The Franchise Insiders "Inside Scoop" Podcast
Jack and Jill Johnson are two of the most experienced franchise experts in the industry, and their podcast The Inside Scoop is a must-listen for anyone considering investing in a franchise. Here are five reasons why:1. Jack and Jill have over 20 years of experience in the franchise industry. 2. They sell franchises, so they know which ones are actually making money. 3. They're not afraid to tell it like it is - you won't find any boring interviews on this podcast. 4. Every episode is jam-packed with financials and data that you can use to make an informed decision about which franchise is right for you. 5. Their insights and observations about the franchise industry are incredibly valuable - you won't find anything else like it out there. If you're thinking about investing in a franchise, make sure to add The Inside Scoop podcast to your must-listen list.
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The Franchise Insiders "Inside Scoop" Podcast
The Hidden Franchise Opportunity with $7.8M Average Revenue
What if there was a franchise opportunity with average revenues of $7.8 million that 99% of franchise searchers have never heard about?
In this revealing episode, Bubba Snider shares his transformation from Fortune 200 executive to successful City Wide Facility Solutions franchise owner in Alabama. When the pandemic hit in 2020, Bubba, approaching 50, made the bold decision to leave corporate America behind—a choice he now only wishes he'd made sooner.
Three years into ownership, Bubba provides rare transparency about his entrepreneurial journey: from the initial challenges of wearing multiple hats to building a team and creating sustainable systems. His business model brilliantly simplifies commercial property maintenance by serving as the single point of contact for the 20+ contractors property managers typically juggle, creating exceptional value reflected in his award-winning client retention rates.
We explore the practical realities rarely discussed in franchise conversations: managing accounts receivable, work-life integration, the competitive mindset needed for success, and the powerful community of franchisees sharing best practices. Bubba candidly addresses whether you can keep your day job while starting this business (you probably can't) and why, despite the initial investment and uncertainty, he could never return to corporate life.
Curious about City Wide or other high-performing franchise opportunities that 99% of searchers miss? Text us at 305-710-0050 to discover your potential path to business ownership.
Revenue figures are from the City Wide Facility Solutions 2024 Franchise Disclosure Document. This podcast is not an offer to sell a franchise and may not be available in your state. Please contact us to get access to their FDD.
Text: 305-710-0050
Hi everyone, Welcome back to the we Bought a Franchise podcast. I'm Jack Johnson.
Speaker 2:I'm Jill Johnson.
Speaker 1:And we have today a very special guest. We have Bubba Snyder, who is the owner of a citywide facility solutions franchise. Bubba, welcome to the show. How are you?
Speaker 3:Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to visit with you today.
Speaker 1:You got it. What market are you located in?
Speaker 3:Located here in Birmingham, alabama, and also a partner in Huntsville, north of me Wow, Okay, very cool, I have to tell you.
Speaker 1:So we have been very excited to talk to a citywide franchise owner because, as I'm sure you know, you guys have revenue averages that, quite frankly, blow almost every other franchise out of the water. But I'm willing to bet 99% of the franchise searching population has no idea that Citywide even exists. Would you mind, can you share with us our journey and how you found this franchise, and maybe a little bit about yourself and what it's been like to sort of scale your franchise?
Speaker 3:Sure, so 2020, covid, the COVID timeframe? Sure, so 2020, covid, the COVID timeframe. Things started changing. I came out of the corporate America type role, working with a big Fortune 200 company, playing a role that oversaw and managed several the culture Everyone's stranded at home, and at that time, I was don't mind sharing my age. I was approaching the 50-year-old mark and so I was like is this what I want to do throughout the rest of my working life? And so I started talking to folks that I've known over the years. I got introduced to the citywide franchise business model, did a little research, talked to several owners and, about a year later, met two gentlemen that had really secured the Birmingham market from an investment perspective, met with them and I'm a partner with them as the operating partner here in Birmingham since May 1st of 22. So you know, my working path started, you know, working in a family business, transitioned to more of a big company atmosphere and did that for about 20 years, and then I found myself here the last two and a half, almost three years.
