Live Facebook Question and Answer with Jim's Group CEO, Jim Penman and CMO, Joel Kleber

Welcome, everyone, to another Ask Jim, which is our Facebook live stream we do on every training. It's come around quick, hasn't it, Jim? It hasn't been too long between the last one. We've got two trainings in February.

Yep.

So it's a fantastic group. It's a very attentive group as well, and they give us our questions. And I just want to run through some things first before everyone. Some big stuff happened. I don't know if you guys saw Jim on the project. Did anyone see Jim on the project last week or any of the media or anything like that? Jim was on the project for six minutes, firing up a bit, which is fantastic. You're on Sky News. You're in the paper. We had Haydar with the offer for the Jim's cleaning franchises. We had it heaps of things@news.com coverage. We had a national story every day of the week last week, which is fantastic, wasn't it?

Which all helps to give us before the public and keeps the leaves flowing in.

Absolutely. So the project Plumber is a good watch. So all this stuff's on our YouTube channel, which you can do as well. So let's get into it. Jim as well. We played racquetball today, so we're a bit tired. So we'll see how. We'll see how we go.

You won, Joel.

Yeah, you won. But I accidentally hit you in the head. And I'm glad you never red mark on there as well. So that's. I was pretty. I was pretty young.

He tried to knock me out, but didn't succeed.

Yeah, I was. Yeah, it was. Was not a good moment anyway. I was pretty panicking for a while. All right, cool. So we're going to do. We've got all your questions here. We've got 70. But as we say to people, just come up and ask Jim anything you like. Anyone who asks Jim a question on the mic will get a prize. So, hey, these beers are worth 25 bucks and they're collector's items. You pretty much get 25 bucks just from coming up to the microphone as well. I'll read out your name first as well. So hopefully you can come up to the mic if you're here. If not, just please kick us off. All right, first. First one here I'm going to pick out was. Okay, this is a good one. Is Pedro from Jim's Lang here. Pedro?

Yep.

Do you want to come and ask your question, Pedro? Sorry to put you on the mic, mate. You can change it to whatever you like. You don't have to go through it. You wrote it down. Ask anything you like.

Ask follow ups or anything.

Ask anything.

Very free.

Ask anything you like.

I was going to ask you. You're obviously very successful in your business and everything you've achieved. What keeps you inspired to keep going? Well, I get very involved with my franchisees. That's my kind of emotional. I don't have any business contacts. I don't know any other, you know, CEOs or anything like that. But I'm very relatable to my franchisees. That's a kind of a motivation. You just feel responsible that if I say things in the right way this morning, that'll help you to succeed. If I'm available to return your emails or your phone call, I hope you to succeed. And to be blunt, I'm pretty ambitious too. I'm just the kind of person that wants to. I don't know, I just like to do, do well. It's fun.

Yeah, Good. Good question.

Thank you.

You can ask another one if you want while you're there. Anything? What was the question I asked him there? The division with the highest income. Yeah. Which one has the highest income? Turnover.

If you're talking about an individual operator working by themselves, something like antennas, skip ins tend to be very, very high earners and. But the advantages of businesses like dog wash and mowing and cleaning is that because they're regular clients, it's much easier to build a major business. So probably the absolute top earners would be in those regular mowing, cleaning, dog wash type divisions. But the highest individual operators would be something like diggers too. Antennas, those kinds of things. Yeah. Awesome. Thank you.

Which division are going to be joining, Pedro?

I'm mowing.

Mowing.

Cool. And mowing's good though. Come on, you can't do better than that. No, I agree. You know what I do at the weekend for my hobby? I go out to my farm and I mow lawns with a push mower and I garden, garden vegetables. That's my fun.

Good man, Pedro. That's how you kick it off, guys. Well done. We always like that. So just jump up to the microphone. Ask him anything you like as well. You don't have to be orderly and wait for these questions to be read out. Please interrupt us and ask Jim anything you like as well. Okay, Cool. Got a heap of them here, which is fantastic. You mentioned that about your hobby before as well. Where's Camille from Jim's Cleaning? Is he here?

Yep.

Do you want to ask your question, Camille? I Forgot my question. All right, I'll read it out, come up to the microphone, we'll get your face in there, put you on the spot. It was about the future.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

So what are your plans for the.

Future for the group?

For gyms?

We just want to keep on being better. The software we've got developed, hopefully over the next year or so, we should make a dramatic improvement to our customer service and hopefully to our franchisees income. So I want to improve, I want to see less complaints, I want to see less franchisees reporting unhappy income. That's my biggest, biggest goal, always my biggest aim. If we do that, we'll grow, but growth is a result. Yeah. And I reckon we can go a long way. I mean, we've come a huge amount in the past, what is it, 35 years. But we can really go beyond that. We can do much, much better. And it is a really big clue to that.

How much do you spend every year in it, just for them?

About $5 million a year spent on software development and we could spend more too. It's hard to get things done fast enough.

You're saying today you read something in Amazon about they had the same frustration as you, which I found was interesting.

Yeah. There's a lady called, did a job, she was 13 years at AM and he had the same problem and they spent like, who knows, a billion dollars a year on stuff. She's still waiting for things to be done. You never ever can have your IT as good as you like.

Good question. Cool. Yeah, I think that's it.

Because you go for it.

If you've got another one, ask him. Yeah. Ask anything. This is for you guys.

Can't think of any now because I think my question was. Same as Pedro's. No, that's fine.

Thank you. Thank you, man.

Cool.

If you've got a question, guys, just feel free to interrupt up the mic. Go for it. That's what we want. Fantastic. Good man.

So the question I actually originally asked in here was going from mowing to then branching out in other franchises. How did that actually all come about? And was that your idea? Did somebody approach you? No, it wasn't my idea at all. The first time we tried to go beyond it, we did cleaning and because I didn't think the Jim's Mowing, being a gardening brand, would work for a woman, for example, we called it Sunlight, put a different brand on it and it failed, getting the money back. The two franchises sold, gave the money back, said, sorry, it won't work. Somebody came to me and said, what about Jim's cleaning? And after quite a lot of resistance, I agreed to let them have a go in partnership and it worked. So it wasn't actually my idea. Most divisions don't come from me, don't come from us, they come from people who come to us. Today we were talking about hair, hairdressing. We've got potentially a new division all over. Who knows? We told her what was involved. Not a lot of money but a lot of time. And that's my phone.

There we go.

Goodness gracious. I'll turn it off. Sorry. Yeah, so you never know. And I've got another question, but it's.

A bit of a two parter.

What's one of the most craziest suggestions that somebody has brought to you as a potential division? And second part, is there a division that you've wanted to add to the business but maybe haven't had a chance to? When you say the craziest idea, like.

Just the most out there.

Well, we had a national conference once where everybody had to come up with a new division and I think the best one there was Jim's Hitman. They had white jumpers with a little black gun on it. So I thought that was pretty, you know, if you want, you want your problems and we can solve it for you, that sort of stuff.

When you had the problems with the council, that was something you might have.

Yeah, yeah. Problems with the council. There we are, Jim's hit men. They're on the way.

Did you start that?

And we just don't know about it.

What was the other one?

That's what's going to happen if you don't pay your fees on time? 10th of the month.

Jim's debt collectors first. Yeah.

And the other bit was, apart from the craziest, what's a division you would love to add but maybe you haven't had a chance to or. Well, I'll tell you what, there's two that we'd love to do. One is driving school. It's an obvious one. It also fits the demographic. Jim's has a very strong appeal to the 1525 age group, which is strange but we do. If you look at social media, it's probably strongest. And the other one is hairdressing. Actually it's an obvious one we'd love to do because it's huge. Hairdressers are very poorly paid on the whole. We can work out about if we can treble their income, which we should be able to. And it's also women friendly and our fastest Growing divisions like cleaning, dog wash, laundry are very acceptable to women, you might say. Nice. Thank you.

And just out of interest, how would you approach Jim's hair?

Do you want me to be honest with you?

Yeah. What would you do?

I haven't got enough left to worry about. I tell you what happened. I was actually at home with a bit of an epiphany. I was actually in a bad place mentally, and I just turned Facebook on and I just believed the signs of God. And next thing you know, Jim's came. Jim's beauty came on today's show. And then I watched the whole segment and he mentioned his last words were. Were, you know, Jim's hair. And I just went. I could. I don't know why, but I can do this. I'm going to approach because I knew.

I was coming here.

I thought, I'll wait till the opportunity coming in for all my partners speaking this weekend. And I thought, I'll just ask the question.

There you go.

Well, Lizzy's actually had three salons and 27 contractors, so she's really well known in the industry. She's also famous as a hairdresser. She charged, like, what do you charge? 200 bucks an hour. What did you say today? Yeah.

Good money.

So it's a very experienced. So from our point of view, very, very good potential divisional, no pressure. He's coming to support the diggers, but we sucked her into here, so you never know what will happen in this place.

Absolutely. Guys, we'll keep going. We've got heaps of questions here. We've got around 70, so if you want to get your question answered, please come up here or I might miss it. So just ask. Come up to the microphone anytime as the people have done before. It's really easy. Now, is there one here from. Where is Suzanne Douglas? This is a good question for Jim. Is Suzanne here from laundry? No, I'll read it out for real quickly, Jim, personal development. What are your two favorite personal development books? I know you're big on your audiobooks. What are the two favorite ones that you recommend for people here?

Atomic Habits I would thoroughly recommend to anybody. That's just about how you create good habits and how you stick to them. I think it's fantastic. And I like Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Stephen Covey. Yeah, that's right. So, yeah, I read a lot, actually. I probably on average read about two books a week. Read or listen to. I'm always reading. Always got my mind. And I read multiple magazines and all kinds of things. So, yeah, it's always wise. It's always good to have lots of ideas.

Absolutely.

