Why GLO30 Franchisees Keep Buying More Units

When franchisees start buying more units, that's not a marketing claim. That's a verdict. 

It's exactly what's happening inside GLO30 — and it's why we had to get founder Dr. Arleen Lamba on the show. 

GLO30 isn't a facial bar. It isn't a med spa. Dr. Lamba calls it a health club for your skin — and she ran four corporate units for 11 years before she ever sold a single franchise. Her first two franchisees weren't investors who found her on Google. They were members who moved to Florida and fought over who got to sign first. 

In this episode, she walks us through everything: how Gloria, GLO30's proprietary AI skin scan, measures hydration, pigment, and texture so members can actually track progress over time. How a $99 monthly Smart Glow facial adapts to your data instead of pulling from a generic menu. How a $125 Botox membership eliminates the $1,000 quarterly sticker shock. And why customers who have stayed for 13 years didn't stay because of the newest treatment — they stayed because of the system. 

For the franchise-minded listener, she gets specific: a lean four-to-five room footprint under 1,000 square feet, a presale model that opens studios with members already booked, and a training system you can monitor from the beach. 

She also makes the case for why keeping a corporate location isn't optional — it's the heartbeat of the brand. 

When existing franchisees are doubling down with their own money, you pay attention. This episode tells you exactly why. 

Subscribe, share with someone exploring franchise ownership, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway. 

📍 Visit www.thefranchiseinsiders.com to get matched with the right franchise for you. 📲 Text or call us at 305-710-0050 with your questions for an upcoming episode. 

From your pals in franchise ownership — Jack and Jill Johnson and The Franchise Insiders team.

Visit www.thefranchiseinsiders.com to subscribe.
Send us your questions for an upcoming episode at 305-710-0050.
From your pals in franchise ownership, Jack and Jill Johnson.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_06 0:10

Hi everyone, welcome back to the We Bought a Franchise podcast. I'm Jack Johnson.

SPEAKER_03 0:14

I'm Jill Johnson.

SPEAKER_06 0:16

And today we have an incredible guest. We have Dr. Arlene Lamba from Glow30. And you guys, something is really happening at Glow30. There is a major movement of existing franchisees that are buying up more and more units. And so as we heard about this, we had to get Dr. Lamba on the podcast. With us, as always, is our team of franchise consultants, Katherine Allen, Carolina Arrosa, and Brian Gross. Dr. Lamba, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining us.

SPEAKER_02 0:44

Thank you so much for having me and for that wonderful introduction.

SPEAKER_06 0:47

Oh, our pleasure. And so our listeners are dying to learn about you and how did this whole thing start? That's it's always so great to get founders on because how did this journey begin with you and thinking about starting this business and maybe tell us about you and what glow30 is?

Founder Story And Glow30 Origin

SPEAKER_02 1:03

I would say that it really started with me solving my own problem. I never set out to create a franchise and I never set out to create a Glow30 system. I was a person who was going to college, had good skin, got into med school, my skin got really bad. And so I want you to think this is like early 2000s now, skincare wasn't at the forefront. I really struggled with finding solutions. I went to dermatologist, I went down the CVS aisle, I did the, you know, beauty counter aisles, aesthetician aisle, what I did all of it. And I kept going through my education. I graduated, became a medical doctor, I became an anesthesiologist, actually, and I was a practicing anesthesiologist. But as I was going along, my skin was getting worse. I studied the skin, I studied the skin cycle, I studied the products, and I saw that there was a broken system and that certain changes in clinical medical grade skincare did not exist. There was no quarterback, there was no health club for your skin, which Glow 30 has become. And I just thought of an idea and I and I and I solved my problem. I moved back to Bethesda, Maryland, because that's where my husband's family was situated, near that area. I said, this would be a great idea to test. I worked in the morning as an anesthesiologist, worked in the PM at my studios. Lo and behold, in 2012, we had a membership model already because we wanted people to come in so their skin would get better, like the Skin Gym or the Health Club for your skin, like a gym. And our membership organically grew. We went from one studio to two to three to four, and now we have 125 developing uh across the nation.

SPEAKER_06 2:34

It's incredible. Do you feel like you're busy?

SPEAKER_02 2:38

I do, but you know, I don't feel like I work because I love what I do. So it's I'm the type of person when if I go on vacation, it'll take me like two days to like stop, like get in the mindset of that. Because I I've been doing this now as a customer and as an operator and as a franchiser for so many years. It's sort of in my DNA. I always say it's like when you're an artist, you study the famous artists or you study the famous athletes. I don't, there's an off time because you're doing your craft, you're doing what you love. And for me, Google 30 has become my sport, to be honest. It's the thing I love to do.

The Membership Model Explained

SPEAKER_03 3:16

I love the skin gym. I love that tagline. That's phenomenal. And I feel like talk to us a little bit about what that means in terms of the membership. Someone who comes in and want to be a member, what does that include? What are the services?

