[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hello, everybody, and welcome to All Things Considered Franchising podcast. I am your host, Scott Scotty Milos, and I've been around the franchising space. Well, seems like a lifetime. So welcome to the show.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: Just a little FYI.
[00:00:14] Speaker A: I help people explore franchise ownership and see if it's the right path for them and more importantly, provide an educational journey to see how a brand that fit can fit your goals and lifestyle. I also educate my clients on how to validate and make a logical business decision as well as an informed decision.
On this show, you'll hear directly from franchise owners as well as franchisors, leading exciting brands and people within and in the industry of franchising. You can always connect with me at scottyperfectfranchise.com that is my email address. Visit the websites at theperfectfranchise.com or Scott Milo's franchisecoach.com or you can also text and call me at 413-935-5111. Now let's get into today's exciting episode.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Hello, everybody, and welcome back to All Things Considered Franchising. I am your host, Scott Scotty Milos, and hey, it's great to be back. This is kicking off another season.
Hopefully you guys missed me a little because I've sure missed doing this. But we took some.
We took a break. We did. We've done some rebranding. Most of you know that I merged Scott Milo's franchisecoach.com and partnered with the perfect Franchise Marcus Group, and we're doing very well. So thanks for joining me. We have a great show today to kick off the new season and I'm really excited because the timing is perfect because we just closed, I think, I believe, the first franchise license in New York. So. So.
And I'd like to welcome Tony Nicholson, who is vice president of development for Centau, one of the.
One of my favorite pet consults out there. Tony, welcome to the show.
[00:02:05] Speaker C: Thank you, Scotty. Definitely appreciate it. I'm excited to be on today. I'm excited to connect. And I just want to say really quick that if you found this podcast and you're out there and you're looking for that next chapter and you're looking for a person to help walk you through the process, there's no better than Scotty Milas. So that's my initial quick. Thank you.
[00:02:25] Speaker B: Thanks for the kind words.
I appreciate it. Just so the audience knows that there is not a check in the mail for anything anyway. And Tony, you are no stranger to franchising development, franchisee multi unit franchisee. And I think it's important for our listeners to get a better understanding of what your background is. So can you just kind of walk us through real briefly, you know, your background in franchising and, and, and, and then we'll get into some more details about franchising in general.
[00:02:57] Speaker C: Yeah, of course, yeah. Thank you. Thank you. So, yeah, Tony and I live in Minneapolis, born and raised.
I've been in franchising for most of my career. It was actually my second job out of under undergrad and grad school.
My wife and I became anytime fitness franchisees 20 years ago, actually 21 years ago.
And we started off with one grew, and then we woke up one day and we had multiple occasions in both Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Since then, we've sold all of them. Last one just sold here in January.
And then that actually got me into thinking about, well, if I'm really enjoying being a franchisee, it's changing my life. A lot of amazing benefits. I wanted to pay it forward. I wanted to be able to help recruit people, to help them find that next chapter, to help them get into a business that I love. And so started off doing franchise development for a concept called Anytime Fitness. Loved it. It was great. I was a, I was a seller, one of the top, top sellers in the space for many, many years, which led to me being promoted to the VP of at the time, Anytime Fitness. We then morphed with a partnership with Roark Capital into Self Esteem Brands. So you had Anytime Fitness Base Camp Fitness, the Bar Method Wax in the city. And then as I was transitioning, getting into private equity, they had partnered and had an equal merger with Orange Theory Fitness. So I ran that team for many, many years in my career. I've recruited just over a thousand candidates and I've loved every minute of it. So I have the luxury of being able to look people in the eyes who are nervous about this process and say, I was in your shoes.
I have the right to say, I won't ask you to do something that I haven't personally done.
And so that's my background. And I've now since transitioned into an amazing space, which is the pet Spend space.
Scotty, can I give a couple stats?
[00:04:48] Speaker B: Absolutely, go ahead.
I don't know about you, but my clients love stats. And I think it's just when you're looking at franchising, investigating and researching, stats are great. And my father taught me a long time ago, numbers don't lie.
[00:05:04] Speaker C: That's right. That's right.
So I'll give you just a real couple quick things to think about if you found this podcast and you're out looking for that next big thing. So why should you consider the pet spend space versus any other amazing space out there? It's a $150 billion industry. Experts are forecasting in the next eight to 10 years, it's going to mushroom to well over $250 billion here in the U.S. that's all pets, but a lot of that's going to be allocated towards dogs. The brand that I'm representing, Scenthound, we are a dog first brand and there are 90 million dogs in the U.S. 90 million dogs in the U. S. Experts are also forecasting in the next four to five years, by the end of the decade, there'll be over 100 million dogs. So one out of every two households will have a dog throughout the U.S. so it's a great space and we're seeing this amazing hockey stick type of growth.
