Michael O. Browning Jr., Founder and CEO of Unleashed Brands, the leading youth enrichment franchising platform, was a featured guest on the Let's Talk Z2Zee podcast with Louie Picazo, CFE. During the episode, Browning discussed the founding and success of Unleashed Brands, which manages the top-rated youth enrichment franchise brands in the country, such as Snapology, Urban Air Adventure Parks, and The Little Gym.
Browning shared that he started Urban Air in 2010 to create a place for kids to celebrate special moments, connect with other kids, and escape their everyday routines. In 2014, Urban Air opened its first franchise in Wichita, KS, which led to the creation of the Unleashed Brands platform that supports franchise businesses. Browning and his team looked at all the systems, processes, and procedures they had built over the past 10 years and realized that they had a platform that knew how to sell, design, construct, open, operate, market, and support franchise businesses. They decided to support the enrichment of kids and landed on this niche as an extension of the Urban Air business. Browning saw an opportunity to consolidate the fragmented youth enrichment market and create a platform that serves the number one asset in a family - the kids.
Picazo and Browning also discussed the importance of finding the right extracurricular activities for kids and how Unleashed Brands is dedicated to providing enriching experiences for families that align with their values.
Browning highlights the importance of creating strong relationships with customers and employees, as his businesses are service-oriented and employ over 20,000 young adults. He emphasizes the need for franchisees to possess a love for people, as conflict resolution and customer service are important aspects of his businesses. He describes the process of filtering out non-qualified franchisees and the importance of maintaining a support system for franchisees to ensure their success. The company has a dedicated department for franchise sales and operations and a ratio of one support staff member for every five franchisees.
Browning stresses that the focus is on supporting existing franchisees to make them successful, rather than just selling more franchises.
Transcript:
Louie Picazo
Welcome back to Z I'm your host, Louie Picazo. We are now at episode 19. If this is your first time listening to this podcast we are a franchise podcast that is focused on providing information To Z by Z's. So let's talk ZZ. Today I have a very special guest here on Z to Z. He is the CEO and Founder of Unleashed Brands. Their portfolio of brands is the top-rated franchise brands in the country. Snapology, Urban Air and The Little Gym are all but a few of the top-rated brands he and his team manage. I had the opportunity to speak to Michael and he provided insight on what makes the Unleashed Brands franchisees successful, so let's take a listen.
As I mentioned, I'm excited to have Michael Browning, founder and CEO of Unleashed Brands on Z to Z. Michael, welcome to Z to Z, Sir.
Michael Browning Jr.
Hey, thanks for having me. Really appreciate it.
Louie Picazo
Not a problem. It's, you know, it's a pleasure to finally have you. Like I was mentioning to you before heard a lot about you, never had the opportunity and the pleasure to meet you. And it's great to finally talk to you and be able to learn about yourself and about Unleashed Brands.
Michael Browning Jr.
I'm looking forward to diving in. Let's do it.
Louie Picazo
So for our listeners who don't know about you or Unleashed, tell us about yourself, where you're from, etc. And then tell us how Unleashed Brands came to be and why and about Unleashed brands business model.
Michael Browning Jr.
Sure. So originally I started Urban Air Adventure Parks in in 2010. It’s really when I had the vision and you know I was looking to create a place that would help kids celebrate special moments in their life, you know, connect with other kids offline and escape their everyday….just play. I started that, had a lot of success with family-owned units here in Dallas/Fort Worth and through that success attracted people who wanted to franchise that business. So we opened our first franchise in in 2014 in Wichita, KS with John Becker who is still a franchisee of ours today and has six Urban Air locations and so we cut our teeth with Urban Air build, you know, learning how to build systems, processes, procedures and a team that could support franchisees and really put franchisees in a position to deliver the best customer experience possible. We grew that business, Urban Air business and then COVID hit and during the shutdown of COVID, I told the team, I said I don't believe we've come this far to just come this far and where there is turmoil there will be opportunities. So, what I wanted them to do is go back and look at all of the systems, processes, procedures, everything we had built over the last 10 years and let's take a look at it. And when we when we came up from that exercise, what we realized is that we had built a platform that knows how to sell, design, construct, open, operate, market and support franchise businesses. We just had to determine what other franchise businesses we wanted to support, and we landed on supporting the enrichment of kids, which was a great extension off the Urban Air business.
