Innholdsfortegnelse for January/February 2021 i Entrepreneur Magazine

Eighteen classes of schoolchildren were tested for their IQs. The results weren’t shown to students or parents. Instead, their teachers were simply given a list of which ones scored highest, along with these instructions: Do not treat these students differently than the others. What happened next may have taken place in a classroom, but it can light a path for our own adult careers. Here were the results—originally produced in this study in 1965 but repeated many times over: After eight months, all the students were given another IQ test. Among the children not identified as unusually gifted before, there were no notable changes. But among the students who had scored highly before, four-fifths scored at least 10 IQ points higher the second time…and a fifth of them gained 30…

Tech used to save us time. Then along came a barrage of email, multiple calendars to manage, spreadsheets to fill—and soon our time-saving tech began taking too much time to manage. That’s why you’re starting to hear a lot of this word: automation. Popular workplace tools like Trello, Airtable, and Boomerang are adding automation features to their platforms, which promise to save their users time by eliminating mundane, repetitive tasks. “The future is identifying processes that happen again and again, then building workflows that automate out much of the ad hoc communication and back-and-forth interaction,” says Cal Newport, a computer science professor at Georgetown University and the best-selling author of Deep Work. “This allows employee brains to spend more time producing value and less time mired in the overhead of…

The first few times I went to pitch a venture capitalist, it was like traveling to a different country where I didn’t speak the language or know the cultural norms. I’d never done anything like it before and didn’t know anybody who had. When I cofounded my first startup, I was a sixth-grade teacher in my 20s. I’d soon discover that people like me—Black, female—are the least likely to get funding from an investor. But eventually, I’d learn something equally as important: People like me are often pitching all wrong, or at least very differently than the founders VCs say yes to. There’s a lot to learn from those founders who are successfully raising capital, no matter who you are. In my case, I came from humble beginnings. My dad…

Started Franchising: 1955 Total Units: 13,125 Cost to Open: $199.7K–$1.7M “GREAT COFFEE, fast.” That’s the tagline Dunkin’—the franchise formerly known as Dunkin’ Donuts—has pushed to highlight its shift toward beverage service. The message resonated: In 2019, revenue hit $646 million, and last year Dunkin’ held the no. 1 spot on our Franchise 500 list. But 2020 shifted priorities. Customers still wanted great coffee, but with a side of reassurance. “The two biggest things our customers are asking for are: Make me feel safe, and give me access to your brand on my terms,” says Scott Murphy, president of Dunkin’ Americas. On both fronts, Dunkin’ has been able to accommodate. Through mobile ordering and delivery options put into play prior to the pandemic, the franchise survived a year that locked its…

Started Franchising: 2003 Total Units: 2,059 Cost to Open: $968.1K–$4.1M LAST YEAR, Planet Fitness performed the corporate equivalent of a dead lift. Coming into 2020, the New Hampshire–based fitness franchise had what seemed like unstoppable momentum. In 2019, it grew revenue by more than 20 percent and net income by more than 30 percent, opened 261 new gyms, and celebrated its 2,000th location, in Colorado Springs, on New Year’s Eve. Then lockdowns came in March, which brought the company’s 53 consecutive quarters of same-store sales growth to a screeching halt. But it picked itself back up almost immediately. Within 48 hours, Planet Fitness began streaming workouts on Facebook Live. The videos have racked up 45 million views from 36 countries. In April, Planet Fitness partnered with iFit to stream workouts…

When Dog Haus launched in 2010, its concept made a lot of sense…for the year 2010. Its mission was to elevate stadium food into culinary masterwork, and it did so by selling dogs and sausages decorated with ingredients such as bacon, pastrami, caramelized onions, and arugula. The three founders, Hagop Giragossian, Quasim Riaz, and André Vener, dubbed their concept “craft casual,” and they built fun, large, airy venues to serve customers. Dog Haus has grown to 50-plus locations since franchising. But in the decade since, much has changed with how Americans eat. People increasingly order food through Grubhub or Uber Eats. Dog Haus responded by expanding its reach through ghost kitchens—delivery-only facilities with no seating, parking, or signs. Then, when the pandemic hit, foot traffic dropped even more—and the ghost…

