Bob & Karen Sommers, Citywide Facilities Solutions Franchisees

“We’ve seen the power of the system.”

Required listening for current ‘Zees and wannabes! Seeking to bust out of their careers in tech and radio and do their own thing, Bob & Karen Sommers opened the 12th market for Citywide Facilities Solutions 15 years ago. But there’s a twist to the story: Franchising was NOT in their original entrepreneurship plan!

Listen in as the Sommerses share their journey and their learnings with Ab and Vini. Hear how a pandemic pivot transformed their “customer/vendor” relationships to “trusted partner” relationships and made 2020 one of their biggest years. How they tackle the unique sales challenges of a B2B franchise. The can’t-miss due diligence questions when you’re choosing a franchisor. The errors of emotional decisions. And the power of proactivity.

Transcript

 Hi everyone, welcome and thanks for joining us for Stars of Franchising. Get ready for a roller coaster ride through the world of franchising as we bring you the best stories of inspiration and entrepreneurial grit and turning dreams into franchise realities. That's right Vinnie. From emerging to global brands, we'll chat with the genius minds behind the magic. All brought to you by the Tariq Farid Franchise Institute at Babson College. I'm Ab. And I'm Vinnie. Now buckle up for some serious inspiration.



 Welcome, I'm really excited to have our two guests here, Bob and Karen Summers of Citywide Facility Solution Franchise here in Boston. Welcome. Thank you for having us. Awesome to be here. Always great to have a Babson alum and two incredible entrepreneurs. And what we always love to start with, Karen and Bob, is if you could tell us what your why is and what caused you to do what you do and a little bit about your story and journey. Yeah.



 So, you know, I was in tech. Karen was in the radio business and I think we always kind of had aspirations of being entrepreneurs and Citywide Facility Solutions kind of presented itself after going through a due diligence process.



 And we decided to take the plunge together.



 We feel that we complement each other.



 And we wanted to do something that was really sales focused that we knew would give us an opportunity to really work together and scale a business, build a team.



 And Citywide ended up being that for us. So we're 15 years in. But for me, my why was really wanting to work with Karen and wanting to do something on my own or on our own after being in tech for 12, 13 years. And I would add that we aligned with a business broker, which is how we uncovered the opportunity with Citywide. And we had presented kind of this must have list of things we were looking for in a business.



 Franchising ironically was not one of them. We wanted a recurring revenue model. We wanted a business to business, sales focused opportunity. And I always talk about a local footprint. Bobby's to travel for work and we didn't want to be traveling to manage a business. We wanted something kind of a little bit more in our backyard. And interestingly enough, we said no to Citywide when it was first presented to us because it was Citywide franchise. We knew nothing about franchising. And in our minds, it was something that was maybe not what we were looking for.



 And we also heard that it was a maintenance related opportunity. And as Bob mentioned, he was in high tech sales and I'm a radio person and we were like, what do we know about that? And fortunately, this broker basically said, OK, but it meets your must have list.



 Also they're relatively new at franchising. So here's a unique opportunity. I've met them. They're value oriented like you and Bob are. It doesn't cost you anything to explore it. And that was kind of where we had to have pause and say, OK, let's do our due diligence, as Bob said. And then the rest is history. Wow. You know what, Bob, you said at the beginning that you want to be entrepreneurs. Yes. OK. And I guess not that you want to be, you feel inside you, you're entrepreneurs. Yes. And then you ended up choosing becoming a franchisee of Citywide.



 We've had people that said, you know, when you go to franchising, you're not an entrepreneur. You have a blueprint. It's all set up. You have the road map. You just do it. You don't think about it. So you're not an entrepreneur. What would you say to that? I would respectfully disagree.



 And, you know, we're a franchisee in one franchise system. But I think we can, you know, determine enough about franchising at large that you're absolutely an entrepreneur no matter what business you get into. In a franchise, you're starting from the ground up. I think the great thing about our situation in other franchises is that you do have a model that you can follow and should follow. And it's, you know, if you put the right work in and you're smart and you've got grit, it's most likely going to work. So for us, that was why we got into franchising, because we weren't going to start a software business. We weren't going to start a radio or communications company.



 But knowing that we could get into something that was proven.