[00:05:55] Speaker B: Let's talk franchising just for a second before we get into more details about Centaumden. Yeah, obviously, like I said, you're no stranger to franchising. I'm sure you didn't go to college and start your four year degree and think that you would come out and all of a sudden own a bunch of anytime fitnesses or be involved in development, whether it's Orange Theory, Centaur, Anytime Fitness. So franchising offers a great path for individuals who are seeking business ownership, entrepreneurship. That's right. I always like to tell people that franchising isn't necessarily for someone who's trying to buy a job.
You really need to be thinking more of a legacy builder.
Multiple units, multiple territories. When you look at franchising, where do you see or where do you see the top characteristics of franchisees who are succeeding just in general in franchising? What are the qualifications?
You know, a lot of people say you got to follow the process, got to follow the process. We get that. But what else do you see for people who become successful investing in a franchise? Not necessarily the brand you're representing, but just in general.
[00:07:09] Speaker C: Yeah, no, that's great, Scotty. So as I mentioned, during my career I've recruited just over a thousand candidates. And this is very anecdotal, but, but I would say that probably 90 ish percent of the people that I've recruited over the years come from a corporate background. Right. So they're in the corporate space, they make good money and then a good chunk of them, not all of them, a good chunk of them Saturday night, Sunday morning, they get this pit in their stomach where the idea of them going back to something that they're not passionate about just really rubs them the wrong way. And so then a lot of these folks have that entrepreneurial spirit, right? So that is a bulk of the type of person that I've recruited. I think that as brands grow and they look to evolve, a lot of us do want to attract a sophisticated buyer. I think a lot of us love the idea of connecting with people who have that background in franchising and have been other brands they've scaled. They've either they're looking to diverse, diversify and, or exit. And so what's the next big thing? And so, so that's one thing. But if you, if you want to take a step back in my, my career, I've noticed a few things about that profile. So. So let's talk about the worst, right? So. So people that fail within the business, and we never want to talk about it, we don't want to be part of the conversation. But. But it's often folks who disengage, right? The folks who want to set up the business, they don't really want to deal with that. They want to hire someone to run the business.
They're not necessarily coachable. Multiple. That's the worst. So don't be that person. And throughout my career, that's been the smallest percentage. There's this middle category, the average, whether it's the, you know, slightly above, slightly below those are the folks that can take a playbook, take a guide, work with their coach. They're coachable, they're moldable, and they just literally execute verbatim. And Scotty, in my mind, there's literally nothing wrong with being average. You can be very average. You can be very successful, especially as you scale. You can make great money, create an amazing legacy play. But when you look at the people that often excel and are amazing in the space, they often have three to four different traits. And one of them is that they're uber passionate about the space. It doesn't mean you have to love ice cream or love fitness or love dogs. I think it helps.
But. But the people who really want to make an impact, they want to give back and they're passionate about it. Those folks are uber successful. The folks who say that rolling out this business in Minneapolis versus Dayton versus Des Moines, Iowa, people are people, concepts and products are products. But there are certain little nuances within my market versus yours, and I'm going to make a slight tweak I'm going to make a slight tweak. I'm not going to blow it up. That's another good trait. And then folks that last but not least, folks that are hyper connected to their community and I think we want to do what's right because we want to give back, we want to serve today. It may not translate to a bunch of business, more revenues, more members. Over time, nine and a half out of 10 times the people that are a little more connected have a much better outcome long term. That's, that's what I've seen. That's what I've seen.
[00:10:14] Speaker B: That's interesting. That's interesting. So let's jump in and talk a little bit about Centamp because I find the brand to be very unique because you're not your typical pet concept and I don't mean that in a negative sense, but you've stepped out of the box to be a little different than the grooming, the boarding. We're talking about wellness. And when, you know, people don't realize that, you know, pets need wellness, they need care. Yeah. Ears need to be taken care of, nails need to be clipped, their fur needs to be treated.
When you look at Scent Town, where is your differentiator? Is that the differentiator? I mean, I guess that's the question. I mean, what makes it different than being a boarding or a grooming? I mean, if that's not a fair question, let me know.
[00:11:09] Speaker C: No, no, it's great. And so, so it's actually part of our DNA. So, so what we are hyper focused on is that Scenthound is creating a brand new category. So I'll give you our real quick value proposition. So think of Scenthound as a routine hygiene and wellness, if not preventative wellness care opportunity for dogs.