Lauren Lerch witnessed the unthinkable: She was at a Las Vegas music festival in 2017 when a gunman opened fire and killed 58 people. Lerch escaped physically unharmed, but the experience gave her PTSD. “I’d hear a car backfire and I’d hit the ground,” says the 37-year-old California mother of three. She struggled with depression, anxiety, and panic attacks, but medications only made her gain weight and feel disoriented. That’s when a friend mailed Lerch a CBD tincture. “After three weeks of taking the product, I woke up one day and I was like, God, I almost feel normal right now,” Lerch recalls. As the symptoms of her anxiety began to fade, Lerch grew increasingly interested in CBD. The hemp-derived compound—CBD is shorthand for cannabidiol— is being used to treat…

When I was in third grade, my teacher assigned our class a project. We all had to take an item from home and repurpose it to fulfill another need. I took an empty container of Planters nuts, washed it out, cut a little slit into the cap, and called it a piggy bank. It wasn’t the most ambitious project in the class, but I’m proud of my 8-year-old self. The way I see it, I had a hacker’s mentality. I was thinking: How can I get maximum output for the least amount of input? Back then, “maximum output” meant getting a good grade for very little work. But 18 years later, this ragtag container still continues to provide. First of all, it’s a surprisingly sturdy bank. I still use it…

When someone tells Kara Goldin why she can’t do something, she replies in the same way: “What can we do?” After all, something has to be possible! That attitude helped her turn her life around, and it led her to create the popular beverage brand Hint Water. As she writes in her new book, Undaunted: Overcoming Doubts and Doubters, the journey began after she left her job at AOL in 2001 and tried to improve her health. She struggled to kick a diet soda addiction, couldn’t find anything unsweetened in the marketplace that she liked, and set about building a lightly flavored, sugar-free water. Despite many manufacturing and retail challenges, she succeeded—and now, like in this conversation, she urges other entrepreneurs to approach their challenges “undaunted.” In your book, you…

You think it’s hard getting to the top? Try staying there. The accelerated churn rate of the S&P 500 indicates that at least half of today’s top U.S.companies will get replaced by someone new over the next decade. That is a mind-boggling market value of $13.5 trillion up for grabs. And the craziest part is who replaces the old market leaders: It’s often companies that, just a few years before, were considered scrappy little startups. So how does a new company rise to slay a giant? It doesn’t happen by accident. Think of these upstarts as if they’re playing a deliberate game of chess—except in this case, the incumbent has been playing the game for years, and the startup is entering the game halfway through. That means the startup is…

Drew Barrymore isn’t sure she belongs in this magazine. “Entrepreneur is a word I aspire to, but it’s not how I feel,” she says. “It sounds like someone who’s got their shit together. If this magazine was called Human Foibles, I’d be perfect. Which is to say: If anyone else out there is struggling to get it all done, I relate.” But she also can offer a simple coping mechanism, a habit she formed recently that’s helped keep her focused through a year of reinvention. Instead of obsessing over what she hasn’t gotten to, she lists out everything she has accomplished. “We don’t often take inventory of what we’ve done—it’s very much a to-do-list kind of world,” she says. “But once in a while, make an ‘I’ve done this’ list.”…

Started Franchising: 1980 Total Units: 5,268 Cost to Open: $137.8K–$566.6K THE UPS STORE’S timing couldn’t have been better. Four years ago, it started developing a system-wide redesign—and when that finally rolled out this past September, right in the throes of the pandemic, it proved the perfect fit for a socially distant world. “With our fresh look, we have an open floor plan, better workflow, more technology, and smart lockers that allow customers to access mailboxes any time of day or night,” says Tim Davis, president of The UPS Store. “It’s very appealing to customers in that it lends itself to cautionary measures.” The company’s foresight served it well throughout a tumultuous year. In January and February, while the coronavirus was taking hold in Asia and Europe, Davis and his team…

Started Franchising: 1958 Total Units: 26,365 Cost to Open: $74.4K–$156.6K UNTIL RECENTLY, the Kumon Method had changed very little since its creation in 1954. It began with Toru Kumon teaching math to the children in his neighborhood in Japan; his guidance helped pupils develop the cognitive tools to learn on their own. That then transformed into a franchise system where franchisee-instructors worked roughly twice a week with students. But the pandemic changed that—and led to the brand’s first-ever appearance on the Franchise 500’s top 10 list. (Last year, it was #12.) Spurred by lockdowns and a subsequent drop in class enrollment, Kumon Math & Reading Centers went remote and began offering instruction via Zoom. What would seem like a small feat for a tech-savvy franchise felt more like a moon…