 And I can tell you that after 15 years, we feel like we've been entrepreneurs. I can't imagine something that we have not encountered that an entrepreneur outside of franchising, you know, has not encountered. So yeah. Yeah. And I think that is kind of a common misperception that we had it ourselves. You know, we thought franchising was you had to follow A plus B equals C all the time. And there was no room to color outside the lines. And that is really not the case. You know, franchisees are bringing their own unique backgrounds and skill sets to their own business. And it really is, as Bob said, what you put into it. And we've been around a long time now in this franchising model. And we've seen people accelerate and be extremely successful. We've also seen people not put the time, work or be willing to continue to invest to grow their own businesses and more that they've almost purchased a job for themselves versus a business. It really is more a mindset of, you know, it is your business. You're fortunate to have a support center that you can tap into. And I'm sure some friends we're very fortunate to be aligned with a very strong franchisor who is supportive. And I'm sure that there are it's like anything. There's probably both sides of the coin there. Right. So that would be a cautionary tale. Do your research. Right.



 Well, well, you know, Karen, you've said a few things about, you know, this partner partnership, right. And what strikes me is, is your approach coming in, which I think is really valuable advice and not only for franchising, but for entrepreneurs, which is to understand what you really want, you know, together and for your venture. But I'd love to learn a little bit more about that process of the selection and your must-haves, because I think that's really insightful that you had a list of must-haves. I think a lot of people come into it early and maybe get excited about the first opportunity a broker shows them and they haven't thought through that. But tell our listeners how important that is to really identify it. And how did you get to that point together? Yeah, I mean, jump in on some of this. But I think that we hadn't made the 100% determination, as Karen alluded to, that we were going to be moving forward in a franchise system. So it was really pretty casual for us. You know, I was still working. So it was almost a moonlighting sort of effort.



 And I think that, you know, in talking to this particular franchise consultant, he gave us some good guidance to even have must-haves.



 But we only ultimately looked at four or five different franchise models.



 And you know, we could have gone in so many different directions.



 But ultimately, Citywide really impressed us. And maybe you can talk about the must-haves a little bit more and why Citywide impressed us. But it wasn't as formal of a process as maybe others go through when they're evaluating franchises. Like, they know they want to do it. And they go to the conventions and they talk to 100 different, you know, systems and so on. I think, you know, one of our key must-haves was that recurring revenue model of not having to reinvent the wheel every month or every quarter or every year and have some type of, you know, compounding revenue stream. And because it's a sales and service model, it has to be a part of the revenue stream. It has that, of course. And it was a unique point in time during our due diligence that because they were small at the time, we had direct involvement with the president of the franchise company. And just as a fact point, we're the 19th market that they sold to. The only in New England, one of the first on the East Coast. And they now have over 92. So just to give a perspective in the 15-year period of growth. But the president of the franchise company was so vested in helping educate potential franchisees that he in turn believed in. You know, we asked a bunch of questions. Well, what kind of buildings make sense? You know, what about unions? What about this? What about that? And he said, you know what? Let's book some meetings. I'm going to hop on a plane. I've never been to Boston. Why don't I come in and let's do some groundwork together, which of course, is any potential business partner that's impressive right there. And we went out in the field that day. We met with the local union. We went to, we cold called on some buildings. And a couple things happened during that time frame is we realized there was no conflict. Any confusion or concern we had about the sustainability and the legitimate nature of the business was totally, you know, cured. Right. We knew that. And then I also sat back and got to watch the president of the franchise company present citywide. And as a career salesperson myself, I sat back and said, oh, yeah, we can do that.



 And I saw people just like you two just did. You nodded your heads like this. Right. And we saw people in the room going, oh, this makes sense. And so that's when things really started kind of coming together.



 And we saw the recurring revenue stream as a true possibility. We saw it as something we could build to have support the livelihoods of people that would become a part of our company, which is important to us, not just to support our own family. We saw ourselves as being able to do that and build a business to support other families. And that's how it happened. I would say the only other thing would be, you know, we were considering something in the service business, whatever that broad definition means, because we just felt that



 with kind of our interests and acumen and that service isn't what it should be across many industries. And if something presented itself in the service industry, that we would vet it. Right. Well, if I may, Vinny, just something on that you said, which I think is pretty striking, which is that the fact that he came to your market and had a vested interest, I think is something we hear often, which is selection criteria for that partnership, right? The best franchisors we've heard, you know, really realize that, you know, you have to make money and do well. So I think that's important. And you highlighted that, which is great due diligence on your part. And you talk a little bit about if you talk to other franchisees, any of the other 18 and how that process was. And would you recommend that for folks, you know, entering a system or multiple systems? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I would say it's probably the most valuable part of the due diligence process is speaking with other people, hearing their stories and understanding their success, their successes and their challenges.



