Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
Hey, everybody, and welcome back to another episode of Confessions from the Home Office. I'm Wendy Hill, and every week I bring you an episode about working from home or marketing topic or today. Or like, today I have a great guest. So my friend Doug Stout is here today. Doug, how long have we been friends? Over 15 years.
[00:00:24] Speaker B: I would say at least 15 years. Absolutely.
[00:00:27] Speaker A: Yeah. So we're both in Greenville, South Carolina, and Doug is a franchise coach. And a lot of you probably do know what a franchise coaches, but a lot of you probably don't. So with that, I'm going to see if Doug will do a quick introduction about what he does.
[00:00:42] Speaker B: Hey, everybody. My name is Doug Stout. I've been a franchise coach for the last 20 years. It's hard to believe it's been 20 years.
I have also owned franchises over the last 20 years, so it's been a great ride into franchising. I help people explore franchise ownership for free.
[00:01:01] Speaker A: No. That's awesome. When I first met Doug and he told me that, I'm like, how do you do that? But once I learn more about the industry, it's actually really cool how you take people through the process. So you've been on both sides. Like you said, you've been a franchise coach this whole time, and you've been a franchisee. So what made you initially choose to be a franchise coach?
[00:01:22] Speaker B: So, funny story. I was 35 years old. I'm 55 now. I had gotten laid off for the second time in 18 months.
And it wasn't because of me. You know, one company got bought out. The other company ran out of money.
I was looking for a better way. One of my best friends had bought a franchise the year before, which was a wheel repair business. And I always thought franchising was food. And I'm like, I don't want to do food. But I saw him, you know, doing what he was doing. I'm like, okay, let me explore it. There's actually a franchise seminar here in Greenville 20 years ago. So I went to it, and I ended up finding a franchise to help people find the right franchise. And that's how I got into this.
[00:02:05] Speaker A: So tell us about the franchise that you own now.
[00:02:08] Speaker B: So the franchise that I own now is called Free Coat Nails. Own it with my wife. It's an organic nail salon franchise, which I never thought y'all. I would own an organic nail salon franchise?
[00:02:20] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: I don't do my nails. I need to visit them.
But we wanted to get into something where it was manage the manager. We have a Manager that runs it for us, we manage her. So we're semi absentee. We're in our business about 15 hours a week and it's worked real well with our lives. It's just something that we saw. There was a good niche market here in Greenville it needed. Because there was no organic nail salon franchises. There's a nail salon franchise at every corner, but not an organic one. And that's how we ended up in it.
[00:02:48] Speaker A: Well, and I know it's doing well because I see it all over Instagram from different influencers and people that go. And they, they tag free coat. So it seems like it's going really well.
[00:02:57] Speaker B: It is. It's been fun. We've had it now for two and a half years. It's grown every year. And, you know, we started small and we're up to 17 employees now.
[00:03:06] Speaker A: 17.
[00:03:07] Speaker B: 17.
[00:03:08] Speaker A: Wow. So how long did it take you to get to the point where you could hire a manager to run the franchise?
[00:03:13] Speaker B: From day one, we, we. Okay, yeah. We purposely did it that way. It was made to be semi absentee. Have a manager run it. Kind of like your Great Clips, Sport Clips type franchises, which are, you know, those owners are all semi absentee. So this was set up the same way.
[00:03:29] Speaker A: That's great. So all the years that you've been a franchise coach and talking to people on the phone every day and walking them through, what's the most common misconception that you encounter when you're advising them and how do you get through that?
[00:03:43] Speaker B: Most people think you need to have an expertise in a business field, in a franchise, in order to buy the franchise. So I always go Back to, hey, McDonald's. You never see an owner of McDonald's in their store. They run. Run it, manage the manager. You know, I placed somebody in a automotive windshield repair franchise up in Charlotte.
[00:04:06] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:04:07] Speaker B: He was an investment banker, knew nothing about windshield repair. So you don't need to know what you're getting into. You're a business owner, you're going to be running a business. The franchisor is going to teach you how to run that business. And the things that you need to know, they need to believe in the product and service of that business. Absolutely. But you don't need to know. Have expertise in it. In it.