What I mean by that is that Senhound is looking to put a modern day twist and spin on traditional grooming. Now if you looked at our marketing, if you looked at any of our material, we're very candid about the fact that we are not a traditional grooming business. Yes, it's true, we do offer some grooming esque activities. And grooming esque activities are all around the look and the smell of your dog. So you can bring a dog in a Senhound and we can make your dog walk out looking and smelling amazing. And although that sounds very shallow and surface level, there's a lot of benefit to how our dogs look and smell. Research proves that when our dogs look and smell good, we as dog parents are more likely to cuddle to love, to want to connect with them. And so our job at from the Scent Hound Core is to enrich the connection between people and their dogs. And that's what traditional groomers do. We say, that's great. We also do some of those things where we're blazing a new trail is, is that now we're now adding in preventative wellness measures all around your dog's ears, your dog's nails, your dog's glands, your dog's teeth. And then we're going to wrap Scotty, a bunch of technology around the process and outline that in five seconds when you bring your dog in a scent hound, we're going to conduct something called a scent check. And that's where we're going to analyze your dog's skin coat, ears, nails, teeth, silent G for the glands. And we're actually going to score in grade each of those areas. And I'm going to take that information and I'm going to give it to you as a dog parent. I'm going to embed it into the palm of your hand within our mobile app. And now you as a dog parent can say, well, one's not great. If not, something very problematic is happening. Five is the best. My dog's at a one and a half to two across the board. That's not good enough. Over time, the goal is to be able to increase those scores. As those scores increase over time, I've got the science and the data and the research. I can look you in the face as a dog parent and say, I can potentially extend your dog's life. You're not going to get that from your groomer and you may get it from your vet, but it may be from a. Oh, crap. Something is happening I now have to solve. They're lethargic, they're throwing up, they're not sleeping.
$4,000 later, problem solved. So Senhound wants to live in this middle space where it's more than what you can do and what you want to do as a do it yourself dog parent. And I want to make sure that if I do my job and I'm not, I'm not saving, I'm not saving lives, I'm not curing cancer, I'm just reading the data. I can potentially save you some, some big, huge challenges later down the road with your vet.
[00:14:15] Speaker B: That's interesting. You know, Centaur is an interesting brag and I'm going to, I'm going to kind of let a cat out of the bag a little bit here. And I remember when this brand was launched. I mean, that.
[00:14:27] Speaker C: And.
[00:14:27] Speaker B: And Tim and.
And there were some transitions that went on with Cent Town.
Obviously, it got connected with some really cool upper management folks that have a lot of experience in franchising.
You know, we can name brands like Orange Theory, of course, Anytime Fitness.
We can drop a company name called Groupon. I think a lot of people have heard that, although they're not a franchise, but in the management team, which leads to a lot of your franchisees getting exceptional support. We always talk about numbers. A lot of people like to dive into numbers, numbers, numbers. But one of the things that I like to coach my clients on is that numbers are important.
I mean, you want the validation to make an informed decision.
But there are a lot of other attributes to your decision process, and that's the service and the backbone, the support that you're going to get from the brand.
From what I hear, Centown has an extraordinary support system, from the technology to marketing to operations. Touch on that a little bit, because I think that's important when somebody's looking at a brand, researching and investigating an opportunity.
[00:15:43] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. So one thing I would say, Scotty, is that if you're out there and you're looking for a concept, looking for a brand, and again, I'll double down to anyone who's found this podcast. I think Scenthound has an amazing value proposition. I think we're doing some amazing things, and I think that we've got a great story to tell. But if we're not the right fit for you, I would really encourage you to work with Scottie to find that right brand.
[00:16:10] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:16:10] Speaker C: With that being said, I think we've got two unique things. I think that we. We make the assumption every brand should provide turnkey opportunities. Marketing, operations, technology. I think. I think, Scotty, in my mind, those are table stakes. And so without. Without discounting any other brand out there, we bring that to the table. If you. If you land on Scenthound, you're going to get coaching, you're going to get guidance, we're going to help with marketing, operations, technology, your finances, you're gonna have a coach, we've got field ops. And so we've got a lot of things that are. I think every brand should have. If I can quickly extend. Why I think we're a little unique, and I really think every brand should be unique. Absolutely.