 That I think was probably the linchpin for us because you talk to other people and you realize, OK, this person had a career in an industry similar to mine and they're having success.



 You know, I have a friend who got into franchising who made a misstep and didn't ask some really important questions that should happen in that process in speaking with other franchisees. And I think to one of your points earlier, you can just get really excited.



 And a lot of the franchisors are selling things, too, right?



 And everybody has different models. And he didn't ask a few critical questions. And unfortunately, it didn't work out. But speaking with other franchisees was enlightening and absolutely pivotal to our decision. And I trust you've spoken to many of the ones that came on to get to that 90. It's very true. And that's something that we personally believe in and the franchisor encourages. And of course, it helps them is that kind of pay it forward. So we've hosted potential franchisees. Bob's a big part of that process where he'll get on calls and people will just because they're able to ask franchisees questions that they can't ask the franchisor, of course. And that is the best way because that was so important to us. And we feel that if we can at least help somebody even make the decision not to join because they're asking the right questions, then we're helping the system as a whole. And that must be rewarding in its own. Feels great. It does. Before I ask the next question, I wanted to know whether you could share with us maybe a couple of those key critical questions that you need to ask to have in mind when you go out there talking with franchisees or franchisor or just doing your due diligence. What are those maybe two, three top questions that you absolutely must ask? I think we'll all just start before Bob jumps in is, you know, for us, we want to make sure that they really have a clear picture that this is going to be a lot of work. When you buy a franchise, they're not handing you a little new start kit and you just put it together and all of a sudden you're making money.



 So it's that key thing. Do they have the grit and the work ethic? And are they asking the questions with that in mind? Like what did it really take? I mean, we're looking for people who are asking questions. So yes, they want to know about when you started making money and all those important key things. But you know, like really, what did it take? What are some of the things, the mistakes you made early on that maybe they can learn from? So I'll let you chime in. When were you? When did you cash flow?



 How much did you invest and how much money are you making? Would you do it again? And would you do it again? I see. Would you do it again? Right. I mean, it's interesting you say that because on the cash flow, I mean, in the disclosure docs and we get this question too, it's a range. So that's a great question for someone to ask, which is, you know, am I at the low end, high end, underestimate? Right. How much working capital do you need? Correct. And what is the risk tolerance? Because, you know, so, for example, we made a choice to invest ahead with certain hires because we identified because it was just the two of us in the business and we literally have done every role. And we think that that's one of the strengths that we have in hiring and recruiting people because we've rolled up our sleeves and we've done it. But we also realized in that process, there's things that we're just not as strong in. And so we decided early on to hire to fill some of those gaps, which then delayed our cash flow and profitability. That was a personal decision that maybe not everyone would be comfortable or willing to do. But that's part of that, you know, process too. Now, given your 15 years now, you've been in this for 15 years and you've seen what you've seen things a lot from the franchisee angle. And I'm sure you've spoken to some franchisees as well. You know, what would you think the best franchisees do?



 Yeah. And what do you think the best franchisees do? Well, yeah, so I'll just say first, you know, our system is like a company, right? And the franchise or what we've seen since we got started in 2008 has grown and learned just as much as we have. It's kind of like when you get into a company as an employee and the earlier people like get the stock options, get the better territories. It's the same thing with franchising, right?



 But I think what we've learned through a great example through our franchise or is that, you know, they're supporting the franchisees, which sounds like a very generic answer. Does it really happen? Right. I mean, are they coming out to visit? Do they have the knowledge? Are they pooling information from other franchisees and helping you benchmark?



 So that's definitely one of the key traits of a franchise or is do they say they're going to support or do they really support? And that's a great question for prospective franchisees, obviously, when they're talking to an existing franchisee. Yeah. And I would also add, are they bringing innovations and excuse me, problem solving to the table that has already been kind of proven or beta tested. Yeah. Right. Not like, oh, here's a great idea we think we'll solve your current issue is here's the research we've done. Here's what we're investing in. But then bringing franchisees into the mix and some of those decisions because the franchise or especially as the system grows becomes much more removed from the reality of the day to day. So pooling resources with the boots on the ground knowledge. And of course, the franchise or is in a difficult position. They're never going to please 100% of the people, right? But they have to look at what the general consensus is of what the needs are, what the priorities need to be and what are the lessons learned in the field. And our franchise or has a couple vehicles for that. You know, they have a franchise advisory council that franchisees sit on for a period of time. We also have a franchisee association that all members have the right to belong to so that they're bringing up issues, concerns, opportunities so that there's a voice. And I'm sure that that's the same. Our experience is limited to our franchise. But I know that there's other examples of that in the system. And then from the other side, the franchisees, the best ones that you've encountered, not just yours, but also talking to people out there. The best franchisees, what is it that they do? So what are the top two or three things that they consistently do? Well, they're entrepreneurial. You know, they work hard and they follow the system.