Speaker 1:Very cool. And before I ask you specifically what you guys do at Citywide, the numbers according to the 2024 FDD showed locations, the average for locations. I'm not going to ask you for your numbers because we're going to keep this FTC safe and compliant, but the average for Citywide locations is $7.8 million, with the top quartile achieving I think it was $18 million and the number one franchisee I don't know how many locations they have coming in at a whopping $40 million. I mean, are these numbers real?
Speaker 3:They are, they are. We're at the 100 mark, I think, of ownership, maybe a little bit over Ownership, maybe a little bit over I think last summer. When me and my partners purchased the Huntsville market north of me, I think we were 102, 103, whatever. So we're a little bit over 100 markets now. But the numbers that you shared are accurate from what I see, and so it's been a really fun ride thus far.
Speaker 1:So what do you?
Speaker 3:guys do. How does a franchise do this? Yeah, so our business models design. We're a sales and management company and we're managing the skill sets in the commercial property facility maintenance industry. We go in and our approach is to save our clients time and solve their problems, and what we do is we represent them at the table, right. So we go in.
Speaker 3:As you know, there's a lot of companies out there that have someone in charge of their property or their building or their facility group of buildings on their property, and those folks normally wear a lot of hats, and so what we like to do is go in, take that workload off of them because on a commercial property you're dealing with 20 plus different contractors in a lot of cases and so we're able to take that burden off of them, represent them at the table, manage that for them, give them back time to focus on what their business represents locally. So we go out and we pretty much target all industries. There's a handful that really doesn't fit us, but otherwise anything commercial wise out there. We're looking to try to partner with them and help them.
Speaker 1:Wow, very cool. Yeah, we own so our business. What we do is we provide window cleaning interior, exterior, for both homes and businesses. As you can imagine, a lot of from very large. We clean a massive building in Palm Beach. We do all the interior, exterior windows. We do the pressure washing of, say, the sidewalks and the buildings, and for residential same sort of thing, we also can do things like paper sealing.
Speaker 1:One of the challenges that we've found is that when we land these larger commercial contracts, it's great, right, they're large amounts, but the accounts receivable side was something that, quite frankly and I'm embarrassed to say this because I've been in franchising for most of my life now I wasn't really prepared for it. It's like, all right, we just landed this really big job, but it's going to take our guys six days to do it and we're not going to get the money for a month, and so it's something we've had to sort of adjust and be prepared for and we intermix, sort of faster paying residential jobs For you guys. What does accounts receivable look like for you guys? What kind of time periods do you see in your business?
Speaker 3:Yep. So we have, I would say, two to three groups of receivables. I have clients on net 10. So the helps cashflow obviously. The majority are around net 30. And then some of our bigger type clients, bigger brands, bigger, larger recognizable names, sometimes extend 45 to 60. So yeah, if I had to, may 1st will be three years for me. Cash flow continues to come through and I'm at a minimal percentage of late, so it's been pretty, pretty good. In other words, I chase very little money.
Speaker 1:That's great. Does Citywide give you a? Do you have a CRM that helps you to kind of manage all this through them? We do. We have a CRM.
Speaker 3:All of our clients and service providers contractors are in there. We have the ability to manage all of that data from a CRM, and then we also have other systems we use and we have a data warehouse as well that receives all the data from all the areas that we use systematically.
Speaker 1:Cool yeah, and it's the same for us. When I log on in the morning and I get the dashboard, you know it's like in the right hand corner. I've got you know what people owe us, what's overdue, what we're going to bill for the rest of this week, what we've collected, and they've actually integrated some pretty cool AI features into the mix as well, which which is really helpful to us to us.
Speaker 3:Yes, it's been easy to adapt and implement on the team to get accustomed to it, so it's not really been a challenge at all. So our systems work well for the most part. They're continuing to invest in improving those, as you would in any business. So far, so good.
Speaker 1:What's life been like for you as a business owner versus a corporate America employee? What have you seen in terms of, maybe, lifestyle or freedom, flexibility? What have been the differences there?