If it's a good book too, I'll read it twice, I'll read it once and then later, in maybe a few months later or a year or two later, I'll read it again for sure.

Got a question guys, feel free to come up to the mic. Just interrupt us as well if you've got anything as well. So don't miss it, just jump up. Don't have to ask permission, just come up anytime. Please feel free to do so and get yourself on our clips. You'll be on our clips, on our TikTok and stuff.

Hey, Jim, my name is Mick, I'm joining the mobile tyres division of Western Sydney. Yep. My question to you is Emma had said something about you enjoying a bit of history and having an interest in that. Yes. And I know you just recently said something about the Roman Empire, but my question to you would be if you could go back in time, to which era do you take most interest in? For what reason? And if you were in that era, obviously being so successful in the gyms in this era, what do you think you'd be doing? Where do you think you would be? I go back to Athens.

Good question.

In the golden age, the age of Pericles. Yeah. A bit of hard. A lot of wars going on and stuff, but that was just an amazing period. It's kind of got me interested in the whole business of history. Back when I get. Somebody gave me a copy of the Peloponnesian wars by Thucydides when I was 14 and it got me hooked. Ever since Jim's catapults. Well, you know what if you went back in time? I'd often have a discussion with my son, my 14 year old son when I drive him to school. We had the weirdest topics. We were talking about how it would be good to actually merge people and insects and why would that be a good idea?

As you do.

As you do. But sorry, what was it too. Actually, I think you'd have the biggest. If you were a time traveler, where you probably had the most benefit is understanding hygiene. They just didn't understand germ theory. So people were dying of things like polluted water and stuff.

At a younger age.

Simple cleanliness would make so much difference. People in the past lived just stinking, disgusting lives, you know. You know, in medieval cities or even till Quite recently, about 1700, they would just toss your chamber out and they'd into the street, there'd be a drain and every now and then it would rain and it would wash it away, but just lived in filth. And so many of them died. So I think you went in time and you actually just had basic ideas of hygiene. And then if you could work out a way for vaccination, like smallpox, if you knew how to buy cowpox, for example, or you could have a tremendous impact, I think that'd be the best thing. Yeah.

Awesome.

Thank you so much.

Good question. Really appreciate it.

Yeah, it is a good question.

I wrote it down.

Put that one down.

Yeah, put it on there for you. Cool. If you've got a question, guys, just come up and ask Jim.

That is. That is a. That is a great question.

Cool.

All right.

And we've got one here from. Don't know if Kai from Pool Care is here still. Is Kai here still?

Yep.

Do you remember your question?

Yeah, I think so.

You can say anything.

Great beard there, Kate.

Kai, you're always the question I was.

Going to ask, why did you get rid of your beard?

And I think you've been answered that question.

Mike, you've answered that question before.

It's fine. It's good to ask. We always.

Look, I grew a beard way back because my fiance at the time liked it. Later I found myself divorced and single, and the beard was starting to go gray, and I shoved it, cut it off. We men are completely ruled by you women. Isn't that we just live our lives to try and keep you happy?

That's it.

Nothing scientific, nothing businesslike. Please. The woman in your life, married 23 years, very happily, gorgeous wife, very happy. So she didn't want me to go. A beard. No question. Very good. So I thought of another question because.

You had to answer that question before I thought.

So you started off with Jim's mowing.

If you could go back to where.

You first started, would you. And with all the other divisions that you got now, would you still start with Jim's mowing or go to a different one? Because I'm a mowing contractor. I've mowed once, 15 years. I understood that business. That's very important. I knew where I was coming to. But if I could go back to the start of gyms, I would do so many things differently. So many mistakes. I didn't understand. I didn't understand the value of meetings. I didn't understand the value of proactive calls. I didn't understand the way that I didn't understand the power of technology. I spent nine months stuffing around with lawyers. I should have just written any old thing and Got good programs done to automate their business. There's just so many things I would do differently, actually. If you read my book, it's like a catalog of all the stupid things I've done. Spending money on ventures I shouldn't have got into. I've done so many dumb things in my life, I tell you. Yeah, cool. I often dream about going back in time, but I would never go back more than 14 years because I wouldn't lose any of my children. Good.

Great beard. And we do have a beard. Always bring the beard down. I know you don't like wearing it, but we can put it on for a bit just so people always see. Feel the logo. So we can. We'll do one question like that as well. He's got a question for Jim like that. It's always good for a clip. He doesn't like me doing it, but I always get in the door.

It's very itchy. All right.

Cool. Next one here is probably. All right, here's a good one. Real targeted question from. I don't know if he's here from cleaning. He goes, how can I get more customers in my territory? So how can you get more customers? So if you started as a franchisee, day one, what would you do to get more customers in your territory?

I wouldn't knock on doors or do leaflets particularly. One of the things I would do is I go everywhere with my uniform, including going shopping, going for a walk, walking the dog. Every time I saw somebody, I just greet them, just say hello, nice weather, whatever. Just keep on talking to people and getting to know people and making contact. Doesn't have to be anything difficult. And I'm a pretty introverted person, but it's not that difficult to actually say a nice greeting to somebody in your uniform and always have business cards with you personal.

There you go. You can take that off now, Jim. I always came to do that once.

It's itchy.

It's not the best. It is very itchy. But it makes for a good clip on social media, so we always do it as well. Cool. Anyone, more questions for Jim? Guys, please feel free to come up and interrupt. There's any online Charles that I'm missing.

What about Smiley lady? When I was talking. When I was talking yesterday morning, she had this beautiful expression. You always look for the one who's really encouraging. I was really interested in what you were saying. You had this beautiful smile. So thank you.

Jim, my name's Cassie.

I am one of your new franchisees out of the Sandgate region of Brisbane, I am a female, and my question to you was, I know that there.

Isn'T a lot of female mowing franchisees.

But with all the experience that you've had personally, and knowing that I am very ambitious and keen to make some really strong headway, what's the one piece of advice that you think I should really take on board? I think if you love what you do, that's so much of a start. You know something about it. Mowing is. You're right. Women are a minority. But you know what? They tend to have the most passionate clients who love them because you don't. Let's face it, a guy can go in for mowing because it's a man's job. You go in for. Because you love gardens. That's all right. Yes, yes. And therefore, if you show that to your clients and you talk to them about what you want to do and you've got such a wonderful personality, I think you'll just find yourself an absolute hit. Listen, the only thing I probably say that you may not do, you might not be tough enough on charging. Okay. You've got to know how good you are. You'll probably find your clients love you. Don't be scared to charge a bit more. Okay? Great advice. Thank you so much. And then, of course, because I am a Star wars fan, what's your favorite Star wars movie? I like the first five, actually.

Just the first five?

First five? Yeah. Well, look, I like Star wars itself. That was the most amazing experience I can remember seeing it the first time. I love Empire Strikes Back, obviously, which has got a lovely twist to it. But I also love the first three because even though, you know, there's things like Jar Jar Beats, we're not all great fans of, but I love the story about how somebody turns to the dark side. I like the story about how Palpatine, who comes across such a good guy, he turns into the Galactic Emperor. To me, that that's a great story arc. And there's nothing been done since then that really beats that or even equals it. You didn't like Mandalorian? No, I don't. I tried it. Don't like it? No, I really don't like anything beyond the first five. Sorry about that. They're brilliant films, but they just don't add up lately. Do you like Mandalorian, actually? Well, I've got step kids, so. And they are all into it, so.

I'm sort of forced to like it, I guess.

But I think the thing I like the most about Star wars is that it transports me to a galaxy literally far, far, far away. And I kind of like that idea that there's more out there than just us.

So.

Yeah, yeah. But thank you so much for the.

Opportunity to be here today.

And Joel, I really enjoyed your presentations.

Thank you. But it'd be great to get you on an interview because we need to get more. You know, I did try and get interview. I try and do more content with women mowing franchisees down here. It's very hard. They're very busy. So it'd be great to interview you if you're doing well. Hopefully you're doing well. Then after a month, I'm sure you.

Will actually, I'm sure you'll find, as.

I said, we do a podcast with it. So.

Yeah, we'd love to talk to you about it. Yeah, sounds great.

After 30 days, Jim sends an email to every franchisee. Okay, please respond. And he'll forward it on to me. And hopefully you're doing well. So if you're doing well, we'll hopefully get you on the podcast. It'd be great to get more. It's been a big motivation for us to try and get more women involved in mowing. It's a, it's a no brainer for us clients. You have a way more of an advantage, to be honest, because most of our customers in mowing and gardening are generally more women focused. Right. So they prefer, you know, not taking anything away from the blokes. But that's just sometimes when I talk to customers. That's a good way.

Thanks so much, guys. Appreciate it.

Well done. Thank you very much. Thank you for that question. But guys, just feel free to come up and ask questions. Guys, just come up to the microphone. Easy as that. You'll get a prize, I guarantee it. Bit of bribes.

Hey, Jim, I'm Anthony.

So I'm in the security in Adelaide. Tim's Security.

Yeah. Cool.

Nice to meet you. We're talking about what next for Jim's. Because you're in so many industries. Will there be an Uber? Jim's. Will you be looking into that Uber?

I've thought about it, quite frankly, I really have because they take a fantastic cut. See the whole principle of what we do, they do, they take such a large chunk of the drivers and I honestly can't see why they should. And the way we do things like. I'll give you an example. Jim's Antennas started off, there was a company called Mr. Antennas. They were big, biggest in the country. They were taking half the franchisees income. We put Jim's Antennas up we took. And it's a high fee because they get a lot of leads. It's about 12% of their income in fees. Now, we killed Mr. Antennas not because of the market, necessarily because they couldn't hold franchisees who preferred gyms system. So I'd say the same principle I love to do with Uber. If we can work out the software, which would be a challenge, I'd love to do it. I'd love to actually have a deal where a franchisee was just paying a certain amount per month, little bit per lead equivalent to what most franchises pay, about $7.50 a month. And they just were able to go out there and make the living themselves. The whole industry is just like a cartel. It's awful. I'm the taxi industry, where you have to have this license thing, the license thing. So it means that most of the money actually goes to the owner of the license, not the person who's doing the driving. What we like to do is to give the money to the person who's doing the work. And that's how you get the best people.