SPEAKER_02 3:34

That's a great question. You know, when you come in, so traditionally you'd come in and you you go to a typical place and you'd say, Okay, I want to get a XYZ facial off the menu, and you'd pay a certain amount. And then you'd come in again when you have either one, an event or two, a problem. And that's how skincare was. And I say, let's flip that. Let's never have a problem. Let's get ahead. Because I'm a physician at the end of the day, and I believe in prevention more than anything. I do believe in treatment, but prevention. So the membership works like this: you come in, we scan your face in our AI scan called Gloria. She will evaluate your skin in terms of health, pigment, um, texture, tightness. It'll give you hydration, it'll give you so much information. We put a number to that, at actually like a heart rate monitor. And we say, Great, you're at this number. Our goal is to get you at X number. So we measure everything. Then you join the membership. Our lowest tier membership is basically what's called a Smart Glow membership. It starts at$99, you pay$99, and every month you come in, me across the system with my team, medical team, has designed a specific Smart Globe facial. So it's not an off-the-menu facial, it's designed. We change and adapt that facial based on your Gloria, which is your AI score, and based on what the aesthetician sees physically. So we we have combined now a provider with AI, and we do a treatment in real time, what your skin would need. And we do it every 30 days. So every 30 days you come in, there's something fresh, there's something new, it's fun, but it's also effective. So I always like to say the Starbucks of skincare, we're making a latte, you're just getting oat milk, you're getting uh, you know, coconut milk, you're getting whole milk, and someone's getting skin. But it's still a latte. It's still a it's still a smarter facial.

SPEAKER_03 5:23

I love that. I because I get a facial probably twice a year. I I go to Skin Spirit, um, which I know they have branches everywhere, but it's probably$250 to$300. And I and that's why I don't do it every month because it's expensive and it's not really custom to me. It's an out-of-the-box, like you said. So I love the concept of first off, the AI piece is great. And I actually tried it at the Francer conference. Yeah, it was so cool. It was so cool. So they did it on me. So I know exactly what you're talking about, and it was phenomenal. Um, unfortunately, they didn't have the back end execution piece, so I could get the faithful, but um it the AI is incredible. Uh, I can say that from you know firsthand experience. And I love the price point is a little lower, like the$99 price point versus you know, the$300 that I typically pay. That would, that price point, I would feel comfortable coming in every month. And and I love it because instead of getting to a point where my skin's like terrible and I'm like, oh, I gotta, you know, I need to come in and schedule a facial, it would be um, like you said, you know, preventative.

Three A’s And No Upsells

SPEAKER_02 6:40

Yeah, correct. So, you know, we created what's called a skin ecosystem. After being in the industry for about 13 years, I've been on the ground for 13 years. So I know the growth has been the last three years in terms of franchise, but I've you've ran units for a long time. And I kind of consider myself the first franchisee of Glow30. And the reason I say that is because I'm a mother of three. I, you know, have uh other responsibilities in my life, and I have to run multiple units. Um, so I was running about four units of my own and I need in different states. And so I needed to figure out the operations fairly quickly so I didn't become imbalanced in my life and my thinking and just go crazy. So I became a problem solver and a systems uh addict. Um, that's what anesthesia really is. It's about systems, and anything that doesn't go in the system, I know is going to deviate us out. So I created a system for myself. It was only later that we I decided that, you know, when we franchise, we had a system and we could now grow that system in our network. And I think that's where our franchisees have been really great at. I would say that one of the first things I did in my system is I formed an ethos. That's what 13 years ago written on a piece of paper. And it was the three A's: affordable, approachable, accessible. They seem really simple, but in every city, those three A's are answered differently. Approachability means something different in an urban environment versus suburban. Accessibility means something different to your provider who works for you versus your customer who's coming to you. And affordability means something different to people who have extra income to have dogs and go to dog parks and pay for doggy sitters versus a mom who's spending her extra income on soccer and dance. So we needed to solve these problems, and anything I bring in a system, nurture in a system, has to solve that. And so that's why the membership was created in a in a almost like no add-ons, no upsells. I've tried those models. Those are not models that go to my ethos and most importantly don't serve my customer or my members. And so I think that it was very important. One of the strongest things I will say about Glow30 is that I ran it independently, without outside capital, myself for about 11 years to 12, 11 years before I franchised it. So I understand a system and a franchise because I was the franchisee. And cost. I understand what cost means to people when they're running a studio on the ground.

Failing Fast And Learning Daily

SPEAKER_05 9:34

And speaking of uh of building that, so I heard you talk on a recent uh interview, which as you're building, you failed at something every day. And kind of mentioned, you know, I still fail at something every day. And I appreciate that transparency, that honesty. But I think that gets back to just one of the things that's so powerful about franchising is getting to build off a business with a team, a founder, other franchisees who have lived in the business, learned the hard way. Um, you know, so I'm I'm curious, you know, you've had very successful studios here in the Washington, D.C. area. You know, 20, 30 locations open, 100 in development. This business is growing very quickly. So I'm just kind of curious what challenges you're seeing today that you're learning in real time.

