Opening A Franchise May Be The Perfect Next Career Move! Franchising 101 with Patrick Findaro | Ep #65

Are you thinking about starting a business for your second act career? Have you considered franchising? Shannon Russell sits down with franchise expert Patrick Findaro of Vetted Biz and Visa Franchise on Episode #65 of the Second Act Success Career Podcast to discuss franchising 101. Patrick has interviewed over 1000 franchisees and analyzes franchise opportunities for his businesses, so he knows the inner workings of the franchise world. Shannon is a franchisee with her Snapology business, so she and Patrick dive deep into this world of business. Patrick shares how you can decide if buying into a franchise brand is best for you, and how you can go from employee to entrepreneur in 12 weeks. If you are still deciding which career path is best for you or what your next business venture will be, then you will learn a lot from Shannon's conversation with Patrick Findaro.

Show Notes For Episode #65:
https://secondactsuccess.co/65

Connect with Patrick Findaro:

Web - https://www.vettedbiz.com/

Web -https://www.visafranchise.com/

Book - How to Buy a Franchise: Employee to Entrepreneur in 12

Weeks

Podcast - Franchise Findings 

Youtube - Business and Franchise Opportunities by Vetted Biz

LindedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/franchise-for-sale-patrick/
-------

Grab my FREE Level Up Career Journal to help you plan your next career move!
https://secondactsuccess.co/careerchange

TAKE THE QUIZ!
Is Now The Right Time To Change Careers? Take the Quiz! https://secondactsuccess.co/quiz

Book a FREE Discovery Call with host/career coach Shannon Russell - https://www.calendly.com/second-act-success/coaching-strategy

LET’S CONNECT!
Instagram - https://instagram.com/secondactsuccess
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/secondactsuccess.co
TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@secondactsuccess
All the latest - https://secondactsuccess.co/links
FREE Resources - https://secondactsuccess.co/resources

REVIEW & SUBSCRIBE THE PODCAST!

Transcript

Second Act Success Career Podcast
Season 1 - ​​Franchising 101 with Patrick Findaro
Episode - #65
Host: Shannon Russell
Guest: Patrick Findaro
Transcription (*created by Descript and may not be perfectly accurate)

[00:00:00] Shannon Russell: Have you ever considered starting your own business? Well, have you ever considered buying into a franchise, then you have tuned into the right episode? Welcome back to a new episode of the second act success career podcast. I'm your host career coach Shannon Russell. Today I will be speaking with franchising expert, Patrick fenders. of visa, franchise and vetted biz. He is here to share his expertise on getting into the franchise world. Let's dive in and learn all about franchising from Patrick. 



[00:00:34] Patrick Findaro: I think it all depends on kind of what your intentions are and how comfortable you are with taking a step back. are you going into franchising full force and you're willing to take a step back to take a step forward? If you choose the right franchise system, and say you invested $150,000 in a home care franchise after three, four years, you might be at a million dollars in revenue and you're making 180 k, [00:01:00] $200,000, and you could sell that business for 600.

So you didn't make much money in the first year, but you're making more money two to three years in, that you can lend against, you can sell, you could potentially put a day-to-day manager in place. there's a lot more opportunities and it might be a step forward after the first six months, 12 months of that ramp up.

[00:02:00] 

[00:02:20] Shannon Russell: Welcome to the podcast, Patrick Findaro I'm so excited to have you here.

[00:02:24] Patrick Findaro: Likewise, Shannon. Thanks so much.

[00:02:26] Shannon Russell: I'm just excited to chat with you as an expert in franchising because I am a franchisee myself, so I'm truly invested in what franchises can do for someone, especially someone new, starting out, wanting to start a business and really doesn't have any idea what they're doing.

So I wanna get your expertise on it and talk about how you launched these two businesses of yours with your.

