Transcript of Franchise Insider: The Quiet Millionaires Nobody Talks About (And How They Did It) | Ep. 460 with Alex Smereczniak CEO of Franzy New

So you can go get a Fortune 500 job, and then it's like, do that for 30 years and then die. This can't be what life is about.

Alex Smirznak has founded 4 companies, franchised one, and bought into another. He's worked with operators doing up to $300 million a year. Now he's building Franzi with one mission: create 1 million new entrepreneurs.

They've quietly built this massive empire, some of them doing over $100 million in revenue a year. And you wouldn't know it. They don't come on podcasts. They think it's the best kept secret. One has done seller financing for almost 36 Midas locations. So he hasn't had to borrow, you know, a dollar from the bank.

What's a boring and unsexy franchise that you think is making people rich?

Yeah, so I really like— Alex,

there's this huge debate going on. At least here at Founder Story, I don't know outside of this, but should someone franchise or should someone start their own company?

So, I think this isn't unique to you guys. I think this— I get asked this question all the time and I've done both. I'm a franchisee of a brand called Papa Bagels, and then I've founded 4 companies from scratch and they both have pros and cons. So, I think it really depends on the individual's risk profile. If you're super risk-averse and you want more of a playbook and structure and less risk, then franchising's the way to go, but you still want to be entrepreneurial and own your own business. If you hate authority and need to go super fast and break the rules and you're fine with failing and no structure and starting from square one, but having all that upside, go start your own company. You're going to hate being in a franchise system. You're not going to like the playbooks and the infrastructure that's in place, you're going to want to go rogue and be that kind of maverick entrepreneur. And so I think it really depends on the risk profile, the personality, and what the ultimate goal and outcome is.

It sounds like to me, most people would fit in better with franchising because I don't think most people can be an entrepreneur and break rules and do all those things without any structure because they're probably coming from a job.

1,000%. If you think about the average person, your family member, your buddy, like the story we've all heard where you're getting a beer, you're having a drink and like, I hate my job and I want to do something for myself, but I don't know what it is. I think that's the majority of the population. They're a corporate warrior or they do maybe side hustles like short-term rentals or dropshipping when that was taken off. Franchising is perfect for the person who wants to be a business owner but doesn't know where to start.

So you've called it one of the most overlooked paths to real wealth. Why does nobody talk about it that way?

I think there's a lot of misconceptions about franchising. I think, and I had it too, I used to be kind of, I wouldn't say a franchise hater, but I used to think, ah, it's just McDonald's and like fast food, that's it. And I didn't realize that franchising is 6 to 7% of our country's GDP and it touches everything that you and I use as consumers, probably on a daily basis. Like you think about like your kid's tutor, like swim lessons, or, you know, the food you eat or the home services you have done, your plumber, your pest control, your gutter cleaning, like all of it is franchising, gas stations, Hospitality, hotels we stay in, Marriott, Hilton, et cetera. All these things are franchises. So it's everywhere. And I just didn't see it for what it was until I got into this world and saw just how expansive it is. And so as I've gotten into it, I see all these people that have quietly become millionaires and they're just your average neighbor down the street. They live in a nice house. They go on trips and vacations and they run their own businesses quietly and they kind of stick to themselves.

And those that have made generational wealth in franchising just don't want to talk about it. They're under the radar. No one knows who they are. They're just the guy who owns some restaurants and they like that. They've quietly built this massive empire, some of them doing over $100 million in revenue a year, and you wouldn't know it unless they're with flashy cars or jewelry or second homes. But outside of that, they don't talk about it. They don't come on podcasts. They think it's the best kept secret.

I used to be a consultant And the people that I consulted with, they didn't just own one thing. They had multiple types of franchises that they had been building for many years, and their goal was to package them together and to sell them to maybe private equity.