 You know, of course, in our model, we've got general guardrails, right? I think our system's a little different from maybe other franchises.



 But generally speaking, those are the three things. You know, the hard work is probably where we, you know, as we look across our system, we've got amazing success. I'm not sure how we compare to your typical franchise system, but almost every franchisee is successful in their own right.



 But you know, the ones that maybe aren't where they need to be, lots of times it comes down to just grit and making it happen every day.



 And I would add that where they need to add resources to maybe disciplines that they themselves either don't have the background done or the skills. So because when you're a franchisee, the franchisor gives you the business model and what that is, but they're not giving you everything it takes to run a successful business.



 So if you're a franchisee and sales is not your forte, then you need to invest in resources for sales. If accounting is not your forte, then you need to invest in those resources. So it's really successful franchisees understand that. And they have to build that into their business plan of where they're going to have to allocate some of those dollars. Excellent.



 Great. Can you talk a little bit about the challenges of the pandemic and any innovation or pivots you had to do as a business that you're proud of or that you were challenging you overcame and maybe some that have stuck coming out? Yeah. So our business is a form of property management. So we work with commercial properties and basically manage maintenance for them by finding vendors and then we're one point of contact for these buildings. So when you're talking about maintenance, you're talking about hiring janitorial companies and all other types of maintenance vendors. So when the pandemic hit, of course, people vacated buildings and our business dropped off precipitously. That recurring revenue, Karen, was talking about dropped 30%.



 So yeah, we certainly had to pivot. And Karen, this is why it's great to have such an awesome business partner.



 We immediately pivoted and said, we need to create a task force and figure this out. And this is the most important thing we have going right now. And you can talk about what you did. But this, to me, was the most notable thing that I think got us through the pandemic and actually helped a lot of other franchisees get through the pandemic because of Karen's leadership and idea and this particular thing. That's nice of you to say that. It was totally a team effort. We did immediately, after a little bit of the shock of, oh my gosh, this is really happening,



 quickly identified what businesses did we have that were essential versus non-essential. The realm that we're in, we are determined or deemed an essential business. Excuse me. So it turned out, as Bob mentioned, 70% of our buildings were still open in some form or another because their distribution, manufacturing, medical buildings that had to remain open. So then their focus was, how do we keep everyone safe? So we formed a task force and we literally met for every day for two and a half years. It feels like we just stopped having our regular daily meetings. And what our initiative was is to educate ourselves because people were getting information about the pandemic and COVID-19 from Facebook and sources that weren't sources of what we call sources of truth. So we determined what are our sources of truth.



 We reviewed all of the information every day to educate ourselves. We created training documents so that we could educate our team. So when a client called with concerns, we could de-escalate the situation and help give them the information they needed to make the decisions that were right for their business. We couldn't tell them what to do, but we could say, here are your options. Electrostatic disinfecting became a really big deal, really starting around April of 2020.



 So we did all of our due diligence and made sure we had a network of contractors that could provide that essential service. What was the right pricing? How do we educate our customers about it? How do we deploy those resources?



 And then we created, again, training materials. And then we broadened that to the greater franchise system. And we weren't the only franchisee doing the same thing, but we collaborated, which is one of the things I'm really proud of being in the system because people are like, okay, what are we going to do instead of sticking your head in the sand? So we have to solve this. And I do believe really now having the benefit of hindsight, you look back and the relationships we were able to build with our clients during this really difficult time that none of us could have predicted deep in those relationships. And they looked at us differently. They didn't look at us like, oh, hey, there's my vendor that manages a couple maintenance services for me. They looked at it as there's my partner citywide who's a trusted partner. And it opened the door in 2020, ended up being one of our biggest years as a result. And we walked into 21 with deeper relationships and projects that the dialogue was now open on that were never on the radar before, because they looked at their account managers, who's their one point of contact as this, wow, here's somebody who advised me. So I could probably go on and on and no one wants to keep talking about the pandemic, but no, I love it. It was a pivotal moment for us. And I think our employees also appreciated and looked at their own positions a little differently, like look at what we can do to help people and have an impact. Exactly. I think our employees for sure, you know, it's a leadership moment.



