Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:05 Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of All Things Considered Franchising. I'm your host, Scotty Milas. All Things Considered Franchising is powered by Scott Milas franchise coach.com. All things Considered franchisees, a podcast dedicated and devoted to the entrepreneur, people seeking and looking to become business owners, uh, invest in franchises or independent opportunities. Uh, we're here to answer questions on opportunities, brands, uh, and answer your questions about being a business owner. Scott Milo, franchise coach.com is a, uh, consulting organization I founded many years ago that helps people build the business model and then introduce them to the brands and opportunities that potentially fit. Uh, today we continue our series, our last series, our last episode, speaking with, uh, franchise development managers over at Horsepower Brands. And I'm pleased to welcome another young gun to the, uh, to the, uh, podcast, Steve Reppert, uh, who is Director of Franchise Development with iPhone, another Horsepower Brands, uh, brand. Um, Steve, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 00:01:16 Absolutely. Thanks so much and looking forward to the opportunity to, uh, to connect and talk franchising.
Speaker 1 00:01:22 Now, you and I have rubbed the elbows at a couple of conferences. Um, you have, uh, kind of been in the industry. Um, I, I, I kind of look at you as one of those people that's kind of under the radar, which is what I like. I like under the radar type, uh, brands and people that represent it and not these big blimps on radars and iPhone, um, has become one of those, uh, sleeper companies that's got a lot of traction. So, but before we jump into iPhone and your role, and a little bit about, uh, you know, the best fit for people who are looking for, uh, businesses, iPhone, tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you get into this? How'd you connect with Horsepower, your background as an entrepreneur? Kind of go from there.
Speaker 2 00:02:07 Yeah, yeah. I'll try to, uh, tell a quick story in this category, but, um, I went, while I was actually in college, I got a job at a nutrition store in, in kind of health, fitness, vitamins, that type of stuff. And really, it was just 'cause that seemed exciting, but, um, they were a growing business and actually they started franchising right at about the time I graduated. I worked at the original corporate locations. Uh, so I figured why not? Right? Went, went to college, why not? Why not go figure something out. So I moved from, moved away from my home area, uh, built a location. I was, I was maybe one of the pioneers of that brand, I guess is what, you know, franchising term. I was maybe one of the first 10 franchisees or so, uh, that went really well. And I expanded, went, went and moved to another state after that, and, uh, and ran those businesses, uh, multi-state for about 10 years. Um, so had a lot of fun kind of along the way and, and somewhere along there decided to have some kids and, and the idea of moving back to Nebraska started to make more sense too. So, uh, sold most of those, uh, but still own one today.
Speaker 1 00:03:13 Great, great, great. Um, franchising has become, uh, kind of that, uh, big blimp on the radar for people who are interested in entrepreneurship. Uh, I kind of look at it as if you're interested in being a business owner, uh, building a legacy, potential wealth, uh, and you wanna start on third base versus being an independent, starting at home and trying to get around all the bases, uh, franchising is a great option. So tell us a little bit about iPhone and how it fits into, uh, someone's, Hey, I really should look at this, uh, brand, uh, to become a business owner in iPhone.
Speaker 2 00:03:58 Yeah, I think, I think franchising gives you a lot of space. 'cause you can be in business for yourself, but not by yourself. Um, but more specific to iPhone, you know, as I look across this and, and just kind of awareness of, of different types of industries you can get into, uh, I mean, it, it checks a lot of boxes for me because it's, I don't think that a lot of people think about insulation. Obviously, it's hidden, right? It's outta sight. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> out of mind. It's between the, uh, between the wall category, between the, uh, the exterior wall and the interior wall. But what's personally exciting to me about this is it's the energy industry, uh, doesn't take a, a fancy crystal ball to realize that building codes as we look out into the future, are only gonna expect that we have higher performance of energy efficiency standards to deal with electric vehicles and greener environments. And those are some things that really appeal to me. But we're a full service insulation company, and we're, our primary focus is on spray foam insulation, which is, uh, uh, the largest growing segment or the fastest growing segment in that product category.
Speaker 1 00:05:02 That's interesting because energy obviously, or energy efficiency has become a big topic. Uh, you know, our big conversation, uh, we won't take a dive into it politically, but it, uh, energy efficiency is important. I mean, it obviously saves dollars. Um, where are you seeing, um, what is the character or background of people that are inquiring about iPhone? Uh, what are you looking for in an iPhone's franchise franchisee? Um, where, where are those characteristics?