We are learning every year. We want to continuously improve. And I'll give you a couple key examples. A couple years ago, our footprints were too big. We were opening up stores centers with 2,000 2,500 square feet. We now know that the right fit is about 1,000 to 1,100 square FE. We've just now shaved and reduced the footprint by 60%. So that was one thing we were opening up with too many employees. Now that we're really surgical with the amount of rebooks, the amount of no shows, the amount of cancellations the franchisee and the manager can get really surgical with how many employees I need giving the franchisee the ability to open up with less employees and scale over time.
And then we're membership play. In case your listeners haven't heard, didn't see the information, Centhound is a membership slash subscription model. Because of that one thing I know is mission critical. 60 days before you open the franchisee, the manager, they're going to work with your business coach to roll out a very, very successful pre sales process. We're going to give you a goal. We can't phone that in. And then last but not least, one of the other epiphanies we've had, Scotty, is that we now have come to realization that as much as we love digital marketing and I can quantify and I can measure and the leads are very inexpensive, you gotta, you gotta sprinkle in traditional, you gotta sprinkle in grassroots. And in addition to the table stakes we're bringing, we're constantly learning from, from what good looks like. Scotty.
[00:18:15] Speaker B: Yeah. You know you mentioned membership based. I think the buzzword I'd like to share with the audience is that is reoccurring revenue.
[00:18:27] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:18:27] Speaker B: Membership based. I mean, you know, it's like anything. If you're gonna be getting that membership fee in every month, that's reoccurring revenue versus looking for new clients every month. I mean obviously you want to track new clients and bring them in, but reincurring revenue, we talk a lot about
[email protected] and Perfect Franchise. You know that recession resistant model which sent down is reoccurring revenue a need versus a want.
It fills a lot of those, what I call punch holes in business ownership. That helps, I wouldn't say simplify ownership but it makes it certainly a little bit easier knowing that you're getting revenue in a membership based model. We're talking to Tony Nicholson who's vice president of development with Cent Town, a dog wellness opportunity franchise. I am your host, Scott Scotty Milos, your founder and host of All Things Considered Franchising and of course Scott Milos franchisecoach.com powered by the perfect franchise. Tony, we're getting ready to kind of wind down here, and I appreciate your time.
One of the big buzzwords in franchising today, and we have to be very careful when we use this term, it's actually morphed into two words.
Passive semi absentee ownership. That's actually, well, two and a half words.
[00:19:54] Speaker C: Let's call it.
[00:19:55] Speaker B: I want to make sure I get it right.
Cent Town fits that category for both, I would think. I mean, it is. It's. I'm sure you have some owners that are involved in the day to day, but where does your model fit into that passive semi absentee that everybody seems to, you know, really gets attracted to? You know, I want to keep my job, but I want to start out slow and open a business, then leave. Talk to us a little bit about how your model fits into. Into that or it does. It.
[00:20:27] Speaker C: It does. It does, Scotty. And. And we are getting really, really good. We've had a play and now we're evolving over time. So I. I think we like to affectionately call ours more of a executive play, where the average senthelm franchisee will have multiple locations.
Rough. Rough stat. Let's call it three and a half to five locations. I'm gonna have some that'll have one, and then I have some that want to develop 50. Right. And so the unit economics for our business get far more attractive as you scale from one to many. And I mean from an ongoing P and L perspective as well as your startup costs. And so you come to us and you say, look, I'm making X amount of money today. I'm not ready to leave my job. I've got a good job that I don't really have a reason to leave. But I do want to diversify. I want to create different streams of income. And then at some point, I want to be able to walk away from the corporate space, work for myself, have a little more freedom, have a little more flexibility.
We will craft and create a transition plan to help you go from one to many. I'll create a strategic plan around what that looks like. Development, project management. We'll get them up and running, we'll get your cash flowing, and then you can decide 1, 2, 3 locations and is it time to leave? And then the transition plan is all around. How do I give you the resources and the technology for you to be able to know your business, be involved, but more work on it versus in it, Meaning that I don't need you as a sentinel franchisee to be in your location. Every day, actually, quite frankly, if I'm connecting with you, I don't really expect my people to wash dogs, cut hair, even some memberships. I think the value of this individual is to hire manager. So we've got a manage the manager model that correlates into a train the trainer and then you as the franchisee connect daily, join your daily huddle and then you can open up your laptop and basically quantify your business, your metrics, your KPIs, your sales, your retention, your average ticket price, how many members, how many leads you're getting, and you can then basically manage that down to your manager. And I think that's what good looks like. So if you're looking for a business where you want that executive play, you're not necessarily ready to leave your corporate job.
I think we're a pretty good option for you.