SPEAKER_02 10:15

I'm always going back to my physician training because I think that's where I learned a lot of it. If you go to a doctor and he says he's never had any complications, then it's probably a lie. Or he's not done enough procedures. So either or, right? So in franchising or in my own operations of the years before I franchised, I failed all the time. I failed all the time not wanting to fail, but it happens. I fail at small things and sometimes you fail at big things, and sometimes there's disappointments. But there's always what's called consistency of getting back up and figuring out and solving the problem. And the reason is is because the customer is ever evolving, ever changing. And so you always have to remember that if you're not looking for the things to improve that you can in your system, then your system will eventually stop working for you. So I actually go and look for the things that don't work. So with franchising, when we were new to the system, we got a really big influx of people. Lots of people wanted to franchise Goal 30. I did not expect that. I should have expected that because year five or four of business, every customer would tell me, is this a franchise? And I'm gonna sound so ignorant, I hardly knew what a franchise was at the time, besides Subway and 7-Eleven. And I'm I'm gonna own my failure on that. And I was like, oh, how dare they say it's a franchise? It's a boutique place, and I've killed it, you know, like and I and I realized that was probably the biggest compliment someone could have given me. And and you know, when we first got into franchising, the first three franchisees, or two first two and three franchises, yes, of different states, were my own members. So once your customer is bought into wanting to grow you, who's moved to Florida and said, Oh my gosh, I want to be the first, and it was a fight on who would sign first to be the first Global 30 franchise, because we, you know, have a number on them. And you know, that gave me so much, first of all, it made me feel great as a founder, but it also gave me confidence that the system was appreciated by the customer. So everything I do is to service the customer. I love my franchisees, I make sure they're taken care of. I try to lead the best way I can. But there are things. The franchisee wants a real estate spot. I want this real estate spot. Then we got to come together. But I want it for this reason. But no, with my 13 years in the ground, it won't work for that reason. And sometimes it's smooth, but sometimes people, you know, want what they want because they're also business owners at the end of the day, also entrepreneurs. It's controlled entrepreneurship, but it's it still is that mindset of it. So you're dealing with people who have been independent for so long, or they're new, but they kind of were like, well, I want it next to this place because I already have a shop there of some other business that's not gonna attract the Glow 30 customer. So something as simple as that, I would say, to be honest with you, was a learning experience for me because I just thought I'm gonna tell everybody what to do, everyone's gonna follow my way, and we're all gonna be everywhere. But it doesn't work like that.

Trends Fade And Wellness Wins

SPEAKER_00 13:16

So I want to touch on something that you said earlier about how customers are, you know, their needs and wants are always changing, right? And clearly, I mean, you're at the forefront of sort of revolutionizing the industry with this whole AI, uh, which I think is amazing. Um, so what other innovations do you see coming down the pipe and in as well as um customers' expectations that you think are changing that are gonna create a huge shift in the industry?

SPEAKER_02 13:44

That's a great question. Um, I would say to you that a lot of people come in this industry because they think it's hot and they jump onto treatments and they jump onto devices and they jump onto the next trending thing. The thing is, trends die. I don't just study Glow30, I study the business of skincare, the business of beauty, which is very different than the operation of a unit. And when you look at a trend, a lot of companies, and I can, I don't want to name anybody's company here, but there's a lot of skincare companies that were trending and very hot, and everybody wanted to invest in those hot companies. But those hot companies were hot for a second, maybe two years, maybe four, maybe some, maybe in four or five years. But everybody had a hot, the hot, the faster you go sometimes, the faster you come if you're not understanding why this is happening. So I everybody sees our growth, like I said, in a way, but it wasn't fast. I wouldn't say that. You know, 13 years in, a lot of people came up with the concept of a facial bar, they opened them, they franchise them. But they don't know what that 13-year-old, how do you keep a member for 13 years? I know the answer to that because I lived it and I have members who can come and we can make a whole room of them, big room, and they'll tell you how. So, what I would say to you is making sure you do no harm. So the customer's getting smarter. AI helps that. The customer can put in any device, any procedure, and say, give me all the positives and negatives and all the 10 year down the right, what can happen? So now you can't just sell sell them random stuff that you think is great. You need to validate that in some way. The second thing I would say is that right now, beauty is shifting into wellness. It's no longer beauty for our aesthetic, it's more for our wellness and longevity. And so, how is your concepts, your ideas marrying those? Generally coming from a medical background, having members for a lot of years, understanding that I will I never created Goal 30 to be a beauty company. I never did and never will. It is not a, you know, I fight that because there's no category for what I created. I'm not a med spa, I'm not a facial bar, I'm not beauty. I'm skin wellness, I guess, skin health. So I would say to you that the customer is a lot smarter than people realize, and I'm glad for it. And I think that they are going to get even better. So when you come up with ideas, what to do, what's the next big thing, I don't jump on things. My franchisees sometimes don't like that, I think, because they want me to jump on more things than I do. But I watch, I study, I wait. I don't think you have to be first to market for everything. And but you have to be smarter to market for everything.

