Why 90% of Franchise Brands Fail (And How to Be the 10% That Survives)

Because there's no one way to do it. You can go fast, you can go slow, you can go with brokers, you can go internal people. You might yourself have a follow— 10 million followers and never have to pay one cent for lead generation. It's all very much brand specific.

I'm a big believer, and this is the way I am, the networking and talking to the people are the ones who make the biggest impact on your career.

It's just people want to get to the finish line too fast, and they— that's why they underestimate the cost. That's why they make everything cost twice as much, because they embark on all these inconsistent Strategies are ones that are just all additive to each other that just makes the whole thing take longer.

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Unemployable Podcast. I'm Jeff Dudan. If you are the founders of two of the top-ranked suppliers to the franchise industry in legal and PR, if you are the creators of the Springboard Franchise Conference, the industry's premier event for emerging and re-emerging franchise brands, your name can only be Brad Fishman and Lane Fisher. Welcome.

Thanks, Jeff.

Yeah, yeah. Great to have you guys on. Just spent a little time with you back out in Texas a week ago getting ready for Springboard. Here's my opening question. Where do you believe franchising will have its greatest impact on the American economy? Over the next 5 years.

You know, as we go through all this right now, AI, you're hearing about AI, how it's going to affect the world. Are there going to be people that are going to lose their positions from it? Probably. But franchising gives you the old model. You don't have to worry about being unemployed because you're your own boss. As all of us know, I've been around this industry for a long time. Franchising is a big part of the economy. It helps what brings the small business to the small towns, to the big towns, to the big cities. I'm in the city right now in Chicago. And as I, Sherri and I walked here, we're staying at some friend's house down here because as I just told you, my house is under, our floors are being redone. It's amazing how many franchises you see everywhere from the food to the fitness, to the health, to eyelashes. I mean, you're seeing it everywhere. So it's always gonna be part of what we live and what we do. We use and where we eat and where we work out. And I don't think that's gonna change. AI, I mean, if you look at, you know, where you grew up, Jeff, the service business, AI is not going to do plumbing and air conditioning and restoration. That's not gonna change. It's such a big part of our life and what people need. AI is going to affect certain things. You walk into a fast food restaurant now, AI, computers, whatever you wanna do, you don't order from people anymore frequently, let's call it all the time, all that, but whatever it is, you're going up there, you're putting your credit card in or whatever it's going to be to order food. But franchising is not going to leave this. That's why it's such a great for the economy the next 5 years. I mean, people have been going through a few things. I think in the next 90 days, 60 to 90 days, as everyone prepares for this midterm election, franchise sales are going to go back up again. Gas prices are going to come down because that's just part of what it is. We've all been through this, the ups and downs. Franchising is always there. I used to joke around, franchising is the greatest thing when The economy's great, people open more franchises. When the economy's bad, they have to open a franchise because they're trying to replace income. So I don't think anything's gonna change over the next 5 years. I think it's continue to grow and it's a wonderful thing for the entrepreneurs, for people who wanna be entrepreneurs and for the economy.

Yeah, I would agree with that. I think it's the engine for small business. I think it's the nonpartisan sort of view of things. Everybody likes franchising, everybody has seen the effect of franchising in the economy, will certainly garner more of every dollar that we spend going forward. I think it will provide a scalable platform for introducing new technology, whether it's AI or otherwise, or automation or franchising provides a convenient way to just to sort of scale that in the general economy. So I think it's going to be a very powerful mover as we go forward. I think it's going to be a driver. I'm very happy where we sit and where you sit and, and, and looking forward to great things.

Audience is pretty deep in the franchise space, so I don't want to go too deep into the podcast without talking about Springboard. You two have been leaders in the industry for many years. You participate at the board level, the IFA, and you have created several of the industry's best events. At Springboard, I think is the biggest. It's probably the biggest event outside of the IFA meeting. Correct me if I'm wrong, or let's not correct it, let's just go with that. This is— we're talking about marketing here, but we'll just go with it. But, um, what was the original idea around Springboard and how did it become?

So I'll take that one, Brad. Um, so we— our first event was our ski conference, our Franchise On conference in Park City, Utah. And that was great, uh, and, and, and still great, and we still do that to this day. But that event has pro— very concentrated amount of programming and a very high amount of high-impact networking. And so it was, it was interesting to me to pursue an event that would have more education, that would be a forum for new franchisors to learn the ropes, the best practices, the things everybody else knows that you don't know. And we wanted to create a, thing that, that was fun to be at, that had a big networking component, that was a way to socialize the new emerging franchisors with the, with first folks that could be their mentors and folks that had been a little, a lot of way ahead of them in the food chain, but also the vetted suppliers that have helped other franchisors get on the map. And so we had no idea it would be as successful as it is now, or was even then. We, We always like to say you're luckier than smart, but we were trying to create something where there was a real gap. And instead of like, you know, creating a place for suppliers to come share what they know about franchising, we created a place where franchisor CEOs, founders, presidents, C-level people could come share their journey with each other and really try to, with the goal of trying to bring the curve up for everybody. So, And I think we've done a good job of really bringing those folks out. Those are the folks that come to Springboard and they come to talk to other folks at their level. And so I think that, so that was the genesis of it.

You know, I used to joke around, I would find Springboard to be a very successful event if emerging franchisors can make one less mistake. I've been saying that from the beginning. My first IFA convention was in 1993.. And I cannot tell you how many times I've heard franchisors, successful franchisors said, if I only knew that back when I first started, my life would be so much different. By giving emerging franchisors an opportunity to talk to people like you, Jeff, people who have been around for a while, who've unfortunately, a lot of them have made those mistakes and everyone's gonna make the mistakes. But if we can help them make one less mistake and try to grow a successful franchise opportunity, because Because there's so many people, it's scary how many successful people have started as really franchisees. They started with their first location, they get their second location, and it changed their life and it becomes generational money because their children will join them afterwards. Someone who has my kids in my business, franchising is a big part of our life. You know, Sherri first started, got introduced to franchising in 1984. Think about how many franchisors have changed. And that's where this is. And as we talk about what's going to happen, people ask all of us all the time, what's the next big thing in franchising? We don't know. I mean, people go, what's exciting? Whatever it is, it's going to be. Things change. People come up with great ideas and they decide to franchise their business. And, but remember, besides your home, a franchise is going to be probably your most expensive investment for a family, an individual, or whatever it is. It's a big investment. They're putting their life and their, their trust in a franchise organization to help build what they're looking for. So we're trying to make— give them a better chance of succeeding and make those franchisees extremely successful.