 What are we doing? How are we handling this? How are we communicating? What decisions are we making? Well, and what's fascinating and admirable is that, you know, you made that decision to do it, but not in the interest of, of course, you want your business to survive and thrive, but you know, what am I custom? How do I add value to my customers? And it'll play out hopefully in the end, which you did as a trusted, trusted partner. Can you talk to the benefits of being in the franchise system to disseminate that to your franchisee partners? Do you think you were better equipped to do that as a franchise than say an independent or, you know, someone who wasn't in the franchise system, meaning you were able to leverage your new playbook to your other franchisees? I think when there's a natural, trusted sounding board, it really does help because you could run those ideas. And I think every market treated things a little bit differently based on their own circumstances, maybe where they are, what part of the country they were in and things like that. So I definitely think it was a benefit at the end of the day, you know, French independent franchisees had to make their own decisions of what was their, their plan basically to do that. And I would say one of the, our experiences in our franchise or was very supportive, but because we, we could pivot and move more quickly than they did. Right. So the franchisees took it upon themselves. We're not waiting for the franchise or right. We expect them to help us and they expect to help us as well, but we're not waiting. Right. This is in the now and they're a bigger entity. So therefore move a little slower. So as a business, we said, okay, well, what are we going to do?



 But then at last, I mentioned earlier, there was that collaboration of us all together. This is interesting, Karen, because I know you went to BU, right? I did, yes. I did your communication because in a crisis mode like that, that's where you see that communication becomes critical. It does. And how was it for you? How did you leverage your, your background in communication, you know, to be able to not just to rally everyone around, it's just, okay, this is not solution coming from you and Bob, but this is also from everyone. How do you, how do you money the whole process? Because I'm sure a lot of noise. There were the tools that were available at the time certainly helped him and some of them were new.



 Bob and I were founding members of the franchise association and we had recently started hosting zoom meetings, right? So we were practiced in setting up zooms and all of a sudden that became mainstay for us all. Right. And I think we leveraged having to send, we sent all of our employees home to our field based employees were still in the field, but not going into buildings. So we had to come up with protocols. We were very fortunate. We have a great relationship with our employment attorney who offered advice, what they were seeing other businesses do. And we just, like I said, took all of that information and then put it into digestible job aids basically for our employees that we hosted our own zoom meetings. And some of them we made fun, right? This is your favorite superhero just to keep engagement because we knew stress levels were high. We reassured everybody. I mean, Bob and I took some pretty drastic steps and we halted our own salaries and we told our employees that because we didn't know what was going to happen and we didn't want them to worry about the sustainability of our business during this difficult time. So I think we probably maybe even went a little overboard in communicating more than anyone ever wanted to know about where to find resources for COVID and job aids. But I guess I didn't think about it leaning into my previous background. It was more just what do we do as leaders to make sure that we're transparent? And that's a philosophy Bob and I feel strongly about is we're very transparent in our business and our team knows that. And so we shared, yeah, this is scary. Here's what we're doing currently. You can ask us anytime. I mean, we broadcasted every step we were doing along the way, just so they knew that there was a plan and we weren't just sitting there with our fingers crossed waiting for someone else to tell us what to do. We were taking action on their behalf and the behalf of our clients.



 Great stuff. You know, one of the things, Karen and Bob, that is a big part of Babson and what we're doing and talk about and try to lead is this intersection and importance of DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion, social impact, sustainability. And Vinny, I've had a lot of great discussions with entrepreneurs like yourselves around this intersection with franchising too. And I'll start with you, Karen. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, your ability to make impact in the community? And then also as a female leader and executive, some of the work you're doing around that and any trends around that and important areas. Sure. I mean, obviously that's a broad topic and so much to talk about with that. You know, one of our initiatives at Citywide is we offer all of our employees what we call a VTO day. It's a volunteer time off, a paid day that they can go out into the community or into local organizations that are important to them. It doesn't have to be something that is on our list as a company.