This is happening a ton, especially, I mean, private equity's getting everywhere. They're buying up residential homes, they're buying up franchises, et cetera. And whether it's private equity or another large operator, this is why I also think it's overlooked is once you get in and you operate one location of one brand, you're now in like the good old boys club, let's say, and you're on the field. And so you have access to other deals now, other brands that you wouldn't have had had you not gotten into the game. And once you're in, it becomes just easier and easier to add more locations of the same brand or diversify into other brands. It's a lot of the same kind of rinse and repeat stuff. There's a playbook, you're hiring employees, you're spending marketing dollars, you're trying to make sure that customers are getting value, whether it's a service or a product. And The rules of the game are relatively the same regardless of whether you're selling chicken or gutter cleaning. There's of course differences, but there's a lot of the same pieces in place. And once you get one, it's easier to get to 2, to 3, to 4, to 5.

And it's really your choice how big you want to get. I know some people that do franchising as kind of a side hustle where they make extra income. I know some people who have done it just to replace their income. and have, you know, dictate their own hours and days off and, and again, just replace their income. And then I know folks that have gone on to open 30, 40, 50, 60+ locations and have a portfolio that does over $100 million a year in revenue now. And that's, again, another beautiful part of the model is it's really what you want to make of it. It's still pure entrepreneurship just with some guardrails and structure.

Are you seeing a lot of acquisition where you can go to these solo people And maybe buy 10 or 15 or 20 that are already going. But instead of you having to start with one franchise, you can just buy up individual franchisees.

I see it happen a ton. And this is what I like again about franchising. It's so easy to do, or much easier to do roll-ups than, you know, Dan and Alex's sandwich shop. We might only have 1 or 2 of them. And so that's it. There's no more room to grow versus Jersey Mike's or Jimmy John's or some of these concepts. If you're into 2 or 3 of them, it's so much easier to go to the other operators and buy, you know, 1 or 2 here, 5 to 6 here. And then once you have this system in place and this team, capital becomes very easy to come by because investors want exposure to these types of things, but they don't want to operate it. If you're the one operating it, you have the hardest part of the puzzle and capital becomes more and more abundant, whether it's bank loans, conventional or SBA, or ROBS rollovers or private equity or private investment from friends and family or folks that want exposure to it. I have 2 examples of people that we've worked with. One has done seller financing for almost 36 Midas locations. He started with 2 or 3 in his family, but then he did seller financing for 30 of them beyond that.

So he hasn't had to borrow a dollar from the bank. He's just gone to these existing operators and said, hey, I'll give you $50K upfront and then I'll pay you X dollars over the next 3 years. And he just uses the profit, puts the store into his system, immediately generates more value than the individual on their own and doesn't have to use debt to do it. The other individual started in franchising 7 years ago, and he's up to 120 locations across 4 or 5 different concepts, Dave's Hot Chicken, Marco's Pizza, Pop-Up Bagels. And he raises money from small family offices or private equity. So he only ends up owning 30 to 60% of each of those individual locations he's buying, but 30 to 50% of a business that does $200 to $300 million a year is not bad, especially in 7 years.

Is capital easier because the risk of a franchise is much lower?

Yeah. So the SBA loves franchising because if you think about it, Dan and Al's sandwich shop, again, we don't have much proof points outside of maybe 1 or 2 locations. But again, Jersey Mike's, hundreds if not thousands of locations at this point where the bank can see the risk profile, they can see that it's normalized over you know, certain average unit volume, AUV. And so it's easier for them to underwrite the risk and, and are more likely to give you capital to go either start some from scratch or to buy existing locations within that brand. So banks look at franchising as de-risked because it is. The 5-year success rate of a franchise is like 78% versus 50% on an independent business over the same 5-year period. So you've got about 1.5 times the likelihood to succeed in a franchise versus going at it alone.

I like Dan and Al's sandwich. When are we going to open that?

We're going to open it and then we're going to franchise it. So we got to get a few open for a couple years and then we'll figure out what

the model is here. How are we different? You know, like I'm getting the wheels spinning. I'm an idea guy, so I'm going to come up with something. And by the end of this, I think we'll have an idea. What's a boring and unsexy franchise that you think is making people rich?

