Entrepreneurs often had difficulty being thankful for what they are going through, especially in the last couple of years. Sometimes the ups, but especially the downs, are just too much to bear, but we must do it if we are committed to accomplishing our goals and dreams.

How can we turn those negative experiences into positive ones for our lives and our businesses? I believe we can do that in two ways:

1. Being thankful for what we have right now
2. Giving what we can, to who we can, every day. 

I remember when I was a child my family lived very humbly. I experienced many things through my friend’s families. One, in particular, had a chalet in a beautiful lake in Guatemala, where I was born. 

She invited me quite often so I got to experience many things at this gorgeous place: she had a boat so we learned how to waterski there, we swam in the lake, went to cool places, and spent the days just surrounded by beauty. It was amazing! 

Another friend had a farm with...

Multi-unit franchisees can truly have time and financial freedom. But the more stores they operate, the less attention they can give each one.

• That’s why having a district manager becomes critical to ensure that all units function optimally. 

But, how many stores should they oversee? Here are five considerations you must analyze to make sure the district manager performs at their best.

1. Distance

If the units are far away, your district manager will spend a significant amount of time getting from one store to another.

And, if the distance is considerable enough, there may be an increase in expenses like gasoline, hotel (if they have to spend an overnight), food, and other supplies required to travel.

This means that even within your organization, how many units a district manager should oversee might differ, depending on how close or far the units are.

2. Complexity

How complex your business model is and the industry you operate in will also...

Business owners need to prepare themselves for the inevitable future and a succession plan is one of the best ways to protect their organizations and the people that work for them, as well as their families. Yet, very few entrepreneurs actually have one.

• Not having a succession plan can cause enormous damage to the company's legacy and the relatives, sometimes beyond repair. And by the time business owners realize this, it's usually too late. 

Life changes. People die and people quit. We have no control over these things. What we do control is how we prepare for them. So if you love your family and you are proud of what you have built, which I know you do, having a succession plan is a very wise thing to do.

To help you be ready, in this blog post we’ll go over the three types of succession plans you should prepare.

Why should you have a succession plan?

I remember when I was leading operations for a large organization and we were responsible to create succession...

 Being an entrepreneur is not easy. To be successful, we require a wide variety of knowledge, skills, capital, and grit to acquire whatever we are missing.

• Fortunately, to accompany us there’s the figure of the business coach, someone that can guide us through our growth as a professional and even maybe as a person.

These professionals are important in the lives of every entrepreneur or franchisee, whether experienced or not. 

When I first launched The American Franchise Academy, six years ago in 2016, I didn't have a business coach. But then I hired my first one and since then, everything started to turn around. 

I have had several business coaches. Each of them fulfilled the different needs the team and the organization had as they evolved. And a lot of our growth and how we can serve many more clients and franchisees at large are because of those relationships.

That’s why when I say it is important to hire a franchise business coach, I say it from my...

Acquiring a franchise requires a significant investment. And usually, the higher the investment, the higher the Return on Investment (ROI). 

• But are franchisees investing the right amount and in the correct places, to ensure their long-term success?

That is what we’ll dig into in this blog post. First, we’ll go over what is a normal franchise investment and then, how we at The American Franchise Academy think this process should be, to have a great impact on your business.  

What a traditional franchise investment looks like

After you have selected what you believe is the best franchise, you’ll have two types of expenses: one-time investments (or the startup cost of the franchise) and ongoing ones (which you'll constantly have).

One-Time Costs

• Franchise fee

This is the initial payment for the right to open the unit. Multi-unit franchisees will have to pay it every time they open a new unit. It could be anywhere between $20,000 to $50,000...

There is a little-known fact in the franchise industry and most franchisees only find out about it after they start to operate on their own. That’s when they realize something is missing and they have to overcome this to be successful. 

• This is the biggest secret in the franchise industry and the reason why a lot of franchisees struggle when they begin operations. 

The good news is that once you discover the truth you can take action and overcome it. The better is that on this blog post you’ll learn not only what the secret is but what you can do to achieve the goals and the dreams you expected when you decided to get into franchising.

What is this secret about?

The secret is that when you acquire a franchise you do not get everything you need to be successful. Even though a lot of expectations and assumptions are that you do, the reality is that you do not. So, what are the things that you do get? 

1. A brand created by a founder that, after...

Although things are turning around with the pandemic more under control, the battle for staffing continues in the retail and services industries. 

• As a franchise business owner, you have to figure out how to win this race faster than your competition so you can provide quality service and products and have happy and loyal customers.

If you give them what they are looking for, they’ll keep returning to your business, your sales and revenue will be healthy and consistent, and you’ll be profitable in the long term. But it all starts with having the right people on your team.  

These are six practical tips to hire top talent. Although anybody can do them, almost no one does. So, if you implement them, you'll be better than most and probably win the race of getting that top talent in your organization. 

1. Be the leader that people are looking for

Easy to say but complex to execute because every person in your organization looks for a specific ...

Turnover is the biggest hidden expense in your business today, especially if you are in the retail and service industries. Why are you not aware of how much it is costing you? Because it is merged into all of the line items and expenses in your profit and loss statements.

• Even though you don't have visibility for it, it is affecting every part of your operations. That’s why turnover has the biggest potential for financial and cultural damage.

With this blog post, I will help you calculate the costs of turnover, walking you through each of the line items that are part of this expense. 

Before we start, find a piece of paper and a pencil, or open an Excel sheet, so you can follow the math and understand and be clear on what is the cost of turnover for your organization. 

Please note: this calculator is just an approximation of how much it costs to lose one employee in a hypothetical business. You can use this information as a model to calculate your turnover expense...

When you own one franchised unit you can pretty much control everything that happens between the four walls of your store. You get to hire, train, and manage all the people, so they get to know you and you get to know them. 

Even if you lack the proper business and management systems, you can compensate by just spending more time there and making things happen.

Different story when you are a multi-unit franchisee and you own more stores. To begin with, you probably have a unit manager in each unit and one or multiple district managers overseeing those locations. 

These leaders are the ones that inspire and lead the team to execute the systems for the business's success. They also manage all the operation details so you, the owner, can focus on the strategic growth of your brand and the scalability of your profits and, ultimately, achieve the desired financial and time freedom.

• Sound great, doesn’t it? But there’s a catch. For you to go from a one-unit job into...

 Being mindful of your expenses is a critical responsibility for a multi-unit franchisee. However, that alone cannot drive your long-term success. If you focus only on cost control, you won’t be able to move forward with strategic thinking and growth for your business.

• Every franchise brand has a proven financial model, we call it unit economics. 

There are five things about your business and the franchise brand that you need to be aware of to truly maximize your profits, make the most of your investment, and be successful as a top-performing franchisee. 

1. Understand the Unit Economics of the brand

This is the first step for you to be a successful franchisee. Financially speaking, you need to know the limitations of the brand you invested in. That means, knowing how to maximize the average indicators based on the experience that the franchise has had in its existing years.

Some of those indicators are:

• The average revenue of the franchise.
• The...