How Gloria AI Was Built

SPEAKER_03 16:51

I just have a quick question to hop into this with the innovation piece Carolina referenced. Gloria being AI and how fast AI is evolving. Will Gloria evolve? Yes. Um I was the first Gloria. You know, that's like, is that is that something that you're gonna that will be updated every X amount of years? Like I already is. She's already being updated. I I knew you were on the ball.

SPEAKER_02 17:18

I knew you were up. She studies you. She studies you. She's already being updated. She already is. Okay. She's a magical thing. And it's it because you know, it's interesting, right? So, how did that about evolution come? Nothing came because I thought, oh, it's AI, let's jump on, it's hot. No, it didn't come like that. Like I wish I could come up with these ideas earlier. I would have been, oh, you know, everything I had to say, fail. Everything I had to fail at to get to this, right? So when I first started Glow 30, one of the things I hated as a customer was when I would go to a facial place or wherever I went, even the doctors, they would judge my skin based on whatever their skin looked like. Oh, you have oily skin. Then someone would say you have dry skin. Then someone would say you're doing this. Someone would say that everybody, by the way, had something else to say. And because I was struggling, I was going everywhere. And then I said, Hey, nobody seems to know what's happening with my skin. Nobody actually measured my skin. Nobody measured anything. And so I was like, why are they looking at my skin? How do you measure your skin? Then I said, How do you measure your skin? I don't even know how you measure your skin. You neither. Right. So so how do you measure the health of someone's skin besides like looking at it? Because that doesn't like my my heart can be scanned, my lungs can be scanned. Gosh, my even my nails can be looked at deeper. So I first started to measure skin by buying this box. It was nothing crazy, but it was expensive to me at the time. I'd turn the light on. It looked like one of those old boxes with a black curtain. I'd look through their face. They would put their face through the black curtain and I would see all the colors light up and I would tell them what their colors meant. This was in 2012. And based on what the colors meant on their skin, I would design month one, two, and three what they would do for treatments. And then that evolved into pH monitors because I couldn't box and do that everybody when we started growing. So we got a pH and hydration monitor, and we would measure their pH by by and the current skin and their hydration, and we would retune it every month. And then I realized the pattern of behavior of skin when we measured what worked, what didn't work, what products, what everything. And then we then created Gloria AI. Because then we realized that we have the technology now to keep up with what we wanted, but I'm always asking Gloria new questions because I want new things answered. And so do our members. And we're always, you're always feeding her data, number one. The more she sees you, the more she knows about you. But then we're also then saying, let's take it to the next step now.

Keeping Members For 13 Years

SPEAKER_00 19:35

And you mentioned earlier, like you keep your customers for 13 years. Like that for me is amazing. Like I'm like having like I rarely do facials. And I always, I guess I always used to see them as if you have a problem, then you go get a facial to address it. So for people who go to blow 30 and they're getting their regular facials and it's finally gotten to the level where it's optimal, right? Because it's constantly, um, they're constantly you're constantly doing tweaks to your facials to get it, um, their skin to the optimal level. Once it's reached that level, like why do they stay on?

SPEAKER_02 20:07

Yeah. Um, one, I was just like you. I was all thought you only get facials when you have problematic skin. And I think probably majority of the people probably thought that, especially in the beginning when I was like, join this membership, and everyone's like, why do you have a membership for this? Like, you get a facial when you the massage is booked.

unknown 20:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:25

So there's two things that I want to say to that question. One is because we're not beauty, we're wellness, we're health. So when you go to the gym and you have optimized your body, are you gonna say, I'm not gonna optimize anymore? Because I'm good now. I wish I could, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

That would be the brilliant case. Whenever AI comes up with that, I'm signing up for that one. That meme that goes like AI took my job, they can take my workout job anytime they want.

SPEAKER_06 20:58

Not the way it works.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

Yeah, that's not the way it works.

SPEAKER_06 21:02

You gotta put in the way you did, and and for all of you listening, there's an important and and sorry to interrupt, but I think it it needs to be said. What you did from day one building this into a recurring revenue business, you told people this is a recurring revenue, this is a recurring deal. You're gonna come here and you're gonna come back. I for one like getting facials, by the way. Yeah, I getting a facial every month sounds like heaven.

SPEAKER_01 21:24

You get more facials than I do.

SPEAKER_02 21:31

You need a Go 30 franchise, that's the thing.

SPEAKER_06 21:34

You know, the aging game is such that that it's not like our parents or our grandparents, like, you know, I'm 50 years old. I I don't want to look 50 years old. Um, it's important, and and we see it all over the country, uh, it and just all over the world. It isn't when I was a kid, the the 50-year-olds had like, you know, blue hair. Like it was over. They looked like grandparents. And um, but now you see it in the aging, the wellness game has changed. We've learned so much. There's and you're right, it absolutely is a massive focus for very qualified investors right now who are looking to get into the wellness space because they see the long term potential. Um, and again, that's where I think going back to you, I think setting the precedent that coming back, and you're right, just like working up, we gotta do it something, we gotta move our bodies every single day. We can't stop. Um, we can't stop having purpose. And so, there again, I think what You did from day one is brilliant because when we look at how businesses are valued, what's the number one thing people bring up to us? They say, I want recurring revenue.