Yeah, so I really like moving companies. AI's not coming into it. You just need a truck and some guys. And I like these garage renovation companies are 2 categories. So home services mostly because not everyone can afford a restaurant. I mean, a McDonald's, even though it does $5 million plus in revenue, you need a couple million to open one. And again, if you're savvy and able to talk to investors and you're like, I can operate this, I've run restaurants or a large team before, I'm ex-military, you're likely going to be able to raise some of that capital even if it is for something as big as a McDonald's. But the average person—

Quick question. Have you ever Googled a supplement and walked away more confused than when you started? Everyone online sounds confident, and nobody agrees. It feels like guessing. That's when I started taking Blueprint's Longevity Mix. Every ingredient earns its place through real research and real-world testing, not whatever's trending on TikTok. And everything is dosed at study levels, not sprinkled in for the label. Instead of a cabinet full of pills, it's one scoop in water. That one scoop supports energy, focus, mood, sleep, And healthy aging. It's third-party tested for purity and heavy metals, and they publish the results. That's what Bryan Johnson, the Don't Die Guy, takes every morning. Science-backed, precision-dosed, no BS. For a limited time only, new customers get 20% off plus free shipping at blueprint.bryanjohnson.com by using code FOUNDERS at checkout. That's code FOUNDERS at blueprint.bryanjohnson.com. For 20% off. After your purchase, they'll ask you where you heard about them. Please support the show and tell them Founder Stories sent you.

Again, they might have a couple hundred thousand saved up and home services still give you that multimillion-dollar-a-year revenue upside without needing to have a fixed cost basis of a couple million in a physical location. So these garage renovation companies are doing a couple million a year in revenue, but you only need a couple hundred thousand to get started. Same with the moving companies. You're buying a you know, you could get a used truck for $40,000 to $60,000. New ones are $80,000 to $120,000. But you can get into these moving franchises. They provide you with leads and customers and branding and deals on the equipment you need to buy. And you're operating now a business that does, you know, the moving company I'm talking about is $1.8 million a year on average. And that's, you know, in the first year or two, you're already producing 7-figure revenue and running a services business.

What do you think the worst franchise someone can sink their savings into right now is?

I think an unproven food concept. So there's a horse, you know, a couple, there's a number of horror stories.

Like Dan and Al's Sandwich Shop.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. That do not invest in us unless we have multiple locations open with great unit economics. And that's the problem I think people make is, you know, they get excited or they, you know, they get sold kind of snake oil. And like Quiznos was a good example. Subway's another good example. They are very predatory. They take advantage of their franchisees, and there's a number of red flags that you can see as far as how the territories are structured, the royalties they take. And you gotta educate yourself on what's market, what's appropriate, just like you would if it was a non-franchise. And so there's a concept called like iBurger, and the guy just sold a ton of locations, took the franchise fees, and left the country. And so like you have to look for, you know, bad actors and shady characters just like you would in an independent business. You gotta do your diligence. And that's why, you know, I'm doing as much content as I'm doing. And we built this platform, you know, called Franzi for this exact reason is go do the homework, go look at the AUVs, go talk to other franchisees in the system to learn if they would do it again and what their experience has been like.

But those are some of the horror stories. I think very expensive concepts like retail or food that don't have a proven track record yet. It's just too much risk. And if you're in a position to take the risk, they can sometimes pay off really well if you get in early to a really good brand. But again, you gotta look at the team behind it and is the product itself Chick-fil-A-esque? Is it just viral and so good and such high quality that it's gonna have staying power?

So with Franzi, you wanna create a million new entrepreneurs. Why does that matter so much to you?