Speaker 3:Yeah, great question.
Speaker 3:When me and my wife sat down and looked at this opportunity, we had to talk about that.
Speaker 3:When you open this type of business and you guys are probably aware you're wearing several hats type of business, and you guys are probably aware you're wearing several hats, from a sales to your operations hat, to your HR, to your accounting, and the list goes on and on.
Speaker 3:And since we approached the end of our third fiscal year, if you will, those hats are slowly being removed and put on others on the team, but we knew it was going to be some long days. Right, our business model and the services we provide our clients does take us outside the office a lot, and so we want to be on site where we are providing a specific service, especially out the gate, until we are comfortable and ensure our crews are doing the work properly. But yeah, we had that conversation. Moving from a corporate position, working from home or catching a flight and flying somewhere else in the country is a lot different than driving 30 minutes or so to your office and digging in each and every day and sometimes a lot of times on the weekends as well. So it's a lot different it is.
Speaker 1:It's we talk to our to our son about this all the time because it's on the weekend and again, I feel like as business owners, we've got a ton more freedom than we ever had before, but it's different. There's still there's things that you do differently than you did when you were working for someone else. So there are. There are sort of there's a rhythm of things that I do on the weekend for our businesses, between our franchise consulting business and our pinks windows business. That I'm just sort of used to doing.
Speaker 1:And so I. But I think when it's it's like when you're working on your house, when you're working on a house that you own, it's a lot more rewarding than fixing it something on a house that you're renting. And that's the way I look at it.
Speaker 3:And we're looking at this as well, the same way. And we're looking at this as well, the same way. Nothing wrong for working for a big company and managing folks from different areas of the country, different cultures, but at the end of the day, now we should get more of a return on our time and effort and investment. We're excited about that, we're excited about spending the time and, um, um, having something long-term there.
Speaker 1:uh, as well yeah, I mean to have a business that if you want you can sell and and it has um a high valuation.
Speaker 1:I mean that's kind of again the, the freedom of business ownership yeah to me the the thing that I it feels like when we talk to new clients about the sort of challenges of franchise business ownership, it feels like we're always talking about revenue first and getting clients. But what I really believe it is is having the right team and managing employees and having good employees, and that to me I mean we every day we get two to three new people contacting us about services, but having the right people to deliver those services, that's the most important thing. I don't know for you guys your model's a little different, but I'm assuming employees are still the number one sort of challenge. But tell me from your perspective what that's like for you guys.
Speaker 3:Yes. So when we opened one of the things coming from my previous path, if you will chapter in my working life one of the things I believed in is because I was kind of involved in a similar type concept sales and service. Right, you had your sales side of the business providing opportunities for your, your service side or operation side, to take care of clients and keep clients happy and retain them. So I've approached this business kind of the same way hey, build your infrastructure to make sure you can provide the business on the books, make sure your crews are being consistent with the services you provide your clients, etc. So that's been kind of my approach to this.
Speaker 3:Managing people is something I enjoy. I'm developing folks because you know as we get older we can look back and know folks developed us or helped us get where we are. So I like to do the same thing to those that next generation. So I continue to build my team as we need to. I've had very little turnover. I want to show employees that they have a vital role in this organization to keep it nose up, and so I've taken the same approach really to that perspective as I have throughout my career.
Speaker 3:And then, from a client perspective. We want to keep that business and we take pride in following the business model, providing the services that we've agreed to support and do it right and do it consistently. So when we just came back from our annual convention and we were recognized as an office in the country that does have a solid retention rate, so I take pride in that as something I've always believed in. Why bring someone into your organization and not provide them what you promise and then they walk away out the back door? So that's something I preach here with my team to make sure our clients are happy at all times.
Speaker 2:Is there anything that you do in particular to keep that retention? Like, is there, you know how do you do that? I think that's like the number one question. You know it's something we strive to do as well, but there's always challenges with that.