Started Franchising: 1964 Total Units: 68,944 Cost to Open: $69.7K–$1.2M STAKES WERE HIGH for the convenience industry in 2020. Demand for basic necessities skyrocketed even as customers grew wary of shopping indoors. “This was likely the most difficult operating environment for 7-Eleven’s small-business owners in modern history,” says Greg Franks, the brand’s senior vice president of operations support and chief franchise officer. “But we listened to their concerns and responded with urgency.” To help franchisees through the pandemic, 7-Eleven deployed 60,000 hand sanitizer stations, obbied the government to help secure SBA loans, and invested $160 million in financial support. More important, it made a dogged effort to keep stores stocked with basic goods. “Customers often found essentials available at 7-Eleven that were out of stock at big-box retailers,” says Franks.…

A NEW YOGA CHAIN FINDS ZEN IN CHAOS CINDY COATS used to do yoga in a warm studio that relied on a space heater to climb past 72 degrees. It wasn’t exactly hot, but people still showed up. So in 2012, Coats joined with two other cofounders to launch Real Hot Yoga, a studio built to deliver a serious burn to the residents of Knoxville, Tenn. The company initially grew by issuing licensing agreements to entrepreneurs within the founders’ networks, but then total strangers started asking to join the company—so Coats and her team decided it was time to franchise. They were just finishing the paperwork in February when gym closures scared away hopes of signing a franchisee—at least for now. What cofounder CINDY COATS learned last year: 1/ Cleanliness…

Sam Caucci was once the bringer of boredom. Back in 2010, when he worked for an athletic-coaching franchise called the Parisi Speed School, his job was to fly around the country giving employee training seminars. It was dreadful work. He’d arrive in a new city, pull employees off the clock, gather them in a room, and watch their eyes glaze over as he launched into a corporate-approved lecture on procedures and protocols. “Employees were never excited to see me,” he says. Nor would he see them again. He eventually realized that most of them were in their 20s or 30s, and they left the company so fast that he had to return to a location every three months to replay the same rehearsed spiel for another group of bored shift…

In franchising, people understand the value of support. After all, that’s the industry’s foundation. Franchisors can’t grow without great franchisees, and franchisees know they can rely on their corporate office and collaborate with other franchisees for support. But there’s another element that often goes overlooked: Franchising can’t succeed without great third-party suppliers. Franchisors rely on franchise brokers to help source new franchisees. They turn to law firms for help navigating the industry’s many legal requirements. They need technology providers to enable smooth operations across multiple locations. And there’s more. That’s why, every year, we dedicate space to highlight the industry’s more celebrated behind-the-scenes supporters. This is our third annual top franchise suppliers ranking. (It originally published in September 2020.) This ranking is based on a survey of more than 700…

1/ Track your progress. “We set yearly goals and quarterly goals. As a fast-growing startup in the midst of economic uncertainty, it’s challenging to forecast what each new day will bring. So we have a weekly goal review meeting with each of our teams to align on how we are tracking toward both yearly and quarterly goals. This helps us course-correct swiftly and gets our whole team on the same page should objectives change.” —JORDAN NATHAN, founder and CEO, Caraway 2/ Prepare to fail. “Have a plan B (and C and D and E). Have you ever heard of a house being built ahead of schedule and under budget? Me neither. The two biggest mistakes people make when setting goals are that they underestimate how long something will take and…

Moms know how to solve problems, and back in 2012, Christina Carbonell and Galyn Bernard spotted a problem. They were on the marketing team of Diapers.com, and both had small kids at home. One day Bernard complained about how her young daughters wanted orange jackets but the only options available were in the boys’ section. Carbonell had been equally annoyed at what she saw as an overpriced, overdesigned, and gender-specific kids’ clothing market—so the two set out to fix it. The result is Primary, a brand that sells affordable, genderless, simple kids’ clothing (no logos, no sequins), which has since raised nearly $50 million and grown to a team of 50. Here’s how they did it. 1/ Find a unique business model. After purchasing the Primary.com domain in 2013, the…

Started Franchising: 1964 Total Units: 7,400 Cost to Open: $570.6K–$3M Taco Bell Makes Winning Look Fun! On a hot August Saturday in 2019, less than a week into his new job as CEO of Taco Bell Corporation, Mark King started driving east from his office in Irvine, Calif. He was headed not for the border but for “The Bell”—the brand’s four-day takeover of the V Palm Springs, a chic hotel about an hour away. All 70 rooms had sold out within minutes, booked by super-fans dreaming of floating on pool rafts shaped like hot-sauce packets while sipping spiked Mountain Dew Baja Blast slushies in plush Taco Bell robes. As King cruised down Highway 10, he still wasn’t sure what to expect from the 57-year-old brand he’d just signed up to…

