Innholdsfortegnelse for January/February 2020 i Entrepreneur Magazine

WORKING AT Wayfair’s Boston headquarters is a lot like shopping on Wayfair online. Each of its four floors, which were designed by IA Interior Architects, channels a different style featured on the $8.6 billion home-furnishing e-com giant’s site—from farmhouse to terrace and villa to lodge and beyond. Employees on the “brownstone” floor work alongside scroll furniture and classic wallpapers, while the “apartment” floor features cozy, comfortable couches and a pastel-colored kitchen. But no matter the aesthetic, each floor is designed to foster collaboration. Instead of staff wasting time attending (and dreading) meetings in isolating conference rooms, for example, the new office’s open layout lends itself to impromptu conversations and efficient problem-solving sessions. CORNELIUS DRISCOLL / Manager, employee tech “For my team of about four or five people, Thirsty Thursday is…

Stuart Landesberg started his career at Lehman Brothers and TPG Growth, but he felt a pull toward the sustainable-living industry. He’d grown up composting in his family’s backyard and had a vision of selling eco-friendly products online. “I was filled with the hubris of a 26-year-old guy who works in finance,” he says. So in 2012, he did what he thought he should: He looked for two cofounders, scrambled for meetings with investors, and showed off his grand plan for a company called ePantry. It would sell multiple existing brands. Nobody was interested. “It hurts me to even think about it,” he says, laughing. Those rejections turned out to be a great fortune, however—because they forced him to be scrappy and inventive and understand his customer in perfect detail. His…

Q My business stalled out in 2019. What can I do to give myself the highest likelihood of growth in 2020?—ADEN, MINNEAPOLIS THE CHALLENGE of growing a business is surprisingly similar to the difficulties of losing weight. It’s something I realized after growing my first business, a fitness consultancy called Born Fitness. Each year, people set resolutions (goals, KPIs), start off strong (lots of early-year focus), get frustrated (friction from the process), plateau (return to old habits), and watch apathy set in (panic and lack of focus if goals are not met). Instead of searching for a magic bullet, a systematic process makes it easier to identify breaks in the system, create pathways for progress, and take aggressive bets that could lead to big successes. It works with your health,…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN FROM THE REMOTE island of Mauritius to the distant deserts of Kuwait, you can’t escape the Big Mac. The world is home to more than 38,000 McDonald’s. So what’s left to conquer? Try Silicon Valley. Ronald McDonald has landed in tech land, not with burgers but with newly acquired technology that aims to disrupt the fast-food world it helped build. McDonald’s has ranked near the top of the Franchise 500 for the past three years, and much of the credit goes to its push toward modernization. With its $10 billion system-wide store redesign nearly complete, McDonald’s is now uploading new tech to accelerate its race toward the future. In 2019, the company acquired two companies that signal its ambitions: Dynamic Yield, which…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN IF IT SEEMS like there’s an Ace Hardware everywhere you go, that’s because it’s true. Over the past five years, 836 stores have opened in the U.S., which brings the total count to 5,312. According to the company, 75 percent of all U.S. homes and businesses are within 15 minutes of an Ace store, and by leveraging that ubiquity, the retailer managed to hit record sales of $16.6 billion last year. The figure is big any way you slice it, but it’s more impressive given the competition brick-and-mortars face from e-commerce. “We’re in a war for relevance,” says John Venhuizen, the company’s president and CEO. “The Amazon effect on retailers is significant.” But Ace is bringing its massive footprint to the online…

It’s late summer in Austin, Texas, and it’s infernally hot inside the city’s newest cryotherapy center. The 3,500-square-foot facility is still weeks from opening, so sawdust is flying and workers are dripping sweat as they put the finishing touches on the drywall. Walking the site, owner Jeff Mobley describes a vision that’s still taking shape. That empty patch of floor there? That’s where two cryotherapy chambers will sit. This is the latest outpost for iCryo, a Texas-based franchise with 42 units open or under construction. If you don’t know what cryotherapy is, then you’re probably just not paying close enough attention to wellness trends. There are roughly 20 cryo centers in Austin alone, and one of those is just half a mile from Mobley’s. For $9.95, first-time customers can be…