[00:02:49] Patrick Findaro: Yeah, no, definitely. And I'm sure in some experts you're much more of an expert than I am, like in terms of operational, hiring employees, all that. But I would say, together with my brother and the 40 [00:03:00] person group that we've, we've grown, we're experts in kind of analyzing and more on the financial side. And analyzing the, the franchise brand performance and how that compares to different franchise brands. So you're in New Jersey. I, I moved from Maine where I went to college, to New York City. And I worked on Wall Street at JP Morgan. 60, 70 hour, uh, weeks. So my brain was just fried every day and I really needed the weekend to relax. Discovered Miami, moved down here 11 years ago and I worked at a, information service business, uh, and then a small private equity fund that would lend money to franchises, both quick service restaurants and hospitality hotels. at that time, my brother, Working at Restaurant Brands International, which owns Tim Horton's, Burger King, Firehouse Subs and and Popeye's. And we saw a niche to help foreign nationals that wanted to move to the United States through the E2 Investor Visa program in terms of I identifying, [00:04:00] analyzing franchise on their behalf. We still have that business. I split my time between Visa Franchise and now Vetted Biz, but we help over a hundred families move to the US finding franchises. We only consult with foreign nationals. So it's kind of a unique niche to find businesses, principally franchises that are eligible. For whatever their goals are in terms of US immigration. So that's how we kind of entered the space and Vetted Biz. Our, our database was just the offline database for Visa Franchise that we decided to put online in January, 2020, and we're just constantly updating that as FDDs come out. As we analyze, recent sales trends for franchises, SBA loans, all different types of data sources we compile in and make it easy for those that are looking to choose a franchise. Franchisees looking to maybe expand to a different brand, franchisors for competitive intelligence, as well as suppliers to understand who they should should try to sell to, whether it [00:05:00] be to franchisees or to franchis 

[00:05:03] Shannon Russell: Wow. So we can go to vetted Biz, and you really have kind of the financials, the rankings of all different kinds of franchises to kind of find 

what someone 

[00:05:12] Patrick Findaro: The database has 7,000 franchises, of which every year we're able to secure FDDs for 1500 to 2000 of them. Essentially, those, say 2000 are the ones that are actively seeking franchisees and that calendar year. Franchise Disclosure Document. For some brands like Blaze Pizza, for example, we have multiple years, so we're able to see how the brand has grown over the last seven years, how the average in a volume. So average sales have grown during that same period as well. And then there's, if they don't disclose, for example, earnings, then we're going to make an estimate based on the data that we. To give an estimate of, if you own a Blaze Pizza franchise and you're an owner operator, you, you can expect to make this. If you own a Blaze Pizza franchise and you want to [00:06:00] have a day-to-day manager in place, you can expect to make this.

[00:06:03] Shannon Russell: Okay. I love that because I think franchising. People don't really understand what it is. And I think a lot of times there are two different kinds of franchises like you just mentioned. So there might be someone who has enough money to open a McDonald's and they just wanna have it be turnkey and hand it off to a manager to run.

Whereas I own Snapology franchise and that is so hands on. You really don't open Snapology and turn it over to someone. , there's two different types of, of people looking to enter the franchising world, and you really have to know what you're buying into,

[00:06:39] Patrick Findaro: Yeah, it's really well said. Every day or every other day, I have a friend, former colleague that asks me about franchising, and it usually starts with trying to get to how much money are you making and how much would someone have to pay you to work more hours? So imagine as a, you know, it's your second act. are you going into [00:07:00] franchising full force and you're willing to take a step back to take a step forward? And maybe you were making $200,000 and unfortunately you were working at a tech company. There was a layoff. If you want to go into franchising, you might take a step back and for the first year, not make much money. Then the second year make a hundred. Third year, 200 K and go up from there. And then after a while you might have to open up multiple territories, uh, but you're creating an asset at least, if you choose the right franchise system, and say you invested $150,000 in a home care franchise after three, four years, you might be at a million dollars in revenue and you're making $200,000, and you could sell that business for 600. So you didn't make much money in the first year, but your time's compounding and you're making more money two to three years in, and you can lend against, you can sell, you could potentially put a day-to-day manager in place. So I think it all depends on kind of what [00:08:00] your intentions are and how comfortable you are with taking a step back. Whether it is, you know, your current job or going to look at other jobs, but if you're already making 200 K, 250 k, most likely going into franchising, you're gonna have to take a step back before taking a step forward. If you're early in your career and you're making like 60 K, 50 K a year, there's a lot more opportunities and it might be a step forward after the first six months, 12 months of that ramp up.