SPEAKER_04 22:35

Right.

SPEAKER_06 22:36

So I just think it's a tremendous thing, and no wonder franchisees are doubling down. And actually, I wanted to tell you something this morning. My first phone call of the day, a new client who's been following me on LinkedIn, he said, I need you to introduce me to Glow30. He's like, My wife and I have been watching that brand. She's a doctor, he owns a home health care uh franchise, and he's like, We love Glow30. And so you, you know, you we don't have people approach us for brands like that very often.

SPEAKER_02 23:05

Thank you for sharing that. That means a lot. You know, we one is that you got it right, that it's really about things have changed, right? You're not in the environment that our parents or grandparents lived in. You have a device called the cell phone that follows you everywhere. And as much information as it is given you, it's also added to a lot of the stresses of our lives, right? Like it's a constant non-contact. Like you always are in motion. So glow 30 means what I always say, uh, when you get a glow 30, you get a sign. It's a very simple, clean sign. I like to say I designed it because I did. And it was what I wanted is your favorite day of the month. And it is. And why is it your favorite day of the month? Because for someone, it could be because my pores are gonna look better. With someone else, it's gonna be because it's the first time I'm gonna be off my cell phone for an hour and no one's gonna bug me. For someone else, it could be because I love that massage, and every time I'm tense, that massage fixes because we have a we have a very strategic approach to our treatment. It's not like a facial like you usually see. And I know because one of the really great things I get to do in my job is try facials from everywhere, right? But the third thing we also did at Go 30s, we didn't just stop at facials. Because if you're just doing facials, you're not doing enough. Why? Because I'm in medicine, I can tell you it's not going to be enough for them in a long-term way. So if you have just facial clients, they'll stay, but they won't see the change as much as they want because eventually they're gonna say, Well, I have a line. So we do a very different version of Botox in our studios of toxin. We do uh a laser for hyperpigmentation and scarring. We do a microinfusion where we microinfuse things like peptides, fillers. Um, we're gonna be infusing other um things in this in the skin coming up soon that we're gonna be announcing because that's advancing. And that's a very interesting field that's advancing in skincare and really, really um exciting. So our ecosystem is a skincare ecosystem that's actually answering a question. If you can't measure it, you can't change it. So if you're just getting a facial, that's great. But if it's not being measured or designed or changed in some way, if you're just doing the same back bar, which a lot of people do because it's easy to train, then that's great. But that's not a 13-year member. That's maybe a year, maybe a couple of months, maybe a year if you're lucky, and maybe two if you have a good location.

Staffing Plan And Ongoing Training

SPEAKER_03 25:32

So so talk to us about the staffing model for a glow 30, based on what you just shared.

SPEAKER_02 25:38

Super easy, not heavy. We're four to five rooms. We like to be a thousand square feet and under. We have a nurse, aestheticians, and a sales lead. And that's how we run seven days a week. So we've we have we we scale up. Um, we start with um, you know, two aestheticians and a nurse and a sales lead. And as the membership scales, we start filling the rooms up with more aestheticians, you know, two per day, stuff like that, three per day, four per day, stuff like that. So it's not a heavy model. What's a training like for them to stay up to date with all these things? Training training is my favorite part because that's what I lead and I love, and because I love the staff. I in I this if they can't, if your staff's not bought into you, one is I want my franchisees to have longevity of their staff. Two is because I want the staff to be bought into the way we think about skin and wellness. Three is because the members deserve it. So we go on site, they come to us, we run modules monthly. Every month, modules are run on the facial, the treatment. We are in constant contact. We have support systems built in for your providers where they can chat to our leads, they can connect, get questions answered. But we can we don't consider training a one-time thing. We consider it a consistency constant thing. And I will say, Brian, I will answer that one question and franchisees who are listening. I'm looking for hands-on, amazing franchisees who all I need you to do is make sure your staff does the trainings, comes to them. We give everything. Your job is just to come in and make sure you do it. And we make it so easy that you can go into our system and you can actually see how much time you know John Smith spent on his training. You can actually see what time they logged in and how much they spent, and if they passed the quiz and how many questions they answered. And you can do that from the beach if you want. But just make sure you do that. That's all I want from the franchisees.

Marketing Playbook And Presales

SPEAKER_05 27:46

One of the things that I think is really exciting about this model, and we see this in Boutique Fitness, you know, MedSpa Space, Glow30, where just that membership model, but getting members in the door, right, and getting up and running. So um, can you talk about the marketing plan and maybe some of the things that have evolved you've learned as you've opened up more and more units to really get that membership up and running really from day one?