Speaker 3:So you don't have to reveal your secret, but some tips, give us your secrets. Well, I mean, that's a great question. It's one that I thought about early on. Our business model is designed. Each seat on the bus, every role is designed. So if you follow that model properly and you're in front of the customers and you're communicating right and you're utilizing the skill sets for every service you offer and you're ensuring that you're setting expectations with your service providers, you've got a better chance of it all coming together right.
Speaker 3:So we talk a lot here, hey, are we going about our day the way it's designed to be? And if we are, then we've got a better chance of retaining business. If we're in front of the client, we should be talking about four or five things, you know, hey, are we meeting with the right person, the decision maker or representative of the company who's going to possibly make a decision that could impact us right, good or bad? Going to possibly make a decision that could impact us right, good or bad? Are we checking properly? Our services are being performed right? Are we looking at other ways to help our clients, to show the value we bring? One point of contact again saving a client time and solving their problems is kind of our universal value proposition. So if we're doing, if we coach and train our folks properly and we're doing all of those things correctly, we've got a better chance of retaining clients. That's just the way our model is designed.
Speaker 1:Where was your guys' franchise conference?
Speaker 3:San Antonio.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's, a nice spot, yep.
Speaker 3:Yep, we were there.
Speaker 1:How's the support for you guys from CityWise in terms of how they support you guys?
Speaker 3:markets, encountering everything we could possibly encounter in a day, and for the support center to be there, whether it's a technical issue, whether it's having maybe an HR department guide you through the hiring process. If you need any assistance there, any aspect of the business the support center has, and it's been really good to be able to lean on them as we're wearing all these different hats as we take off in this business. The Sports Center's been there, but pretty much every aspect that you would need, so it's been really we just had our.
Speaker 1:So every week we do a weekly conference call with our Pink support team and we go over just basically the network, new franchisees coming in and we actually get to see, from a sales perspective, where every office is recurring revenue, last week's revenue, five-star reviews as well as our close rate. I love it. I know there are some people that don't like to have that kind of data. I want as much data as possible as a franchise owner and I think it's great to see how we compare to other markets. And one of the things that Jill and I have always felt like is that franchising is a competitive sport and it's not just for us to grow a business. We want to win. We want to be a top performing location, and I think that's one of the things.
Speaker 1:A lot of times when we talk to new franchise owners or prospective franchise owners, there's a lot of fear, right, oh my gosh, what if I lose money? What if it doesn't work? And what we talk to them about is, if you embrace this sort of competitive mentality where, let's say, you're going in and you're a part of a cohort of new franchise owners, if your focus is to have the top revenue and, you know again, do it by providing great customer service. But if you are embracing a competitive attitude and you want to win, that's just another way to make sure that your location performs very well.
Speaker 3:Yes, we're able to do that. Our data warehouse provides us kind of a high level perspective on how other owners are performing in other markets. Your Birmingham market, we could say, is kind of the middle size market, competing against your Atlanta's, la's, you know all those Chicago's, whatnot. But for the most part we can see each other's monthly performance, if you will. But we also collaborate a lot. We also talk to each other a lot. Hey, what's working there, what's not? Hey, don't do this. You know I've failed at this.
Speaker 3:And so we have a couple of things in that bucket. One, the support center provides a business consultant. So if I'm meeting with my consultant once a week, if you will, I know I'll have that little time slot on my counter to share. Hey, I need help here, or could you find me some better resources here, or whatever. The other side of that coin is we have peer groups. I have a peer group or two that I collaborate with, if it's just through general email, or we meet once a quarter and we share successes where we won something where we didn't, and we help each other.
Speaker 3:So it's basically a big, large family where everybody's driven to accomplish basically the same goals, which is success and growing their business and we help each other out. And that's been really a warm feeling, if you will, and it's consistent, kind of going back to our convention a couple of few weeks ago, you know, we get to see each other once a year. We're able to sit down and talk and catch up. If it's someone I haven't seen and I've seen them throughout the year be successful and I want to go hey, what are you doing? Hey, let me. Let me pick up on that. So to your point yes, we do a lot of that in our model, our business model.