Yep. That kind of leads to. My next question is, do you have a car collection and do you have your dream car or are you into cars at all?

Or. I'm actually notorious for not having. Until November 2022, my car was worth $10,000, and that's about the most expensive car I've ever had. And I actually ended up giving it to my. One of my sons. Okay. I've never actually sold a car because I usually they're so wrecked I just throw them away or give them to somebody. But at that time, I bought an electric car because I want electric because we've got solar panels. And I love to be able to charge my car during the day when the solar panels instead of on coal. I really believe in that kind of stuff. So I actually have got a new car now, which I really like, but I'm not. I'm not into it. I just like safe. And I love. I love not not burning coal to make electricity. That's all I like. Solar panels is great. You know, the staff here, they have an open option. If you've got an electric car, you can park. You can charge your car for free because we've got surplus power coming with solar panels during the day. So it's an actual option anyway. And we encourage them all to get electric cars.

And just one more question. Did you come up with the chant for the adverts? The. You know, the Jimbo Jimbo. Because as growing up as a kid, that was always stuck in our heads from ages ago. Yeah.

You'd be surprised how little about gyms actually comes from me, honestly.

That's true.

But the general culture, the idea, passion for customers, franchisees first being selective about this kind of stuff, that's my. That's my personal values and I'm proud of that. The fact that they are wide, but the actual nitty gritty of how things work. Like social media, for example. This guy's been doing it all. All I do there is answer is his questions on camera and stuff and he handles everything on the face. But he's the actual mind behind social media. So that's the same against a lot of people. I got fantastic stuff. I get people like Rocky, my coo. I've got John who's the head of finance, Megan who's in business. I mean, there's a lot of great people who do so much stuff. A lot of what I do is just talk to them and just float around. Actually, I don't do very much, sort of. But that's one of the reasons I've always got time to talk to you. Yep. Because I'm not involved in the running of the business. I'm actually more. I do certain things, but mainly my role is communication. Franchisee with issues, how to improve things. How do we get better customer service, dealing with difficult customers. What's happening, what's going wrong? How do you change the system? That's kind of my role.

I think it's great that we can, like we're investing our money into this and we actually get to meet you and talk to you and you're not just a picture on the wall and. Oh, yeah, that's. That's like your boss or whatever. Like. Well, it's good.

You notice during this session I've actually gone around and talked to people. I try to say something like, but just because if you've met me and you know me, then if you need to talk to me or you've got an idea to improve the business or you've got a new division or anything, no matter what it is, you know, you can pick up the phone or even better, email me. I'm really easy to get my emails and just be in contact with me and get a response. Yep, cool.

Here's some examples of what happens. Jim will, let's say if a franchisee calls him during the day. This used to happen in insurance. It happens with insurance sometimes, if you call it, let's say you have A problem with insurance or a claim or whatever. Franchisee will call Jim and give him a bit of a serve. What's going on here? Jim will go, right, put him on speaker, walk to the person who's doing insurance and go what's this about with the franchisee on the phone? And it'll get sorted generally pretty quickly.

Or if somebody doesn't get an answer from the office, I'll go straight through. Why haven't we got a response from that? 24 hour working days is how it should happen. Actually there's a hundred dollar credit if you don't get a response within 24 hours from my office. Some sort of response. It may be. This is what they're going to do about it. You have to get, you can, you can claim a hundred bucks.

You don't want to be on the end of that staff don't like to.

Actually get that kind of thing on because it's a bit of a black mark.

Yeah, very true.

Good question.

Thank you for doing that. Come up and ask any questions, guys. Feel free to do so. I did have one here though which Jim will like, I reckon. Tom from Diggers here. Mini Diggers. Tom, really good question here. Jim will right up his alley.

Tom from Adelaide. Diggers and just everyone loves a holiday. What's your favorite holiday destination? My farm. Your farm? Yeah, I go up and dig vegetables on my farm. I find it very difficult to take holidays. I honestly do. You can't work between Christmas and New Year, nothing going on. So I go with my family down to lawn or somewhere for a few days. I like to see my kids but basically I'm so waiting to get back to work. So there's no overseas destinations. I hate travel, hate travel, hate planes. I enjoy what I do in my everyday life really, really, really a lot. I don't like holidays. I just don't like them. Yeah, fair enough. I actually think during the Commonwealth prompt when Oliver Cromwell took over, he tried to outlaw Christmas. I think that was a good idea. That's what I would do.

Not a fan of Christmas. Not a fan.

Not a fan of Christmas. A lot of time off and presents and all kinds of. I just want to get back to work. I enjoy it. Yeah, very boring man. I am.

Yeah, very boring.

But busy man. I did have another question. If you had a superpower, what would you choose as your superpower? I'd like to be able to actually look to people's minds and find out who's going to be good at what they do. Honestly speaking, if I Could trying to light on everybody here know the 90 plus percent of you that are going to do well and pick out the ones that weren't. I would not take the people who are likely to fail. That's really hurtful. It really is. The thing that upsets me the most when I see somebody fail. The same thing with the office too. I mean. I mean, what grows, what limits our growth? Quality. People. I've got some great people, but it takes a long time to find them. If I could actually interview somebody in shine light, say, okay, he's going to be great. No, no, good. Yeah. And it's often you can't tell from talking to somebody, so that's a good question. I'll put that one down.

Did you have one about the epigenetic stuff as well? Was that you? That wasn't me.

What do you think of the movie Dune?

I know you like Star Wars.

Have you seen Dune? No, I'm not a fan of Dune. I didn't like the book. Didn't like the film.

Yep, Good question. Thank you very much for that one as well. There's one I thought he asked, but the name's not next to it. So if this is your question, I apologise. Someone's gone. I have a very limited understanding of epigenetics, but I believe it means that you can alter someone's DNA to give them different characteristics. Or trusts. Or trusts. If this is a trait. Sorry, is that your question? Do you want me. I'll stop and you want to read it out. I can't remember the rest of it. You sure? Yep.

All right, cool.

And then he goes, if this is the case, then what characteristics and traits do you think are desirable in the world to be A good question.

Yeah. Epigenetics is not about changing your genes. Epigenetics is changing the way the genes function. So if you imagine a gene, the DNA code, it's like a series of little tiny taps that's spitting out a protein. That's how it works. What epigenetics does is it turns the tap off or turns it on. And that's an effective environment. The thing we're interested in this book here is looking at the effects of mild food restriction in particular, because it has very, potentially very beneficial effects for character. For example, it does things like people more likely to be drug addicts because they think long term they're better parents, they're less likely to be philanderers, they're more law abiding, they're more successful economically. There's all kinds of positive benefits to it. What we're trying to do is to actually work out the exact effects on the genes, epigenetics, effects on proteins, hormones, everything else, and then work out how to reverse engineer it. It's got the potential of making a massive, massive difference, an improvement to human welfare. Okay, thank you.

Because you're doing it. Sorry, I didn't read it. Your name wasn't on the question. Sorry, that was a good question. I wrote it down. But do you want to just maybe talk about what your next project regarding this thing as well, which I think is pretty exciting. The population stuff as well.

Oh, yes. Actually, we're starting off to write a book about birth rate, birth rate problems. As you know, the birth rate is plunging all over the developed world. Any country with $50,000 per per head, capital income, annual income is going down some very fast. Places like South Korea, China, Japan, they're basically only having half the papers they need. And to me that's a crisis. It's a sign of a bigger problem within society. But people think of it in terms of economics, but they're wrong because money has nothing to do with it. What is it? Country spending 5% of their GDP like Hungary or somewhere to. To try and persuade people to have more children. It doesn't work. You know, China, they got rid of their one child policy. First of all, they got rid of it and now they've got a policy where they want you to have more children. So do you know what happened in all these stages? The birth rate went down. See, people have children because they want to have children. I've got 10 children because I love kids, love being around kids. It's my nature. So if we got this epigenetic change worked out, it would help people to want to have children, to want to be parents. That's the solution. So actually writing a book, which is probably about a year in the gestation, getting some people in America to help me with that. And we're going to have publicized it very well and we're going to actually push this research program through that thing because a lot of people are concerned plunging birth rate's a problem. You've got more and more old people and some of them are like me. And we're still going to keep on working forever. But you have more and more old duffers in the around and less and less people to support them. It makes more and more difficult to actually have a decent society. So I think having dropping, declining population is really bad. Jim, I'm trying to convince My wife confirmed.

Do you have any special tips? I'll give him. Give a shout out. What's your wife's name? Sorry? Mick. Mick. Do you want to give a message to Mick? Yes. It will go on camera so you can send it. It's 34 minute mark if you're going to get it. Not me. Harbor. Sorry, Harbor. I see for Hubba.

So how do you persuade your wife to have children? More children or.

She's taught me to have.

She what?

She's taught me to go away.

Go away. You don't. Don't want children. Don't want more children. I want more. I want a third. Happy? I've got two at the moment, two baby girls. There's a book called Selfish Reasons to have More Kids actually, which I recommend that you have a look at and see if you can get her to read it too. It talks about being parents. Let me tell you something. Having had multiple children, sometimes they're easier actually because they entertain each other. My son David I'm going to see tomorrow night with his family and my daughter too. They have one child who's just over a year and he's a really cute kid, but he's a handful because he wants to be entertained all the time and they're quite indulgent parents. Now if he had a couple of younger siblings or older siblings, they play with each other. So actually they look after each other and they become friends and they fight each other and they do all kinds of things too. It's actually having more children is really. It's so fun. It's really, really fun.