SPEAKER_02 28:09

Yeah, so we have uh a uh you know, a system in place. Uh we do marketing on all levels. So I believe in a high-low model. And high means that you market the brand, which is goal 30, and low means you're going local and doing all the local stuff. So I need the franchisees who we give a playbook to to do the local stuff, right? To keep it at. So local stuff never ends because you have to be in the community. And obviously, um, that allows my our high level A to be promoted better, which is like, you know, the big hits. So for some small thing. Um, I'm I I go on Fox Five very regularly. I do a monthly, monthly or quarterly segment with them, depending on my time. And I've been doing it for many years. Um, I do a lot of media, I do a lot of thought leadership on the industry, and I don't just talk about glow 30, but the industry itself, but I do um obviously also talk about glow 30 and our treatments. And so it allows other people to understand us as a GLO30, the entity. Then there's the ground model. But we also have something called a pre-sale model, where before a studio opens, as it's constructing out, the teams can go into pre-sale mode where they will start selling memberships at a certain price for members who want to sign up early. And our goal is to really get that pre-sale model as strong as we can. So our studios are opening with members, books, appointments, ready to go, and then events on the books. So we are very, very uh focused on that. And with that, we've seen each unit. Now the hardest units were the new units, right? Because they were new to a new market and a new area. But then as now our units have grown, Vegas is opening, Seattle's opening, or Westlake, Orlando's open, Texas, many locations are open, Charlotte's, Nashville's open, doing fabulous. So what happens is it's easier as we all become stronger together. Every unit is making all the units stronger. That's what I would say.

Revenue Streams And Botox Membership

SPEAKER_06 30:17

Can we talk about uh numbers? Are you comfortable sharing what's in your item 19 and in your in your item six, uh, meaning investment and and uh and what you guys are seeing in terms of revenue averages?

SPEAKER_02 30:28

Yeah, um, I could say more, I think what we published, I can kind of share off the top of the line. Because I don't live in my like we have a new one coming out, I know, so I'll tell you what I'm already living in the new numbers, so I'm not sure able to share those yet.

SPEAKER_06 30:42

Yeah, if it's not out, let's not.

SPEAKER_02 30:44

I'm happy to talk about those stuff that we have done. Um, you know, basically we want that, you know, like I'll give you an example as I think our unit in Bethesda is our first unit, right? So when we open that unit, we really want um that unit's, I think, on item is doing 1.5, 1.6, somewhere in the middle. Um, and I don't quote me on that, but somewhere there. The reality really is that that's a larger unit, a little larger, more rooms, right? Is that we want our franchisees to be gaining members and be gaining a revenue stream as well. So you have your membership stream, but you're also getting a stream of revenue from products, which we're which we're strong in as well, from other services like Botox. Now we have a Botox membership, just so you guys know, it's at$125 a month, and you get a talks credit and you come in. So people love that. But if they're not in the Botox membership, they can still come and get Botox, which they do.

SPEAKER_06 31:45

And if you don't mind my interrupting, um, okay, so it feels like when when Jill and I go to Botox, and we go like once every three months or so, would you say? Four. Three, four months. And it's usually about like a thousand bucks for us to do it, something like that. Um, so you're saying if we had a membership to to Glow and we were paying the Botox, but would you what'd you say, 150 a month, something like that? 125. How often could we could would that and would that be inclusive of us coming quarterly?

SPEAKER_02 32:15

Yeah, so you could come quarterly easily to do multiple areas for that amount. There's um so I I actually uh I'm I'm a skin nerd, I'm a sort of a nerd. So I created a method of doing toxin called a vapping system called a glow map. Because when I was on the ground, um anesthesia, if you know anything about anesthesia, open heart surgeries, north surgeries, everything's about measurement. And when I saw Botox being done, nobody measured anything. They just said, hey, raise your eyebrows up, boom. And I was like, that's so weird. Like, even when I got my eyebrows done, they have to like measure it because I'm really particular about these little things. And so then I said, and my doctor, my my my uh my customer came, my member came to me and she goes, Dr. Lamba. I went to Dr. So and so, and in January, this is how I used to get customers back in the day, because one of the doctors would do it and they didn't like it, and then they would come try the new guy, and that was me, right? So she's like, Dr. Smith did it in January, but then when I went in June, it looked completely different. Why? That's a good question. And I wondered why too. I was so young, I was barely getting Botox myself at the time, right? So then I was like, wait, let me measure it. So I created a system where I measure their perfect brow shape, forehead size, and I map it and created micro injection technique of how much Botox to inject based on my mapping per the person. Based on how far my my product would spread based on how I make it. It's it's I know it sounds very nerdy and complicated, but that's what I mean. We like that.

SPEAKER_06 33:41

We like nerdy and complicated.

SPEAKER_02 33:43

I mean the 125. Yeah. Yeah. So then I was like, all right, so we did this, it's great. And then there's this unit per unit. Okay, my mom doesn't know what per unit means. Okay, my mom is thinking it's gonna be$9. Like, and they're like,$9 per unit. My mom's like, okay, I'm spending$18 on Botox. Like they don't understand, like new markets, new customers. They're not like Googling this, okay? Because like they're not an instant, maybe they are, maybe some of them are, but a lot of them are not. So I like to say that we get people who want a simple, easy to understand, how much am I going to spend the 3A model? And I said, 125 per area. We're going to do a certain area. Now, if they need like extensive, meaning like they have really drawn out lines, that's two credits, but completely free touch-ups. And they can now do 125 and they can come in once a month because there are some people who do the model of where they want to micro dose. So they'll just do one area and they'll come in once a month and do talks in certain areas or another area here. And there's others who will save their three credits or four, like you guys, and they'll come in every quarter. But you're never dropping a thousand dollars now.