[00:08:28] Shannon Russell: right? Yeah. I am definitely the first that you mentioned, making really good money, having two little ones and then saying, okay, I have to get out of my corporate career. I'm going to open a franchise. And taking that huge hit at first. But for me, I didn't know. , operate a business. It was new to me. I was a television producer, so I said, well, you know what, I'm used to running big budgets and running huge productions. I can use those skills in running a business, and that's what I did. So I felt like it was a great step [00:09:00] into being an entrepreneur. It gave me all the tools to learn. Would you suggest that to someone who is interested in opening a business, would you say go into franchising as opposed to taking an idea and building it from scratch on your.

[00:09:13] Patrick Findaro: really good question. I've started multiple businesses. Um, one business took two months to break even the other one over two years. So I was fine with that. Risk tolerance and. franchising, it's much more clear, like where there's a bell curve and your chances that it's gonna take four months to break even if most franchisees are taking four months to break even, is much clearer. Also same with like time to open the business, break even time to start making money to, you know, sustain your, your bills. With a franchise, it's much more predict. I think if you already have deep relationships in the industry, like for example, if you segued right away from working at a big television group to you're already getting all this inquiries about consulting [00:10:00] gigs and you're able to just segue that to an independent production company. Awesome. You already have the clients coming in. That's what it was kind of like with Visa Franchise where I already had the clients, so I was able to break, we were able to break even in two.

[00:10:14] Shannon Russell: Nice.

[00:10:14] Patrick Findaro: you don't already have the clients it's generally gonna take a lot more time to open up, break even and start making real cash flow. and that can be a big mental strain you know, it's nice to have these like early wins where you have money coming in and, and you have months where you're above, where you're actually making money. Thinking about, Snapology is in the education space. But say you were going to do something very innovative in education that wasn't a franchise and it, you have to educate the market cuz that. That product doesn't exist in your area and you've gotta do a huge education of why parents should sign up for your service. And it's something that's very unique and you're gonna probably spend a lot of time on the upfront [00:11:00] education component before making money. And, uh, it can be tough as an entrepreneur if you don't get those early wins and you don't start getting cash in, , in the first few.

[00:11:10] Shannon Russell: Yes, and you're so right and with a franchise, I felt like you had that headquarters, that corporate team that is giving you the marketing materials, telling you. What to say. And For me, there were no other Snapologys in my state of New Jersey, so I really did have to do a lot of building and educating. But I had that corporate support, I had people to go to and I wasn't sitting in my own head all day trying to figure it out by myself.

. And now I've gone on to open another business completely on my own, and now I have the tools to do that. But for me, back then, it was a nice little step, you know, of. introducing me into the business world, you know, kind of on

[00:11:46] Patrick Findaro: Well, you brought up a good point. There's a lot of franchises like in the service space, especially with these junk businesses, like 1-800-GOT-JUNK, Accelerated Waste Solutions, College Hunks, where the franchisor largely is [00:12:00] responsible for sales and marketing, and they're getting the leads, they're marketing, they're pushing, you'll do some local gorilla marketing to try to get referrals, but in terms of content marketing, the franchisors,

[00:12:11] Shannon Russell: Mm-hmm.