Cassidi Brown wanted her Coolgreens to stand out among the nearby restaurant chains in her Dallas suburb. So she began building a selfie wall, covered with succulents and vines, that would live at the store’s entrance. She promoted the store’s opening with social media posts featuring the staff playing Jenga. And two days before the official launch, she opened the doors for a fundraising event for low-income residents in the area. As a franchisee, Brown is ambitious and innovative. She also believes she knows how to draw in young customers because, well, she’s their age. At 28, she represents a generation the franchise industry has struggled to recruit. “Franchise systems are aging,” says Mark Siebert, the founder of iFranchise Group and author of The Franchisee Handbook. “As they do, there’s…

Ayesha Curry just wanted her family and friends to eat healthier. So in 2014, she started sharing her favorite recipes and tips online—but when people outside her inner circle took note, she saw an opportunity to turn a hobby into a career. Over the past six years, Curry has grown her video-blogging habit into a popular YouTube channel with more than half a million subscribers and built an Instagram following that’s nearly seven million strong. She has segued that success into a best-selling cookbook, her own series on Food Network, a barbecue-focused chain of restaurants, a lifestyle website and e-commerce shop, and, with husband (and NBA star) Stephen Curry, launched the Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation in their hometown of Oakland, Calif., to help kids nationwide. To manage this growth, Curry…

It was too EARLY. And too LOUD. Shok—as the founder of MeUndies had become known in federal prison—shook himself awake, pissed. The 29-year-old from Beverly Hills had gotten used to sleeping in a cell, but actual sleep was sometimes hard to come by, given that his bed was across the hall from the “black TV room” (as everyone called it). Guys could get noisy in there. And on this morning, as the halls of the prison were still largely quiet, they were having a heated conversation about politics with the door wide open. So, scrawny as Shok had become behind bars, he got out of bed determined to shut their door—even if it led to a confrontation. What he found, in the middle of that room, was an intimidating dude named…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN The brand once known as Dunkin’ Donuts turns 70 this year. The first 68 are inextricable from the word Donuts. They were a beloved treat for founder Bill Rosenberg, a working-class eighth-grade dropout in Depression-era Boston. By the time he died in 2002, he’d built his brand into 5,000 stores in 38 countries. But the most recent 20 years of history have been an evolution toward something bigger. The brand evolved into the largest coffee-and-baked-goods chain in the world, as well as one of the fastest-growing in the U.S. Of its 13,000 stores, about 9,500 are in the U.S., and it plans to double that number over the next 20 years. It might even pull it off, with rising same-store sales now driving…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN ON NOVEMBER 20, 1953, pilot Scott Crossfield took a Douglas Aircraft Skyrocket up over the dusty California desert, blasting through the sound barrier and setting a world record that helped usher in the space age. That same year, the first Sonic Drive-In opened in Shawnee, Okla. Its slogan: “Service at the Speed of Sound.” Today, nearly seven decades and 3,600 restaurants later, the company is sonically booming in another direction—this time, into the era of machine learning. “We’ve heard from our guests,” says Sonic president Claudia San Pedro. “They still want us to be fast, but they also want their favorite customized food.” So through a partnership with Mastercard, Sonic is piloting an AI-powered car-side menu board that updates its offering in real…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN EIGHTY PERCENT of Americans don’t have a gym membership. That’s bad for the health of the nation, but it’s good for Planet Fitness’s bottom line. The New Hampshire–based gym franchise has built a seemingly foolproof business by going after customers often ignored by the fitness industry: the newcomers. “Forty percent of our members had never belonged to a gym before joining Planet Fitness,” says CEO Chris Rondeau. “We’re really going after that casual first-timer.” The company reaches its target customer with bargain pricing (basic memberships cost $10 a month) and the promise of acceptance (the gym calls itself a “judgment-free zone”). And the plan works: In five years, Planet Fitness memberships doubled from seven million to more than 14 million. “People who love…

As host of the television show Bar Rescue, Jon Taffer shows up to fix other people’s restaurants. Now he’s also looking at the casual-dining sector more broadly, and he sees signs of trouble: “They’re dinosaurs,” he says of many brands that have been around for decades, “and I think they’re facing extinction. All the Uber Eats in the world can’t bail them out.” His diagnosis: rising labor costs, plummeting meal prices, and an economy in flux. That’s why starting this year, Taffer plans to spend a lot of time in restaurants of his own. He’s launching a new franchise restaurant concept called Taffer’s Tavern, which is designed for efficiency—with minimally staffed, robotic kitchens cooking vacuum-sealed food, and data-driven decisions everywhere. The first unit is expected to open in Atlanta in…