It's changed my life. I think I was on the path that a lot of us set out to do because it's what we were conditioned to think. I was trained or raised to think get good grades in high school so you get into a good college and then get good grades again so you can go get a Fortune 500 job. And then, it's like do that for 30 years and then die. And, I'm like, this can't be what life is about. And, it wasn't until I did this laundry business in college one of the most unsexy, boring things I could have done, but it was super fulfilling. I was addicted to it. I was in my classes not paying attention and working on the business instead, talking to vendors and marketing opportunities. And I loved it. It didn't feel like work. I would work on it on nights and weekends and it was fulfilling. And then I started talking to family members and friends and mentors of mine, and you could just tell they had these jobs that they kind of hated for the most part, or just like, did because they had to. And that was really sad to me.

I was like, this is what people spend a majority of their life doing and they never really get to do something that fills them up. And until I got that taste myself, I didn't get it. And once I got it, I was like, everyone needs to know about this and everyone needs to do this, whether it's laundry or gutters or food or a gym or a million other things you could go do. Like, do something for yourself, be a business owner. It is way more fulfilling than I think pressing a button, you know, the same button over and over in the same corporate job for the majority of your life. And so we want to help a million people go free themselves.

You were driving Uber and doing laundry.

Yeah.

Where did that drive come from at such a young age?

Yeah. So my dad, early on, he was an entrepreneur in the sense of he was 100% commission. He was a financial advisor. And so I grew up watching him and we grew up in Minnesota. So it's winter 6 months out of the year. And I would grow up watching him golf all summer long and barely work. And I was like, how are you doing this? My friends' parents are working 40 hours a week, 9 to 5. This is what they got to do, pay the bills, everything I just talked about. He's like, Alex, if you want not just financial freedom in life, but the freedom to do what you want with your time and truly enjoy your life on your terms, you need to do one of two things because there's 3 types of careers you can have. You can either work for someone else, you can work for yourself, which is what he was doing, 100% commission. He ate what he killed. If he didn't go do sales, he wasn't making any money. He's like, or the last bucket, you can have people working for you. He's like, if you're not in one of the last 2 buckets working for yourself or having people work for you, you're not going to have the level of not just financial freedom again, but the time.

Even these partners at like EY where I used to work, they're making millions of dollars, but they're still tied to the man. Like they get the same number of vacation days a year. They get more than the entry-level folks, but like they're still tied to a structure to produce a certain amount and they're tied to EY's kind of mandate versus a business owner. They might be front-loading at first in the first few years and working weekends and nights, but eventually they get to a size and a point where they've got systems and a team in place where they could leave for a month and the business is going to run itself because you've earned it and you've worked for that for yourself. And so that early on just really taught me I either need to work for myself or have people working for me, and the job starts now.

Who do you think succeeds in franchising and who gets crushed?

Yeah, I think the people who do their diligence and talk to franchisees. I mean, use a platform like ours to get a lot of the information you need, but the best thing you can do is go talk to other people that have done it, whether it's franchising or not. Go talk to other business owners. What would they do differently? How did they diligence? How did they finance? People will help you. So those who succeed do that kind of homework. They also find the right fit. So really get serious with yourself and honest about what are you good at? What are Dan's skills? What are unique to him? And then try to find a business that will allow you to let those skills be put to the best use. Like if you're really good at sales, but then you get into a business that like food probably where you don't need to be selling, it's more managing a small army of people mismatch. It's misaligned versus if you're ex-military and you're not good at sales, but you're really good at managing people, something like retail and food is Very good for you. So those are the ones that succeed, the right alignment and the right level of diligence.

The ones that fail are the ones that have the wrong expectations. They think it's mailbox money. They think a franchise is set it and forget it and that it's a shortcut and that it's mailbox money. They are going to have a rude awakening. They're not going to put the effort in that you have to, especially in the first year or 2 to get through that kind of J-curve, that couple months of suck, I call it. They need to be educated and have the right expectations. So it's usually those that don't do their diligence and have the wrong expectations going in that it's a cheap code and a passive investment.

