What Nobody Realizes About Running a Multi-Unit Business | 316

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Business with Beers podcast, your daily dose of what it takes to build an eight-figure business. So happy Monday. Hope everyone had a great weekend. I am a little under the weather, but the show must go on. So my shops just finished another record setting month, $4.792 million of revenue. Almost hit $100. That's the next big milestone to crack. I think we're going to hit it in June or July. We were up over 15% versus last year, so continued to have major growth, double digits every month. When I go through all of the sales numbers, there's something that really surprises me. One of my shops in North New Jersey did $160,000 in revenue. Now, it was a record month. It broke the previous best month that was set just two months ago of $140,000, so $20,000 more. But what really impressed me or continues to shock me was let's rewind. January 2025, that shop only did $49,000 for the entire month. We had lost money. We probably lost $15,000 of profit, like negative that we had to pay from another store's profit just to just to make it all work, right? And we were we were so close. We were literally months away from shutting the shop down. Our lease was up in May of 2025. So January, we do 49. We lose money. That store has like been always one of my worst. I bought it in 2021 as part of like a package deal. And it just it literally over four years, we ran the numbers, it made zero profit. So from July of 21 to when I bought it, until like January, like the net profit of the entire store was essentially zero. And we did put a lot of money back into the store. I had to we had to replace like all the lifts and and the heating system and you know we we we did a bunch of work. But it just still couldn't make money. We had manager after manager, and it's one of the furthest stores too, and sometimes the stores we say like the edge of the empire, uh, if they don't have really strong teams, generally they they get you know less kind of oversight and and you know they tend to take shortcuts and it just can you know compound into to to bad results. And so anyway, we're months away, and so we made another change. And that lit a spark. We got the right guy in the store, and immediately we saw impact. The next, literally the next month. Uh you know, I I don't have it in front of me, but I I you know I think we did a hundred thousand and then a hundred and ten, and then a hundred and then ninety, and then a hundred and twenty, and just like it just started to show promise. We started to make money there, and you know, now it's one of my most profitable stores, and it's it's just funny, and like I've learned this and re-learned this many, many times over you know the decade now that I've I've been an owner, which are for us, there are no bad locations, there are just bad leaders, and bad leadership is cancerous. If you have a bad person leading the the the ship, everything that falls down from them isn't gonna work. The the the the techs don't w wanna work, it's like a bad environment, the customers don't have a good experience, you know, the paperwork doesn't get done right, and then the office is all like annoyed and it's causing problems there, and it's just like you know, there's that old like power rule where you know 80% of your headaches probably come from 20% of of you know your you know, in my case, it's the stores, but but then it's like you make a change, like getting a new a new leader, and boom, all of a sudden it's it's it's crushing it. And so again, I I don't know store. It did 175,000 in May. Not the record month for them, but but still very strong. But looking back in March of 25, so just what's that, 14 months ago, it did like 80,000. So you more than doubled the revenue. And again, same store, new manager, new energy, and you get the results. It also works in reverse. I mean, I had another store doing 140,000, 150,000 every single month. Unfortunately, we lost that manager. Now it's like doing 90 to 100, and you know, we're working to get the right guy back in there. It is what I love about this business, and you know, honestly, my biggest frustration, which is our success is 100% determined by the the people that we have in the store, not the location itself. That's reverse. Like in some other businesses, you get into a fast food business, you buy into a Popeyes or something, Taco Bell, you know, it not to say the people don't matter, but like as long as the food comes out consistent, the place is clean, like it's it's to people's expectations, or maybe just not below their minimum expectation, then it's fine and they can perform. And yeah, real estate really matters. Like, pick a good spot that has good visibility and good traffic and demographics, and like you know, the people can come and go, but but as long as you're running the system right, that's what matters. But in mine, I could have the best freaking piece of real estate in the world, and if I have a bunch of duds in there, it ain't gonna work. So just it just reminds me again and again. And that's why we've put so much emphasis and focus on our systems around hiring the right people, retaining the best, building leaders from within, and all that just like compounds into these results. So, yeah, right, it's a it's a good reminder. And the other thing that's funny is like running a multi-unit business is like spinning plates. Right? So imagine you have like a plate and there's like a stick and you know you're like you're like spinning it and you get it going, you get them moving fast, right? And then and then another one wobbles, you're like, oh no, and you like go over there and you have to like fix it and correct it. And then another one, you took your eye off it, it crashes to the ground, it breaks apart, and you're like, ah shit. And so now you get that one going again, it's just it's just like okay, it's still a little wobbly, but now your best one is slowing down, and that the one that crashed, oh yeah, that one's now one of your best again. And so like it's just this up and down and up and down, and individually, it feels like a roller coaster. And it's like it's just it's it's really hard. I mean, I know some guys with you know single single stores at that absolutely crush it some months, but then other months, like, man, you get that you get those down months and it really, really hurts. And so we feel that at an individual store level. But I and I haven't run the numbers lately, but I want to say it was something like