Yeah, I think focusing on emerging was super intelligent. I think the Springboard name is perfect because you are diving into the pool. And before Springboard, as I was trying to learn franchising, I actually hired my first franchise attorneys in 1997. And it was— oh man, she was an heiress to one of the large trucking companies and she had gone to law school and she had a law practice out of Jacksonville, Florida. I can't remember exactly what her name was, but it was just— I knew when I came back from Hurricane Andrew that I wanted to, and I had this, this startup business, I knew that I wanted to franchise it because I saw in the hurricane recovery, all of the companies doing the biggest work were the franchise businesses, the ServPros, the ServiceMasters, the Paul Davis, all of these people. And I'm like, well, okay, so that's, that's what I want to do with my business, which is a little aggressive since we had just started it. But so, but I mean, it really from, from that education and then, you know, reading UFOCs, I mean, it literally took me forever to find my way to broker communities, then find my way to the IFA, then find my way. And it's— and the problem with that is, is that if you don't get— if you don't have budget and you don't fall into the right places and you have an emerging franchise brand, you are likely to make the biggest mistakes that you're going to make at the foundation. And that's where, Brad, you're with your, you know, with your PR firm has to fix it for him. Or Lane, you're with your law firm. You've got to fix the problems because they have either structural, legal, or fundamental problems with their program, or they didn't understand how, you know, they gave away the whole state of Texas as a single territory because they thought somebody told them it was a good idea. And now, like, some of these mistakes— and I get people in my Fran Mastery mastermind and they come to me and it's like, hey, I'm 4 years in, this is what I've done, and I'm looking at it. And one thing we would do at Fran Mastery is we'll tell them the truth. I'm like, well, you know, you've got a real problem here because you have to, you have to undo some of these things to create a company that's going to have the greatest value for you for what you're trying to build. These are, these are problems that are just going to be bigger as, as your system gets bigger. So sometimes they've got to back up or, you know, change the program or whatever it is. So I think from, from the emerging perspective, Springboard is a great place for emerging brands to grow and really you know, get around. It's a smaller environment than the IFA, so you get access to the people. But it is really people that are focused on emerging. And of course, as suppliers and vendors and private equity firms, you want to know these people early. You want to get— you want to get in business with them early. You want to help them early because they can grow into great customers.

Yeah, it's funny. People are— I think it is the foundational things that people get wrong. They try to either do it too quickly or try to grow too quickly, and they embed these terrible provisions in their, yeah, in the fundamental business that they're licensing. And it's like, and had they just gone a little slower or talked to folks that had more experience or frankly vetted it with more mentors and things, people that could have advanced it, they would know that that's not the way to start. And you mentioned my law firm, but you know, I have, I have 13 or 14 lawyers. I mean, half of them work on unscrambling that, those kind of messes. And many of those things could have been averted if they were, if it was structured better or different in the beginning. We fix it when we get it, but you know, we take it as we find it. And everybody has some sort of like, you know, duh, they give you when, you know, you find something that sounds even stupid to them when you read it. But people are pennywise and pound foolish and we try, you know, it costs much more than we charge to have somebody at our event, but we set out long ago with investing our own money and trying to bring, provide this kind of education to the folks that needed it most. And, The good thing is, is that they're so grateful to have it and people leave at least knowing how big the mountain is that they're trying to scale, right? They don't, you don't know anything when you, you're the only two people that comment on how great you are, are your family and the two people you pay the most money in your company. You're not really getting an objective rounded out opinion. It's not really that diverse. And so if you don't ask anybody who's smart, then nobody will tell you anything other than what you're doing is perfect. But I can only tell you from 40 years of doing this that that, you know, it's not, you know, it's a lot of it is the foundational beginnings and doing it the right way from the start and investing time and money.

Franchising's hard. You know, people realize, they think, oh my God, I'm gonna have 100 units open up in 3 years. And franchising is really, really hard. You have a lot of different personalities. And sometimes in, I, we represented, God, years and years ago, I'll never forget it was a, it was a hamburger concept out of the Carolinas and they had 17 corporate units., and I'm at the National Restaurant Show and was having dinner with, with them. And the wife looked at me and she goes, we were doing really well having 17 corporate units. We sold one unit, we had more aggravation from one franchise than we had from our 17 corporate units. And they ended up buying the corporate unit back from them and say, we're just gonna keep this corporate. And so, and she made a comment that I'll never forget. She goes, most people go into franchising to grow a brand, to make more money. Let's be blunt. And she goes, we were making less money with a lot more aggravation. And she goes, so we made the very tough decision to not franchise anymore. But franchising is the greatest mechanism in the world to grow a brand, a concept, if you find the right people. And those first, you'll hear that all the time and they'll talk about it at Springboard. You know, your first 5, 10 units are the most important because they're the ones who are going to be the believers. And you got to make sure that they're successful. And this is what we want the emerging franchisors. And, you know, it's like anything else reemerging. You know, we use that word pretty loosely, but there's lots of other concepts out there that have 25, 30, 40 units that are really trying to get out of a geographic area. How do they expand? What to do, what to learn? And these are the things that our mentors, our speakers there really focus on is how to help those franchisors, period.

It is a noble pursuit because at the end of the day, what we say at Homefront Brands is we are providing accessibility to businesses that are good for people so that people can pursue economic freedom and financial security. They can be as successful as they desire, that they want to be, especially in the property service space. You don't have to build another restaurant. You don't have to build another fitness studio to grow your business and Property Services. You, you, you find a way to get more leads, you buy them, you, you work for them, you add salespeople, you add production capacity, and you just, you just keep growing. So for people that are looking about getting into a business, wants to scale, we feel very good with the low cost of entry to home services, then with the high potential of, of home and property services. So that's why we've— after, you know, I kind of sold my first company, that's why we did Homefront Brands and And especially with maybe what's happening with the economy or with the workplace and with AI, which we don't know, but there are going to be people that are going to have more month at the end of their money and they're going to need to find a way to feed their family and take care of the people they care about. Why is it that the— in this, this piece of information is so hard to get? And I seem to be the only— when I talk to people, it's like, I can't believe you've talked to this many people. They haven't shared this with you. People, why do emerging brands not understand how much money it's gonna take to build a franchise brand? Hmm.

That's interesting. I think it's, it's, it's who, it depends on who you ask, right? If you ask, you know, people are, are trying to make it seem doable. And, and the reality is, is what you need to develop and grow a franchise brand at some pace is a lot more than you need to validate the brand by getting a couple out there in close proximity that you can closely supervise. And so like, I think that answers, it depends on what it is, right? If it's home service and you just need to, and you need to operate a fleet of vans or you need to have a, a real estate part of your business where you have several people going out looking at real estate, one's just much easier to scale and open.

I mean, we're talking things back when we started in the franchising industry, it was a lot easier because of, you were, you know, you would advertise, you'd go to a couple of trade shows, you'd find a couple of friends family who would go into the business, and that's how you started. Yeah, you bet. You mentioned before the broker space. Playing the broker space gets expensive. And so people have to realize if you're going to go out and play the broker space, you used to pay for leads online. Now so much of it's traded with social media. Everything that goes with running a successful organization as a franchisor is more expensive. I mean, Hey, there's a lot of people trying to sell you services and products and whatever you think it's going to take to get there. And I think one of the, as you kind of mentioned it before, it takes money to really focus on building a, a, an organization properly to franchise the services. And if you're gonna go all over the country getting on planes and going to conferences and learning whatever it is, and that's not even talking about the internet, the intranet, the every, you know, marketing, what it's gonna take. Can you do, do you have the experience to what it takes helping you set up the organization? Legal fees, marketing fees, PR fees. There's a lot of things that go into building a franchise organization.

I don't know, Jeff, why do people understate it? They do understate the number. I just think it scares people off. And I do hear people come, they, Somebody said I need like $5 million, like some huge number that somebody is just making up. I think that's not a calculation. But, but, but what do you tell people? How do you tell people how to anticipate the costs? My last question.