[00:22:39] Speaker B: So if I heard you correctly, Tony, getting, scaling that multi unit has to be a strategic play. There has to be kind of that end zone. What are the short and long term goals? And it shouldn't be based on ego. I mean, you don't want to buy 10 units because you want to tell all your friends you bought 10 units.
Right. I mean, let's face it. So it has to be strategic.
[00:23:05] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:23:05] Speaker B: And what you're saying is it's your role as, or part of your role and your team's role to help build and make and potentially help them manage what they're trying to achieve. Because that's unique in franchising. Some brands are, hey, look, I'll sell you 10, here's your development schedule and that's it. But you're, you're involved in more of the strategic planning to make sure they can get to those goals.
[00:23:31] Speaker C: Yeah. You know, so what I've learned over the years is that, you know, selling licenses for most brands, and I can't speak for every brand, but for most brands it's a loss leader.
I think where we get excited is when you open up one, you get good, you learn it, you start executing at a very high level and then you rinse and repeat and you surround yourself with some good people, you scale, they scale with you.
So our job is not only sell you and get you into these markets because it's the right fit for you, for us, the community, the brand. But then I want you to scale and I want you to be successful and I want to actually, this is going to sound unique. I want you to become a brand advocate not only from the consumer base, but I want, I want franchisees that validate well, that are excited, that are open, that are transparent, that are willing to share P. Ls. And that only happens if you have a great experience. And so me awarding them is one thing, but I really want you to open. I want you to be successful. I want you to be a brand advocate. And we're going to grow the heck out of this thing in the US.
[00:24:29] Speaker B: But even on the brand side, you want them opened. I mean, let's face it, the royalty stream is how you make your money. So you want them open. Selling 10 franchises and 10 units and collecting a fee on 10 units doesn't really. I mean, that's nothing. I mean, that's not how you. That. That's not how you build the brand. You got to get people open.
[00:24:48] Speaker C: Yeah. And guys, I'm trying to think of it. I think it was Stephen, Stephen Hawking said that, you know, showing up is half the battle, Right? So I want you to show up. I want you to open them up. But I also, I also, I want. If not, I expect you to have great performance. Right. Because that's going to be a good tale for all other future investors. Can I scale? Can I open up multiple? What can I make? And so not only do I want you to open and show up, but I also want you to do well.
[00:25:15] Speaker B: Great. Great. Tony, we're getting ready to wind down here again.
Any closing thoughts, anything you want to share, Any words of wisdom to our listening audience in regards to centown franchising in general before we.
Before we say goodbye?
[00:25:32] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. You know, thank you for that, by the way. So the one thing I would say is that this is a crazy world, right? This is a crazy world. And you had mentioned this earlier, I just want to quickly touch on it. But what I love about what we do is that I have an AI Amazon tariff, political pandemic, economic resistant model. Right. So unless the world shuts down and we're all sitting in our basements in the dark, you're. You're going to bring your dog to. To Scent Hound. I'm not going to be put out of business by Amazon. AI Is only going to make my business better. So that's one quick thing. If you've got interest in franchising, reach out to Scotty. Scotty will reach out to us and get us connected. And then this is the last thing I'd say. This is a short ride we're on. Right. As we know now with some crazy things that are happening. Life is short. So maximize our time here. Do what you love create a legacy opportunity. And I think that Scenthound could be a potential fit for you.
[00:26:29] Speaker B: Great, Great. Well, Tony, we've really enjoyed having you. I hope in the next 612 months we can get you back, get an update and a shout out to your team, Chris, and everybody else, because they've actually been great to work with.
All my clients who have made the movement to Centaur have spoken highly about your team and the touchy feely, the love they're sharing and the information to make the decision process. And it's a difficult decision process. It's not easy when you're investing, but making it comfortable. But, but we've been talking to Tony Nicholson, vice president of Cent Town, vice president of development at Cent Town. I am your host, Scott. Scotty Milas, founder and host of All Things Considered Franchising. For more information regarding franchising, if you're interested in learning more and researching and exploring opportunities, feel free to reach out to me. It's Scotty attheperfect franchise.com or give me a shout on the phone. I actually do have a landline. 413-935-5111. And through technology, you can actually text that message number as well. If you want some more information, you can also visit the website the Perfect Franchise.com and Scott Milas franchisecoach.com and of course, to see all of our episodes, go to any of the podcast channels and of course, All Things Considered franchising dot com. Tony, thanks very much.
Look forward to catching up with you again.
[00:27:53] Speaker C: Thanks, Scotty. Appreciate you, man.