a uh on an individual store basis, we had about a 25% variance in week-to-week sales. Uh-huh. So in any given week, you could they could be 25% up or 25% down from like their average number. But when we grouped stores in the markets, so we have like five markets, you could say, like uh with with uh district managers, it cut it in half. It went to like a 12% variance of the market revenue week to week. And then when you looked at the company, it was like I'm gonna say it was again half. It was like a six percent uh plus or minus each each week. And you know, it just goes to s to show that like the the bigger the company gets, the the smoother the overall sales are. And for us, I mean, luckily, or intentionally really, that smooth uh climb has been up and to the right. But for smaller operators, those down months have way, way more impact on their personal bottom line. For example, like four of my shops were down 30% last month versus the previous year, right? So 30% down. So again, they're not all winners, the spin plates. But like if I only had five stores and four of them were down that much, it would have crushed me, right? I would have been pulling money out of savings or putting money into the business just to make it because they were down so much. And honestly, like this is how I've been able to acquire multiple locations over the last couple years. Is sometimes it's just sitting and waiting, and eventually, you know, people get tired, eventually they have a couple bad months in a row, somebody quits, and they're like, Man, I want out, right? And and they're ready to sell, and guess who's ready to buy? Like, even last week we went and looked at a number of acquisitions. I'm gonna talk about more uh in in detail this week. But I mean, all the time, like we're saying, all right, like let's put some offers out there, let's like make some seeds. We know that like the sellers probably aren't gonna take what we're have to offer initially, but we plant the seeds and then we circle back, you know, when it starts to get slower, and we we just we just build that relationship. And then over time, yeah, when they're ready to roll, guess guess who's gonna be ready to buy. So uh that is what I've done for for years and years. That's what I recommend if if you're looking to do a similar you know acquisition roll-up strategy is build these relationships, build your systems, so then when you have an acquisition opportunity in front of you, you are like ready to go. Alright. But even for me, it it wasn't like that. Like, this advice, I made this podcast, or I'm redoing this podcast for myself ten years ago when I was just getting started. And even then, like when I went from two to three to four, like at even at every one of those, I felt like, ah, is this the right move? Uh more more locations is gonna mean more gr more stress and that like you know, more chaos. And it did for a period of time until I figured out the systems that didn't make it chaotic, right? And and that's my goal and sharing more and more content, you know, every every day here is to to help you ins identify and then install those those systems. And you know, the the whole this whole I'm not trying to brag, right? I'm I'm not talking about these record months and weeks and all stuff to like talk about how awesome I am. I'm I'm really doing it to make a point, which is that it also wasn't by accident, right? It's a direct result of the systems that I live and I breathe and that we've worked on for years and years and years to perfect, and it's proof that the things that I talk about work. There's so many people online who give all this advice or tell you what to do, and it's like none of them have built a real business, right? We are literally done it, and now I'm documenting it, and the next part is like I want to help as many people as I can get the same results because it's the the world is abundant, there is as much uh you know, rewards and money and opportunity out there for anybody that's willing to do the work and go and get it. And so, you know, I'm gonna be sharing as much as I can in terms of information here on the podcast, on YouTube, on my newsletter. I'm just getting into Substack if you want to come and hang out with me over there. There's a number of other owners out there who would prefer more direct insights from me and like direct coaching on what they specifically need to do because information is you know a good part of it, but what really matters is implementation. How do we take the concepts that I'm talking about and actually install them when it comes to hiring, when it comes to retention systems, and you know, building stronger margins and sales process and acquisition strategies and all that. So uh in June, here's what I'm gonna do. It's it's a little bit different. I'm gonna open up 10 spots in my new coaching program for owners who are ready to build the foundation of an eight-figure business. And so what I'm looking for are I mean, it's it's people who are really serious, to be totally honest. You know, you you gotta be coachable, you've got to be able to move fast and take action to implement the the plug-and-play systems that I that I want to give you. Uh you gotta either own a franchise or be in a small business owner in some sort of like service-based business. I I'm not really working with like uh I don't know, agencies or whatever, like online businesses. It's gotta be like in the trades or service businesses, and gotta be at least a million dollars in revenue or ten thousand dollars a month in cash flow. You know, it's it's not cheap. You know, I'm only working with a few people, and so it's it's gonna be ones that uh got some skin in the game and willing to do whatever it takes. And man, I know that these things work to help build eight-figure businesses. So if you're interested and want to learn more about that, click send me a text in the the bottom of this podcast description, name, phone number, uh, your a note about you, your business, and I'll send you back some more information on that. You can decide if it's a good fit or not, and and we can go from there. So um anyway, looking forward to doing that. And I am flying to Orlando Monday afternoon with my wife and kids. Uh, it's tomorrow. I'm recording this here on Sunday. And we're gonna hit up Animal Kingdom for I think it's two days, Cocoa Beach, to go see the Space Center for a couple days, go to the beach there, and then returning Friday. So it should be a good short trip with the family, and um I'm looking forward to uh sunny Florida. So cheers.