In the world of business, the relationship between a franchisor and a franchisee is indisputably unique. Some liken it to a partnership, but in fact, it’s nothing of the sort. In a partnership, interests of both parties are directly aligned. And while the best franchise systems work to actively align franchisor and franchisee goals, at the end of the day, the franchisor’s financial interests are met by increasing franchisee revenues, while a franchisee’s interests are met by increasing profits. Others liken the relationship to a marriage. But still, it is unlike (most) marriages in that the franchisor has almost all the power—at least when it comes to brand standards. It’s also nothing like a traditional employer-employee relationship. Franchisors govern by contract; they cannot hire, fire, or discipline franchisees the way…

1/Asking for advice. “I hired a business coach seven years ago, and it helped me propel my company forward. As an entrepreneur, running a business feels like something you should be able to figure out on your own, but investing in a coach helped me raise the bar in every way. Not only was I able to shift my behaviors to identify and overcome self-imposed roadblocks, but it allowed me to be more engaged and hold myself accountable.”—KATIE CONOVITZ, founder and CEO, TwelveNYC 2/Hiring for keeps. “Early on, we hired agencies and freelancers with experience launching a consumer health-and-wellness brand. But it became clear that we needed full-time people who were 100 percent dedicated to our success. So we hired key team members who have been instrumental in the growth…

Lara Merriken needed to make some changes. In 2000, after an intense decade spent earning a psychology degree and building a career in social work, she could no longer ignore her entrepreneurial itch. She thought about how her own wheat allergy had forced her to rethink her diet—and to find her own solutions. What began as kitchen experiments to benefit her own health eventually grew into Lärabar, a snack brand that launched in 2003 and won over fans with its dessert-flavored bars (cashew cookie, cherry pie) made from a handful of natural, whole ingredients. Merriken’s commitment to keeping her products simple became her biggest asset, and when she sold Lärabar to General Mills in 2008, it was because she trusted the food giant to stay true to that ethos. Today,…

In 2009, I knocked over a mug of coffee and destroyed my computer. In 2011, I launched a product to prevent that from ever happening again: the Mighty Mug, a travel mug that clings tight to any surface and is nearly impossible to knock over but seamlessly lifts up when you’re ready for a sip. I knew it would be a hit. And it was. We closed deals with Target, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Office Depot. When I started noticing knockoffs on the web a couple of years later, I wasn’t scared. But when Bed Bath & Beyond canceled a $5 million annual program—one they replaced with a knockoff—I went to my lawyers. They said I had two options: Fight it in court (at a likely cost of…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN WHEN TREA TURNER stole second base in the World Series this fall, it was tacos on the house for everyone in the country. As part of an annual Taco Bell promotion (the brand calls it “Steal a Base, Steal a Taco”), the freebies sent America a subtle reminder that, yes, the chain faces increasing competition in the crowded Mexican fast-food market it created, but no, you can’t beat it on value—just try. If America got a little pudgier that Wednesday, Taco Bell itself has continued to grow in every direction, including two notches higher on our list. Sales were up 6 percent, to $11 billion, in 2018, and as of third quarter 2019, year-to-date same-store and overall sales were up 5 and 8…

STARTED FRANCHISING TOTAL UNITS COST TO OPEN OVER THE PAST decade, Jersey Mike’s has nearly quadrupled its total store count, and since 2015, 80 percent of that growth comes from existing franchisees opening new stores. “That’s telling you two things,” says Mike Manzo, the company’s COO. “One, the franchisees are happy, and two, they’re profitable enough to be investing back into their brand.” The stats are a point of pride, but they’re especially impressive given Jersey Mike’s unlikely trajectory. The sub shop was founded as a single location on the Jersey shore in 1956, and 15 years later, the third owner, Victor Merlo, sold it to a 17-year-old counter worker, Peter Cancro, who is still CEO today. Manzo worked alongside Cancro in the original store, and while the two are…

The franchise world was on alert. In a series of actions between 2014 and 2016, the Department of Labor (DOL) and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued guidelines suggesting that every employee within a franchise system could have two bosses: the franchisee and the franchisor. This was joint employer—the idea that a local franchisee and a parent company were jointly employing their workers. To franchisors, this news held potentially devastating legal repercussions. They’d long operated under the assumption that each franchisee was solely responsible for its employees. If Jane Frycook was unhappy with her work conditions, she could sue the SuperBurger franchisee that hired her. What she couldn’t do was sue the corporate office. But these new interpretations appeared to change all that. Well, not so fast. The Trump…