[00:12:12] Patrick Findaro: have a call center that's booking the client for you. So as a franchisee, your job's client service and hiring, training and firing, and it's kind of franchisor does everything that can be done virtual, where the franchisee's doing everything that needs to be local. that's a trend that I'm seeing in franchising where the franchisor is doing a lot more even than they were, you know, five, 10 years ago. Especially for these service type. and the franchisee, your marching orders are very clear. It's client service and employees, and you gotta focus on those two and execute those two well, and the franchisor is largely going to handle the rest.

[00:12:52] Shannon Russell: Mm-hmm. . And that's something to bring up too. That franchisor is doing that work, but you're paying the fees. So that's something different I think, too,[00:13:00] with a franchise compared to opening a business on your own, you're now paying. Royalty fees. You're paying franchise fees, but you're getting that help as well. So I think that's just another step in your vetting process when you're looking to start a franchise, is to kind of know what those fees are, to know how much support you're getting.

[00:13:17] Patrick Findaro: It's always important to ask franchisees. If you didn't have to be with this brand, would it make sense you're five years in, 10 years in to just go separate? And I talked to, uh, home Healthcare franchisee does about 8 million in revenue. A million dollars in in ebitda. In earnings. And he says, no, no, it makes sense for me to be part of a larger brand. And, and everything that goes together with that in terms of the referrals from the larger hospital groups, back office functions that largely the franchise brands handling. And then same thing with remedial, cleaning, like cleanup after like a hurricane. this franchisee, I believe does something close to like 30. and sales, and he is grown that business over 25 years. [00:14:00] So it didn't happen overnight. But even with conflict with the franchisor that him and fellow franchisees are having, he's like, no. I really, I really want this to work. I don't want to go independent. If I go independent, it's gonna drop the revenue for these reasons. So it's like these are two franchisees that are making a lot of money and they are in conflict with the franchisor. , but they still see the value and they don't want to go independent. They wanna resolve that conflict, work through that conflict to, have a more, a better relationship, working relationship with that franchise brand because they see the value of being part of something bigger.

[00:14:37] Shannon Russell: you bring up a good point with the conflict. I see that a lot of times, you know, Come really close with other franchisees within your brand and you huddle together and you are forced with your franchisor of what you want, what you don't want, what's working. But there is always room for negotiating to make sure that everyone's happy on both sides.





[00:14:58] Shannon Russell: 

[00:15:00] 



[00:15:24] Shannon Russell: Within your database, you have so many different types of franchises and you know, To do for someone to truly vet and analyze a business before you jump in. So what are a couple of tips that you might suggest that if someone is looking, say they wanna open a home healthcare franchise, what kind of questions should they be looking at and asking at that potential franchisor?

[00:15:46] Patrick Findaro: So I wrote this book that's behind me and, and right here. And I don't wanna, you know, self-promotion much, but it, it is my, my life's work of, of the last decade in the franchise space. And number one is [00:16:00] like passion, purpose, and pay and, and understanding what you want from the business. Where if you want to go into a field, that is something that people all love. , there's generally gonna be a lot of competition and people aren't making as much money. So if you're passionate about fitness, okay, that that checks one of the boxes. And maybe purpose you get from training and mentoring, the personal training and mentoring the staff. And you really like that. And that gives you purpose in life, your professional life. But pay pays tough, you know, and that doesn't mean across all fitness brands, but I largely see the industries that are more appealing to people don't make as much.

First define what you like, and then you can see that if it's like junk removal or home healthcare, a lot of employees, so, after a year you might have 30 caregivers, second year, 60, going on. You, you go to a hundred to 200 [00:17:00] plus caregivers. So if you don't like managing people, and a lot of people do not like managing people and have all that responsibility and having to worry about, your insurance policy to make sure you're covered cuz they're going into, elderly people's homes. If you don't want that, don't do that. But that is generally a pretty profitable opportunity cuz a lot of people overlook it and don't want to be doing that business. So that, would be at like the high level then, like the nitty gritty is. 