 And I know that they feel they're proud of that and they feel really good. And we have a lot of people take advantage of that. And we've had some, you know, unique things that we've as a company been exposed to that our employees have then shared with us. Oh, I get to go do this, you know, and they feel great because you can't volunteer just at nights and on weekends all the time. So that's one initiative that we're trying to broaden. We do as an organization do a lot of charitable giving and really try and create that culture as a system. Bob and I are on the charity committee for our franchise network and we have an annual convention and this past year for a local organization, we raised over six hundred and nine thousand dollars as a system. So it's powerful when you put a bunch of entrepreneurial people with a driven mission and they're a little competitive at the same time. You put them in a room and a lot of powerful stuff can happen.



 And I'm also fortunate enough to have some other female entrepreneurs in the citywide system. And we formed something called the League of Citywide Women, which the franchise or is extremely supportive of. And it's a space and place to give female franchisees an opportunity to, you know, share and collaborate amongst ourselves as well as the greater masses and support other key leaders in the system as they're growing their careers. And when Bob and I started back in 08, I was one of three women in the room, as they say, and it was a new system in fairness. And there's a significant increase in the last 15 years and it's a mission that we want to continue to have. And I'd like to think we're doing that locally as well, a lot of key women and a broad network of leaders in our company.



 This is awesome. So let me, I'm going to digress a bit and maybe ask you questions regarding your failures.



 Here at Barbston, we see every entrepreneurial journey, which always encompasses failure as well.



 So when you look back this past 15 years, what would you do differently and why?



 Yeah, lots of failures along the way, right? How much time do you have in the five weeks? You know, I think the first thing that comes to mind is right when we started up, I mentioned earlier that our franchise or was relatively new to franchising. So the conventional wisdom at that time or the requirement was you need to bring in a salesperson or two, but we had never sold this. So we listened and we did it and it was a failure. And I think we probably would have said, "Hey, can we revisit this? This doesn't seem like the right thing to do right now." And it was a major investment with no revenue on the board.



 So that was definitely an early failure. I think as we've grown the business and we're looking at just our mindset and where we're going to invest and things like that, it's really trying to focus on being proactive instead of reactive, especially with our team. We don't have trucks and there's no widgets being punched out anywhere. This is all people in our business. We're basically a customer service business.



 So yeah, that's like really important. Yeah, I would say our decisions, just like Bob said about that being proactive more than reactive, we made probably more emotional decisions at times. It can be a little scary as much as we had a lot of confidence in our abilities, it's still scary. You're not making any money. You've got a family and families of other people you're responsible for. So there's a lot of pressure. So I think it's not making as many emotional decisions. Now that we can look back at Eagle's eye view and all of this experience. And I hear that from some of the newer franchisees. It's almost like I want to say, oh, please don't do that. And sometimes I do because it's like, I know exactly how that's going to turn out. Your heart's in the right place, but you've got to listen to your business as much as listen to your heart. Well, if I may just piggyback on this, but maybe if you can share with us one or two things that franchising, being a franchisee, start you, they think everyone that's going into business at some point in their life should learn about.



 Franchising is a system, right? And for us, it gave us the confidence that it was something that we could put hard work and smarts into and be successful. I think that applies to everything in life, right? It's like you put your stake in the ground and you go take the hill. And I think with entrepreneurship, you don't always have that certainty like you might in a franchise model. But I think franchising has taught us and it gave us that confidence. This is going to work if we put the hard work in and we keep our heads up and we lead by example. So I think maybe that's a little bit of a remote example of what you're looking for, but that's what comes to mind. We've seen the power of a system. Sure. Okay. And I would add that, and maybe we already knew this, but franchising, there's no guarantees. You know, just because you're buying into a franchise and maybe you're passionate and all of those things, it doesn't mean it's a guarantee it's going to work. You still have to have a plan. You've got to be willing to invest. You know, it's not like you make the initial investment and all of a sudden money just starts rolling in and it's always going to roll in. There's times where you have to pivot your business, whether it's a pandemic or not, you're saying, okay, I do need this discipline. I'm not skilled at it. I've got to hire ahead of the curve and put in maybe a key level leader or manager that costs more. I mean, so I think that that is just an important factor for people to know. I see.