Louie Picazo
That's great! Now I did some research like any good podcaster you should do. I did some research and a lot of this really stems from the fact that in one of your videos, you have kids. And at the time when you shot this video, they were young. I think you had one that was just a toddler. If not at that point. And you kind of wanted to have a place for them to go and play and have fun and learn, right?
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, you're so right as a parent, when we were allowed to come out of our homes from COVID, it was really like a reset for all the families. And we were trying to figure out in our home what we were going to do with our three kids at the time. We had a an 8 year old and we had a 5 year old and then like you said we had a toddler and what I learned As a parent, Googling where to put my kids in the market was very fragmented And where there was fragmentation, I saw a consolidation opportunity and I began to study consolidating platforms like Neighborly and Driven Brands and how they serve the home, how driven brands, services automotive and I said and nobody has put a platform Together, that serves the number one asset in a family……The kids.
Let's do let's do that.
Louie Picazo
Behind great ideas, great businesses, Great business Models and it's great that you looked within your own family unit and found an opportunity from a from something that you couldn't solve at the time. You know during that pandemic it was a crazy time, obviously, and I have two kids myself, but mine are older. They're 15 and 18 and for my for example, my daughter, my oldest daughter She has been in dance since she was like 3 years old and still does it today. And so my youngest, my 15 year old when she was younger we had her in different things and dance and everything and it was just almost like hard and strenuous to find exactly what was fit for her and What was around our values as a family.
And I think that is important when you get your kids involved in something, it's not the activity per say But it’s what that business stands for and I think that segways into what I believe You guys call your 3 pillars of success. I just added the success part of It but learn, grow and play. Right.
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, absolutely. We believe no matter a kids race, origin of birth, religion, every kid needs to learn the basics. Science, technology, engineering, math. They need help identifying and growing in their skills and hobbies. And then they need the opportunity to be a kid and just play. Those 3 pillars are so important. We believe that that every kid has a name. Every name has a story they're writing, and that story is about a journey of a kid trying to reach their destiny. And at Unleashed Brands, every destiny matters, and we're trying to play a small part in the story of that child's development and trying to make an impact through Our fun, engaging, and inspiring experiences.
Louie Picazo
Yeah. Yeah, I could definitely hear the passion that you have in in, in the brands that you brought in that are surrounding those three, those 3 pillars. If you will and now switching over to the brands and know that's an important aspect and that's something that you deal with from the time You get up and the time you go to sleep. Right. You know you probably dream about it too sometimes about the different brands that you currently have and the ones that you want to have. And one of the things that I really liked about also when it comes to the brand and the pillars. The learning, the growing and the playing. Right, but you also Have the 9 core values that Unleashed and your brands must follow as well, right?
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, absolutely. Core values are important. We hire and fire by those core values here as a Home Office team that gets up every day and supports our franchisees and we look for those core values in the franchisees that we award franchise and it's important. And you know, for example, we, believe that we can have fun and find joy in every situation. And that joy is not found on the mountain top. But it's found in the journey that we believe that we've got to be synergistic. So, we work well with our team, our teammates at the Home Office And our franchisees to find a way to help them accomplish their goals and objectives, and. Really it's very, very simple.
As a franchisor, our job Is to build the team, the systems, the processes and the procedures to put franchisees in a position where they can deliver the best customer experience and when they deliver the best customer experience, they do two things through Unleashed Brands, they make an impact on their community and they build wealth. And our goal on the wealth side for franchisees is for them to earn cash flow create cash flow every month for the fruits of their labor, while also building the value of their business so that when they go to sell that business someday, they can sell it for more than they invested in it or they bought It for. And that's what we get up every day to do through what we believe is the World's best business model the franchise model.
Louie Picazo
Right, right, right. And you know I say this all the time I've been in franchising, you know, over 25 years and you know what I learned is You can train somebody how to Operate a business and how to construct a business. And sell but You really can't train anybody on their values and the personality right. I'll just give you a sample of what's what I'm seeing here is authentic, synergistic communicative, innovative, gritty, you know, fun. All those things are innate in our DNA and You learn you know a lot of the stuff you learn as you grow as a person. But a lot of them are innate in your DNA and it's important to really as a franchisor to understand what you're bringing into that particular brand Because if you don't, and you probably know, please speak on this….If you don't do that, you're in for a world of hurt down the line.