What was the book called? What was the book called again?

It's called Selfish Reasons to have More Kids. If you can't find it, just email me jims.net and I'll give you the details. Read it yourself too, you'll have some ideas. One of the things I point out too, he points out that children aren't as much work as people think, that you can spend all this time thinking you have to take them to Lamaze lessons and all this kind of stuff. It has very little effect actually, if you just enjoy your kids and spend time with them. Like I'm obviously successful enough, man, I drive my son to school and pick him up and at that time, which is about a 20 minute drive, we talk about things like, you know, people having insect genes and this kind of stuff too. He's a really interesting kid, great kid. So it's just, it's just so much fun.

It really is fun doing it too. Yeah.

I love my kids. I miss them being young. They were so great and teenagers are a bit more difficult, but then when they grow up and they start having families of their own and stuff and you've got extended family and grandkids and stuff, it's just. It's just wonderful. It's the biggest joy there is. I appreciate that. Thank you. When this birth rate comes out, turns out, send me an email. I'll send you a copy of that one too, but that's for you for a while.

Signed with a message in there as well. Got some comments online real quickly as well. Someone says, where can I buy Jim's lager? You can't buy this one anymore. This one. Cooper's tried to shut it down but that's something you only get at training. So become a new franchisee and ask him a question. You can get a beer, simple as that. Another one online. Real quickly. Jim, someone's going about doing mobile coffee. I think this guy asked this last week as well. Last time. Mobile coffee. Jim's mobile coffee.

Well, we do it. We actually started on the stage but again it's the problem with. As we were saying to Lizzie this afternoon, it's a matter of finding somebody who's going to persist with it. This guy just wasn't. He wasn't the right driver for the division. It just all fell apart. We do it. It's probably not as obvious as some others, not as obvious as driving to school or hairdressing or those kind of things, but it's still something we'd like to do.

Another quick one as well from. Sorry, who was that?

I'm just saying, just quickly, those options. What about mobile entertainment? I'm not talking about nightclub things but like DJs for weddings and parties.

So I've got to repeat that. Yeah, I just got to repeat that for people. So mobile entertainment, weddings and parties is the question.

Look, it's a possibility. Again, if we had the right person coming forward. It's probably not as obvious as some because it's very personality based. You really have to be a dj. You have to have kind of manner, I would think. Really you have to. I've seen so many people that are just robots and don't think. But that's. But that's not gyms. You see, our way is to do things well.

The good ones have the personality and.

Can actually connect with the audience. That's what you want to do. We want to find good people and get them. And get them in business. Look, I'd do it if I had the right person approaching me honestly. Everything is about who drives the division, the divisions that work. I mean I never thought of the idea of laundry, never thought about it. But three months as of next it's just reached his three year anniversary. It's got 120 franchisees. It's not the most obvious one but you've got a plausible idea. Woman, friendly, big scale, brilliant leader, that's what you need. So I'd do it if I had the right person approach me. That's why I was really excited to talk to Lizzie actually I talked to him to yesterday because she's had that background in the industry. She loves what she's absolutely fanatical about. She can't shut her up actually. She really is. She loves what she loves her profession and she's got a good background in it too. That to me is like a perfect. I said that to Rocky, I said this woman you've got to meet, she's fantastic because she fits those and it's a big industry. Doesn't help with me, Greg. I think it's hairdressers. Sure. They're all nat. They all natter like anything cool.

Guys, you got a question, please feel free to come up and ask them for Jim as well. There's some good questions. Just jump up to the microphone. Can we have a microphone? Get yourself on there. It's a good clip for social. Thank you.

Okay, I'm going to ask a few personal questions. Okay, go ahead. What's your favourite music you would listen to if you had time to? Well, I do listen occasionally. I'm not talking books but actually it's very Christian music a lot. I like certain kinds of classical music like Brahms and Aaron Copeland and Vaughan Williams, those kinds of things. Quite a lot of just. I like Kenya, I like Abba. I mean I'm not Abba.

That's a new one.

I'm hyper.

My favourite song is A Dancing Queen. Which one do you like? Abba. I haven't heard you say ABBA before.

Nah, abba's been cool.

I love abba.

Abba's cool. I grew up in abba. ABBA actually fairly wide range of music but I don't like heavy rock music.

Or anything like that.

No. What's your favourite cuisine to eat? If you had a choice, you had to go to a restaurant. Lots of things. I like Greek. There you are. There you go. I do. There's a place in Croydon that has this really nice. I was about to ask, is there a great restaurant in Melbourne? What's the best restaurant.

Breakfast.

A place called. It's like a cafe thing. It's called the Meat Palace. It doesn't look anything, but they got a really nice euros souvlaki with. With. With Mediterranean vegetables, like eggplant in it. That's really nice. Okay. Is that a dish? No, it's a. It's a roll. It's called a gyros. It's not a. Yeah, it's a gyros. I don't know. How can I tell? It's not a kebab.

It's called a gyros.

See, I told you she was a rat bag. Ok, but I like artist things too. I like a bit of Asian food and I like a bit of. I like pizza sometimes. Nice. I like Japanese. We got a really nice Japanese restaurant we started going to in Knox. So lots of stuff. So when you have time on your own, you've got nothing to do. What's your favorite hobby? Gardening. Gardening. I've got this giant vegetable garden actually, if anybody wants one. Does anybody want a giant zucchini? I've got. For some reason, I don't know why I've planted these things. They come at this size. Nobody can eat a zucchini that size.

Maybe you can give it as a.

Graduation present if anybody wants a zucchini. I have got a couple of giant zucchinis and actually I've got one. I'm going to give one to my daughter tomorrow night. So. I love gardening. I love getting outside and just getting out there and digging and weeding and stuff. It's just fun. That's good. Okay, I'm just going to ask one more question because it's so obvious. I can see with your merchandise you've got wine and beer. What's your favourite? Wine or beer? I mean, teetotaller as of 50 years. Okay, just. You have to choose one. I don't drink. Okay. I have no idea what even. I'm not going to tell you how to choose one. They're all bad. Okay. 50 years ago, you know, let me tell you. Let me tell you something. This is a story about a town which was a small town newspaper. Really quiet day, very quiet news day. There was nothing going on at all. No news at all. So the supporter said, what do I do? He said, go out and interview this guy. He's known as being the oldest man in the district. So he goes out, talks to this guy and he says to him, important question. Everyone should know. What do you. How do you account for your extremely long Life. And he says, the guy says, old guy says, look, there's one rule and one rule on that's responsible and that is that never in all of my life, in all my 105 years have I ever touched a drop of alcohol. And as he was saying this, it was a double story house and upstairs there was this incredible crashing and banging and swearing and stuff going on. And the porter, he said, what's that? He said, oh, don't worry about that. That's just dad drunk again.

There you go, Jim's jokes.

Thank you so much. Thank you.

But it was quite funny because when we did the beer, we had channel 10 channel. We actually leaked. Coopers tried to. They sent us a legal letter and we thought, stuff Coopers. We leaked it to our PR lady. Next thing, Jim's on Channel 10 having to talk about a beer. So he's trying to pour a beer, trying to talk about it. He's like, I don't drink beer. If I drank beer, it would be this one. And you're on Channel 10 talking about a beer and you're pretty much anti alcohols. That was quite funny. You're in the Age, in the Age in the Herald sun, double page spread. Holding up a beer like that, pouring it into the. That was the first beer of a poured into a glass, wasn't it? It was quite funny, yeah.

Sorry, I've got another question. Obviously you're always giving advice to your new franchisees, but you said you've got 10 children. I've got a couple of children. What is the one thing you really want your children to absorb from you.

Or the piece of advice that you.

Really hope that they walk away from you to be good parents? I actually think that is the number one obligation of any human being. Before anything, there's a wonderful statement that goes, no other success can compensate for failure in the home. And my next book, the next version of the genes book is going to be called no Other Success. And it's going to start with an anecdote about a guy who, who bought a franchise so he could spend time see his kid growing up. That is the number one thing. Honestly, I reckon that a person who becomes a billionaire and has lousy kids is a failure. That's my view. Whereas somebody who lives a very ordinary life, like many of my franchisees, very average life, but is a good father, a good husband, I think they're a success. That's the most important thing of all. Beautiful. Thank you.

Great question and thanks for asking it, guys. You've got a Question, please feel free to ask. I'm definitely not going to get through them all, so just jump up and ask away.

Great question.

It was.

I like that one.

Write that down. Hey, Jim and Joel, my name's Andrew Gelding. My question is your personal property, Jim. Do you use your franchise territory guy to do your lawn and garden care?

I actually get, I actually have. Not regularly, but I had you look at my place. It's just across the road there. There's a lot of planting being done that was done by one of my gyms guys. He just charged me 75 bucks an hour.

So who does your mowing?

Somebody with a ride on from Cropper.

Center, VIP or Jim's.

I want it done properly. Thank you very much.

That's good. Excellent.

Now we have, we have, we have Tanya on staff. He does the lawns with the rider. It takes no time at all.

Excellent. Thanks, Jim. Well, we have people around your house with antenna.

But you know, hey, you know what, what I use on my farm to cut the grass there?

What's that?

I use the push mower which is not powered, it's just the old mechanical ones.

Oh yeah.

I really like the physicality of cutting with it with a, with a self powered mower that turns because you, you push it.

Cool. Very good. Thank you. Good man. Good question. If you've got a question, guys, feel free to come up and ask him as well. Here we go. Thank you.

Hey Jim, thank you for having me. My partner and I just got into.

The mowing division and you just mentioned.

Before that there were things if you could go back in time that you would do differently.

Is there anything in the mowing division.