 Yeah, great stuff. One thing I'd love just a little bit to hear about because we get a lot of interactions with more retailer and franchising, but can you just talk a little bit and explain to our audience the nature of your service delivery system and the recurring piece of it and how why you thought that was attractive, maybe the fragmented piece of service providers, just just to give people an understanding of how that works and why you made that choice, because I think these opportunities in service that you guys have shown can be pretty attractive if done right. Sure. So we, as Bob mentioned, we provide managed maintenance services to commercial buildings and where our current territory is Eastern and Central Massachusetts. So literally, if you think of buildings like here at Babson and medical buildings, auto dealerships, private schools, commercial office buildings, you name it, anything you see driving up along the highways are kind of buildings, manufacturing plants and things like that. And we're able to provide such a wide array of services from janitorial to seasonal services, interior services, as well as that broad geography because of our business model. And we work with a carefully vetted pool of independent contractors that specialize in those independent trades across this geography. And that's really kind of that value we're bringing to our clients that we have a system of finding them, vetting them and managing the ongoing administrative compliance for those contractors. You think of things that they have to have, like the proper general liability and workers comp insurance, that they have to have all the proper business certificates. And I can go on and on about building requirements for specific industries. Our team does all of that. And so we're going out and meeting with them, understanding their needs, putting together that customized solution facility solution, you get it with the name, right?



 That meets their needs and of course, their budgets. And we have a professional team of managers. That is that one point of contact because we're meeting with people who've been in pain. Yes. For some, they they're either missing something in the relationship. And we're that something. And then we're that same fair market price because of the value we're bringing to our contractors. Right. So why does a contractor want to work with citywide? So all the things we're bringing to the table, you know, we're finding the business for them. We're helping them scale and grow their citywide portion of business, because we've got a team of people out there retaining business and finding new customers and doing all of that due diligence of sometimes there's payment portals and insurance things you have to upload. And we're doing all of that that might not be in their wheelhouse. So with no overlap and overhead between their costs for citywide business and our costs, we can keep that reasonable fair market price for our customers that attracts them. And that's what is that recurring revenue model, right? The customers sign up and we're providing those services on a recurring basis. And you would never really need to leave citywide because even if we had a contractor that failed, and it happens sometimes, right, we would take another contractor from our network, train them and put them in the building to provide that service so it doesn't miss a beat for our clients. And we have clients that have literally been with us since we opened our doors. I love it. And you're handling double pain points. We teach a lot around, you know, solving pain points in the market need, but you're doing it for your customers, you know, the property owners and managers and your contractors too. So that's fascinating. Back to that trusted partner. Yeah, yeah. Many of the quite a number of the guests we've had so far, majority are from the franchise model that are more like B2C. Okay. Yeah. And then they're able to leverage the power of the brand of the franchisor. And that was maybe direct to consumer marketing. In your case, it's a B2B model. It is. And then so it's a sort of a segue into maybe asking a question about the importance of sales. Yeah. Pounding the pavement to go there. You can, citywide, you don't have a citywide art going on all the time that people are looking. So how important is that? What's the difference between what you do and what other franchises that are? It was one of the allures. And in fact, if we were going to add another thing to why we selected citywide, it was the B2B. That's our wheelhouse. We both have sales backgrounds and we like the idea that we were kind of more maybe in control of our revenue than something we weren't familiar with, which is more of a retail setting. So we can actually go knock on doors and talk to people and proactively try to secure business and building a sales team and those sorts of things are just things that we enjoy. So the B2B model was very important to us. And it continues to be important today because that's the front engine of growing our business. And so you can never kind of over communicate with your marketplace. So it's constantly prospecting. We're now at a point because we've learned so much over 15 years of really kind of reverse engineering what is our ideal customer and how can we reach more of them and just continue to do what I call Toma, which is top of mind awareness, being top of mind because not everyone needs to make a change right now or wants to or is in a situation. But when they are, how do we get them to think about citywide because of our consistent outreach to them? Well, really fascinated with different different ways to scale and different types of franchise models. So just to be clear,