I've heard mailboxes can have some success, but you talk about mailbox money. I could see where people have the misconception that I open a franchise and it runs itself. I don't have to be involved. I guess maybe if you're able to hire Yeah, there's

definitely exceptions. So like some people, I'm doing this right now to a degree. I'm developing 10 to 15 pop-up bagels in the Midwest and I live in Charlotte, North Carolina. So I'm not even in the same, not even the same city, but I'm not even in the same state or geography at all. But I have an operating partner there and an operating director there and paying for that. Like I'll burn more money in the first year as a result, but thankfully I've through my career and of saving money, I have enough cushion and we have investors as well that give us that cushion to hire some of those people ahead of the growth of the business so that I'm not the one running the first store, the second store, the third store. So there are exceptions, but if you're going to do this on your own and not raise outside capital and you want to own 100% of it, you got to expect to be in the business at least the first year, maybe the first 2 years. And there's 3 kind of phases there. It's either It's I do it at first, then it's we do it where you've got a GM or an assistant GM that you're starting to train or an operating partner.

And then it's they do it eventually, probably year 5 and beyond where you've got a management team, a senior management team, and you can disappear for months and the thing runs itself. But it takes that evolution to get there.

What do you tell someone who's stuck in their corporate job and they're thinking about owning a business? Is this a great option? Do they continue as a side hustle? Or do they just go in and be an entrepreneur and do something else?

Yeah, I think franchising is arguably the best path for that type of individual who doesn't have this burning idea, the next Facebook or Tesla. They're not that type of entrepreneur, but they're entrepreneurial, they're skilled, they have a desire, they want to do it, they have the means to do it. Franchising is one of the best paths to do it. And There's ways to do it passively. There's ways to do it where you can go all in and de-risk it still. But I think this is one of the best asset classes and business models to take advantage of. If you're unfulfilled at work, you have some capital, you have the skills to do it. There's 4,000 franchise opportunities and brands out there. One of them is going to be a really good fit for you, and the work is in figuring out that fit and the right expectations and alignment.

Franzi is the Zillow of franchising. What is broken about how people buy a franchise today?

Yeah, so we— the reason I got into this is I franchised my last company. It was the laundry and dry cleaning delivery, and we eventually owned a bunch of laundromats that we eventually franchised because we wanted to get hundreds open. And doing that corporate or, you know, with our own capital would have taken 30 years. And so we started franchising. That's why most brands franchise. They want to get breadth and expansion faster than they could on their own. So they bring partners in, they give them the playbook, they take a small cut of the pie in a royalty, but then they let you run it as your own business and you're the business owner of that location or number of locations or territories that you do. And as we got into that, I saw there's all these options. Again, it's way bigger than I thought it was. I didn't realize how expansive franchising was, but it's also this black box and kind of this good old boys club. And I knew from my personal experience, like you, all these people that hated their jobs would be great entrepreneurs, but just didn't know where to start.

And then I saw all these businesses that needed good operators and good partners, and they weren't talking to each other. And then these business brokers sat in the middle and they took 60% commissions. They only showed concepts that paid them the most money. And so you have this group of people ready to bet on themselves. They're already nervous, but they're excited. And they're getting bad advice. And so I thought there's got to be a way to let technology democratize access to the right brands, to the right data, to the right diligence so that this group that's betting on themselves is doing it in the most aligned, de-risked way possible versus relying on an intermediary that isn't always serving this group's best interest. And so similar to what Zillow did for all of us looking at houses or second houses or whatever it is that you're looking to buy in real estate, It opened our eyes to what things should cost, what the taxes are, what the school district might look like, what the actual house looks like and what it's sold for recently. And just all this information so that we as individuals are way more informed when we go to buy a house now, which is a huge life decision.

Same with buying a business, massive life decision. It shouldn't be that hard to find data around what am I buying? What are the risks? What is the team behind it? What do customers think of it? What are competitors doing in the same area? We provide all of that information and are unbiased in the way that we help you match with concepts because it's AI taking what you're good at, what your risk tolerance is, what you can afford, what your goals are, and then matching it up to the 4,000 brands that are out there and showing you a shortlist that we then help you refine with one-on-one coaching.