SPEAKER_06 34:53

Can you know? I'm just throwing this out to the universe. What would be amazing is if there could be a glow30 next to an HB protein smoothie somewhere in Bulkover Con for any of you listening.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

We do, we do very good next to smoothie places. I have two really good, strong locations next to them. I have a I have my own real estate mindset on these things.

Who The Customer Really Is

SPEAKER_03 35:14

I don't know. Who is your who is your customer, um, Dr. Lambda? Who who's your target customer? You mentioned your mom. Like, what's the what's your demographic?

SPEAKER_02 35:24

I'm gonna say the most non-business answer because everyone says you need to know your customer. I would say who is not my customer.

SPEAKER_03 35:31

Okay, yeah, I love it.

SPEAKER_02 35:32

You know, and I and I I would I would beg to argue that when in certain like look, there's workout companies that I see out there that their workouts look so tough that I'll never be their customer. I admire their customer, I bow down to their customer, but I won't be their customer. And it's brilliant that they know that who their customer is. But my industry is sort of different because now I'm telling you, I have a$99 membership where I have 15-year-olds, soccer kids, soccer kids, actually, lots of boys who are my members.

SPEAKER_03 36:03

That's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

And then their mom is my member as well.

SPEAKER_03 36:06

Yeah, different stuff. That makes total sense. I mean, I was just thinking of the acne teenage years.

SPEAKER_02 36:12

Yeah, like totally, and they do it together, and it allows them to bond. And it's something you can do. And you know what's I I almost like literally teared up. I'm I'm getting very emotional about my company. So I I had my social media person and she made a video and she said, You got to see this. I said, What is it for for Valentine's Day? And here are these couples coming into Glow30 together, um, buying each other a membership, or just like saying I love glow 30 and getting their like gear and their stuff. And they're like, I come here on Saturday. We go and have facials, me and him. Then we go have brunch, and then we go out for a walk. Or Saturday, Friday night we do this. And I thought about it. What do couples do today for fun? Like when I was young, I went to the movies on a date. But don't go on a movies to a date now. Besides going to a restaurant and maybe working out sometimes, sometimes they don't work out together. What do they do? And Glow30 is filling that space. And I love that. And and I never thought that would happen. But something in us has really related to something in them, and that is a customer evolution. The customer did that. We didn't say, let's make it a couples concept, it just happened.

SPEAKER_00 37:19

But I love that because then it just completely expands your market as well as your marketing, right? Like you could do family packs, right? You could do couple packs because, again, like you said, this is more of a wellness thing because you're not positioning it as a beauty thing. You are positioning it as a wellness thing that can again cater to the whole family and can be with them from a certain age all the way up to the end. So again, creating a clear pathway for them.

SPEAKER_02 37:44

Where where we differentiate, where that changes, and you know, Carolyn, why why it works for us? You get a private room in here. There's not a curtain, there's not like an ER curtain, like you're in an ER zone. My husband's not gonna do that with me. Like, I know that. Like he's not gonna be cool in an open space getting like cryoglobes done while like girls are walking in and getting, you know what I'm saying? Just I would love to see it, but he's that's not. And neither's my mom. Neither, neither's neither's my mom, because it's this the age thing, right? And neither's my teenage son. So when you when you think in a concept of, oh, let's do a cheaper build out, let's do it this way, we'll get X, Y people in, yeah, you will. But you won't change the industry. To change the industry, you have to think beyond the customer the industry is giving you and create your own customer. Starbucks created customers. Coffee, Dunkin' Donuts created customers. Yes, now we all drink coffee, but there was a time we weren't. And so my goal always is I don't want to hunt for customers that everybody else is hunting for. I want to create my own customer.

Brand Focus And Corporate Stores

SPEAKER_06 38:58

Okay, now here's something that's very interesting about what you're saying, because you're right, that the foundation of those two brands. I'm I grew up in California, so I always go back to In N Out. You ever had an In N Out burger before? Okay. You will never see In N Out plastering protein on their sign. You will never see In N Out selling a fish sandwich. You will never see In N Out selling a chicken sandwich. Why? Because they make burgers, fries, and milkshakes. That's what they make. And they are consistent. And if you put an in-and-out next to a McDonald's, it is going to have a hundred times more people. As I see Starbucks, as I see Duncan, Duncan has signs for protein now. These are brands that are that that so quickly try and keep up that they go away from their core essence. And so I think it's very important for a strong brand to obviously stay with the times, but with things like this, I mean, stay who you are. And so you're right, like what Starbucks initially was, now it's this pivot to trying to be everything dev one, like McDonald's has done in Subway and things like that. So that's a hard thing too for a founder like yourself because you want to stay true to your core brand, but you want to make sure that you're also, you know, growing with the needs of your I think that is something I think about a lot.