 is citywide the franchise or providing you that technology or that infrastructure, the platform to do all the things you talked about, Karen, with uploading and managing your contractors and certifications? Is that a big part of the value or is it that they're providing you and you're doing a lot of the front end? Like did they as part of your agreement, you get it? Yeah, technology platform or a service platform? We do. It's more CRM and accounting and kind of back office ERP stuff. Yeah. Okay. You know, but what we're getting is the business model and, you know, lots of systems and, you know, processes and things like that from our franchise or great. So we're coming up with that on our own. And, you know, the whole screen and vetting of our contractors is something that we took pretty seriously right from the start. So we've almost developed an internal competency for that. You know, that's a lot different from some of the other franchisees and just in a different way, not necessarily better. But we've really emphasized that in our business. Great stuff. Yeah. Is there anything that keep you, not if there is there anything, I put it this way, what keeps you awake at night when you think of citywide your business? You know, I think we've matured with the business and the thing that's probably most important to me. And I think, Karen, I share this as our team, right? You know, we genuinely care about them. When you go into business, franchising or otherwise, I think oftentimes you're thinking, all right, me, me, me at the beginning. And then you start to realize you have responsibility for all these people. Right. And you've got to make smart decisions. So I think the thing that would keep us up now is just kind of worrying about the team and making sure we're making the right decisions so that they have opportunities. Okay. You know, our big thing right now is really trying to build out our leadership team, because we're just at a point where we want to make sure people have a path where they can grow. And Karen and I are not the best at everything. Yeah. Right. So we are at that kind of classic transition, right? You got to get out of the way. Right. Right. Right. Wow. That's what keeps me up. And we want to create growth opportunities. You know, we have 40 people now, which still sometimes when I do a new higher orientation and I talk about our org chart, I'm, I kind of look at it and I'm like, Oh, it used to be two boxes and look at all these boxes on the org chart now. So it's pretty wild, but you know, our job is to continue to find growth opportunities so people can come into Citywide and see a natural path. So that's something that we think a lot about is how do we make those right investments? Talk transparently with people about what those opportunities are so that they can grow. We recently adopted the EOS, Entrepreneur Operating System, that we're putting our entire company through now. And that's been a big investment on a mostly of time, not just money, but to, you know, create some of this bigger picture, sustainable planning that has given us a common language and a common system across all departments because these departments are growing fast. Right. And we just want to make sure that things don't, you know, get wild, you know, from that standpoint. But Vinny, early on, it was that one of our contractors would not show up at all. Yes. Or someone didn't have a roll of paper towels. Right. So that was absolutely it. Those are the things that we used to change. Well, and that represents you've been in all parts of the business. Well, Karen and Bob, what a treat it's been to talk to you today. I know Vinny, I'm sure will agree. You know, you represent so much that's great about entrepreneurship, authentic leadership, and partnership, you know, starting with the two of you and how you need a partnership to grow a business and built that into franchising as well. So we're really grateful for you. And here at Babson and the Tarik Fried franchise Institute, it's always great to welcome a Babson alum and a Babson partner back. And if we can do anything to help you on your journey, we'd love to stay engaged. We know you're involved with interns, et cetera. So thank you. And the bottom line. We love our Babson interns. Thank you. So we're going to keep collaborating on that front. You know, I want to say thank you for everything you've done for us. So in the past, you know, helping with our sales curriculum, the two of you coming to engage our students and then to actually have some interns. I remember Cameron Beran. I hope he's still with you. He's actually been offered a full time position. Thank you. Thank you so much. And then I just want to, because this is the first time we're having a couple as guests, the dynamics of being couples, you know, what strength does it bring to people? Why are you laughing? He seems so scared asking the question to you, Bob.



 What strength does it bring to the table? You know, you're going to franchising, but as a couple, you know, right? Well, as a couple, we, you know, we're talking about it nonstop, right? I mean, so we're always working on the business and it's been a lot of fun. And I think it's actually added an element to our relationship that we probably wouldn't have envisioned back when we got married. But division of labor is very important. And my, whether I state it or not, my kind of motto when I'm working with Karen, there's nothing more important than our relationship. So if there's a disagreement on the work front, which really there rarely is, you know, it's okay. Well, it's, the sky's not going to fall here. Yeah. Okay. Wow. And, and we work hard to make sure that that is, you know, we're very transparent. I've mentioned that probably many times during this interview, but, you know, we want our team to be comfortable. And, you know, we've had people where, you know, we've reached out for potential positions that we're interested. And they've said, Oh, you know, at first I was a little hesitant because I didn't know husband and wife team. What's that going to be like? And I think it takes meeting us to really see that there is a true division of responsibility and kind of that org chart and the communication. But, you know, we try and make it comfortable for people to know it's okay to be curious and wonder what that's like. Thank you so much. We're beyond grateful. Thanks. Thanks a lot. This is wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for joining us on this episode of Stars of Franchising.



 Stars of Franchising was produced at Babson College engineered by Travis Gray. Karen Sowell is our guest coordinator and music by Ralph Taylor. If you like Stars of Franchising, be sure to review us wherever you get your podcasts and swear the word and share these stories anywhere you can.