I mean, it's amazing how technology has democratized access. 2 things like this. You were a franchisor before. What was the major difference between being a franchisee/operator and then becoming a franchisor?

Yeah, so I was like a tech founder that then turned into a franchisor and now building another tech company and franzy, and also I'm a franchisee of Pop-Up Bagels. So I've seen every, you know, every side of this equation. And being a franchisor, if you have a concept and you're listening, you're like, oh, what if I started franchising? It is a great way to grow. Eventually you'll have all these locations and franchisors start to buy the locations back because it is more profitable to own the whole thing yourself. You're choosing to exchange profit for speed and getting your brand out there faster and beating someone else to becoming that number 1 or number 2 player in the category nationally. And so that's why brands franchise. But the natural evolution is they eventually buy those locations back. That's why private equity's gobbling up and consolidating as well. As a franchisee, it's great if like, I would know nothing about making bagels and cream cheeses and schmears and having to figure out the supply chain and the marketing behind it. Like I wouldn't necessarily be good at that from scratch, but now I have this playbook and I know how to hire people and raise capital and do those parts of operating the business.

And so PopUp loves the idea partnering with me as a franchisee and our team, and we all benefit. It's a win-win. And so that to me is a great reason to franchise and become a franchisee. Now I want to scratch my high risk, high reward, zero or one or all or nothing, which is what I'm doing with Franzi. It's a tech platform. We've raised venture capital for it. This is going to be either a couple hundred million or billion-dollar-plus exit, or it has a likelihood of failing entirely. And it's a big swing. It's an idea that hasn't been done before. And I, as an individual, like the access and the exposure to both. One de-risks it for me, one gets the more upside. And so that's really a lot of the differences is both operationally and then financially the outcome. How do you want to pair things and what kind of operator do you want to be and how do you want to spend your time day to day?

Did you learn this from your father looking at, it's almost like managing a portfolio. You have high-risk stocks, you have Low risk, maybe slow gain. Some are a huge gain, but huge failure rate.

Exactly. Like, I— to me, pop-up is more— it's still a risk because it's a business. And even though it's a franchise, it doesn't mean it's a sure thing. It's still a ton of work and effort, but it's less risky than a pure, you know, a tech startup where you're, you're really trying to go fast and do this in 5 years and, you know, change the way that something's historically been done. And so I look at the things that I'm doing is exactly right, diversification. And I think when people think about becoming a business owner, they all think it's this all or nothing bucket. And the reality is it's probably more like the pop-up bucket where it's not really all, you can take a fraction of the money you've saved or your income if you've got a business partner or a spouse, or again, if you want to raise outside capital to de-risk it and give up some equity, there's ways to do this and to be fulfilled and happier in the work that you do without having to necessarily go all in. You probably need to go 80% in still or 70% in, but you don't need to say, hey, if this doesn't work, I'm going bankrupt and my kids aren't going to go to college.

And it's not that intense. There's ways to structure these deals where it meets you where you are on your journey, your path, and where your risk tolerance is. And even if it does fail, I've had offers from EY to come back and I would've probably leapfrogged my peers and where we all were when we all started because I have learned so much more doing these entrepreneurial things than I would've had I stayed in the corporate kind of rigmarole and the path that I'm on. It just, you move slower as an organization, you move slower as an individual in your own growth. And so these jobs that I think people are so married to or attached to, you can honestly always go find another one if you're a hard worker and you have a skillset that is in demand and is needed. And if you have a job now, you're going to find another one. And I think that's what I like about this idea of Portfolio construction and risk exposures. You can really create it and design it how you want.

I like the fallback, but honestly, could you go and be an employee again?

As an individual? No. I know I'm marketable and I could be hired, and I don't mean to sound arrogant. I know the skills I've developed are wildly valuable. I, as an individual, could never go back. This world of entrepreneurship is addicting. And I know, I mean, you've experienced it. Like, could you ever go back? Everyone I talked to who's done this and has made the leap, None of them. I don't think a single person is like, yeah, I regret doing this. I wish I was still working at Bank of America. Like, no one tells me that.