[00:04:31] Speaker A: I think that's good. I mean, a lot of people think that they've got to be, you know, if it's automotive, they've got, they should have been a mechanic for years. Or if they go into like expense reduction, they should have been, you know, a financial person in a company and there's so much training out there. I mean, a franchise is not going to bring somebody in as a franchisee that they don't think is going to succeed, so.
[00:04:51] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely. There's a whole formal process that franchisors and franchisees go through to investigate each other, because it's got to work for both people, because if it doesn't, you don't need to be in business and the franchisor doesn't want that either. And that all has to get disclosed to you and disclose your documents.
[00:05:06] Speaker A: So I know you've owned other franchises in the past, but between that and Free Coat, is there a significant challenge you faced? And how did you. How did you overcome that? And then how have you used that when you're talking to prospects and your clients working through the process?
[00:05:22] Speaker B: So if you look at, you know, sometimes getting out of my own way, you know, the franchise is a proven business model. If you bought a business to make chocolate chip cookies, you gotta follow that recipe. Now, you can't put salt in for sugar, raisins in for chocolate chips. You gotta follow the plan. And sometimes I've gotten sidetracked where I did not do that. And so, you know, I've gone to the franchisor and said, hey, you know, what am I doing wrong here? What's going on? And they definitely will help you out. But staying true to the business plan, that's good advice.
[00:05:54] Speaker A: So what do you think is a surprise that new French new franchisees come across even after you've worked with them, coached them, they've gone through all the training with the franchisor? What do you feel like is a consistent thing that new franchisees come back and say, oh, I was surprised about this.
[00:06:12] Speaker B: I think a couple of things. One, the level of training and support they're going to get, and also the level of camaraderie amongst the franchisees. It's not like corporate America, where it's almost like everybody's against each other, everybody's in the same boat, everybody wants to help each other succeed. And the amount of help and support that's there. I think the other thing people forget sometimes is, hey, you've bought a business. Just because you bought it doesn't mean, hey, it's going to run itself, right? You've got to be a business owner, you've got to make decisions, you've got to show up for work. You just can't, you know, hey, I bought this. Here's my shingle. It's all Going to work out. It doesn't happen that way. It's the same thing with a job. You just can't show up. And it's all going to work out.
[00:06:54] Speaker A: Right. I have a client who's a franchisee out in the Midwest, and he always has these quarterly meetings with other franchisees, and he always comes back, like, feeling really good because it's not just him and his employees. He's actually gone and talked to other people and he gets all these ideas and it's like extended family.
[00:07:13] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. You get some great friendships and great families.
There are people in that first franchise I still talk to today, which is 20 years later.
[00:07:21] Speaker A: That's great. That's great. How do you feel the franchise industry has evolved since you got into it as a franchise coach? And how do you. Do you feel like there's any trends that are starting to show up now?
[00:07:35] Speaker B: It's very interesting because I've been in it since 2004 as I got into this.
We've gone through a lot of different economic cycles.
[00:07:44] Speaker A: Right.
[00:07:46] Speaker B: One of the tried and true industries has always been home services, which is still does great today. But one of the big trends I see people getting into and that's growing now is things dealing with health and wellness. Okay? Those are very big trends going on right now. People want to take care of themselves. They want to go through eat right, they want to exercise right. They want to understand, hey, what's my body doing? How do I, you know, live longer? And things in medical also, you know, have done very well. So those are growing trends that I see happening in franchising now.
[00:08:20] Speaker A: That's great. I know we had talked one time about, like, these IV drip bars and these different things that had. Are those still popular?
[00:08:28] Speaker B: Yeah, those are still popular. You know, there's one down on Augusta Road here in Greenville that's called. Oh, shoot, I just forgot the name of it. Drip Bar. And it does very, very well.
You know, if you look at. There's a lot of things being combined now, like Restore up on Woodruff Road. They have a lot of different things that you can do from cryo to IVs to infrared therapy.
[00:08:51] Speaker A: Did see that. Yeah.
[00:08:53] Speaker B: So there's a lot of things being combined there so people can kind of pick and choose.
[00:08:58] Speaker A: So is there anything else that will ever go in with free coat or are they just strictly organic nails? And we'll just stay that way?
[00:09:04] Speaker B: You know, we're gonna be strictly that. Now we do have waxing, so we do get into some waxing and Things like that. Again, non toxic products. But that's, that's typically what we're gonna be doing.