Speaker 2:That's great. I love that. You know, when we talk about franchises and everyone says you know you have the support team and you have the blueprint and you know you have all that. It's also the other franchisees too, you know. So it's it's be like what you said kind of working with each other, trading stories, you know, getting tips, and you don't get that with a lot of businesses.
Speaker 2:If you start your own business, you're on your own. This is, you have the friendly competition. You want to. You know beat them, of course, numbers wise, but also you want to learn from them too, and it's been really helpful for us especially. We're in South Florida, so our weather is challenging, so our off season is opposite than everyone else's off season, so, but that was something that we learned, so we can all kind of talk like we went through it first, so we can suggest certain things that worked for us and we can help other people and vice versa. So we really love that. Like you said, like a family. You have a family and you have people really truly looking out for one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's been. The really cool part is being able to collaborate with others, and one of my partners is an owner in St Louis, so he's been around a lot longer than me so I'm able to bounce things off of him as well, so that's been kind of a positive thing, if you want to call it that. Coming in as a new owner almost three years ago and being able to talk with others, that's been through it longer, that's experienced more challenges, if you will, so we can reduce them if we're able to just reduce the challenges. But starting a business is starting a business like most are, and fortunately for us here at Citywide we're able to join a business model that's been successful, continues to grow and if we follow the model, we've got a really good chance of being successful. So that's what I'm excited about.
Speaker 1:That's right. I mean, it's franchise ownership. Ultimately, franchise owners make franchises special.
Speaker 1:There are some people out there who like to try and quantify it and say, hey, can I keep my job? Can I work, you know, five hours a week? And I just don't think anyone, before they get into it, can know how they're going to be able to balance it. Maybe you can, but the truth of the matter is is that it probably is going to take more than you think, especially in the beginning. It's harder in the beginning, especially the first six months, but you find your rhythm and you learn how to be a franchise owner, you learn how to be a business owner and you just won't know until you get in.
Speaker 1:And so the the almost universal question is could I do both? Could I keep my job and have my business? And sure, maybe there's some businesses where you could do that. But if you've got employees and you're out there serving clients, I think it's probably a lot harder to do that. And but it's you know again, everybody's different and every business is a little different, but my experience is, and Jill's experience is the same the shit usually hits the fan at the least opportune time.
Speaker 3:It does, it does, it does. Yeah, now, looking back, I don't see there was any way I could be involved in two different adventures, if you want to call it that. There's just too much going on, plus having an investment in the business. You want to get going, you want to focus on that, you don't want any distractions. So that's one thing that we really sat down and looked at at home before we got going and both understood hey, this is going to, we might have some distractions or moments of interruption, but at the same time we got to just keep the focus and keep looking ahead.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean I think that's the great thing about it. Well, is there anything we haven't asked that you think is important for folks to know if they're exploring citywide or just franchise ownership in general?
Speaker 3:No, I mean. All I would say is all the years that you know I was working for a bigger company. Looking back, you always think, man, I wish I had got into something like this sooner Right. Think, man, I wish I'd have got into something like this sooner right. But I had not ever looked into being a business owner. And now that I am, and now partaking in a second market and second franchise, it's really rewarding in a lot of ways and hopefully one day as far as an investment, that part comes over time. But it's been really rewarding. If anybody was to ask me, would you do it again? I would say absolutely, absolutely. I don't have any desire of going back to work and there's nothing wrong with it. But now that I've got a taste of this, I would never go back and work for a large company and play that role.
Speaker 1:So I don't know if that answers your question but that's kind of how I feel now that I'm in it for about three years now. No, it does, and I think it's a great answer because and you probably felt this too when you were going to invest in your franchise, there were probably some sleepless nights. Am I doing the right thing? Is this the right thing? It's a lot of money and a lot of times when we talk to people it's well, I'm not sure this is the right time. You know, the economy or this or that, never a good time, and I think it actually it's always a good time, it's never the right time Right.