Let's talk about the growth of Franzi. What have been some levers that you've pulled that have enabled growth from the app side?

Yeah, so this is always the fun part, I think, of entrepreneurship is, and like where it differs, but it's still problem solving. So laundry, you know, we're selling people their time back essentially, and it's like our our ideal customer persona was mom. It was females 28 to call it 40. And so it's like, where are they and where do they consume things and how do you speak to them? And now with Franzi, it's like, all right, they're entrepreneurial people, they're maybe corporate warriors or side hustle folks, or maybe they're already sophisticated operators. It's like, where are they? Where are they consuming things? So it's the same motion of like, what's the problem? Or like, who are you trying to reach? And now what are the clever, creative ways you can get there? And so for Franzi, A lot of an unlock for us was, well, people that want to own businesses or that currently own businesses love talking about it and learning about it and consuming content about it. And so podcasts like this, our own organic content as well, we have a podcast called The Exit Plan where we talk about corporate escapees or people that have sold to private equity and exited and how they did it.

People interested in doing that for the first time or more of it want to consume that type of information. It's like, that's been a huge channel for us. You're like, well, where else are they? Well, they're also, searching for it. So paid search has been really big for us. And they're also, their feeds, their algorithms, Instagram and Facebook are also showing them Hormozi content and stuff like that. So let's go do some paid search ads and organic content. And then channel partnerships for us have been big. So who's transitioning out of a career? Who just got laid off recently? Who's transitioning from the military? Veterans are fantastic entrepreneurs and operators. But they like structure. They love a franchise. They like the playbook and they like the, you know, that infrastructure that's in place. And so we just go where we know these people are and where they're consuming. And that's true whether it's gutter cleaning or laundry or helping people buy a business. You gotta break down who's buying and where they are and where they're consuming information.

How do you look at the content creation side? I almost feel that everybody now is a content creator. I know people say that they're content creators, Essentially, we are all content creators, and I think there's an art for the more B2B side and how they look at content creation.

I agree 1,000%. AI's made it easier, but the bar for quality needs to be so much higher. Like, we run into it too. Like, we— I'm not a natural, like, bubbly shamwow infomercial, like, you know, just good at content. And so Taking reps for me like anything else. If you're not a fit person, going to the gym for the first time sucks. And eventually, you go, you go, you go, it becomes a habit, it becomes part of your identity. Next thing you know, you're like a gym person. You know which lifts to do and how to do them properly in the right form. And, I think content isn't any different. You have to put in quality repetitions and do these things that scare you and are uncomfortable and not natural to you. And eventually, you get better at it. And, I think content's the same way. But you need to look out for the AI slop and shortcodes. And same with fitness. You can't just like get fit quick, you know, schemes. It's just, it's not reality and it's not practical. You gotta put in the work.

Alex, this has been great. Franzi.com. What a name.

Franzi, like a play on franchising, which a lot of people do, but it was 2 syllables, which are good for .coms, and it was a .com and it was available. It's funny the things that Go, go into a name behind the scenes.

I have always liked franchising. I've met a lot of people who've become rich, highly successful from franchising. Big misconceptions out there. Glad that you're breaking it down. You and I are very similar in terms of you want to help a million people become entrepreneurs. And our goal is to impact a billion people. And how we do that is by you getting to that million mark. So I appreciate all that you're doing. I love the breakdown of franchisee to franchisor to app startup operator. I mean, a lot of things here, man. You live like 3 lives.

I think the gray, the gray hair is coming in. I'm 34 and I don't feel like it or look like it, I don't think. But I,

uh, not bad. You got like 2, 2 gray hairs out of a thousand. You got some nice hair, man. I'm not gonna lie. I'm jealous.

There's not a franchise for that yet, at least I don't think.

But Alex, thank you so much for your time, man. Appreciate it.

Yeah, Dan, thanks for having me.