Right. So if we, if we stayed inside of the— so first of all, if you have a direct business, okay, how, how much of those resources are you going to be able to use kind of in this transition period, if you have an operations person, let's say you're a service business, let's say you're in the garage door business and you've got a $5 million garage door operation. Okay, well, you've got salespeople, you've got operational people, you probably have some training resources. So when you start franchising, which is kind of— which is what I did with AdvantaClean, was we had the best people in the industry. I thought we did, and I still believe we did. And those people would just do the training. So we very— we were able to hire maybe 2 or 3 people in the franchise business, but then we were— we had access to these resources. And candidly, we didn't have to cross-bill very much. We didn't even have to pay for them, you know, to be able to do these types of things or, you know, so a franchisee has a technical call on a job. So if you have a significant business, it's easier to franchise. That being said, from a psychological perspective, you need to separate it out. Now, so now I will tell you and I'll throw the number out there, man. If, if you're going from a cold start and you're going to fund everything, you need at least a marketing person. You need an operations person and a training person and maybe a technical person that knows what they're doing. Somebody can go out in the field and help the franchise owners. You've got to, you've got to solve franchise sales. What I like to say is it will cost you $1.5 million to $2 million to launch a franchise brand in the first 24 months minus whatever margin you can make from franchise sales. So, and, and, and now here's the, here's the other side of the coin. And I just learned this at Homefront Brands. We did 230 deals in 30 months. Deals, not territories, deals, like 800 territories. The faster you go, the more expensive it is. So, you know, you think, you think the faster you, it's, it doesn't make sense, but you think the faster you go, you're creating more margin. We were creating, I mean, we'd have million million and a half dollar. We did $30 million in franchise sales in 30 months. Like, that's a— we are getting after it, right? Very quietly. Like you said, Lane, I didn't even know, you know, we don't— one thing, you know, you said, hey, you just, you just reacquired AdvantaClean back. I didn't— no one even heard about it. And I said, well, we, you know, one of our values here is we don't promote until it's permanent, you know. So until something's done, you don't— we don't go, you know, bragging about it. But, so, but you would think that that the faster you go, the more revenue you're going to be generating over here. But it just creates more trips. It creates more coaching, more training. We had to staff up to 70 people right away to get that done. But if you're just— so let's just say— and that's over— that was over 5 brands. So let's just say you've got a single brand, you've got to hire these 3 people. Now you got to go out and get franchise sales depending on how you're doing that sale. Some of the margin from the franchise sales might come into the company, but probably, you know, maybe that covers your training expense and going out with them the first week or whatever it is. You're not gonna be generating margin outta franchise sales, really. You could burn a lot of money doing franchise sales if you don't do it well. And then you're paying all of these people until those franchise owners get up and successful and pay you 7 cents on the dollar or whatever the number is. So, so yeah, I mean it, it, you know, you, and, but I do believe that if you're gonna hit it, you need to, you need to be able to do 2 deals a month, you know, to, you know, 1.5 to 2 deals a month to be able to, just to have consistent people coming through training, to have consistency of, to be able to justify having full-time people working with those people. So yeah, it's very— so if you don't hit it exactly right, which usually it's the franchise development piece where you don't hit it exactly right because you're trying to find your way through that in a very, very, very competitive space. Now you've got, you've got some overhead and you're not servicing it with enough new franchise owners., uh, to come in. So it's, yeah, so like you can, you, you better have a little bit of money in the piggy bank if you're gonna, if you're gonna do it. And if you don't and you try to shoestring it, then you get into this cycle of you're under-supporting your first 5 to 10 franchise owners and now they don't validate. So now you don't get the next 10 and now you're in this, now you're nowhere near being able to cover it with the royalties you're getting. And, and that becomes a death spiral, which is why, you know, 90% of brands fail within 12 years.

Well, and the interesting thing is I just heard the statistics. Someone just told me in the last 5 years we have still average of people who are registering new franchise opportunities somewhere between about 350 and 375 different concepts each year. So you're talking— yeah. So you're talking, you know, almost 2,000 or 1,800, 1,900 new franchise opportunity in the last 5 years. And that's who have registered.

Right. Well, exactly. The people that just have an FTD and are selling, you don't even know that number because there's no reliable source. But trust me, there's hundreds and hundreds. People jump the gun and go create their documents, become franchisors before they even go through the validation of like, does the, does it make any money? You know what I mean? People want to tell me how good the yogurt is, but they, you know, when you know they open with how good something is, you know the numbers are off. Or they would open with that if they were really numbers people.

Yeah.

But it's funny, that kind of conversation, that's exactly why somebody should go to Springboard. I was gonna say it's hallway talk, but it's not. It's, it's part of the educational program because there's no one way to do it. You can go fast, you can go slow, you can go with brokers, you can go internal people. You might yourself have a follow— 10 million followers and never have to pay 1 cent for lead generation. It's all very much brand specific, but it's exactly as you were talking, I was thinking like, This is Springboard. Choose this up because there's so many people have done it so many different ways to the same, to a successful outcome that it people, that's why I think people are like, I'm so glad I went. I learned so much more how round the world is instead of flat, you know?

Yeah. Springboard, September 23rd through 25th. We'll hit it at the end. But if you, if you're, if you're here, sign up, go to what's the, what's the URL?

FranchiseSpringboard.com has a registration link right on it and they can click through that. Yeah, do it right on the site. There's a link to the hotel room block. And Jeff, we should really, in the interest of full disclosure, you should admit that we did come to you. So Jeff, as a, as a person who's been through this journey since 1980, whatever, and the lawyer from whatever, you're a very experienced person and you've been through the ups and downs and you've seen the ugly side, sold things, bought things back. And you were the, our first choice to chair this as a person to help us lead and tailor this programming to fit the audience that we're trying to attract. So, so people aren't surprised when they get there and see you, you know, called to the stage. It's very much deliberate and by design because I think we're all on the same page in terms of what information and what content is the most valuable. And then have our very, very good reputations and we're able to get people to come out. You gotta get somebody to come out, right? People come to this framework or somebody tells 'em to go regardless how many emails you send them or how much stuff you send in the mail. They go because somebody tells 'em to go. So this is, you know, you know, all the listeners know who needs this information and they should, you know, pay it forward and make sure folks are aware of it, have the link and, and maybe even a, a chaperone to the, their first event.

Well, I'm, I'm thrilled. I'm honored to be the chair. I really was so excited when you called and, and offered that and looking, it's, we had our first first meeting. It's going to be a great event as always, and it's a big, it's a big event. It's 500, 600, 700 people typically show up, so you need to go and register like right now. Maybe 800 people, uh, this year. Um, it's a— we've moved to a bigger place from Philadelphia out to Fort Worth, Texas, but go get your registration, the hotel, go get your hotel early, make sure that you're on property so that everything's convenient for you. And, uh, just to highly recommend. And, and by the way, I know you, you barely charge for it. I mean, you barely for this quality and capable and the food and everything that you do. I know that this is a giveback by you guys to the industry. I know you're not making a ton of money on this thing here. So it is a— it's— and it's because I know that you care about the industry that's given your families and yourself such a great career over the last 3 decades, maybe 4 for Elaine. I don't know.

