, then all of a sudden a business that maybe was completely unattracted to them initially becomes very attractive when they look carefully at the franchisee role, and that's true of so many that. I think you just, you need to be focused on, okay, what does a successful franchisee do on a day-to-day basis? And, you know, a student for that role, does that sound attractive to me? Right. Rather than focusing on the, the actual product or service of the business. And I think, I think most of us did that, as you mentioned. You were you in the same, you were in the same boat. And I, I'm looking at the exact same thing and you just get super excited. And I always, I always tell, uh, someone, if you wanna be in the sandwich business, you can, you can run your business and buy all the sandwiches you want if you're truly passionate about sandwiches. I, I'm in Jersey Mike's land. I, I live, uh, in the same town, the first Jersey. Mikes got to, you know, meet family and friends that, that I grew up with, the founder and it was really interesting to, to hear his story and going back to the, to the widget. You'll notice that a lot of brands, your role is gonna be very similar. You're not actually installing the roof or cleaning the porta potty or painting anything in a painting franchise. Start to look. But, but, but look at, I, I kind of do it in two, two different levels or, or layers, we'll call it. The first layer is getting the business up and running. You, you may be wearing all hats to learn the business, get it up and running, but really figuring out six to 12 months out, what is that role in the business, the team's in place. That learning curve, you learn the business, you understand it, especially if you, if you've never owned the franchise or any business before, what does that role look like six to 12 months out? And that'll really help. And that's part of. Validation, getting to speak with franchisees and, and hearing directly from the franchise owner. Exactly. What's an average day in a life, maybe when you started to where you are today. And that's, and that's super, uh, helpful. So not only are you hearing it from a Fran, the franchisor, but you're getting to hear it from the franchisee. So a very important part about the widget, because that is, that is an area a lot of people just kind of, they get super excited and then they go, okay, what do you have in this specific space? Or maybe it's. Maybe it's a misconception, right? Maybe they, you think you have to have experience. Do you have to have experience in a, in a, in the franchise itself, or is it, is it something else? It depends on the franchise. For the most part. The answer is no. What, what franchisors are doing is that they've got a business model that they know if people execute that business model effectively, they will be successful. That's the foundational, uh, approach of franchising it. And what they've also developed then is a methodology to take someone who doesn't know that business and bring'em in and in a relatively short period of time, train them in how to set up and run that business effectively so that if the people just follow the system, right, do what the franchisor tells them, they will be successful most all the time. And, and, and that's. That's two different skills. First, you have to have the skill to operate the business effectively, and this is the path that most franchisors follow. They maybe open the first 4, 5, 6 units of whatever their business is themselves, and they run it very successfully and it's doing well. Then at that point they realize they need somebody else's money or, or management experience or something to help grow the business further. So they turn to franchising to do that, then they have to develop a second skill. That's, that's even more important than being able to operate the business effectively. They have to develop a skill to take somebody who doesn't know being about that business and, and train them in a fairly short period of time to be able to effectively run it. And those are two different things. Quite often you'll see people who are very successful operators who are not very successful franchisors because of that. And that's another reason that there's a lot less risk in a franchise if they've got a track record. And they've proven that they could take people like me and, and put'em in business and make'em successful. I like that. W we, we call it a business on training wheels. That's something I, you know, when, when someone had, they want a comparison, I go, that's really the one of the best comparisons. You have that support and that's what you're really getting in. You want that support, that, that Anything you, you have any questions, have any issues that you have that go to someone to, to contact, to, to help you out. One last question on that. So what would you, what, what do you think in not every franchisee is gonna be successful, so what do you think is the main cause for people maybe not to do so well in the, in their franchise? This is the, from the franchisee standpoint, if you investigate. At the franchise opportunities carefully and, and, and, and ensure that they do have a track record of success, of being able to help people. Then if you don't succeed, it's almost always because you decided not to follow the, that the franchisor laid out for you. Well, today we're gonna be talking about, you know, utilizing advisors or, you know, not utilizing advisors and kind of the difference when thinking about starting a business. I think I'll, I'll kick this off. Obviously you need to talk to Chuck about anything that you're thinking about doing when it comes to getting into a business. My advice, though is to talk to people that are in that industry. So