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, it's important because what everyone has to understand is it's really, it's a relationship with your franchisees. You know, we as a franchise are bringing a tried-and-true business model and we want innovation But we need to make sure that that innovation is replicable Across the system. And we want franchisees to be successful and because really, you know, I tell our staff here all the time at the Home Office, I say we have no registers here. We make the money that we need to pay our operating expenses at the Home Office through our relationship with franchisees. We have to put our franchisees in a position to win, winning means driving top line revenue and winning means making sure that a large percentage of the top line revenue drops into profits and when we do that, then we get paid a royalty and that royalty is what pays our operating expenses. What pays your salaries. And so you got to get up every day thinking about those franchisees on the front lines who are delivering the service to the guests.
Louie Picazo
Correct, correct and It's important to really streamline and structure that process that way because you know it's not all about the bottom line. I mean, at the end of the day. Yes, I mean we are in this business to be profitable. That's the end goal. But in order for that to happen you have to have the processes and in place. What does that qualification process look like At Unleashed Brands, if a franchisee wanted to get into one of your brands?
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, it's a great question. So, we have an 8 step process that we go through and it's pretty rigorous, right, again we, we do not take for granted that somebody is wanting to sign up for a minimum of the next 10 years of their life with us and we also don't take for granted that we are looking at someone to carry the torch of the brand in their community. And so it's very, very important. So, we have an 8 step process where it starts out with just an overview of goals. This is their opportunity to learn more about us. We want to talk to them about What their vision is for their family, for their future, for their business, understand their why. From there we do a deep dive into the brands, and it's how does how does the brand's vision and brand's goal and the unique value proposition of the brand line up with the individual's desires. We then go from there into a request for consideration phase, this is more kind of some of the like confidentiality agreement, stuff like that where we start really getting into the nuts and bolts and diving in. Then we say, OK, looks like that you know our values align, our goals align. You understand the value proposition. We think you can carry the torch for the brand. Let's start looking at your qualifications financially and is there a territory available for you to steward, for you to run the business in? And then if those two boxes check and those qualifications financially obviously vary significantly from brand to brand inside of Unleashed cause you know they they're different CapEx models but From there, they move to the reviewing of the franchise disclosure document, right, we want them to review that they need time to review that. And then after they review the franchise disclosure document we have them attend the Launch Day. So today for example, I was just in a room With over 40 potential franchisee candidates where they're here, they're going to be in the brand's hands on. They're meeting all of the members of the executive team and senior leadership team at Unleashed Brands that supports all of their brands. We share meals with them. I'm having coffee in the morning with them at the hotel, in the lobby and just to get to know them, because again, this is A relationship that we are going spend together for the next 10 years. So, after launch day. They'll go through a final validation process from a banking perspective and then they sign the franchise agreement and we're off to the races.
Louie Picazo
That that's great. And really you're creating, you're creating substance and ultimately you're creating a relationship. A relationship, as we all know, is not just superficial It has to have such substance In it and. I think that's. Exactly what? What? What you're creating and really getting into the into the into the substance of it, of it all, to create that relationship that you want. We talked a little bit about the qualities you know the values and the core. But you know what other qualities do you think that Unleashed looks for in someone that's interested in your brands? I mean is there anything that we have already not spoken about.
Michael Browning Jr.
It's funny, absolutely. Like there's a lot, but I, but I'd love to focus on one. We're in the people business, right? All of our brands are service oriented businesses where Mom and Dad are the customer, but kids are the users. So you really have two audiences that you need to serve. On top of that we employ over 20,000 young adults across the franchise locations here in the United States. So we're in the people business. So I always tell them if you don't like people and you can't handle conflict and you can't speak truth, you can't support people, then this is not the business for you. Because when you think about it, even on the customer side, we'll have 25 million visits this year to the various franchise locations across the country. Of those twenty of those 25 million visits, even if we had a 99% customer satisfaction. We'd still be dealing with 250,000 upset customers. Now We don't want a single upset customer, but as we all Know with the Law of Large Numbers, stuff happens. We make mistakes, so they have to be willing to admit when they're wrong, make it right with the customer and not let it ruin their day, their week or their year. They’ve got to be able to rebound in a people business and continue to carry the torch and make an impact in their community. So, love for people Is so so important.