It's getting there, right? I know it's— it definitely is. It's— It's our attempt to try to, but first of all, so we know a lot of people are in Jeff, Brad and I are in different industries. Obviously we have our own downline of folks and, but we are able to collaborate and bring out the best of the best. We get the best keynote speakers, we get the best event chairs. We get people that not only do we not have to, we not only don't have to beg for it, there are people are elated at the opportunity. Springboard is meaningful. They know they'll have, just a whole huge universe of emerging franchisors to, yeah, to try to help make one less mistake, as Brad says, or do learn one thing differently or meet one new person. You know, I used to think that the work I did that was the best was the intensive legal work. And, but when I asked somebody, they would say, well, no, no, you introduced me to this person and that they were so meaningful. They was such a catalyst for in my life. And I took that as an insult for a long period of time cuz I knew how hard I worked. On the legal side. But the reality is that people need introducer. People need people to socialize them through a community that already exists. That's hard to, you know, when everybody already knows each other, you know how hard that is to penetrate versus how we do it. We're trying to make sure everybody's in the bubble, like meeting people and talking to people constantly. And so I'll tell you about two things we're doing differently. 'Cause we, we used to do pre-conference on Wednesday and just do a legal program on Wednesday afternoon. And so many people came to that and there was such an opportunity to offer programming on Wednesday afternoon. And the Carlisle was Friday afternoon is always challenging because people have, whenever the flights are, are the flights. So we're starting earlier on Wednesday. As you know, we're gonna do legal and ethical franchising programs back to back from 1 to 2 and 2 to 3, which will, which I hope my goal is first, we change them every year. I mean, anybody ever saying to me that they did it last year. Because last year is not the same as this year. But I wish, Jeff, I could tell you that I took one deposition in the last 10 years where I asked the person what training they got in franchise sales compliance where the answer wasn't, "The what?" You know, "Duva said what?" You know, right? So it's like, it's, it's not— I'm exaggerating a little bit, but just a little bit, right? Because, and I like to think that people coming to our event are going to get some franchise sales compliance training every year, and that'll be the answer. When, when their, when, when their competence comes into question that, no, I take this very seriously and I get it every year and I, I, and it's important to me. Right. And, and so we, we keep records of those things. So if people ever ask us, we can tell them how much of this training they've achieved from us. But it's not a bombardment of a day, you know, we're not trying to suffocate people, but we're trying to make sure they know enough, you know, about what's changing, what's staying the same, and what they need to know going forward to be successful franchisors and not make those early stage mistakes. But so we offer that. So that's the ethical and, and, and the franchise sales compliance program. And then we're really excited about our, the next thing. The next thing is from 3 to 5, we have our icon keynotes where we have sought out and actually got commitments from people who I would take as a, they're the best keynote speakers that they could be, but they're gonna do more like TED Talks about what their, their particular journey, which is not really TED. They're gonna talk about their particular journey, but in a confined format and serially with nothing running against them. So, and they're all people that I'm, I guarantee nobody will move from their seats. Nobody will use the restroom. It's gonna be a 2-hour thing where people are like, are bringing a snack so that they don't have to get up. I, I could tell you who they are, Brad. You can decide whether you wanna tell 'em who they are. But we're really excited. And they've all said, yeah, once they all confirm, they're pretty much confirmed.

But I think we'll save that for a different time. But it's like, as Lane said, Lane and I, as Jeff knows, You know, Lane and I are as different as night and day in a lot of things. You know, he really focuses on the programming. I focus on the networking. And we like to keep people from 7 in the morning till 12 at night. And people are going to have the opportunity because I'm a big believer and this is the way I am. The networking and talking to the people are the ones who make the biggest impact on your career in the franchising because you be— people are so willing and giving to take phone calls. You have a question with them, you text them. You email, it's so much different than what it used to be. You can text someone, ask for one question, and they're going to email, they're going to text you back because of people you've met, the relationship you meet as you go on. And, you know, you know, Jeff, we, you know, we've known each other for a long time, but because we see each other, it's, you know, people talk about the franchise family, but in a lot of cases, you're on vacation with these people more than you're on your family. It's called work, but you're with them in places all over the country. And so it's so important, these relationships. If you go to a broker thing, if you go to the IFA, if you are in the restaurant space, you go to a restaurant financing conference, you see these people all the time. Industry events, specific industry events, you know, whatever it's going to be. These are people that are going to answer your questions for you. They're going to take the time. You're going to get to know them as a person, not just as another franchisor that you see speaking. And that's what I love about this event is because the relationships that people make and create are long-lasting. Yeah.

So a couple of notables for me at this event, one of our brands, one of our great brands, I walked into Springboard the first day, I just showed up and somebody had somebody with them and they brought them over to me and they said, we've been looking for you and introduced me. And it's one of the brands that we currently own. And that was the founder I met. Walked— I just walked in the— in the door. Like, I wasn't in the door 5 feet And he said, look, I've asked 3 people that I was— I've been looking for somebody to help me as a partner in this business. And all the first 3 people I talked to said that you should— they should talk to you. So I guess I'm supposed to talk to you. And we met later and then they flew here to Huntersville, North Carolina. And, you know, and now we've done great with that brand. So that just walking in the door there was just incredible because there's going to be emerging brands like that. And then the other thing I'll say is You have had speakers where I text people I know and say, you wouldn't believe— was it the RE/MAX founder story? Oh my goodness. That was like an episode of The Sopranos. It was unbelievable. Like, I couldn't believe— I couldn't believe what I was hearing. And then, you know what? I've— you remember the Arby's story?

You know, they sold— I flew down there. He was 94 years old, the founder of Arby's. He was the— uncle of my son's college entrant tutor. They, I went to drop my son off and the woman had a picture of the Arby's hat with black and white with the two guys standing with the big lad. It's a famous Arby's picture. I've seen it before. I said, why do you have an Arby's picture in your den? She goes, that's my dad. That's my uncle. I'm like, that's your dad and uncle. And so everything starts, it's the craziest way it started, but I went, I flew down, I met with him. He was amazing. He, told— he first, he said, why would anyone want to hear from me? I haven't been involved with Arby's in 50 years. And I said, I promise I won't ask you a question after 1980, but you know, you duked it out with Ray Kroc. And like, I mean, like, it was such a good story, and it's, it's videoed, it's in our archives. People who are interested should read it. But that was our first home run in this, and that was our first thing, like, oh my gosh, people really do want to share their story. Especially this guy thought everybody forgot about him, and he— they invented, allegedly, the drive-through and the roast beef sandwich. That's good.

Yeah.

You know, and look, you know, I, people, you know, fuss at me about eating so much red meat, but look, he's 94. He's the Arby's guy. Red meat's fine. But the, but the other thing was, is he, him and his brother started the business. I believe it was those two. They sold the business maybe in the late '70s. You can, you know, fact check that. I, but they sold the business and then ultimately several years later they bought the business back and then they turned it into the company that it is today. And, you know, I referenced that story when we, when we bought back our first brand of Vaniclean just 6 weeks ago. It's like, it's, you know, so things come back around. All right, Brad, let's talk a little bit about PR first. Can you just give a quick overview of your company and a little bit of the history and what you do?