SPEAKER_02 40:18

And, you know, when you have a lot of uh growth franchisees in areas, some will come up with some smart great ideas, and some will come up with ideas that are good, but they're not necessarily what the brand uh dynamics that I'm going for. I can put 20 things in my cup in my studio and make money. I've I've had other services when I first started, like uh I I did like a massage at some point and I did laser hair and I made money in them, but I stopped. So and I stopped and people were upset and I lost some customers and I gained new ones. I I went through the cycles. And um I speak about the the way the curtains are, the facial part, because I tried that once and I know what that I did it, I did all. Like I did, I did I failed and succeeded at all. I learned from every single thing. But I would say to you, there's two two things different in us. One, um, there is a founder in this brand. I'm not answering to anybody's money right now besides my franchisees and my members. They are the only people who have invested in my company, and I owe them all the answers, and I will come up with great ideas with all of them. So, number one, we already have a wonderful platform. It's our membership. If I wanted to go to my studio for 13 years and say, hey, whatever number of members, X, Y, Z, go give, I want to add these services. Do you want me to? I I could get a poll right now for real customers who would say I would spend it or I wouldn't, and this is the money I would spend. So I I have like an ear to them a little bit more. And they and why do I why would I listen to them? Because they stayed 13 years. And I want them to, I want, they know why they stayed 13 years. But I can tell you that none of them stayed with me because I offered a protein shake, or because I made my service a little extra, you know, sexy looking, or because I offered an IV hydration therapy, or because I did the newest thing. None of them stayed for me for that.

SPEAKER_06 42:05

But that is an advantage to you having a corporate, and I've always said this about franchises. We had it at home care assistance too. We had a corporate location where anytime we wanted to test a new innovation, we did it. And we could test it in-house before we ever rolled it out to franchisees. And I think that those franchises that have corporate locations, or even at least one corporate location, um, it's great for franchisees to know that you're still in the business with them, that you still get it, that you know what it's like to be in the trenches. So I think that, you know, hats off to you for using that and having that and and and having that grounding because I think it's a real sign, a strong sign of a great franchise is to have those corporate locations. Um I mean, I think it's wonderful.

SPEAKER_02 42:46

No, I appreciate it. I think I think that is very true. I think especially I, you know, I have wonderful franchisees in my uh brand that are franchisees of other brands, you know, and large brands, I would say as well. And multi-they're multi-unit franchisees of those large brands. And everything I heard was about the same, like when X happened, they changed and it didn't feel the same. Or it was like a it was a record that I could say everybody had, even from other brands had the same thing. And I can understand how that happened. So I'm not saying it doesn't, but I do think what happened in a lot of those is like they no longer had a corporate store. And once you don't have a corporate store, you don't have boots on the ground, you don't understand that the offer didn't hit right, that the supplies aren't working the way you want, that the music sounds crazy. Now you're depending on something else. You don't have what's like a heartbeat to the studio the same way. And you no longer are a franchisee. I I would say I'm a franchisor and I'm a franchisee of Glow30, you know? But if I didn't have that, I would just be the franchiseur, which is very different.

Final Takeaways And Closing

SPEAKER_06 43:55

You're right. And I think that's really powerful for your franchisees. Like I think we're coming up against our time and you've been so generous with your time, team. Uh, any any last thoughts, questions?

SPEAKER_03 44:06

It's just clear how much you care about this company and your brand, and that really shines through. And um that's exactly what a franchise owner wants. Like if I you know, like you've sold me, but I I I don't have any more time. So I'm unfortunately I would love to, but I don't being honest. But you got Brian, you got Brian over.

SPEAKER_05 44:29

One of the things I would say too, I've had the luxury, I you know, live right in the backyard of where Glow30 was founded. So I've been able to go into a couple of studios, and I'm not a skincare expert, right? I'm not a med spot expert. But one of the things we talked about earlier was just being accessible. And you know, you're not using jargon like units. I was able to go in, do the AI, you know, talk to a real person, and everything was just clear. It was simplified. It was not overwhelming. You know, so I think you know, anyone that's listening, what I'd highly recommend is you can hear about Blue30, you can read about it, go find your closest studio and just go experience it because you'll really see the difference once you walk in.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

Thank you, Brian. That is so kind. That is so kind. Thank you.

SPEAKER_06 45:12

Wonderful. Well, Dr. Lamba, thank you for being so generous with your time. I know our listeners who are interested in business ownership and franchise ownership, they will appreciate everything that they've heard. And for all of you listening, I think she's a great example of doing it right, taking your time, taking your time, but also understanding that you can learn from failure. You can build off small wins. And we talk about this as a team at the Franchise Insiders all the time. The big wins start with the small wins. Do the small things right first, it leads to the big wins. So thank you so much for your time, and thank you all for listening to another episode of the We Bought a Franchise podcast. I'm Jack Johnson.

SPEAKER_01 45:51

I'm Jill Johnson.

SPEAKER_06 45:52

And we'll talk to you next time.

SPEAKER_01 45:53

Thank you, guys. Thank you. Bye. Thank you.