Louie Picazo
Yeah, and it that comes across the board in anything and everything you do. You know we can't do business we can't do anything without communicating with another person without engaging with another with another person.
So how do you filter out those non-qualified Z's that can't make the cut. What does that Process look like?
Michael Browning Jr.
It isn’t one single thing that would cause us to, I mean other than maybe a background check like they didn't pass the background check. That's a pretty quick cut. But You know, it's a combination of various things and at Unleashed Brands our Chief Growth officer, Josh Wall who's one of the best in the business, gets the feedback from everyone who has or is going to be Interacting with that franchisee over the next 10 years and so there's a scorecard process where we score them on core values, we score them on our experience with them at Launch Day. And so there there's a mathematical process that allows us to take a bunch of variables that we think drive franchisee success and quantifiably score them so that it makes it a little easier to understand if this person would be the right fit for us, or if we'd be the right fit for them because again, Just because someone isn't awarded a franchise doesn't mean they did something wrong or they weren't the right Fit. It could have been something along the lines like we're not the right fit.
That's how we Look at it. We are honored to have a room full of over 40 people right now wouldn't even be allowed in the room if they weren't financially qualified and hadn't had success in a prior business venture or, you know, corporate job. So, to have that type of qualified candidate in the room is an honor and we don't take that lightly and so we put in a lot of effort to get to know them And make sure this is right for both sides.
Louie Picazo
Right, exactly. And now so now that you have the 40 people in front of you in front of you, you know they're in your office, they're kind of talking to your organizational staff. Talking about your organization, your structure, how is that structure set up to support these new Zees in This case these 40 Zees that are coming through. How do you support that?
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, great question. I've always taken the approach, and this has come from people who have been mentors in my life, that we've got to have departments or divisions in the organization. One department focuses on new franchise sales and then a mutually exclusive department focuses on franchisee operations and support, and it's important to maintain a ratio of support. So, for example we have 1 Home Office support staff member for every 5 franchisees in our portfolio, whereas you know industry standard is around 1 Home Office employee to every 25 franchisees. So, we really, really emphasize support. So, we have Fran Dev, right (Franchise Development). Which their job is to sell the franchise and get that franchisee open all the way to grand opening. Then there's a handoff to our operations team, our compliance team and marketing who get up every day thinking about how to support the existing franchisees and make them successful. And if we never sold another franchise again, this particular team isn't even compensated based on that. And so they get up every day caring about supporting franchisees by building those processes, those systems, those procedures and the team to help franchisees win.
Louie Picazo
That is key. You know the purpose of a new Zee coming in and a lot of them have never been owners, they've probably been executives. You know, high-ranking executives at their careers, and they've been at this for 20 plus side years and now they're switching the chapter, turning that page into now becoming a franchisee within the system and the beauty of that is they're not creating the widget right. They're coming into a business where they’re being supported 100% and they want to know and that's that is what they're buying into. Yeah, they have to love what they do and what that brand is doing. You know, whatever that brand may be. But at the end of the day, what they're depending on is that support and that support has to be key, and that support has to be structured properly so that you don't have to have continuous problems down the line with Zee's having that disconnect, right.
How are you preventing that? What do you do to help close that gap?
Michael Browning Jr.
Yeah, it's a great question and it. It all comes down to, in my opinion, franchisee engagement and input. And so you've got to put the infrastructure in place that allows franchisees to be engaged with the Home Office with the team and so the way we do that is, we set up a peer elected Franchise Advisory Council, so they meet quarterly and they provide strategic input to the Home Office and they help us prioritize areas of focus that are important to the franchisees that elected them to the Council. So that's number one. I think it's very, very important. So an FAC. Number two is creating subcommittees, so these subcommittees have a Franchise Advisory Council member on it, along with a senior leadership team member from the Home Office, and then any support staff Needed. These subcommittees meet monthly and they dive into key business areas of the business such as product and curriculum, technology, sales and operations, retention, engagement, marketing, finance and accounting. This is really, where the rubber meets the road. So in the tech subcommittee, they'll talk about hey You know, we need to change the makeup class feature or you know for some reason, we need to change the self check-in module and that is really where the rubber meets the road. So you have FAC and subcommittees. From there we also host monthly system-wide meetings, so this is where you're giving them a review of the month, you're casting vision for the next month. You're giving them a heads up around Has spring break shifted, what are some things to be looking for, macro trends and then between the system-wide meetings You have biweekly newsletters and then at Unleashed Brands because we are multi brand and a lot of our franchisees like 8% of them have more than one brand and 57% of them have more than one location, we host quarterly all franchisee all brand town halls. Then the final thing is, you've got to put a system in place to be able to track their needs and support. So we use a ticketing system called Zendesk that allows us to track their requests and identify hot button areas where we need to deploy or improve systems, procedures or hire additional team. So that’s the multiple legs to the franchisee engagement stool and how we do it.