What's the resale value for this business? If it costs me a hundred K to open, what could I sell in three years, four years, when the business is really stabilized and doing well? Subway by our estimates midpoint. Investment, 350 K. Subways are generally selling for 150 K to 200,000. Subway right now in the United States in 2023. Maybe with their new prototype. I don't know. That's not proven. I don't think it makes sense to open up a new Subway, but it might make sense to buy an [00:18:00] existing one I don't want to go back too much to the home healthcare option, but 150 K investment fourth year, fifth year in could probably sell for 600 800 K. So that's a nice return on your time and the resale values there where you don't want to allocate your precious time to something that you're not getting compensated for down.

[00:18:20] Shannon Russell: that resale value is something to really think about because you don't wanna get to the end of your contract, your franchise contract, and just walk away like it's a. Car lease. You know, you wanna be able to resell. That's your, your purpose. If you're not going to re-sign for another 10 years, and you actually, you have incredible videos on your YouTube channel, which I definitely wanna talk about. And I was watching one just yesterday that said that 2023 is a great year to sell. 

[00:18:45] Patrick Findaro: Yeah, well, I would say 2023. It could be a good year to sell depending on what you're selling, but I think it's even a better year to buy where startup costs have, gone up construction costs, especially if it's a [00:19:00] physical buildout. So whether it's a restaurant, education, business, anything that's not like you're servicing the, the client and, if it's real estate, property management, um, it, it might be a better option to buy or start. It just depends on, on what you're looking for in the cashier available. But anything that has a physical presence and retail space, definitely look at franchise resales as the cost to build. and permitting times aren't going down. There are a lot of entrepreneurs that kept on taking SBA funding, whether it's P P P, EIDL Restaurant Revitalization Fund, , I think a lot of these businesses are gonna be pretty stretched. So it's a good opportunity to potentially buy a, a business from a, an owner who maybe was too stretched out, you know, financially or operationally, and you can get in right away. If you want to get a really super deal it, the business, it might be losing money and you've gotta turn that around. Or [00:20:00] if you're investing, you know, 150, 200 k. , most likely there's, there's cash flow, and from day one you can be making some money. Do keep in mind that when you buy a business, it's common for the revenue to drop 10, 15% in the first year with that transition and then scale up from there.

[00:20:17] Shannon Russell: especially if you are buying into a business that already exists. You're paying a little bit more to have that instant, you know, you've got your partners, you've got your clients, the customers are there. So it just seems like a, smart decision rather than trying to grow it and doing the build out and all of that.

[00:20:32] Patrick Findaro: And some parts can be like identifying a franchise brand you're really excited about and letting people know, cuz if you don't voice your intention, It's like I have a friend who's late thirties and he's single, and he lets me know. He lets everyone know he wants to meet a nice girl. So that's top of mind. If there is a nice girl, my wife's friend, whoever, I'm gonna think about him. So if you don't voice your intention, if you don't let people know and say [00:21:00] you enter in a franchise system, if you don't let people know you're, you really want to grow and you're, you're talking to other franchisees in the area, they're not gonna approach you when they're thinking about selling mostly franchisees will, will go to the franchisor or franchisees around the area first before they list on the site, like Biz Buy Sell, or through a a business broker. so if you're not in the know and you're not making your voice heard, the chances of finding great deals are are gonna be less and less.

[00:21:28] Shannon Russell: That's such good advice. So smart. You've done over a thousand interviews with franchisees, so what is one benefit and one negative that you've heard that they might feel about the franchising system once they get in it?