I am married to the founder of our company and I'm looking at her right now out there, out the glass thing in my office. And we founded our company. She got into franchising PR in her first job, but don't tell her what I'm telling this, but I guess it's on a podcast, in 1984. And she decided to, when she got into, she was a PR major and through a contact got a job at a firm that was doing original PR. And she jokes around, one of her favorite stories was one of her early accounts was a guy named Fred DeLuca. Who was the founder of Subway. And Fred, till he passed away, up to that, would always take her. Anytime she would call, he would always answer, and he still called her Sherry Cannell, which was her maiden name. But, but that's how we started. We founded our company back in 1991. And, you know, we like to think we're the, you know, Entrepreneur Magazine will tell you we're the number one PR firm in the franchising space. And we're proud of what we've created. We've got an organization of about 57 people and We love this industry. It's a part of it. As I mentioned before, I'm partners with my wife. Both my sons are in the franchising industry. It's part of our life, part of our DNA. And it's something my kids have looked at and it's just franchising is why Lane and I did this. It's been wonderful to us. I'll be the first one to admit it. It's created a dynasty for our family, but it's something we want to give back to and we love and are passionate for the industry. We see franchising people all over and it's just It's part of what it is. They're friends, they're family, they're clients, they're non-clients. It's just part of what we're— the industry we're part of. We've kind of talked about the IFA a little bit here. IFA is where— how I met Lane. I mean, Lane and I met in the mid-'90s at an IFA event down in Delray Beach, Florida. It shows you the names we're talking about at Bill Rosenberg's house, who founded the IFA, who was the founder of Dunkin' Donuts. So that's how our relationship goes long. It goes back to, and Fishman PR is, is very proud of what we've created here. We've worked with some phenomenal brands over the year, and we're proud of the work we've done, but it's, it's a passion for us. And that's why we want to see our clients do well. We want to see franchisors do well, and the franchisees part of it. And that's kind of how we got back to Springboard.

So 20 years ago, PR for us meant things— well, Undercover Boss was brought by our PR firm, but getting in the Wall Street Journal, getting an article, getting something that was, you know, traditional PR, traditional media and things like that. What does public relate— what does public relations really mean today?

Hey, earned media is still very, very important. But as we all know, there's not as many media outlets out there more. It's social media. How are you going to— the big buzzword now is geo. How How are you going to drive people to put you on a higher level of AI? Because so many people now are doing their research through AI, the Claude, the, you know, anything out there. How are you going to get your brand to the top of what AI is covering? And it's really putting content out there, you know, it's, but you know, the earned media is still important. It's just changed. Bloggers, that's such a big part of it. You know, you'll see different things out there right now with social media has, can have tremendous amount of impact, both good and bad on a franchise organization. We are dealing, we've, you know, unfortunately one bad franchisee could affect a whole organization. We were just dealing with something about a month ago. It's horrible that how one bad franchisee and one social, it needs to be handled by experience professional people because one bad review just bubbles and bubbles and bubbles. So we've changed, we've had to go along with it. And, but you know, earned media is still extremely important. It's just the earned media now could be from a blogger and who's got their hand out with wanting to do something or someone who just loves a brand. The brand lovers are so important. I mean, I don't have to tell you in the service business, if you treat your customers well, they're not afraid to go out and tell help people, they are so great. I mean, I just saw something the other day of someone in the franchising industry is doing a remodel, and they— all they talked about were all the great brands that were helping them do a home remodel. And that has an impact on AI.

Yeah, yeah. What about authority and working with founders? Or when you look at a client or you're considering taking on a client, Do you look at the founder and say, okay, how much social media does this person have? How can we leverage this person? Is this person going to help us? Is this person going to hurt us? Is this person going to be neutral to us?

We still have to look at it, but we're not— if we like— as I try to like, I like work with people I like, and that's so important. I got to trust my clients. And so if they have bad social media, We can fix that. Will it take some time? Yes. In the perfect world, do they have great social media? That makes our life way a hell of a lot easier. But we're not going to be afraid to work with people as long as I believe in the people and the client and the concept. And because, hey, one bad review could be something really stupid. It could be like, I didn't like their donut, or I didn't like whatever. They left a spot in a painting That we can deal with, that we can help correct, but I gotta believe in the concept and believe in the people.

Is there a story that comes to mind about where you guys did something PR-wise and had a positive impact, a big positive impact? Like what, what would you point to as like a huge win if you could?

A huge win is helping an entrepreneur, a founder of a company, really help grow their brand. Nothing, nothing we more, we like to hear is when you really believe in a franchisor when you believe in the individual and we get a great story and that helps blow their business up. You know, we, and like, as all of us know, and you know, so much of what people find now to be successful as a franchisor is getting bought out by private equity. Back in the days when we all were around, private equity really wasn't around, but you saw a franchisor go from, 2 units to 800 or 1,000 units. And we were there from the beginning and they just owned a very successful franchisor and their family became involved in it and it became fun to watch. And but now so much of what franchisors in our startups is getting bought out by private equity. Hey, we are going to work with our clients to help them achieve what their final goal is to be. Is it to buy it, to sell it, whatever it's going to be? They're going to buy brands that are— they're going to add on to it. As working with so many brands now that are part of holding companies, it's fun to watch. As you know, I don't have to tell you, as Home Brands grows there, you're finding people, the synergies you found at Springboard, you found an entrepreneur who probably, let's be honest, would never get to where they're gonna get without your backing and your knowledge. And it's fun to watch. That's the things that get Lane and I excited for something like Springboard. Same thing at Fishman PR. It's exciting to watch our brands grow and see their franchisees succeed. Anytime you'll hear franchisees talk about how an organization, you know, that's a client of ours, they help build their American dream. And that's what everyone's there for. You're changing the life of their family. And all of a sudden you say, I don't work as hard anymore. Now I've got management there. That's part of it. We went from 2 units. Now we have 15. And this franchise organization helped us really do what we wanted to do. And we are living the dream right now. Our son has joined us, or our daughter as part of the organization. It's fun to watch. You have your, you know, your children with you into your organization. You see people like Barb Moran, who's got her daughter into it. She's running marketing for us. This is what success is. And you see the same thing with franchisees, how it's fun to watch that you see the franchisee become family businesses.

Yeah, for sure. Hey, Lane.

These are all great springboard content, Jeff. I'm watching, I'm like making notes, but it's already on the program. I'm, he lets get across a lot of stuff, but if, if this is what you're thinking as an emerging franchisor, this is the place for you because this is where we tear these one, one-word answers into, we shred them into all the different ways. There's no one way to do this. One person's path is definitely not the only path. And so it's really the diversity of opinion that I think is where bring, makes Springboard relevant. I'm sorry. Yeah.

No, that's fine. Lane, did you start, uh, in the franchise space or did you start somewhere else in legal? And then how did you come to have the firm?

So I, as a, before I was a lawyer, I was a summer associate at a big law firm in Philadelphia that did franchise work. And I was, I, I got my first exposure to a case in franchising there. I was really knew nothing at that point. I ultimately got a job at a firm that specialized in it. The person I was working for sort of shepherded this connection for me. So my first job really was in franchising. And so I worked for a firm that did only it, and then I worked there for about 7.5 years and then left to form this firm in 1995.

So does good PR make franchise legal problems easier to deal with? And how do this, how do, how do the, how do you interplay the two? If you've got, if you're working with a brand, they've got some legal issues. Um, do you interact with the PR or, or, or how does that work?

Yeah, it depends. So PR owns crisis management, right? You don't deal with that on your own. You don't have your receptionist who started 2 weeks ago answering the crisis management calls when somebody passed away in one of your units or something, which is, believe me, they're real stories. Um, you need to have professionals deal with that at the earliest possible moment. Um, and so yeah, there's a huge interplay there. I think that You know, PR is the ultimate way for you to spin something before it, someone else does, right? So it is a way for you to, you know, introduce brands and changes of, in, you know, modifications to systems or changes in the way you do things. I guess you could just do it contractually and tell everybody, guess what, we're not doing it this way. But when it's a company with a PR program to explain why there was beta tested and, you know, I mean, yeah, they, they, they go hand in hand. The best The best and most successful franchisors use both and use them to complement one another and use them to back up one another so that to mitigate, you know, bigger losses or crisis. Yeah.