if you're thinking about getting into the technology industry, talk to it. Technology buys. Think we're getting into franchising. Talk to a franchise advisor, not your neighbor, not your, you know, friend that tells you that, you know, they, they don't think franchising makes sense because they, you know, heard on TV that, you know, x, y, Z happened. And I, I would tell you that, that, that, where I like to think about this is I'm on my, you know, maybe fourth business of starting and I've never had a family member, not one time. It's a good idea. Not one time anyone of all my business. Ever said, you should go for that. It's a good time. Never been the case. And I'll leave with, or I'll kind of end with, I was thinking about this, Sarah Bleakly. She started Spanx. Mm-hmm. And she actually said that when she had the idea, she didn't tell anyone for a year. She built the idea because she knew people. She told them. They would start to bring her down. So she had to work on her own, get that momentum, get that confidence. What do you, what do you guys think about that? You actually did that to me. I had a business idea a long time ago when we first started the, when we first started our consulting business. I was like, you know what I'm gonna do? I was like, we just need to make a site where we sell F dds. Hmm. Has like every single FDD on it. And then after we sold the business, I did it and it worked. Yeah, there you go. Don't listen to Dan. Don't listen to me. Wise. To me too, it applies. I was like, why didn't I do that earlier? But it definitely was a massive undertaking at the time. But I think what we were talking about was Giuseppe was with the Shark Tank and you were telling us about something and that's how we went into how even the sharks are wrong. They, I mean, listen, you never know exactly what's gonna work out. And I think just to add to kind of what you guys were saying, sometimes it's, people don't mean anything negative by it. It's more of they're just, they're being cautious, right? They don't want you to lose money or there's a big risk, believe it or not, my first business, my accountant told me I couldn't make money with the franchise. So you know what happened? I made money with the franchise and I fired the accountant, so hopefully he's not listening. We're not gonna name, we're not gonna name names, but, so, you know, they look at the numbers, they don't look at necessarily the big picture of the actual business itself. So, so, yeah, I, I completely get it. But when you do ask for advice, you do have to be very cautious. Cautious of who you're asking for. And where are their motivations coming from? True. You know, I, I, I know that in my 11 years of being in franchising, I've never heard a financial planner or no offense to financial planners, but a lot of times I've seen people, they get close to buying a, a business, they go to their financial planner to get their financial planners opinion. You know, again, I like to think, yeah, most people operate with integrity. I'm sure they do. But keep in mind the money that you have in your retirement account or in your investment accounts, if you're talking to your financial planner. About taking them out. They make a percentage fee on the money that's in there, right? The more that is in there, the more that they can manage and the more that they can make you, but also the more that they can make themselves. And so a lot of times they're not gonna be motivated either to say, yeah, I think it's a great idea to take out half the revenue stream of my business right out of the account so you can go do another business. Meanwhile, meanwhile, they own their own business anyway, right? Yeah. Right. And yeah. Offense to financial planners, I am offended. You know, and that's part, right, it's percentage vest that's under management and it's hard to control a startup versus you're buying mutual funds. There's data, there's a lot more history. So yeah, we've, I've, I've experienced that as well. So, so what, what about Shark Tank? What are some, do we have some examples of, of some deals that, uh, I mean, but imagine if you were like, well, let me call Mark Cuban. You had his ear and you told him about an idea. They were wrong on the Ring doorbell, which is massive. They were wrong about. So many other things. And then they invested a lot of money in things that didn't work like that sweet balls, like what was that about? So I think even if you have people that could be experts, they could be wrong. And you just need to trust your instinct. And it, the secret ingredient in a business is you, I mean, I, I think back, you know, if, if we had went around and tried to find reasons not to start, you know, voter or make the acquisition and then franchise, I wouldn't have done it. Right. You know, there would be a a million. Things that people would tell you. You just kind of have to talk to customers, obviously, to make, you know, or potential customers, and listen to them and see kind of their feedback. But anyone else, it doesn't matter. And you know, I'll give you another example. I've had so many times where people are close to buying a franchise, for example, and then they go, oh, well, like my, my neighbor has, you know, advise me I shouldn't do it. I was like, what does your neighbor do? Right? Or they're an accountant or they're, you know, whenever a lawyer, they're, you know, they work in tech. It's like, why does your neighbor have any precedence on this decision? Right? You don't know anything about. People. A lot of times we just trust people that we know, even if they have no knowledge of space, it just triggered a core memory. I was talking to this guy, and I'll never forget, he worked his whole life and his