That you would have done differently? Because the things I get involved with are basically to do with every division. Things like meetings, things like proactive calls. Just didn't understand the technology of support. See, people don't mowing. Isn't that different really? I mean you should do what you love. That's the best thing. If you love gardening, if you love being outside, it's great. If you love cars, then come. If you love dogs, then dog wash. So what you actually do is less important. What's really important is how you run the business and how we support you in the business. All those things are totally generic because it makes people think that we do everything. But in fact we are one of the most narrowly focused businesses that you could possibly imagine. We're just looking at service industries, individual.

Operators, how you pee or gyms.

James, I want it done properly. Thank you very much.

That's good. Excellent.

Now we have. We make them successful in an independent service business. Yeah, no worries.

All right, thank you very much. Good question. Nice new shirts as well. Yes, very nice and fresh. And I'll get to it as well.

Have Tanya on staff. He does the lawns with the wider. He takes no time at all.

Excellent. Thanks, Jim. But we have people around your house. You're fantastic.

Hey, you know what I use on my farm to cut the grass there?

Guys, jump up and ask a question. Feel free because we're not going to get through them on the piece of paper at all. So please come up and ask a question for Jim as well. I've got one here, I've got a couple online, Jim, I just want to get to real quickly. Robert, who was Roland, who was in training last time, says with a lot of Australians doing it tough, what do you think our chance of being, becoming or being successful is? I should have asked this question when I did my training a couple of weeks ago. So he's a new franchisee, hasn't started yet.

Well, remarkably good. People are doing it tough. But in actual fact, the service industry is incredibly easy in a sense to do very, very, very well because there's so much work and there's such a hunger for good services. I would say it's a lot easier than it was a few decades ago when I started because it's so easy to find work. People are desperate for service. As you go out there and just do the basic stuff, the returning of phone calls, turning up on time, pride in your job, just the basic simple things. Well, you can do extraordinary. Well, it's actually. I don't want to be put down, my fellow.

What's that?

I use the push mower, which is not powered, it's just the old mechanical ones.

Oh, yeah.

I really like the physicality of cutting with a self powered mower that turns because you push it.

Cool. Very good. Thank you. Good man. Good question.

If you're a countryman. But we're a really fat and lazy country, aren't we? I mean, honestly, I mean, people are just so. They don't want to get their hands dirty. This is one of the things that really annoys me.

Got a question, guys? Feel free to come up and ask him as well. Here we go. Thank you. Hey, Jim, thank you for having me.

They want to go to some, some cushy office job and sit in front of a computer all day, which isn't very healthy anyway. But getting out there and building a fence or mowing A lawn or cleaning, all those kind of things too. It's like that's. But you can make so much more money and have such a better lifestyle and flexibility.

And AI can't do it as well. And AI can't do it as well.

It cannot be automated away. It's a fantastic opportunity. If you're the kind of person doesn't mind, doesn't feel it's beneath you to get your hands dirty. I actually have calloused hands. You can probably see them. And that's because I do so much gardening. I love having calloused hands. I think that's. To me, I always enjoyed it when I was a mind contractor. I love having calluses on my hands. My wife doesn't complain too much when I'm caressing. She's kind of used to it. All right. She doesn't object, I assure you. She probably do it a bit much. I'm a little bit too handy at times. But that's our problem.

Too much information. That's all good. But a question.

Great opportunity. It's a great opportunity and there's so much I see the world as bir. My partner and I just got into.

The mowing division and you just mentioned.

Before that there were things, if you could go back in time that you would do differently.

Is there anything in the mowing division.

That you would have done differently? Um, because the things I get involved with are basically to do with. With every division. Things like with opportunity. There's so many things we'd love to do. How you going, Jim? I'm Simon. I bought a Moen franchise down Kyne, which is Bendigate way. Yeah. Your honesty is infectious. Do you believe that that has made the success of your brand easier? And is it easy to be so. It's like you. You're part of us. Even though you're a CEO. It never happens. Is that reason why it's so successful? Well, it's very nice of you to say so. Look, look, the sad thing is I'm not very good at doing very much. I honestly not. I'm not. I'm pathetic. I don't even. I don't even. I don't even do our own social media. I put things in, but this guy handles it. I don't handle the finance. Rocky is a vastly better manager than I could ever be. So I've got staff in about 98% of what you need to do to run a business. I've got staff who are streets better than me. There's just a couple of things I do all right. And one of them is expressing the values of the company. So I can do that. That alone makes us just believe in it straight away. Because you'd never see a person, CEO, or even the owner just be so honest. To be sitting here amongst us is pretty powerful. And I'll thank you for it because it's made my worries not there no more. Well, I appreciate that. I'm also known as being incredibly tactless, too. If you ask for meetings, things like proactive calls. Just didn't understand the technology of support. See, people don't mowing. Isn't that different, really? I mean, you should do what you love. That's the best thing. If you love gardening, if you love being outside, it's great. If you love cars, then car cleaning. If you love dogs, then dog wash. So what you actually do is less important. But what's really important is how you run the business. My wife, she's actually said, you know, Jim has more faults than the stars in the sky, and his virtues are few, like the sun. She said, but when the sun comes out, you don't see the stars. There's a lot of things I do. I upset people. I say things that are tactless. It's just my nature. So I'm kind of honest. But I'm also very tactless at times, too. And my family's always having a go at me for saying, why did you say that? Or why did you put people off? Or why did you make that comment? But in certain contexts like this, it actually works quite well. But it's part of my everybody's got flip side. You know, you're good at something and you're bad at other things. Yeah. But thank you.

That's a good comment. But we used to. Because all the stuff you're talking about now, we never had any vehicle for that until we started doing, like, the live streams and all that sort of stuff, which is back in 2018.

It does actually work very well on social media. This kind of outspokenness. It just doesn't always work well with. With kids who are a bit woken and say something that upsets them, which.

Often happens, I can assure you, because we're 29 ingles. What happened is there's a lot of bad press around franchises and how we.

Support you in the business. All those things are totally generic because it makes people think that we do everything. But in fact, we are one of the most narrowly focused business sizing and.

All the stuff you hear now, I used to hear every day in the office and we thought, well, why does.

More people know about this that you could possibly imagine? We're just looking at service industries, individual.

Operators, how you think this is a transparency. When a CEO goes on a live stream for an hour and will answer anything you want. You guys have been really nice.

Make them successful in an independent service business. All right, thank you very much.

We've had some tough questions in the past and Jim will answer them. And that just goes a long way. Where you see most bank CEOs and that will hide behind or do a pre recorded video or whatever.

It's a very important skill too because people often ask me, am I proud of having 5,000 plus franchisees, biggest franchise in the southern hemisphere? I said, there's one thing that I'm most proud of is the values. My peculiar way of looking at business and franchise in particular have spread so widely and so successfully. The great majority of my franchisees and franchisors buy into that. That's the kind of influence that really, it humbles me. I'm very proud of it. Because we are very strange in this company the way we think about franchising. Nobody in the world actually has our kind of system where you're constantly giving more power to franchisees or even franchisors. Too often people say you should do this. And I say, well, actually you've got more power than I have. If you don't like your franchisor, I can't get rid of your franchisor because you don't like them. Because as long as they fit in the system. But if you don't like your franchisor, you can vote them out. This is unique, it's extraordinary, this whole value.

Nice new shirts as well. Yes, nice and fresh. And they'll get dirty as well. Guys, Jim, up and ask a question, feel free because we're not going to get through them on the piece of paper at all. So please come up and ask a question for Jim as well. I've got one here, I've got a couple online. Jim, I just want to get to real quickly. Robert, who was Roland, who was in training last time, says with a lot of Australians doing it tough, what do you think our chance of being telling.

Changes to your own manuals? It's very odd. And these are my values and generally speaking, widely accepted. I'm proud of that.

Yeah, good comment, good question. Got any comments or questions? Guys, feel free to come up and ask. We haven't got much time left but it'd be great to get some more from on the mic as well here. Got heaps here. I'm not going to get through them all. We've got a couple more here. Someone's asked about growing their business with trailers. Is there any extra charges if they want to put on more employees or trailers?

Absolutely not. We encourage it. We really. We really. The only dexterity if you pay because most of your fees are flat fee, you also have a lead fee. If you take a lot of leads and you want to put a lot of people on, you pay more lead fees. But it doesn't usually do anything like double your fees. It just maybe adds 10% to them. So we love it. And to us it's a great thing too, because you think it from the point of view, if you've got somebody who's got a lawnmower or cleaning business and they're turning over a million bucks a year and they got all these employees and stuff, they're a fantastic advertisement for the business because it shows like Dan, that you heard in training this morning, it's a fantastic advertisement for the business because people know that you can achieve anything. So we actually deliberately right from becoming.

Or being successful is. I should have asked this question when I did my training a couple of weeks ago. So the new franchisee hasn't started yet.

Well, it's remarkably good. People are doing it tough. But at the beginning, it was part of the original idea behind Jim's group that we would never charge any more fees no matter how successful a person was, no matter how many people they put on, how much they turned over. That was in actual fact, the service industry is incredibly easy in a sense to do very, very, very well because there's so much work and there's such a hunger fundamental concept behind. And it's not common because there's some.

Wild stuff online about. There isn't about the fees, isn't there? 30%, 40% you take, 50% clip people take.

Well, it's like Mr. Antennas 50%. You know, our top people would pay a fraction of a fraction of 1%. It's tiny by comparison. But why do we mind with the same work to look after somebody who's got 20 employees as somebody who works by themselves, they're no different. In fact, they're probably easier because they're so successful at what they do.

There you go. If you've got a question, guys, feel free to come up and ask. We've got some time, so please jump up. Mike, Andy's gave a presentation on the pay for work. Was it pay for work? Yeah, Mike Andy where he gives a portion of the profits back to employees as part of the franchise. Do you think that'll work in the Jim's mowing for us? The pay for performance app. You know where Mike could come out. He has a pay for performance app.