[00:09:14] Speaker A: That's very great. That's good. So when you're talking to potential franchisees, how can you tell if somebody's either ready to be a business owner or maybe they're not?
[00:09:26] Speaker B: If they're following my process, to be honest with you.
[00:09:28] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:09:30] Speaker B: If you're serious and you're working with me, you know, we have scheduled meetings, we have scheduled follow ups, the franchisors have scheduled meetings with you.
If you're missing meetings, constantly rearranging your schedule for me or with the franchisors, it's probably not a good time for you to be a business owner because you're not willing to follow a process and deliver on what you said you're going to do. And the franchisors look at that, you know, hey, things do come up so that, that's okay. But if you're, you know, missing meetings, not doing the homework assignments, things like that is probably not a good time for you.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: So, and I know this probably varies with every person, but how long does this process take? So somebody reaches out to you, they say they want to buy a franchise. About how long is it going to be before they're ready to, ready to go?
[00:10:16] Speaker B: Three or four months. You know, it's not an overnight process. You know, we can get the bulk of the information and people will know, hey, this is the right franchise for me. Probably about two months. If we're meeting once a week and they're meeting with franchisors and then by the time we, you know, round up funding and things like that, you know, three, four months, but usually four months.
[00:10:36] Speaker A: That'S really not bad for somebody to be making a, you know, a huge decision about their future.
[00:10:40] Speaker B: No, it's not bad at all. Now if it's a retail, they're not going to be open but, but they'll be at that decision, they'll know, hey, is this the right franchise for me? What the funding looks like? And they'll have the whole picture.
[00:10:50] Speaker A: Okay, that's good to know, good to know. So if you could go back and give yourself one piece of advice from when you were first starting out as a franchisee, what would it be?
[00:11:02] Speaker B: Breathe. Sometimes, you know, those first, that first 18 months, I put a lot of anxiety and pressure on myself, right? And you know, I was learning something new, totally new for me. So probably giving myself a chance to breathe would probably be the big thing.
[00:11:21] Speaker A: So tell people how to find you, what group you're working with, all that.
[00:11:26] Speaker B: Sure. So I'm with the group called the Perfect Franchise. You can definitely find me on LinkedIn. Google Doug Stout, you'll find me on LinkedIn there. You can always call me at 864-346-5277 or my email is doug@the perfect franchise.com.
[00:11:42] Speaker A: That'S great. I know if I'm ever ready to buy a franchise, I will work with Doug because he is by the book, he's straight shooter and you, it's very transparent about things, so.
[00:11:54] Speaker B: Oh, thanks.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: That's good. That's good. You've had a good, good 20 years in the business. Are you still enjoying it?
[00:12:00] Speaker B: Oh, absolutely. I'm planning on being in another 20 years.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: Oh, really? That's great.
[00:12:04] Speaker B: That's great. Yeah, I still, I have a 10 year old, so I got to get her through college and marry and everything.
[00:12:09] Speaker A: I keep forgetting about that. I keep thinking she's tiny. When you told me 10 the other day, I thought, you got to be kidding me.
[00:12:14] Speaker B: No, she's grown up too fast. I'm finding that out.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: I know you're going to blink and she's going to be going to college. Just wait.
[00:12:20] Speaker B: Yeah, I know that's gonna be sad. That's all right. She's doing, she's loving life and she's doing great.
[00:12:24] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. She's a happy girl. Happy girl. Well, thank you so much for giving us just kind of a quick overview of being a franchise coach and franchisee. I think a lot of people, like you said, think about fast food and it's so much more. How many categories do you think there are in franchising?
[00:12:40] Speaker B: So there's about 6,000 franchisors down about 200 different business categories.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: That's crazy. So just about everything is a franchise at this point.
[00:12:48] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:12:49] Speaker A: That's good. That's good. Well, I'll put Doug's contact information if you didn't catch that in the show notes and definitely give him a call. Even if you just have a question about the franchise industry, I know he's always willing to talk and answer questions.
[00:13:01] Speaker B: Absolutely. Thanks for having me on.
[00:13:03] Speaker A: No, that's great. So that's it for this quick episode of Confessions from the Home Office. And I'll be back next week. Thanks.
[00:13:11] Speaker B: Thanks.