Is there, is there a single biggest mistake that you see emerging brands make in their legal documents over and over and over again? Whether it's a strategic thing or whether it's a compliance fact, thing.

I mean, when I look at, at somebody's dot, when somebody comes to me and say, Mike, that it's broken in some way, it's almost always item 19. Like, I mean, people can get the bios right. I can get your bio right. I can write in plain English. I mean, I think like that's not where the magic comes in, but the item 7 and the explanation and the footnotes and the item 19 and the understanding your own iterations and permutations of units and having them organized in some way that creates very predictable and narrow ranges is like, you know, the greatest thing that you can have, I think, in terms of data. So Item 19 is usually a thing that I can, I can, it's life-changing to give somebody something instead of saying what you can't say, which is everything without one, right? And getting to them what they can say and, and actually capturing the information that comes up most often in the, as either boogeymen in the sales process, like what a manager might cost that might be totally out of line with what they really cost or or what people spend on marketing, or, you know, there's a lot of boogeymen. People hear a lot of stuff, they Google a lot of stuff. And item 19 is a way to sort of just to set it straight. It's the reward part of the risk-reward proposition. It is the most important part of what you could possibly convey there, but it's that. So that's broken. Or the multi-unit offer. People are offering either some multi-unit territorial or unit arrangement that either makes no sense or is completely outta line with reality. What, what, how other franchisors price them, and obviously just set in a vacuum. So like, I can look at those two things first and be sure I'm right. And then there's just other stuff, I think, that just— people say the same thing over and over again. They say not the same thing over and over again. They say inconsistent things. People want to do something fun. Ask Claude what's in your franchise agreement that's not in your FDD, or the other way around. Even when you're perfect, you think of that, you know, like, like there's, you know, Claude's good at that, you know.

And you—

and people always tell me how great their document And I wonder if they've ever read it because it's, it's not great from the beginning to the, I don't know what they think is great about it. But, but those two things, like people come in and we, if you give somebody what they, because you can change the whole trajectory of sales, how you present multi-unit, how you present performance in multi-unit, how you present a motivational trail to show people the path to multi-unit. Like it just, people don't either don't know or don't spend the time. Everybody's worried about getting the cheapest FDD. Instead of talking to the smartest people. And the smartest people are the ones that know what the competitive landscape is like at the places where heads butt, and they know what the difference is, you know? And it's, and I, it is your only option is to do it through the Item 19. Otherwise you gotta hope that a franchisee pieces it out for you in the, in the validation process, which is a lot more indirect and a lot more likely that it's distorted and doesn't come across the way way you'd want to put it across. You have all the data. When people don't have them, they assume that— I assume the numbers suck, right? You don't have an Item 19, it means the numbers suck. Not that they're so wildly unpredictable I could never create a range. It means you don't know and they're so, you know, nothing. So, um, yeah, we always try to have people identify their highly efficient unit because when you get your first couple open, it's a hodgepodge, and then you kind of get your rhythm, right? And you get a certain demographic or location or type of territory or constituent of a territory that is your sweet spot, right? And And that's of course what you're trying to sell, your highly efficient unit, right? Nobody wants to, nobody's not a big line for the inefficient units, but people don't know it. And why is a lawyer telling you what your highly efficient unit is? Just because you haven't really considered the data. And when you finally collect it, it presents itself, right? You're, you have outliers, then you have narrow ranges and then it's like, oh, well they really, wow, it's really predictable if you're near a school, you know what I mean? Like, oh, you know, you should be selling from that strength. And if you're doing better in the Southeast than the Northeast, you should be selling there Logic would send you there, but you could also do things in your items 19 to highlight your performance there. So yeah, I mean, yeah, the FTD's broken in some way when we see it.

Through the IFA, we have FRANPAC, which is a political action committee for the purpose of protecting our business model and taking on challenges and lobbying for, for us and protecting this great business model that we have that is a franchise. SB 919 was passed in California on June 30th, I believe, which A, uh, which is a new law around franchise seller disclosure. So people that— brands that have sellers or franchise brokers or all the— all of those people are going to have additional reporting requirements or disclosure requirements, like almost like a real estate agent but more in-depth. Uh, we were kicking this around in my mastermind the other day as to how it's actually going to roll out, but— and it's only in California right now, but it'll be a model for other states to at least think about. What are some of the legal trends or regulatory developments that you're thinking about or that are on the horizon that could impact the model in our industry?

I mean, you just identified the biggest regulatory trend, the folding the brokers into this disclosure scheme in some way. And there was a lot of speculation about it being more overreaching than it is or, or, or requiring more disclosure. I think there's This is not a terrible way that it worked out. It's, I think it makes sense, the California registration process and particularly the kind of information that they're trying to highlight. But I think, yeah, I think there's a lot of these states are becoming more active. There's, you know, as many great stories as there are that Brad's writing great stories about, there are also stories you read in all the books that are not great. Some of them are unfounded. They're just editorializing some fact that somebody heard in one moment as opposed to like being able to really assess the quality of a franchise system, right? Listen, franchising is hard. Brad said it earlier, and not every franchisee's gonna be successful notwithstanding everybody's best efforts. And there's going to be some fallout and you need to have some way to deal with folks that fall out of your system. That could be litigating them out of existence. It could be figuring out a way to, I like to have like a resale program where I can point somebody to path or a methodology for exiting a relationship that didn't work, even though everybody thought it would. And so, you know, you're trying to, you know, it's so important.

Like I said, as Lane mentioned, we've all been around this long enough. Everyone is not your perfect franchisee. You are buying a blueprint of things, a system to follow. And as good as you can follow, it might not be what you're really good at. And, you know, it might be be the location. Occasionally, all of a sudden, you have, you know, could be construction and all of a sudden a street in front of you is closed and all of a sudden it's just not working. Technology changes where it might be different. And I mean, look at how, you know, who knew that what's going to happen now with DoorDash of the world and Uber Eats about you have to, people were afraid to use them. And, but you have to go, that's part of a business model. And then people, like you said, there's gotta be some form of resale organization that's going to help people to get everyone out in the best way for both the franchisee, the franchisor, and for the rest of the organization, because no one wants to have closed units and what's gonna happen. And, but franchising is not for everyone, or certain concepts are not for everybody. And, uh, I would never go into the pest control business, which I invested in because because I don't want to go in a crawl space. That's not something I want to do or even think about. But you got to find out. I always tell people when someone goes, what should I, if, what should I look into? Find what you're interested in, find what you're passionate about, or find something that you can have an organization that you can run. And, but that takes more capital. Long as you realize that, as you know, the number, like you said, to start a franchise or It's not far off. And but people will say, I can't— I started for $100 grand. No, you're not going to be able to. I mean, well, my special— what I look for is I'm great at marketing.

Well, great.