The more for good services I would say it's a lot easier than it was a few decades ago when I started because it's so easy to find work. People are desperate for service. As you go out there and just do the basic stuff.

All they work obviously the more they can earn. As a software system. Yeah. As employees for the franchise.

I didn't even know about this one.

So Mike Andes came out from America. He's a big American lawn guy.

Oh, this is the guy with the mowing frame. Yeah.

The Gustin lawn mowing.

Yeah. So he. He actually gives it a.

It's called calls it P for P. Which is like his system. He has software. So they know that they have like.

An returning of phone calls, turning up on time. Pride in your job. Just the basic simple things. Well, you can do extraordinarily well.

I don't it actually up on their phone. The more they do, the more they get paid. Profit share from the day. So depending on how much they work.

This is the workers you leave.

This is the employees.

So as a franchisee I would then.

Go to the workers.

Here's your base rate. And then they've made all the targets.

And done really well for the week. And then they get a bonus at.

The end of the week on top of that. I think it's a good idea. We don't have software for it. There are so many things we need software to do that we'd love to do it one day and make it possible. At the moment we don't have software that allows. Makes it easy to employ people. For example, Jim's Jobs is developing. It does a lot of fantastic stuff. But it's a long, long, long way short of what we wanted to do. Yeah. But I think it's a good idea. Down the track of it.

Talking about the software. Is there $5 million a year that.

You think you said you put into it?

Yeah. Is there a point in time when you say I'm not going to develop any further. I'm actually going to invest into something.

And partner with someone that's already made it and already works like service. I'd be very confident that you come back in two years time. We'll be spending a lot more than $5 million. Even if we did everything that we imagine we'd like done now which is probably won't happen in two years. We'd be. I don't. We'd want to be put down. My fellow countrymen. But we're a really fat and lazy country, aren't we? I mean honestly. I mean people are just so. They don't want to get their hands dirty. This is one of the things that really annoys me. They want to go to some. Some cushy office job and sit in front of a computer all day. We just very health too have other things that would be even better. Software is a tremendous asset. It does so many things. If you look at all the stuff we've done, like just one thing. The survey system. Yeah. That's been more responsible. That survey system alone and the quality improvements it's brought has been worth millions upon millions upon millions of dollars a year. We'd have to spend on advertising to try and equal that. If we could. If we could equal the effect of that. It's been so powerful and there are so many brilliant things we could do. I was talking to you about this I think on Monday morning. But the idea about a book job straight into your diary, for example, massively improve your conversion rate, cut your leads down, those kinds of things. Ability to be able to sell off surplus clients that you. Regular clients that actually wipe out your fees and then take more local work. That kind of idea. The idea be able to get paid for leads that you pick up. Just put them into the system and get paid for them. There were just so many brilliant things we could do that'll improve. So I believe that software is going to be. I wouldn't be surprised down the track about we're spending $10 million a year.

Okay, good question about not the partner. What like that's a good question. Why. So partnering with servicemate, for example, they are franchisees who use other software and stuff.

Yeah.

Have you ever thought about. Because it's a good question. What's the reasons for not partnering with servicemate?

Because they don't do what we want them to do. We have visions for the program that are worthy anyway. But getting out there and building a fence or mowing a lawn or cleaning all those kind of things too. It's like that's. But you can make so much more money and have such a better lifestyle.

And flexibility and AI can't do it as well. And AI can't do it as well. Oh that's the thing.

Way beyond anybody else could possibly imagine.

And I recommend there's an Interview with.

Gerald be automated away. It's a fantastic opportunity. If you're the kind of person doesn't.

Mind the guy called Gerald up in Brisbane. He's been around. He's been with us for three years. We did interview him the other day. He turns over a million dollars. So he's built from zero to a million dollars in three years. He talks about how he pays his workers and what he does in his leadership for his region. His name's Gerald Shishelbush. I'm stuffing up his name. He's a really good guy. Probably one of the best interviews we've done. So it'll come out next week on the Mowing podcast and the Jim's Group podcast. I recommend listening to that.

Did Dan talk about his workers at all and how he used to motivate them? He used to actually have games with him and stuff in the evening and things. Yeah. So being a good boss is a very important part of it. The hardest part of growing your business in gyms is not finding work. Usually it's finding good people. That's about 98% of it. Finding good people, holding them, making being a good boss. See, I spend a lot of time and I talk a lot about franchisees, but it actually applies equally to staff. I wander around the staff, including the call center. Doesn't feel it's beneath you to get your hands dirty. I actually have calloused hands. You can probably see them and that's because I do so much gardening. I love having calloused hands. I think that's to me, I always enjoyed it when I was a mine contractor. I love having calluses on my hands. My wife doesn't complain too much. I sort of. When I'm caressing, she's kind of used to it. All right, people every day just chat, see what's going on. Finding out, is there anything that's troubling you? Just trying to keep in breast. How can we be a better employer when somebody leaves? Why are they leaving? What went wrong? Why couldn't we keep them? How can we improve that kind of attitude to staff? You've always got to be almost selling your business to your staff as well. What. What makes them want to work for me? What makes them want to continue? What do they want to achieve? What's their goal in life? It's like Joel started off doing only what, years ago, 12 years ago.

12 years ago.

12 years ago. Doing a very basic admin job. It was a temporary thing. It wasn't even permanent. Doing the most basic thing you could possibly imagine. And he's now one of the top executives in the. In the company, making many times the salary he was in the beginning. I won't say how much he's grossly overpaid, of course, but still the point of it is you look to talent. And one of the reasons I knew the Joel was good because he used to work with the insurance, helping the guy in insurance. And when I would go in there to have a chat with him, he'd come up with ideas about ways to improve the website and how he could do this and this and this. He had all these ideas. That's why I got my eye on this guy or Megan, who does run a system called Jim's plus which or Bizza, which sells off the rights to jobs we can't service. She doesn't object, I assure you. She probably. I do it a bit much. I'm a little bit too handy at times, but that's our problem.

Too much information. That's all good, but it's a question.

Great, it's a great. It's going to produce probably about a million dollars worth of bonuses and stuff for friends. Opportunity. It's a great opportunity. And there's so much. I see the world as franchises over the next year, which is going to be amazing stuff. Free holidays, all kinds of great goodies we're going to be able to produce from that system. Now Megan is a single mother, like in her 40s. I gave her a pay rise very early on. It was the first time in her whole life she'd ever got a pay rise. She's now one of my top managers and she's brilliant at what she does. She's a great leader, she's innovative and stuff. You've got to find people, you've got to know what they're capable of. And if you've got somebody who's a good worker, show them they've got a future. You know, you can be just with opportunity. There's so many things we'd love to do. How you going, Jim? I'm Simon by me. Or you can be working. You can head a trailer, you can get a share of profits. I'll help you to get your own business. What do they want? Try and work on that. That's really. It's great stuff. Really care about people too. I get upset when people are not happy. I hate people leaving. You know, one of the greatest things today is when you get somebody back. You've lost them and you get them back and that's a real fantastic Like Eugene, who's the head of our IT sort of, you know, networking stuff. We lost him for a while and there was reasons for that and we got him back. And Eugene is such an asset to the company. He's not the only one.

There's a really good interview of a guy called Mitch Millison. He's got around eight staff. He talks about it as well. And a lot of franchisees.

Actually I bought a Moen franchise down Kyneton, which is Bendigo way. Yeah. Your honesty is infectious. Do you believe that that has made the success of your brand easier? And is it easy to be so it's like you, you're part of us, even though you're a CEO, it never happens.

Is that reason why find stuff through like people who are neurodivergent, they might be on the autism spectrum. And a lot of franchisees, those, they swear they're really great workers as well. So not only just maybe look outside the box as well, but Mitch Miller so successful.

It's very nice of you to say so. Look, look, the sad thing is I'm not very good at doing very much. I honestly not. I'm not. I'm pathetic. I don't even. I don't even. I don't even do our own social media. I put things in, but this guy handles it. I don't handle the finance. Rocky is a vastly better manager than I.

Really good interview. And the Gerald one, I reckon the two ones, they have really big teams, they've done it in a short amount of time and they just tell everything about their business. So I recommend we've got a whole.

Series of good, really good stuff, including that one day seminar that Dan and others spoke. And also the American guy. We've got a whole lot of stuff about putting a larger business together. Have we got a sort of a list that you can show people? Yeah.

So we do have a gym's intranet for franchisees which is not out yet, but it's new and all these videos are on the Internet.

Yeah. We need something where you can go to. I want to put our employees. Here's stuff I can watch. We would have days of stuff all about discuss people who are doing this. In our kind of industry, we want to encourage it. Not everybody's that ambitious and we're very happy. If you just want to work by yourself and you have a lot of spare time for your family, that's fantastic because that's what you want. But if you want to grow a major business, if you want to become really Wealthy and have lots of employees and yeah, we'll show you how and we'll help you and we'll give you coaching and advice and you can talk to anybody. People like Dan are very approachable. You've met him, haven't you? He's a very approachable guy.

If Francis is in your region doing what you want to do, you got to hunt him out and just grab all the knowledge from him.

Go to meetings to find out who's successful. What are they doing? Okay, I'm making $150,000 a year. This guy's making quarter million. What's he doing different? How's he doing it?

I'll tell you.

I guarantee they'll tell you that they will really want to help you. And when you're successful, you want to help people too. So you're making $300,000 a year and there's a company coming in who's struggling to make 100. And you'll be talking to them about what you did and how you were successful. That's the way it works.