[00:21:41] Patrick Findaro: Good question. one, I guess, benefit that I think they overlook is the power of their, their relationships with other franchisees. that shared learning. And ideally the franchisor is the one cultivating it where information flows up to the franchisor and then [00:22:00] product development flows back down cuz they're cultivating all that information and sales strategy, marketing strategy, et cetera. , but also just like one-off relationships. I had a client that his first customer came from a franchisee in adjacent t. in the real estate property management sector that was kind of tapped out. She was later in her career, so he got his first, property management contract as a referral from another franchisee. totally financial or it could be like exchanging ideas of how to work on your business, not in your business, and kind of more high. that's the biggest benefit that talking to franchisees one to two years into the, to the system they really appreciate,

[00:22:42] Shannon Russell: You know what? This afternoon I got. , to speak with, there's a group of really new owners in my franchise system and they just reached out and said, can you just give us some ideas? So I have a call with them later and I'm like, sure, I'll tell you whatever I can. And I love that because people did that for me. We all help each other, so a [00:23:00] thousand percent. I agree. That is my 

[00:23:01] Patrick Findaro: People, people are really willing to open up within the same franchise system. And then I think even across systems, you have a shared experience at the end of the day where you're a franchisee, there's a franchisor at times, every system. There's tension that's, that's, it's like being married and it is really a marriage between the franchisee and franchisor. and almost all the times they work, you know, you work through the problems. And then going back to your question though, I would say on the negative front, it would be misalignment in terms of what the franchisor, quote unquote said they were going to offer and provide support with and what they were getting in return. there's a conflict on how franchises are. oftentimes , there could be an outsource franchise sales organization. There could be a a, just a franchise development, person that's in-house at the franchise brand. There can be a franchise broker [00:24:00] involved. They want you to do well, but they're, they're getting compensated on the sale and not how you perform so it's really important to work with someone that's trustworthy and understand, how prior people they've sold to have done, and, and ask those questions and try to connect with some of their prior placements to understand how happy they are in that role, whether that's an outsourced franchise sales organization, the franchise salesperson at the franchise brand or the franchise broker get some actual testimonials to see how they've done. because you have that conflict where the person selling is not the person servicing you and the person servicing you, it's generally, they're the director, operations, whatever title, depending on how large the franchise system. You could have been oversold and sometimes you're not oversold, but you have selective hearing and you cling on to the things that they said and you [00:25:00] magnify it, and that happens as well. So try to get things in writing and vet that information with existing.

[00:25:10] Shannon Russell: Do your research. Talk to so many people before you go in and, and know too that like in a 10 year contract, a lot can change. So you can sign on with a franchisor and things will change that maybe you're not as happy with down the road. So that's just always going to happen too. Keep that open communication and just. what you want. I love that. 

[00:25:31] Patrick Findaro: Yeah, and don't be like a Debbie Downer, and people don't like people. Negative and whether it's with other franchisees. And, Scott Greenberg wrote, wrote a great book, the Wealthy Franchisee, and it's a lot about just mindset. And the most successful franchisees really have a different mindset on how they go about their business, how they treat their employees. So, you know, you gotta look yourself in the mirror.. And the franchisor, oftentimes they don't want you [00:26:00] to fail. They don't want you to close. That's gonna hurt them on the franchise fees they collect cuz they're not gonna be able to sell more franchises, and they're not gonna get that royalty from you. So they want you to, to do well and put a smile on your face and, and push through, especially in that first year, or.

[00:26:16] Shannon Russell: I agree. And my franchisor is wonderful, and I keep my head down and I smile, and I'm happy to talk to anyone they want me to talk to. And they've written two or three press releases about me going from TV into this. Franchise and now starting my Second Act Success business. So how wonderful of them to do that for me.

[00:26:37] Patrick Findaro: I'm part of entrepreneur organization, where it's for business owners and I meet with a forum, once a month and it's eight other business owners and it's all confidentiality and it's about sharing your best 5% and your bottom five.

[00:26:54] Shannon Russell: I

[00:26:54] Patrick Findaro: and that helps a lot. And it's all about experience. It's about what your experience was, what their experience [00:27:00] was. with franchising, there is an incredible potential with that. But you have to first build that trust, and I do encourage everyone that goes into business ownership to have that, whether it's with a group like entrepreneur organization, directly with a business coach, or it could be with one franchisee or cohort of, of franchisees.