Then you can keep the marketing thing, but you got to find someone who's going to do the operation, the sales. Yeah. And now you got to learn if you want to play the broker space and what, as Lane mentioned before, it's going to So it's going to make it— is it going to make it more difficult? No, but it's going to have to be honest about what a lot of more information that was hidden and things there. And like I said, social media now is so much more important now because the average individual, if they have a bad experience or a great experience, they just put it on their social media and, you know, whatever goes in there. I mean, all of us— well, I shouldn't say all of you. I know Lane does. We buy stuff that we see on Instagram or different products and services. It affects what you do. That's just the way life is now.

You guys have been partners in several of these event-type things. I know, Brad, you're active in, in investing. Lane, I'm sure you are as well, being business guys that you've been in and around this space because there's always deals that are coming across your desk. Lane, sometimes you're involved in unwinding them. What experience would you two share about partnerships? Uh, because you've got these emerging brands, you got these young people, and they're walking into a room, and now they, they, they start to see the reality of what they're facing, and they still want their dream. They still have a great business. They still have belief and vision. Um, but they know that they can't go it alone. So ultimately, people seek partnerships. What experience or advice would you share care about going into it?

I'll take this one because I've been in good ones and I've been in bad ones.

I'll sit back.

You have to really believe in the person you're investing with, and you look for their strengths and weaknesses, what you can bring to the table and what they can bring to the table. I know, I know Lane brings in, just like my wife Sherry, they bring organization. I am not great with organization. I am a natural, like a lot of people, I am a salesperson. I get people to believe in a vision, but you gotta have someone to take that vision and bring it to reality. So you gotta look for the people that look for your strengths and weaknesses. You both realize what type of, and you know, I don't have to tell all you guys, you have to look where the, who has controlling interest. And you have to have a good idea what people's goals are. If I want to keep my company for the next 20 years, great. But if my partner wants to sell out in 5, there's a problem.

Right.

And so you have to look for the vision and you have to look at it and you believe it in the concept. I used to joke around, it's easy. It's believing.

Partnerships are a lot like marriages. It depends on who the partner is. I get a lot of, sometimes, you know, people, they tell a great story and then the legal documentation says something totally different, right? You're like, you said entirely the opposite, right? That's a big red flag. Sometimes the legal documentation says nothing. Is the, is the, you know, it's just not, they just don't jive. Sometimes the people have no track record or their track record was in some very narrow piece that they're purporting expertise and every piece. A lot of times, a lot of people are just there really syndicating people for you to pay to perform various functions.

Yes.

Right? They're just gonna introduce you, like lead generation for franchising. Whoever tells you about anything, it's just somebody that advice is for you to go do, pay for it outta your own pocket. Right? So the question is like, what is, you know, what are you bearing? What are you doing the partnership for? Is it capital? And is capital the thing that's coming in? Is it for operational expertise and is that what's coming in? Is it for tech and that's what's coming in? Like the whole thing's gonna be tech-based, right? It just, just depends on who the partner is. Everybody, there's a lot of movement now and a lot of people trying to get an end on somebody's business to try to walk them through franchising. That's not a secret. I think people meet dozens of people that purport to be that person, but I mean, I think it's really important to qualify those people, to talk to people they've done business with. I love people that wanna be your partner that have 25 years of history, but can't give you one person that would say one good thing about them. Them or what, you know what I mean? It's like, or their mother only, you know what I mean? Like, it's, it's, there should be a track where people have been around for a while, have a track record. You should, don't be lazy. People are, franchisees are lazy. People are lazy in this process. You gotta call people and people don't even like to pick up the phone these days, but you have to talk to people and find out what the partnership experience was like. How were they as partners? Where, you know, is it, are they just auditing you? Or just now, see, you never worked for anybody your whole life. Now you work for somebody who put no money in, right? Like, do you still control things? Do you not control things? Do you still have to do the training and the training manuals and everything yourself and sell the first couple and make them successful, which is what you'd have to do as an individual without a partner? Right, right. So I mean, like, what is your partner bringing to the table? I think there are, are some— I don't think— I think it's a lot easier to get to your goal with the right partner. And I think if you just look at the history, it suggests you can't do it on your own. Franchising is not a me sport. It's a team sport that requires competent people that have done this before on the team, right? So But you have to vet those people. Everybody says they're the greatest. Everybody can write a post or something that, you know, but they're, but the people that have actually done it and that have successful people that say my dream was realized through this partnership is critically important. So I just think people can't be lazy about it and have to really do some diligence on who the partner would be.

And I think you take the acid test. I like to joke around when I go into a serious investment where it's going to be Go someplace for 3 days with the 2, 3, 4, whatever partners in, and just lock yourself around there. Not somewhere it's in— don't come to Chicago because this is my home territory. Go someplace where there's nobody else. You look and you talk and there's no place to escape. With VRBOs now, you can go find a house and be stuck in there for 3 days. And if you guys can get along, for after 3 days and realize you're on the same thing, then I think you're at a good starting point.

That's excellent. That is excellent, excellent advice. And, you know, to the legal point, good agreements upfront head off bad disagreements down the road and the sophistication of the person you're dealing with. I mean, there's all kinds of things that people put in these. Oh, don't worry about it. This is just a clause that, you know, gives me a voting block or it gives this and it— I mean, it's just you're on your company.

And I'm not a lender. I have no liability. I have no nothing, but I control the, you know, something that's really important to you. That's really important to know first.

Yeah. Yeah.

So no, that's, that's a, some great, uh, great experience to share there. Thank you so much. All right. Look, it's 4th of July weekend here, 2026. So, um, it is Friday afternoon. I don't know about you guys. This is the last thing I'm doing today, but, uh, I think we need to tug on the reins and turn this, turn this horse towards the barn. But I've got 2 questions for you each. If you want to play, I always play.

I've been—

All right, I've got a curve. I've got a curveball and a fastball for you. All right, we'll go Brad first. Here you go. Curveball, Brad. Gun to your head. You have to start a business in the next 30 days. It can't be something that you're currently in or currently doing. Where do you see the opportunity in the marketplace is what business do you start?

I would probably go to something where everybody needs, where I see the future going, senior, somewhere in the senior space. I think there's gonna be some opportunities in the future that I think the senior space is gonna continue. We're not getting younger, this country. Our family is not like the old days where they wanna take care of you. So as I think this time goes down, I think the senior space is, there's going to be a lot more. Let's be honest, all three of us are closer to the same age. We're above 50. And I think there's a lot of us will have money and we want to live a lifestyle. So things that are going to help seniors live a life, that's going to continue to be what we want to live.

Yeah. If you listen to the longevity people, they say if you, if you live another 5 years, then it'll be your choice to live to 120. Yeah. Elon Musk. Elon, because you, there's all the tech, all the AI and, and the peptides and, you know, and this is a one of, I heard Elon Musk say this and he said, he said, you know, because he was talking about Neuralink, he goes, but I'm, I'm not gonna work on longevity. Somebody asked him about longevity. He goes, I'm not gonna work on longevity. I'm gonna leave that to other people because I think it's too easy to solve. And he goes, because it's all software, you know how he, he says, you know how I know it's all software? Because your right arm and your left arm don't age at different rates. So you're basically, you're, you're, you know, your cells are just little machines and you know, when the clock says stop, you know, creating this or start creating that and you start the aging process, he goes, it's just software. All you have to do is reprogram things and then provide whatever's missing and you're, you'll just continue to regenerate and things like that. So he goes, he goes, that guy, I could solve that. He goes, but I'm, I've got other, he says other things he's apparently working on. Like, uh, solar— 5-mile solar fields doing AI compute up in space by 2028. So, you know, he's, he's doing that thing. Um, so, uh, but anyway, yeah, I, I mean, but, but you're right to the extent that, you know, our lifespans, I think, what, 73 and 76, men and women, or something like that, average lifespan. I mean, that, that has the— that has a real opportunity to go significantly up in the near term. And, you know, and, and that's gonna really knock outta whack our demographics in terms of all, all, all of the things. It's probably gonna, it's gonna be a real problem. So I, I think there's probably some interesting things to think about there, Brad Lane, same question to you. Gun to your head, you have to start a business and you hadn't, you had time to think. Now that's not the intent, but you know, what do you got?