Speaker 1:And so I think it's exactly what what Baba said and what you said, which is all of us kind of look back and say we should have done this a lot sooner. We should have started easily five years before we did, and so it because the sooner you get started, the sooner you get past. To me, building a business is like raising a kid right that first year when the baby you know it's it's, it's hard, it's really hard. But as the baby grows into a child and the child grows, things do, it changes. I don't ever want to say it's easy, it's different, but it becomes more and more rewarding, and I think that's true of a business. To me it's, and it becomes sort of addictive. It's like you want to keep adding more of them and it's fun.
Speaker 3:And that and to to that point kind of where we are versus some of the more tenured owners. Sure, your point is you're hitting the nail on the head. I see those and I'm like, hey, they put in the time, did it right, followed the model and here's where they are. So hopefully I'll be able to be fortunate enough to spend that same amount of time and accomplish some of those similar goals. So that's what I. You know, I try to keep everything in front of us. There's nothing you can do with what happened yesterday, it's over. So I try to keep everything in front of us. There's nothing you can do with what happened yesterday, it's over. So I try to keep everything in front of me to say, okay, how do I set goals and keep the ambition there in front of me to want to go after success long term, and so in our model, in our business and the folks representing Citywide across the country, I keep an eye on that. I want to know how others are doing and try to do the same thing.
Speaker 1:You know, jill and I we've kind of famously admitted that we own a window cleaning business and we don't know how to clean windows and we don't know how to pressure wash, but we don't want our guys to think we're above, working alongside them. So we try and contribute where our skills help. So, like on the weekend, I handle the internet leads for our GM. It's not hard to do and people are like oh my God, what does that do to your life? What we could be at dinner. It's two seconds, it comes in. Hey, we'd love to get you on the books for a free estimate. It takes no time. But you know what. We also want to do our part. I guess they call that servant leadership. Is there anything for you like for you guys? How do you guys do that in your business? Well, there's a lot of networking.
Speaker 3:There's social media efforts here internally. I have one of my team members involved in the social media piece. At the end of the day it's referrals who you know, who you know, that knows, someone else door knocking. But we also kind of like you said, sometimes we'll get a lead through our website or whatever and follow up on it. But yeah, we're always out there searching for the opportunity to give free quotes, free estimates to those that are interested and we have, like your business, we have that same service in our arsenal of services as well. So, whether it's something on a regular basis like janitorial support, or those once a week, once a month, once a quarter, whatever services, we're always looking for those opportunities. So it can come in at any time, sure can.
Speaker 1:All right, I have two last questions for you and then I promise we'll let you go Any tax advantages. So, for example, we help clients. You could buy a laundromat right and those laundromat machines qualify for up to a $500,000 section 179 tax deduction depreciation that can be claimed in the first year. Is there any tax advantages to being a citywide or is your, is your guys, more service related?
Speaker 3:It's all it's pretty much service related. Yep, pretty much service related.
Speaker 1:All right, and then um I was going to ask another question. I had two questions, but you know what that I think that one just took care of all of it. Oh, I know. Um, so obviously right now hot topic, and when people look back on this podcast, for all of you in the future that are watching two years from now, I'm going to ask a question that probably won't age well, but any concerns may the tariff stuff going around right now affecting your guys' business, raising your costs?
Speaker 3:We have had some communication throughout our business about that. When it comes to the tools supplies we use, whether it's equipment, cleaning chemicals et cetera that we would use for service, we're keeping an eye on it. We have seen maybe a couple vendors message us about that that provide us those things, maybe on a nationwide basis. So we're keeping a close eye on those things. For sure it can be impactful if it gets, you know, too crazy, but right now we're just keeping an eye on it yeah, I think it's the same for us.
Speaker 1:I mean, we're mainly delivering services, so for a business like ours it's not a big impact, but hopefully it's a lot of posturing, but we'll. We'll leave that to people that that work that side of the shirt anyways. Well, listen, bubba, this has been very, very cool to have you on today. For those of you that are interested in learning more about Citywide as a potential franchise opportunity, you know the drill Text us at 305-710-0050 for more information. Bubba, thank you so much for being on the podcast today.
Speaker 3:You're welcome.
Speaker 1:Appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 3:You all take care. Same to you, sir Take care Bye.