Speaker 2 00:05:36 This has been, it is been quite interesting. Now, we have, I believe, 40 plus franchisees in the, in the iPhone system today and, and continuing to rapidly grow in that category. But they all have really diverse backgrounds. I'd say most of them like to generally say none of them came from the construction or the insulation side. They brought with them professional experience somewhere mostly in white collar categories. Uh, and I think why we're seeing so much success there is because they're bringing the baseline entrepreneurial skills, and they're able to accelerate with our system where the experts in the insulation space, or we hire the experts in the team, and so they're able to deploy that and, and take advantage of this great industry without coming in with knowing how to already swing a hammer.
Speaker 1 00:06:24 So it's safe to say that when you're talking with someone, you're not looking for somebody who quote, I, I like to refer to as, get behind the griddle and flip a burger. You're really looking for somebody who can provide oversight management, uh, you know, kind of manage the business, all aspects of the business, and hire the people to help them manage the business and, and, and go from there
Speaker 2 00:06:48 A thousand percent. Personally, I believe that you should always be willing to wear any hat in your business, but if you're wearing all of the hats, you're not gonna build a very big business. And when you look at what we've built at iPhone, this is a really large scale business. We're in all three verticals when we look across a market segment, existing residential, new construction and commercial. And so that's, that'll be a big growing business. If you're the one out there spraying foam or installing product, you're not running the business, you're doing the task. Uh, we're looking for the, the manager of that operation or the c e o of that operation, so that way they can focus on scaling.
Speaker 1 00:07:29 You know, one of the things that has always impressed me about Horsepower brands, uh, and I've seen, you know, Josh and Zach, uh, grow individually, grow as a company, uh, bringing on the brands that you have, whether it's Blingo, mighty Dog Roofing, I mean, the list goes on and iPhone now, um, is that when traditional consultants, when we talk about, um, service-based businesses and that this is the category we're in service-based is one of the big ques, one of the big focuses as a consultant that we like to focus in on, on service-based is a sales aptitude. Now, I'm not talking about being that Willie Lowman where you're knocking on doors or dialing for dollars and carrying a briefcase around, but the back end of horsepower and the support that you give people coming in that may not have that sales aptitude expertise is, is second to none, because you are loaded on the backend when it comes to marketing, sales, support, uh, call center, uh, operational support. So maybe share a little bit about that, because it's always fascinating to me when I get on the phone with and talk to people or, you know, podcast phone conversations with horsepower, uh, representatives and their brands is the back end of this, uh, F s O, the Franchise Sales Organization of Horsepower.
Speaker 2 00:08:52 I mean, I think there's, there's, there's different types of organizations that you can grow, different types of franchise systems and some franchise systems. And and I, you're, you're going to be the guy who does everything in the business, and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. I mean, owning your own job, I can say that in a positive or a negative, if you can replace your income, you call the shots great. But that's not really scaling to where things can go. And that's where we come in, is setting up franchisees with the infrastructure that they can leverage our systems, our processes, our infrastructure to help out with everything from finding people, training people, and then growing and scaling the business that way you can run a bigger enterprise. Uh, it's a whole different ball game. And that's really what we put our focus on, is how can we put that bigger scale and a different trajectory on there where we're not just selling somebody a new job.
Speaker 1 00:09:47 So there in a sense though, that there is this sales aptitude, this ability to go meet with people, uh, obviously a presentation meeting with homeowners business owners, uh, but as, as far as the back end to that, the scheduling, the call center, I know Horsepower has an HR recruitment center to help find people, uh, to work in the industry or work in that particular location. Uh, is is, is, is somebody, somebody coming in as a franchisee with iPhone, should they feel comfortable knowing that they got that backend support?
Speaker 2 00:10:24 Absolutely. But I think, you know, to, to directly address that, like there's, every single business has a sales element. iPhone certainly does, but if you're not the salesperson, that's where you're gonna leverage the systems to support the recruiting, right. Hire a salesperson. Um, and that's, that's my advice. Whether you're looking at iPhone or anything else, if you're not a salesperson, don't, don't try to do sales. It'll cost you more money than you'll make.
Speaker 1 00:10:47 Right. You know, one of the questions, uh, I I get we're talking to Steve Reper, who's a franchise development over at Horsepower Brands working on the iPhone brand. Um, I'm Scotty Milas, the host of All Things Considered Franchising. You know, one of the things that, um, I I, I always hear from potential people that I'm talking to, is this the term semi-absentee? Um, you know, uh, and everybody has a a a different definition, you know, uh, while I'm just looking to hire a manager to run the business, and I just want to kind of be in the oversight 10 hours a week or 10 hours a month, whatever it is, um, tell us a little bit about whether iPhone fits into that semi absentee category, or are you really looking for somebody who's gonna take the helm for 6, 12, 18 months, build the business, and then build that management team to run the business?