Now, real quickly, Jim, I want to give a shout out to this group. So someone's telling me online, Alice, they're saying someone shared this into the Lawn Mowing Contractors association group. We know our fans have used some time and they're saying get Jim to give them a shout out. So this is, you know, the Lawn Mowing Contractors Association. It's a massive group and when you settle the stuff about independents and gyms and stuff, it went pretty much viral and berserk and cause a lot of conversations in this group. So is anyone part of the Lawnmower and Contractors association group here yet? Join it. It's a really good one. It's for all the law and mind could ever be.

So I've got staff in about 98% of what you need to do run a business. I've got staff who are streets better than me. There's just a couple of things I do alright, and one of them is expressing the values of the company. So I can do that.

That alone makes contracts in Australia. So they're watching now, Jim, do you want to just tell them how much you love independence and there's no competition.

Look, I have enormous respect for any independent in this business. Your chances of being in business for 12 months have been independent, cleaning, gardening, that kind of business. Your chance of being in business in 12 months time between 5 and 10%. With us, it's us just believing it straight away because you'd never see a person about 88%, which is not 100% but 88%. But if anybody starts a business by themselves and is able to be successful, I have enormous respect for them. I take my hat up, I say well done and I would strongly recommend you join the association. It's great to be part of a group where you can meet together like we do in our meetings, but meet with people who are like and learn from them and go regularly and support that. It's always important. It's good to learn and it's also good to be part of a network of support. People who've been through what you're going through. We provide that as part of our system. But if you're not part of gyms, work out how to do it yourself and that'll increase your chance. And also as an independent CEO or even the owner, just be so honest. To be sitting here amongst us is pretty powerful and I'll thank you for it because it's made my worries. There are so much stuff. All of our stuff is available. Everything we've been talking about is not. It's not. You can just see this stuff. It's all public. We don't hide it. You can learn as an independent to do the kind of things that our top guys do. Then maybe down the track a bit, you might want to switch across and come and join us.

They always share some continents. Very sometimes when we see the clips. So. Yeah, but big shout to Ella mca.

I'm not there no more. Well, I appreciate that. I'm also known as being incredibly tactless too.

If you ask guys, and thanks, let me know as well. Anyone got one more question for Jim? Guys, before we do, the prizes come up. Ask it. Yep. Get your face and camera. Hey, Jim again.

So firstly, are you a flat earth or a round Earth? My wife, she's actually said, you know, Jim has more.

Are you a flat earth or nice one?

Yeah, I. I have a standard, orthodox scientific views about such things. Thank you very much.

Yeah, okay.

I believe the word the earth is round and I do believe what goes around comes around and I heavily believe in karma and you wanting to do good for so many people, you wanting the best for so many people and at all levels, you know, it doesn't matter your financial being right up high. You know, I've seen people that are extremely wealthy and people more faults than the stars in the sky, but. And that extremely poor. Everyone has their own problems at different levels. Do you believe by wanting so much good for so many people, do you think that's helped and his virtues are few, like the sun, she said. But when the sun comes out, you don't see the stars. You in your life for. Oh, yeah. Up until now. Do you believe that or is that like something the nature of gyms is a business that helps people and that's why it's successful. Why have we got 5,000 plus franchisees? Why have we well overtaken anybody else? Absolutely, yes. But let me tell you something. There's a lot of things I do, I upset people. I say things that are tactless. It's just my nature. So I'm kind of honest. But I'm also very tactless at times too. And my family's always something else too. It's not just a matter of worldly success. I'm a great believer in the science of happiness. I read a lot about that kind of thing too. What makes you happy? What makes people happy? It's not what people think. They sort of think, if I could have more money and buy a bigger car, better house, have better fancier clothes, go to more expensive restaurants, how expensive, I'll be happy. No, it does not work that way at all. There are certain things that drive happiness. Exercise, spend time spent outside in contact with nature. They're the drivers. Social relations, good relations with people around you. And they don't have to be rich and famous. Anybody. Your family, your friends, being a part of a community. And as many of you want to spend money, there are ways of having a go at me for saying, why did you say that? Or why did you put people off? Or why did you make that comment. But in certain contexts like this, it actually works quite well. But it's part of my everybody's got flip side, you know, you're good at something, you're bad at other things. Yeah, but thank you.

That's a good comment. But will you spend it?

Spending it to try and look better than somebody else is actually a pretty miserable sort of thing because there's always somebody richer. It does not create happiness. Theodore Roosevelt said, the social comparison is a thief of joy. It's very true. Better to spend money. On going out occasions, I often have a go out with friends like, like last night I was out with some friends at the local pizza joint. We just talk about all kinds of things, politics, arguments, everything. But you know the number one thing that makes people happy with money, it's giving it away to a cause.

Because all the stuff you're talking about now, we never had any vehicle for that until we started doing like the live streams and all that sort of.

Stuff you're involved in. And I'm not talking about something what you should do to be, you know, ideally a good person. It's what makes you happy. That is what scientists have found creates happiness. So living a life that's invested in other people involved and helping other people is actually. It's not only just good for them, it's good for you.

Yeah.

I was once told that the stomach is filled with what you eat and put in your mouth and the soul is filled with what you give to others. Yeah. You know, they've done studies that show what makes people happy. They find getting somebody help you, it does actually boost your happiness. But you know what helps even more? You're helping somebody else. It actually does boost your mood more, which is why this thing about. Which is back in 2016, it does actually work very well on social media, this kind of outspokenness. It just doesn't always work well with kids who are a bit woken and say something that upsets them, which often happens. What we do in gyms, which is part of our culture, not just go to meetings and learn from other people, they'll help you. But down the track of it, you do the same thing. And that's very joyful. You find people like Dan love helping them. I love helping. I love. I enjoy it very much. And I think what you just said, I'm going to screw this up.

But you said that, I can assure you, because. Yeah, because we. Because with 2019, what happened is there's a lot of bad press around franchising and all the stuff you hear now, I used to hear every day in the office and we thought, well, why does more people know about this?

No success outside of, like, overcomes the failure of family. Yeah. And I think that's something that's really going to stick with me. No other success can compensate. The value in the home is. Is the staying, actually. And it's really true. And it's going to be in my next book. I appreciate it.

It's a video on Jim's Instagram, so follow him. It's on Instagram. But real quickly, Jim, I just want a great question. Comment real quickly because we want to show how transparent we are with Jim's. And that's a great comment from the gentleman about the honesty. Before, most people did not answer this. We're going to answer it. So Christie's jumped on a customer who's got a service issue. So she says Jim's pest control has missed termites. It's now a Court case, beware. She's gone. Strangely enough, three months ago, we contacted our lawyer and they said. They literally just said transparency. When a CEO goes on a live stream for an hour and we'll answer anything you want. You guys have been really nice. Finished up a case of the same thing. Also, another lawyer we asked before chose the one we did. Also had a case done against Jims about missing termites. So she's not happy about the missing termites. She's going legal. Do you want to talk to Christy, the customer online?

Well, we've never had a case in court about anything really. So it just doesn't happen. It's not true.

We've had some tough questions in the past and Jim will answer them. And that just goes a long way. Where you see most banks, if we.

Have a genuine case, we'll fix customers up. If there's a real certain case, CEOs.

And that will hide behind or do a prerecorded video or whatever, I say.

Yeah, it's a very important skill too, because even if it's marginal but likely to be the case, we simply fix the issue. We have a thing called a warranty fund, which means even a franchisee goes and leaves problems behind them. And we've paid out payments of over $100,000 in some cases. So we'll always fix. People often ask me, you know, am I proud of having 5,000 plus franchisees? Biggest pressure customer who has a genuine problem. However, if the customer is complaining about something where the franchisee was not at fault and it's clear they're not at fault, then we don't fix it because we will not burden the franchisee with something that wasn't their fault in the first place.

And all franchisees have insurance as well. PI PI insurance.

Look, we have people come up with all kinds of things and they want to. They think gyms are huge. We've got lots of money. Like you get a person who gets their carpet cleaned and the carpet's a real ratty mess, and they come out at the end of it and they say, we want you to replace the carpet because your machine did it. Now, we can have experts show that that wasn't the case. We didn't wreck their carpet. It was already in a bad condition. They think GM's is big. So people do try and take advantage when it comes to. In the Southern hemisphere. I see. There's one thing that I'm most proud of is the values. My peculiar way of looking at business and the franchise in particular. Push to Shove. If the franchisee is right, then we will back them. There's a saying that says the customer is always right. I do not believe that. Most of the time, customers are very decent and reasonable. They just need to be satisfied. And we'll do what we can. But sometimes customers try and take advantage.

There you go. So Christy. I don't know where she's gone, but hopefully that answers your question.

Cool.

All right.

Might have spread so widely and so successfully the great majority of my franchise.

Charles, thank you very much for tonight. Doing the setup as well. It's not an easy job. Now, Jim, your questions. We did write them down, but I've got my chicken scratch there, so I don't know if you're going to read it, but let's have a look. So we're going to pick out the three ones. Jim's like, if you asked him a question as well.

I like the one about history, which is my favorite period in history. That was a really good one. Who sees when franchise was why into the. That. That's the kind of influence that really I'm. It humbles me. It's that.

That would have been you. You asked a lot of good questions. Come up. Pick out what you like. So you get.

Grab any prize.

You pick first pick.

All right. First pick.

Grab anything you like. There's nothing really to promote having kids or anything on people. Yeah, perfect.

Cool.

Good man.

My second favourite question is yours as well, actually was about having more kids. So I can't give you two lots people of prizes. Go away. One to nine. One more.

Two more. You're more than welcome to send me.

The book about more kids. Yes.

He'll sign it for you. Exactly right.

It's not my book. I think the piece of who asked. I'm very proud of it because this. This. We are very strange in this company. The one about superpower. Superpowers. Which superpower would you have? Yeah, that was a great one. I like that. The way we think about franchising, Nobody in the world actually has our kind of system where you.

That was one. We wrote that down.

Yep. Yeah, you did.

And there was one more. Everyone gets surprised at the moment.

It's that question.