wife stayed at home and he was like, it's finally my chance. I'm gonna start a business. I really want to do something on my own. And his wife had this control over him where she was like, no. And. I felt really bad because like number one, I was like, oh, what does she do for a long? Oh, she's never worked. I'm like, okay, but maybe it's just like a business background professionally. Is she like in finance or does she, is she able, is she examining the numbers? No, no, none of that. I was like, wow. Like I'm thinking in my mind like she doesn't believe in you. Like that is so sad that you have someone that you've supported your whole life and like they still don't have faith in your abilities, you know? It's interesting that you say that. I was actually just having that conversation with, with someone. What I've learned, and this is not really related to like talking to an advisor, not about buying a business, but just in general when it comes to teammates and partnerships, something I've learned is that more times than not, in my experience in business, when I find someone is acting differently, a lot of times you don't realize how much of that is driven by the spouse or the family members. Whether it's a, you know, a company owned by, you know, a father, son, and all of a sudden. It's not the father son relationship that can change. It's the son's spouse or the daughter's spouse, right? That, you know, starts to see the opportunity or starts to understand things a little bit differently and starts to get there into their ear. And so I've learned something. It's, it's so interesting. Like same with business partnerships. You, you better make sure that you have a pretty good relationship with this spouse of your business partner. If you don't have the trust there too, that can go really quickly the other way. Because of course they're gonna side with their spouses. They should. Right. But if they don't have all the information or lifestyle changes, it's very important to be careful of that. So would you say, I think it's important for everyone to be at the table. So if you are buying a franchise, whatever the business is, that partnership, everyone should be on the table. Everyone should know exactly what's involved. Because as a, as a consultant, if we're talking about a franchise, maybe they're not. Relaying that message back to, to the spouse. So I always, you know, mention, Hey, we'd like everyone to be on these calls together. So if there's a, a concern or a question, we all kind of are on the same page. Not, not easy, and I don't know if you would agree, but to get everyone on the phone, but it just makes it so much simpler. And that way everyone knows the plan and, and the expectation is. If we're gonna grow this, this is where we wanna be. Maybe we want us the plan to sell it in 10 years. So I think that's crucial. I think everyone involved in the decision and even the families, you know, why is mom or dad doing, you know, buying this franchise? It's so we can spend more time with Mia and everybody else. So you know that that's the reason for doing it. I think I put the fear of God into people because when we have that conversation, I'm like. Take it from someone that's been divorced. You either do something to your spouse or you do it with. Right. So I would definitely recommend having your spouse on the call. Then they're on the pulse. I 100%. And they don't have to be in every call. Like my wife was on the first call and, and she was like, great. She's like, I have, you know, you're gonna run your business. I'll support you. Every way I can, but I'm gonna keep my job. And she's been at the same employer for 25 years and she's happy there. And she, but she said, I, I understand the risk. She was on the first call and then after that she said, I don't have to be on the calls. Just let me know kind of what's going on. And that was, that was our agreement and it worked out fine. Were you talking about being married? You think about it like making a decision of anything. Do you really make that many big decisions with your spouse? Of course not. So like, why would it be the difference? With a franchise. I actually think when people are looking at a franchise and they know their spouse usually is involved in decisions and they don't include them, it's kind of a way to kind of subconsciously give themselves a way out. Right? It's like, oh, well my spouse isn't on board. Well, you didn't bring them into the whole process. Right? Of course, I'm not on board. I wouldn't be either, which is, which is interesting. I think it's, I think it's challenging though, right? Because I think there's a lot of people that they think. Let me get the information first and then, right. Bring my spouse. The other thing I've, I've noticed is I think in the case of someone when they're the breadwinner their entire life, whoever in the relationship is the breadwinner their entire life, I think that's a little bit of a different situation where it's like, look, like you trusted me to provide for all this time. You're gonna have to, like you said, you have to bet on me here too, right? Mm-hmm. And I, you know, this is the move I, I have to make. But maybe they just don't wanna do it because honestly, like they might not be that into it if they're not really sharing it with their spouse. Do you know what I mean? Maybe they're like not all in yet, like I'm definitely doing this. They're more testing the waters before they bring them into the conversation. Yeah, but I mean's to understand is like if you want to, you know, get in shape or lose weight, you have to go through pain to get there, right? If you wanna make a business, you know, successful, you have to go through sacrifice. You're gonna have