Speaker 2 00:11:38 I think the key, the key to any business is managing the relationships with your people. Um, within iPhone, I believe greater than half of our system starts a business from day one with a general manager in place. Um, and, um, I don't know, I maybe 80 plus percent of those actually leverage at our recruiting department to find that individual. Um, but you know, I think we're even trying to update some of the terminology to, to semi involved instead of semi absentee. So I think absentee is a little bit confusing when you say semi absentee, because a, a business is not your 4 0 1 k or, or buying stocks, you don't just write a check and put it in there. It's gonna grow based off of how effective you can make things work. There are people who can really manage people really well, and they are also good at protecting their time.
Speaker 2 00:12:31 If you're not good at protecting your time, you're gonna spend a lot of time in there doing things for your employees instead of instructing your employees how to do it. So I think that also comes in where we've put a lot of focus on entrepreneurial support. Um, you'll hear the, the team and, and, uh, some of the founders of Horsepower, Zach and Josh talk about traction and e o s, uh, which is a business management strategy. We put a lot of focus in those categories because we also know that's what's going to scale larger businesses, if Right. A franchisee is, again, doing all of those tasks, they can be effective, but they can't scale if they're putting out all the little fires that happen throughout a business, they need to focus on managing the people so the people can make decisions. I've even personally lived that myself, not letting people make decisions.
Speaker 1 00:13:21 Right, right. But I think also, you know, when it comes to the decisions, uh, good entrepreneurs, people that, um, you know, can follow a system, put themselves in a position where they can eventually make a decision, uh, people who are unde undecisive, I think aren't necessarily great entrepreneurs. Uh, you know, uh, I have a client I'm working with right now that just can't make a decision. And, you know, I, I think the bottom line is I told him, I said, you know, you've just gotta let go because if you can't make a decision on this, how are you gonna make a decision when you own a business? <laugh>? I mean, you know, decis, sometimes decisions have to be done in a timely manner. Um, so, uh, it, it, it's interesting. So, you know, just to recap here, it sounds like that there's a lot of support on the back end from horsepower for somebody who's coming in as an iPhone franchisee. That's not to say that Horsepower Brands is running the business for the franchisee. So I wanna make sure that we put that out there, because there are people that think because they invest in a franchise that they can automate, you know, it, it's the franchisor's responsibility of the bus, uh, run the business. That's not how it works.
Speaker 2 00:14:35 Correct. So, uh,
Speaker 1 00:14:36 Now one of the other things that I've, that I've heard about the horsepower brands is that there's a lot of, there's potential tie-in to the other services or other things the other brands are offering. Does iPhone get involved in anything other than, uh, uh, residential or commercial, uh, insulation spraying? Are there any services, uh, other than the, uh, the foam itself?
Speaker 2 00:15:02 Uh, well, it depends on what, what direction of question. I mean, we are a full service insulation company, so we actually do Okay, fiberglass and cellulose. So really, quite, quite frankly, if there are structures, there are opportunities in iPhone. 'cause we serve a small, okay, we, we like older homes, we like brand new projects. Uh, we even really like metal buildings, which in some parts of a community, those might be related to industrial applications. In other communities, in the rural areas, those could be barndominium or agricultural types of structures.
Speaker 1 00:15:36 Okay. So again, uh, it, it, it, it's kind of a, a, a bigger blimp on the radar as far as the services. It's not one small dot that you're going in and trying to, to grab. So, uh, and, and I always tell people that, uh, you know, spray foam insulation is, there are other companies that do this, but like anything, you just gotta be better than everybody else. And it sounds like you're offering your franchisees the tools and the technology to be better than, uh, to be better than others.
Speaker 2 00:16:08 I think some, some things that really impressed me is the, and part of this is, is horsepower and their ability to, to work with vendors and have experience in, in kind of maximizing those relationships that all franchise systems needs. And then also the actual iPhone team themselves. Uh, I always do like to drive home, uh, with anybody as they look at kind of anything from us, like the infrastructure around the corporate level of support for iPhone is a standalone entity, and it's impressive all by itself. The advantages that come along with horsepower, uh, are icing on the cake, realistically.
Speaker 1 00:16:44 Right, right. You know, it, it, it, it's, it's interesting because, um, franchising, uh, you know, people that are interested in investing in a franchise, franchising, you know, with a brand like iPhone really brings the opportunity for this, uh, building a big business model, multiple territories, uh, multiple, you know, uh, eventual, you know, wealth building wealth, I guess is the way to look at it. So, I mean, it's just not, it's not just buying a job. It's, it's building this empire, so to speak. Uh, and I think that's, that's the beauty of franchising. It's, uh, it, it, it, you know, it, it's, it's the opportunity to have other territories or other units, as they say, uh, that you can add to your portfolio.