[00:27:20] Shannon Russell: Great advice. So tell us about your book then. How To Buy A Franchise: Employee To Entrepreneur in 12 Weeks. So tell us about that and what we can really learn if we run out and grab it today.

[00:27:32] Patrick Findaro: It's essentially a 12 set process every week there, there's a, a focus area, and it was a culmination of. 10 years of work in the franchising space and dumbing it down based on interviews with thousands of franchisees, franchise executives, suppliers in the industry.

Week one, what are your goals and objectives in life? Two, how are you gonna finance this franchise? Are you gonna get an SBA loan? [00:28:00] Is it all cash? Friends and family? Rolling over your retirement savings. There's a lot of different options on, on financing the, uh, the franchise. Week three, your trusted advisors. So who's gonna help you? If you bought a home without a, a broker helping you search and, and schedule all the meetings, and you just went on Zillow and contacted the seller directly, you're probably a better fit. Contacting the franchisors. But if you used a, a, a broker to find a home and, and represent you, a real estate agent, then you're probably better fit working with a franchise broker to help you guide the search and, and schedule the calls on your behalf and help you throughout the process. So, non-negotiable, I say, is the franchise attorney, and then I, I list other, trusted advisors, that you could work with slash should work with. And then initial franchise search. Checking the franchise criteria, initial calls with the franchisors, deep dive calls with franchisors cuz it's dating. You [00:29:00] don't just go right in to ask all the financial questions on the first call, , um, you know, that's better in the second or third call. And then validating that information collected with franchisees in week eight. , your local market research. So I imagine, Shannon, maybe you didn't know how difficult it was gonna open up in New Jersey as being like the first one. and understanding like, are there light competitors in the area so you don't have to have crazy education. And it can be like, oh, we're like this concept, but we differentiate this. And they're like, oh, okay, I know that. Like I'll, I'll sign up. Instead of like having them educate all about STEM education and, and the benefits. So local market research is key. And then week 10, going back to secure that financing, whether you chose to work with a loan. or directly with, , an SBA lender, or financing professional. And then week 11, the franchise attorney is negotiating the franchise agreement. And then week 12, you [00:30:00] sign the agreement and then you plan to do the initial training, whether it's one week or, or up to a month, with the franchisor and try to get that business open as fast as possible. Or if it's a franchise acquisition, you take the keys and you're, you're going in and you're running the business.

[00:30:16] Shannon Russell: Your book is really a tool book for someone who is really ready to jump into this world. That's fantastic.

[00:30:22] Patrick Findaro: Ready to jump in, or it's like I had a friend from college that I, I talked to who he's not gonna do it in 12 weeks. He's gonna take a year, and he is seriously considering franchising, but he is also looking at buying an existing business. 12 weeks is pretty accelerated where you're allocating, you know, 20 hours a week to this process. But if you don't have that time and you're fine, bringing the process out that that's fine too. And, and the book can really serve as a good tool, to go about whatever you're looking to get out of business owner.

[00:30:53] Shannon Russell: And how can we work with you in your business? So if someone is listening to this podcast right now and they're like, okay, I'm [00:31:00] sold. I really want to buy into a franchise and start a business that way. What kind of services do you offer at Vetted Biz? , to help with that?

[00:31:08] Patrick Findaro: So right now at Vetted Biz we don't have any plans to go in the consulting space. When we first launched, we were doing some consulting for franchise brands, suppliers. Right now it's really just a subscription as a service, a SaaS model where you can start two free trials, you get access to limited information, but 7,000 franchise profiles, and then $79 a month, you get a lot more information, contact information on the franchisors earnings, average unit volume, all that information and if you don't like it, it's a seven day free trial. So no harm you, you sign up for the free trial. If you're getting value in those seven days, great. You stay on. But there are people that drop off as maybe they only needed it for very specific franchise brand and they, they got their initial value and, and you know, that's, that's great.