Started Franchising: 1976 Total Units: 3,377 Cost to Open: $383.5K–$2.6M “I AM NOT a very efficient laborer,” says Sami Siddiqui, president, Americas, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen. After accepting his new role in September, Siddiqui spent a day cooking in one of the brand’s kitchens—and he dropped more chicken on the floor than he cares to admit. But he did gain a deeper understanding as to why people are so obsessed with Popeyes. “This is not normal fast food,” he says. “It’s fresh chicken, battered and breaded and marinated by hand. This is how you make food in your mom or dad’s kitchen.” It’s been an incredible year for Popeyes. In late 2019, sales and store traffic skyrocketed after the franchise added an all-new, $3.99 chicken sandwich to the menu. Thanks to…

Started Franchising: 1987 Total Units: 1,742 Cost to Open: $169K–$804K WHEN THE LOCKDOWNS hit in March, business at Jersey Mike’s dropped 45 percent in a week. And with fall sports on hiatus, CEO and founder Peter Cancro lost the ability to reach his football-loving customers with game-day commercials. So he went on the offensive: He shifted his marketing dollars to Fox News, NBC, CNN, and ABC. “Everyone was watching the news, so they saw we were still open,” says Cancro, who used the marketing blitz to reaffirm his small-business roots. One commercial, for instance, opens on a photo of Cancro posing with his high school football coach, Rod Smith—the banker who famously went on to lend him $125,000 to buy his original sub shop in 1975. The quick advertising pivot…

Started Franchising: 1969 Total Units: 1,841 Cost to Open: $167.6K–$221.5K SERVPRO HAD a busy year. The company specializes in fire and flood cleanup, and between blazing forestland in the West and hurricanes blowing in off the Gulf and the Atlantic, 2020 served up plenty of both. But it was the pandemic that ultimately tested—and proved—the company’s tenacity. “We have a really loud voice, and I never understood the power of that until COVID hit,” says Rick Isaacson, Servpro’s CEO. When stadiums, strip malls, and small-business owners started calling on Serv-pro to kill a virus, the company moved quickly to launch a new program. It developed a COVID-19 cleaning protocol with input from industry groups and disseminated disinfecting chemicals and PPE. Within a few weeks, businesses began posting “Certified: Servpro Cleaned”…

I’m a franchise consultant, and I was speaking recently with an executive at a major fast-food franchise. We stumbled onto the subject of franchisee recruitment and both agreed: It’s hard to recruit talented young franchisees because people under 40 generally don’t have much management experience. But at the same time, we agreed that younger franchisees have a lot to offer. They have long careers ahead of them, for one. That’s time they can use to grow the franchise. Plus, they’re in tune with the trendy, spendy customers that most franchise systems want to attract. Since the executive and I were in lockstep, I asked him what his company was doing to make itself youth-friendly. I expected a savvy recruitment strategy, or an innovative feature catering to millennials and Gen Z.…

Jeff Yoder had been a creature of many offices. He spent two decades as a federal government contractor, but a tough 2019 prompted him to reevaluate his job. He wanted more freedom and started shopping for a franchise to buy—and eventually zeroed in on ShelfGenie, a brand that installs versatile shelving in people’s homes. He liked many things about it, including that most ShelfGenie franchisees operate out of their own homes. In other words, no more office. “That was huge to me,” says Yoder, who is based in Alexandria, Va. “I’m comforted by not having the overhead of thousands of dollars a month in rent as I’m starting a business.” His timing couldn’t have been better. Yoder opened his new business in April, just as the pandemic was taking hold.…

KEY K Thousands ($), M Millions ($), $ U.S. dollars, * Selling multiple units/master licenses only, ** Selling int’l. master licenses only REGIONS MW Midwest, NE Northeast, S South, W West, C Canada, I Other International 1Snapology has 3 additional nonfranchise units 1SafeSplash/SwimLabs/Swimtastic has 4 additional nonfranchise units. 1Aloha Poke Co. has 4 additional nonfranchise units 1Peace, Love and Little Donuts has 8additional nonfranchise units. 1Topper’s Craft Creamery has 1additional nonfranchise unit. 1TacoTime has7 5 additional nonfranchise units 1Jersey Mike’s Subs has 4 additional nonfranchise units 1Modern Market Eatery has 3 additional nonfranchise units. 2River Street Sweets Savannah’s Candy Kitchen has 2 additional nonfranchise units 1Your CBD Store has 467 additional nonfranchise units. 1Surface Experts has 1 additional nonfranchise unit. 1EnviroLogik has 5 additional nonfranchise units. 1Real Hot Yoga has…