No, I wrote the same thing down. I said the minute you said it, so I've been more fascinated just, I just I wasn't that familiar with them, but these referral-based businesses like BNI where you take a micro community and there's one of everybody that does everything and you meet and you somehow schmooze them all together and they all do business and you get a, you don't have to do any work and you get a piece, a commission on all the work. Like to me that is highly appealing. There's no, not a huge employment, not people specific, not real estate specific. So low investment and really the best skill like we all have is like this ability to connect people and to, so like, I'm interested in that. I'm with Brad though. If it's, you know, if it, they say if it poops, it's gonna be good for franchising. But so I think child education, I talked to a STEM person yesterday, every day this week, actually another person with a different angle on STEM with summer camps and school programs and stuff that I love, certainly not in my kids' school. Those things, you know, as incomes go up and education is more valuable, I think those are highly valuable franchises, I would probably go something more child than senior, but that, you know, tomatoes and tomatoes, right?

I think, yeah. I mean, people spend lots of money on kids. I mean, they, you know, I would spend anything on my kids, my pets, you know, those things. But you know, there's now 95 million dogs in this country and only 87 million kids. It's inverted. And you know, the birth rate, people are pushing their kids old longer as well. So, and everybody wants it done for 'em. So, you know, more, more people having to work and, and, you know, so the kids space is still gonna be good for a long time. Who knows with AI, since we're gonna live in utopia where nobody has to work, maybe people would have nothing else to do other than procreate.

What would we do?

Kids everywhere. There'd be kids everywhere.

You don't know what to do. Yeah, right. Exactly. Very smart kids speaking many languages and, and doing very math problems that have like, you know, symbols in them you haven't seen in 30 years.

Yeah.

Doing math problems they'll never have to do.

All right. Exactly.

All right, Lane, you get the, is the fastball straight down the middle. You get it first. Here we go. If you had one sentence to make an impact in somebody's life, what would that be?

One sentence to make an impact in a, who's the somebody?

It doesn't matter. What do you say to your, what's the best thing you say to your kid? I'm gonna give you, here, Jeff, I'm gonna give you one word. Listen, listen, that's it.

I was going to say slow down, but I wasn't sure that's what I mean. I think that people want to be successful and they see all the trappings of success and they just want to, it's like the people that come to you and they say, I want to have 100 units. That's like the dumbest thing you could ever say. Like we all just put up with it. Like, no, I mean like immediately, right? Like it just, people want to get to the finish line too fast and they, that's why they underestimate the cost. That's why they make everything cost twice as much. They embark on all these inconsistent strategies or ones that are just all additive to each other that just makes the whole thing take longer. And I think it's part of it is taking the franchise education process seriously and knowing that as much as you might know about pizza or retinal surgery, you know nothing about franchising and about how you might enforce those rights or bring about a cent for those things. And so like, I think being humble, maybe that's the better word, right? Humble enough to know what you don't know. To come to things like Springboard to try to get a lift so that you're not having to learn everything by trial and error. 'Cause you can't live long enough to do everything by trial and error, right? That's a rocket statement. You have to learn by each other's mistakes. So I think that the point is that, that that's the better route. Awesome.

Yeah. And, and like I said, listening in business, you gotta listen to your team. You gotta listen to your franchisee. You gotta listen to your family. Listen to everybody. Then you can make your own decision. Decision. But this way you have different options and you— but you're taking that information in and making the best decision. You're not always going to be right. I always tell people, I said, I'm not always going to be right in my decisions. I'm going to make one, but I'm going to be right more often than I'm wrong. But I'm listening to try to make the best decision for everybody.

Awesome. All right, if you need PR services or legal services, these are two of the best.

Uh, how can everybody get in touch with you I was just gonna say, Jeff, can you ask people that are— anybody interested in this subject matter should follow both of us. We try, we go out of our way to try to share and post things that we learn that we think other people don't know. They should also follow FranchiseWars.com, Franchise Springboard, and all the social media channels. We try to not only be, you know, constant with our programming, but also entertaining and trying to make light of things that can be made light. And so just keep an eye out for that stuff, but follow our things so that you get aware.

And LinkedIn. I mean, people send me messages on LinkedIn. I answer them. Brad Fishman on LinkedIn, Fishman PR, and Lane Fisher on Fisher Zucker. And we answer people.

Awesome.

And we hope everyone comes to Springboard. And besides that, I hope everyone had a wonderful 4th, has a wonderful 4th.

That's exactly right.

Absolutely. So go out, sign up, register at FranchiseSpringboard.com.

Correct.

September 23rd through the 25th, Fort Worth, Texas. It is the premier event for emerging and reemerging franchise brands and people like me, because even meeting in the meeting we had last week, the organizational meeting, I picked up something from Tom Wood at Floor Coverings International that I've been doing this for 20+ years and it was a huge mess. So just, you know, there you are. As long as you're radically curious There will always be something for you to learn no matter how long you've been doing it.

We promise you, you will learn a lot, but in my situation, I promise you will have a good time doing it.

All right.

All right.

Exactly. Oh, Brad, did you want to tell 'em who the entertainment is?

Go ahead, Lane.

This is Brad's. So we, we decided last year when everybody's skimpifying everything you go to and they give you a cupcake for dinner with no protein and tell you that's dinner, we tried to make our event more experiential. And last year was the first year we introduced entertainment to to keep people locked in till midnight. And last year it was the Sugar Hill Gang, which was a wildly successful thing for a franchise party to end in a concert. And this year, um, much back and forth, is, uh, right, Sugar Ray. Mark McGrath, uh, and Sugar Ray will be performing at Springboard. And so we will have— you'll know every song. It's— he's an incredible entertainer. We got some big surprises coming in then, but it'll be a day you'll never forget and a conference that you remember because of But anyway, that's the big news.

You, you go to a conference, you get the industry leaders, you get people like the Arby's, you get these incredible stories, you get breakouts, you get panels, you get fed the whole time, coffee's flowing, and you get a Sugar Ray concert with Mark McGrath. This is literally the best deal that anybody could ever po— it's, it's almost like a, it's almost like a cruise. I mean, it's the cost. Well, it is. It's, it's the cost of a 3-day cruise to the Bahamas. That's all it is, you know, per per in a, in a, in a room. Lower floor.

Thank you so much for having us, Jeff. We really appreciate it. Uh, we love talking to you, and more importantly, thank you for hosting as being the chair of Springboard 2024.

Exactly. Thank you.

Yep, it's an honor, guys. Thanks for being on today. Brad Fishman, Lane Fisher, incredible, here with Jeff Dudan on the Unemployable Podcast. Thanks for listening.

Talk to you soon. Bye, guys.