That was the gentleman who asked three. And that was about June as well. If you like June. Yeah, you grab whatever you like. Yeah, for sure. Go for that.

The question about epigenetics was good, too. Constantly giving more power to franchisees or even franchisors. Too often people ask that one.

They weren't there to ask it. I asked Them on their behalf. But the last one maybe was. Was it. I like the comment from the gentleman here. I'm gonna. The piece of advice, the honesty one. The gentleman up there.

No, that's good.

I'm sorry I'm pointing at you, but yeah, come up and grab it. You like. And anyone who asked me a question. So the gentleman, the Irish shirt as well. Anyone else, this one here, come and see me. Then you can grab anything as well if you like as well.

We'll say you should do this. And I say, well, actually, you've got more power than I have. If you don't like your franchisor, even if asked it for a new audience.

But yes, just, just please come up and grab it here now. I will advise you as well. Come up now if you want. I will advise you now if you want to get a photo of Jim, now's a fantastic time. We have a light there as well. I'll take the photo for you. It's a mad rush on Wednesday. It's really rushed and the light starts. You got a light right there if you want a photo. Thank you very much for your time tonight, guys. We appreciate it as well. Thank you.

I can't get rid of your franchisor because you don't like them because as long as they're fitting the system. But if you don't like your franchisor, you can vote them out. This is unique. It's extraordinary. This whole values vetoing changes to your own manuals. It's very odd. And these are my values and generally speaking, widely accepted. I'm proud of that.

Yeah, good comment. Good question. Go. Any comments or questions, guys, feel free to come up and ask. We haven't got much time left, but it'd be great to get some more from on the mic as well here. I've got heaps here. I'm not going to get through them all. We've got a couple more here. Someone's asked about growing their business with trailers. Is there any extra charges if they want to put on more employees or trailers?

No, absolutely not. We encourage it. The only dexterity, if you pay because most of your fees are flat fee, you also have a lead fee. If you take a lot of leads and you want to put a lot of people on, you pay more lead fees. But it doesn't usually do anything like double your fees. It just maybe adds 10% to them. So we love it. And to us it's a great thing too because you got to think from the point of view. If you've got somebody who's got a lawnmower or cleaning business and they're turning over, you know, a million bucks a year and they've got all these employees and stuff. They're a fantastic advertisement for the business because it shows like Dan, that you heard in training this morning, it's a fantastic advertisement for the business because people know that you can achieve anything. So we actually deliberately, right from the beginning, it was part of the original idea behind Jim's group that we would never charge any more fees. And no matter how successful a person was now how many people they put on and how much they turned over, that was a fundamental concept behind. And it's not common because there's some.

Wild stuff online about. There isn't about the fees. Isn't there? 30%, 40%.

Yeah.

You take 50% clip people take.

Well, it's like. It's like Mr. Antennas, 50%. You know, our top people would pay a fraction of a fraction of 1%. It's tiny by comparison. But why do we mind the same work? To look after somebody who's got 20 employees as somebody who works by themselves, they're no different. But they're probably easier because they're so successful at what they do.

There you go. If you've got a question, guys, feel free to come up and ask. We've got some time, so please jump up. Mike Andy's giving a presentation on the pay for work. Was it pay for work? Yeah, Mike Andy, where he gives a portion of the profits back to employees as part of the franchise. Do you think that'll work in the Jim's mowing for us? The pay for performance app. Neck come out. He has a pay performance for performance app. The more they work, obviously, the more they can earn as a software system. Yeah. Employees for the franchise.

I don't even know about this one.

So Mike Andy's came out from America. He's a big American lawn guy.

Oh, this is. This is the guy with the mo fret.

Yeah, the gustin on mine.

Yeah. So he. He actually gives them a.

It's called. Calls it P for P, which is like his system. He has software. So they know that they have like an app on their phone. And the more they do, the more they get paid. Profit share from the day. It's all depending on how much they work.

This is the workers, you mean?

Yeah, this is the employees. So as a franchisee, I'll then go to the workers.

Here's your base rate. And then they meet all the targets.

And done really well for the week and then they get a bonus at.

The end of the week. Yeah, yeah. On top of that, I think it's a good idea. We don't have software for it. There are so many things we need software to do that we'd love to do it one day and make it possible. At the moment, we don't even have. We don't have software that allows. Makes it easy to employ people, for example. Yeah. Jim's Jobs is developing. It does a lot of fantastic stuff, but it's a long, long, long way short of what we wanted to do. Yeah. But I think it's a good idea. Down the track of it.

Talking about the software, is there $5 million a year that you think you.

Said you put into it?

Yeah. Is there a point in time when you say I'm not going to develop any further, I'm actually going to invest.

Into something and partner with someone that's already made it and already works like service providers. I can be very confident that you come back in two years time. We'll be spending a lot more than $5 million a year.

Yeah.

Even if we did everything that we imagine we'd like done now, which is probably won't happen in two years, we'd still have other things that would be even better. Software is a tremendous asset. It does so many things. If you look at all the stuff we've done, like just one thing, the survey system.

Yeah.

That's been more responsible. That survey system alone and the quality improvements it's brought has been worth millions upon millions upon millions of dollars a year we'd have to spend on advertising to try and equal that. If we could equal the effect of that. It's been so powerful and there are so many brilliant things we could do. I was talking to you about this, I think on Monday morning, but the idea we had a book job straight into your diary, for example. Massively improve your conversion rate, cut your leads down, those kinds of things. The ability to be able to sell off surplus clients, regular clients that actually wipe out your fees, and then take more local work. That kind of idea. The idea be able to get paid for leads that you pick up. Just put them into the system and get paid for them. There was just so many brilliant things we could do that'll improve. So I believe that software is going to be. I wouldn't be surprised down the track about we're spending $10 million a year.

Okay, good question about not the partner. Like that's a good question. Why? So partnering with servicemate, for example, There are franchisees who use other software and stuff. Have you ever thought about, because it's a good question, what's the reasons for not partnering with Servicemate because they don't.

Do what you want them to do? We have visions for the program that are way beyond anybody else could possibly imagine.

And I recommend there's an interview with Gerald, a guy called Gerald up in Brisbane. He's been around. He's been with us for three years. The other day he turns over a million dollars. So he's built from zero to a million dollars in three years. He talks about how he pays his workers and what he does in his leadership for his region. His name's Gerald Shishelbush. I'm stuffing up his name. He's a really good guy. Probably one of the best interviews we've done. So he'll come out next week on the Mowing Podcast, the Gyms Group podcast. I recommend listening to that.

Did Dan talk about his workers, the two, and how he used to motivate them? He used to actually have games with them and stuff in the evening and things and. Yeah. So being a good boss is a very important part of it. The hardest part of growing your business in gyms is not finding work usually it's finding good people. That's about 98% of it. Finding good people, holding them, making being a good boss. See, I spend a lot of time and I talk a lot about franchisees, but it actually applies equally to staff. I wander around the staff, including the call centre people, every day, just chat, see what's going on, finding out. Is there anything that's troubling you? Just trying to keep abreast, seeing, how can we be a better employer when somebody leaves, why are they leaving? What went wrong? Why couldn't we keep them? How can we improve that kind of attitude to staff? You've always got to be almost selling your business to your staff as well. What makes them want to work for me? What makes them want to continue? What do they want to achieve? What's their goal in life? It's like Joel started off doing 10 years ago, 12 years ago, 12 years ago,12 years ago, doing a very basic admin job. It was a temporary thing, it wasn't even permanent. Doing the most basic thing you could possibly imagine. And he's now one of the top executives in the company, making many times the salary he was in the beginning. I won't say how much. He's grossly overpaid, of course, but still, the point of it is you look to Talent. And one of the reasons I knew the job was good, because he used to work with the insurance, helping the guy in insurance. And when I would go in there to have a chat with him, he came up with ideas about ways to improve the website and how he could do this and this and this. He had all these ideas. That's why I got my eye on this guy or Megan, who does. Runs a system called James plus, which or Bizza, which sells off the rights to jobs we can't service. It's a great. It's going to produce probably about a million dollars worth of bonuses and stuff for franchisees over the next year, which is going to be amazing stuff. Free holidays, all kinds of great goodies we're going to be able to produce from that system. Now, Megan is a single mother, like in her 40s. I gave her a pay rise very early on. It was the first time in her whole life she'd ever got a pay rise. She's now one of my top managers and she's brilliant at what she does. She's a great leader, she's innovative and stuff. You've got to find people, you've got to know what they're capable of and if you've got somebody who's a good worker, show them they've got a future. You know, you can be just working by me or you can be working. You can hit a trailer, you can get a share of profits. I'll help you to get your own business. What do they want? Try and work on that. That's really. It's great stuff. Really care about people, too. I get upset when people are not happy. I hate people leaving. You know, one of the greatest things today is when you get somebody back. You've lost them and you get them back. And that's a real fantastic. Like Eugene, who's the head of our it, sort of, you know, networking stuff. We lost him for a while and there was reasons for that, and we got him back. And Eugene is such an asset to the company. He's not the only one.

There's a really good interview of a guy called Mitch Millison. He's got around eight staff. He talks about it as well. And a lot of franchisees actually find stuff through, like people who are neurodivergent, they might be on the autism spectrum. And a lot of franchisees, those, they swear they're really great workers as well. So not only just maybe look outside the box as well, but Mitch Mellingson is a really good interview. And the Gerald one, I reckon the two ones, they have really big teams, they've done it in a short amount of time and they just tell everything about their business. So I recommend we've got a whole.

Series of really good stuff, including that one day seminar that Dan and others spoke. I think also the American guy, we've got a whole lot of stuff about putting a larger business together. Have we got a sort of a list that you can show people?

Yeah. So we do have a gym's intranet for franchisees, which is not out yet, but it's new and all these videos are on the.