[00:31:56] Shannon Russell: Really it's knowing your numbers before you jump in. So the fact that you have all [00:32:00] that information ready to go and just available is huge. 

[00:32:03] Patrick Findaro: Advisors are there to help you and steer you in the right direction, but it's your life. So own it and understand the numbers and understand what you're getting into. If you don't understand a p and l statement. You really wanna learn that before you sign a franchise agreement, the franchise system's only as good as other franchisees, and as we were talking about that, that is one of the biggest benefits you get from a franchise system. You should be impressed by who the other franchisees 

[00:32:31] Shannon Russell: Patrick, such great advice and so much good that you are putting out into the world for potential franchisees. And really helping franchisors too, because you're attracting people who are interested and it's, it's really just helping the whole franchise industry, everything that you're doing.

[00:32:46] Patrick Findaro: Yeah, I would love for, the franchise success rate to go. and educate people on the benefits of a franchise and for everyone to go up with the rising tide. But to [00:33:00] do that, people need to understand what the best franchise opportunities are and which ones they should look over based on their, their historic track record. Whether it's SBA loan defaults, or the resale value doesn't make sense for an amount of money you invest. So pass on those opportunities and. Have people invest in businesses that they can make a nice livelihood from.

[00:33:22] Shannon Russell: And you offer such great free resources too. I mentioned earlier your YouTube channel, which is fantastic and has so much good stuff, and your podcast as well.

[00:33:30] Patrick Findaro: Yeah. Franchise Findings , our blog too, so a lot of the content's based on a long form article. And then I do a video and, and strip out the, the podcast episode for, for that and that information. We have no plans to put behind a paywall. So it's, it's out there. We, we produce a lot of free content.

and if we can help you, great. Enjoy the content that we're producing. And for any franchisees listening, franchisors, we're always looking for additional content [00:34:00] and, and insights. That's, Fuels, most of what we, we go after are either anonymous, suggestions or just, you know, directly from a franchisee that's giving insights, whether it's a profitability of the franchise or other, other factors.

[00:34:16] Shannon Russell: Nice. So where can everyone connect with you? What's the best place?

[00:34:20] Patrick Findaro: I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. Patrick Findaro, and you, You had mentioned also our, our podcast Franchise findings, YouTube, channel Franchise Business Opportunities by Vetted Biz and then vettedbiz.com

[00:34:36] Shannon Russell: wonderful. Oh, thank you so much for sharing. So much good information. I could talk to you all day, Patrick. so thank you so much for being on the show.

[00:34:44] Patrick Findaro: No, thank you Shannon. Really appreciate it.



[00:34:46] Shannon Russell: My thanks to Patrick for all of these tips, he shared. As a franchisee myself, I appreciate how honest and upfront Patrick is about the franchising world. He truly wants you to be educated and have all the [00:35:00] information to make an informed decision. Patrick really gave us the pros and cons of the franchising world and he gave us great advice. On how to open a franchise business with the step-by-step plan that he lays out in his book. I will link to all of this in the show notes below this episode, or you can learn more Another special. Thank you. Goes out to you for spending some time listening and joining me today and trying to educate yourself a little bit about what is out there for you, because the world really is your oyster and it's up to you to figure out. What path you want to take? 

I will be back later this week with another Second Act Success story. This time, it is Limor Bergman Gross. Limor more was a leader in the tech world before she left her corporate job to work as an advocate for women who want to enter this male dominated industry. She really is doing such amazing work.[00:36:00] Helping coaching, leading other women who find themselves maybe a little lost being in this mostly male dominated field. And she wants to change that. It's a fantastic conversation. And I really can't wait to share it with you so you will hear all about her remarkable career story on the next episode of the show. 

Until then make it a great one. My friend.