Speaker 2 00:17:32 Yes, sir. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Speaker 1 00:17:34 Well, you know, Steve, um, is there anything you want to add here? I mean, any thoughts about, you know, if anybody's on the fence, no pun intended, about picking up the phone and reaching out to you and wanting to talk. I mean, you know, if, if you're gonna talk, say, you know, I'm, I'm a believer in learning. I mean, give yourself an opportunity to learn. So if, if somebody was kind of hesitating any, any words of wisdom,
Speaker 2 00:18:02 Uh, my first words of wisdom would be maybe connect with, connect with yourself and, and get kind of some, some core fundamentals of, you know, what's important to you. 'cause like, I, I don't know that anybody has ever got on the phone with me, uh, at least very often and said, boy, I've just been dreaming since I was 10 years old to be an insulation contractor.
Speaker 1 00:18:21 Exactly what I was gonna say. Great point, <laugh>,
Speaker 2 00:18:24 That's pretty, pretty dang rare. Uh, now the industry is really exciting, and when you start getting into the economies of scale with business, business, when you start looking at the, the forecast for the industry because of those energy elements, because of the importance of those drivers, this is a really big business. Because when I think of some things, I look out and I say, well, well shoot, if I wanted to, if you were gonna get into this business, the goal is to plop myself into this marketplace and in this five mile square area, I want two to maybe 10% market share, whatever. And, and that's my pie, right? I gotta, I gotta grab some of those percentages within this business. The marketplace is attractive today, but as you look over the course of the next, over the course of the next decade, that's where a lot of those building code elements and continual and, and we kind of skirted around a little bit. I like to hit a on, I, I don't think it matters which political party you are, because whether you wanna call it energy independence from one side, or you wanna call it climate change, both of those are the same problem. Yes. You wanna get more energy efficient to be more independent. And insulation is, uh, fits in both of those categories quite
Speaker 1 00:19:39 Well. Yeah. But also insulation, uh, and that's a great point, but insulation is also a, a need not necessarily a want. And it also is a recession resistant, technology resistant, meaning it isn't something you're gonna order on Amazon. I mean, I guess you could order the old traditional foam and try to install it yourself, and, but, uh, it is, it, it is a need. It's not a want
Speaker 2 00:20:04 A hundred, a hundred percent. Nobody, nobody upgrades their insulation to keep up with their next door neighbor. The Joneses, you know, they're, they're doing this because they have a problem, right? Maybe the humidity's is too high in their home. Maybe their utility bill's too high, maybe upstairs in the summertime is uncomfortable compared to the downstairs. And so they need a solution to that. Uh, we come in on that category. Um, it's, uh, it's a space that we're filling that demand with more professionalism and compete out competing.
Speaker 1 00:20:34 That's great. Well, Steve, I've enjoyed our conversation. We've been talking to, uh, Steve Reppert, who is a director of franchise development, uh, for iPhone, A Horsepower brand, uh, opportunity. Uh, Steve is somebody who wanted to reach out to you. Is LinkedIn the best way to, uh, uh, to reach out? Uh, obviously someone can reach out to me to learn more about iPhone and some of the other opportunities over at Horsepower, but, um, LinkedIn, uh, we'll post it up there. Your, uh, the link to, uh, connect with you. Um, any closing comments, any thoughts?
Speaker 2 00:21:08 Def definitely LinkedIn. Um, my, my TikTok followers are, are, are zero. Unfortunately, I just not
Speaker 1 00:21:15 <laugh>. You and me, both you and me both. The only TikTok I have is on my, uh, watch and it's not even a TikTok anymore, it's Digital <laugh>. So, uh, anyway, thank you. Uh, thanks Steve. Uh, we've been talking again with Steve Reper, director of franchise development at Horsepower Brands, focusing on the iPhone brand. Uh, I'm Scotty Milas, the host of All Things Considered Franchising. For those of you who have questions about franchising or iPhone in general, please reach out to me as well at 8 6 0 7 5 1 9 1 2 6. Or you can email me, Scott at scott milo franchise coach.com, or visit my website, Scott milo franchise coach.com. Uh, Steve, again, thanks very much. We hope to get you back in the next six to eight months, get an update on where iPhone is. But until then, this is Scotty Milas. Enjoy the day and we'll catch you on the next episode.