to, like you said, get your spouse involved.'cause they have to be on board with the, the sacrifice that they're gonna be sacrificing too. It may, it may, it may be less, no income the first year. It may be no vacations that that first year or is gonna be a shift in lifestyle. So absolutely, they have to know what they have to set. This is the expectation, but the goal is too, you know, go on more vacations, retire early, spend more time with the family. So I think if you set the expectation they're on board, then. Ultimately everyone, everyone has to be on board or it's gonna be a rocky, rocky road. I, I got a question. What's this trend or thing that I feel like I've been seeing, which is people that are looking at buying a franchise business with an expectation of like, they have to make this, you know, crazy profit their first year, which by the way, to me, crazy profit is anything that's like, you know, a good amount of money. Like, you know, you're trying to replace your salary or something in the first year. I've never really seen businesses usually do that. What are you guys seeing where people come with those expectations? Has something changed in the, you know, kind of economy or the generation? Like, what is that kind of driving? I think, I think people expect the, the immediate return, right? They wanna go viral in the first post on social media. So I think that's, that's where it's coming from. You know, I always tell people that first year is you're, it's a learning curve. You've never owned a business, you've never hired people. So this is all new. You're, you're learning something new, but. To be matching the income you were making immediately. Now you're, you're building something. So to have that expectation, I, I, you know, I always take a step back and say, realistically, any profit. So even if there is that kind of profit, you wanna reinvest in the right team, in the right systems because this, this is not a business that you hope to grow 10% a year. This is something that's gonna be growing exponentially. That's something I've experienced in my business and I always, my first year reinvested everything back. I didn't take a dime out, but I also set reserves aside for that, so, so I think it's this instant gratification I have to make money right away. And it's okay if you don't match your salary the first year, you should really be investing in those systems. Or else you're starving the business, you're, you're pulling too much out. You're not hiring the right people or not, you know, paying them what they're, what they're owed. And you're not investing in the, in the technology as well. Yeah. But people, people say that, but they're still taking a salary and they're saying, the business is, IM profitable. And, and they're pulling their salary and they're, they're pulling their salary. So, I mean, I think it just depends. Some people can hit the ground running and some people don't. There's hurdles that you can't predict. No one has a crystal ball, right? Like COVID happened. People that own certain businesses. Were affected and other people like you were selling masks, you killed it, or gloves or whatever. Right, right. So it just, it just depends. I think you can make money year one. We've done it before and it's doable, but it's more what you do with that money. So even if you make the money, you don't have to pull it out. Right. You can, you know, reinvest. I think you should be reinvesting as much as you can to build that base so that you know the money's not made the first few years. The money's made later, and in many cases, money's bad on the exit. Yeah. You know, it's interesting, like Yeah. Right. People forget about the enterprise value. Right. Built in a business. I was talking to, I was talking to a business owner that, you know, had started building a business. They, their first year did well but didn't make money. They, they lost money. Right. But they were building the bones of the business. Mm-hmm. And in their regular job, they made a substantial amount of money. What you have to remember, it's like, you know, I can't give tax advice, but when you lose money in a business, but you have another income, well, that, that loss is a net operating NOI net operating loss. Right? And yeah, net operating loss. And it carries over into your taxes. And so if you're making a bunch of money in one place, well now you're losing money if you will, as far as your other business. But you're building a business, you're building an asset, you're, you're mitigating tax exposure. Right? And then. The next year, when you do build the business further, and let's say you do start to make a profit, which by the way, most business owners, they, they wanna try to have a big profit. When they do start to have a profit, you're gonna be able to get a multiple on that profit, you know, whatever, multiple down the road.

giuseppe_1_08-28-2025_151154: 41:39

That's another legacy franchise lessons in the book. Remember, building generational wealth through franchising isn't just about choosing the right franchise. It's about systems succession planning, and making decisions with the future in mind. If today's insights spark questions about your own franchise legacy journey, drop them in the comments below. Don't forget to subscribe for our weekly franchise wisdom. And check out the full conversations with our guests linked in the description. Until next time, keep building your legacy one strategic decision at a time. Thanks again.

42:11

Thanks for tuning in if you want to learn how to make the transition from corporate to owning your franchise. Join Giuseppe on the next episode. You can also follow on all social media platforms and achieve financial and time freedom today.