Louie Picazo
I mean, that's very impressive that you have all these systems in place to support and really identify where there's gaps in in in this system or potential gaps in the system, right? And you want to be able to cover those as quickly as you can because, you know, at the end of the day, we talked about this or you talked about this earlier, at the end of the day, you want these franchisees to be successful and profitable that that is the bottom line. That is why they chose the brands. That is why they went to Unleashed from the first place and that is the ultimate core, because at the end of the day you want to leave you, As a as a founder/CEO, and them as the franchisees want to leave a legacy we all want to leave a legacy.
What would be the best advice that you have to a new Zee coming into franchising so they can Be a great Z? What advice would you give?
Michael Browning Jr.
The first thing I would say is follow the system. There is a recipe for success that a franchisor should be educating you on and it's very important to first follow that recipe, get your reps and get some success before you try to innovate or change anything. I always use this metaphor when we were all in, you know, middle school learning algebra, you can only solve for one variable in the algebraic equation. It is very similar in franchising. If you start introducing new variables, too many new variables in the recipe, you cannot determine what is making you successful or what is making you unsuccessful. And so, too many times we will see that franchisees, whether it's in our brands or other brands that we hear about, they don't follow a recipe or they try to boil the ocean by changing too much, too fast and then they can't figure out really what's driving it. So I think that's First and foremost right out of The gate. Then for me, you've got to love the journey. We try to tell people that, you know, problems are just mile markers on the road to our destiny. And that there's no such thing as two good consecutive days in a leaders life. And so if you're always prepared to deal with a mile marker on your journey, then you don't get too rattled when something pops up and there's always a solution and being a part of franchising allows you to tap in and talk to the Home Office or talk to other franchisees who have dealt with your same customer issues, system issue, whatever it may be. And then the third thing I would say is be engaged with your franchisor. Franchisors need franchisees input. We want to hear from franchisees. And we want to connect with them. That's why Unleashed Brands, we try to own and operate corporately, every brand that we have in the portfolio, so that. We can talk to. Franchisees on an equal level and say, hey, yeah, I hear you. We're having that same problem at our corporate units or Yeah, yeah, that does work great, we tried that too. Let's Put that into the operations manual and you roll it out, so engagement is so important, and it just it makes the relationship so strong.
Louie Picazo
Yeah, no, 100%. And I think that it is this is this a journey you know franchising and getting into it, whether or not you're starting your own your own business from scratch or you're going into a franchise. In this case It is a journey. And you, Michael, I appreciate you. Thank you very much for being on the show.
Michael Browning Jr.
It's been an honor. Thanks for having me and look forward to connecting more in the future.
Louie Picazo
Michael. me too. I appreciate that very much and we will talk to you soon. Thank you again. Thank you for being on Z to Z.com. I appreciate you have a great rest of your day and we'll talk to you soon.
Michael Browning Jr.
You too, take care!
Louie Picazo
Thank you, Michael, for providing great insight into what makes a franchisor and its franchisees successful. It was great to speak to Michael and I'm sure we'll have him back on the show. As always, you can listen to ZtoZ on Spotify, on your favorite podcast platform, and please remember to always like, subscribe and download Z to Z. As always, I like to end the podcast with. A favorite quote. “You don't build the business, you build people, then people Build the business.” Zig Ziggler. Thank you for your continued support until next time.
About Unleashed Brands:
Unleashed Brands, currently includes portfolio brands Urban Air, Snapology, The Little Gym, XP League, Class 101, and Premier Martial Arts and was founded to curate and grow a portfolio of the most innovative and profitable brands that help kids learn, play and grow. Over the last 10 years, the team at Unleashed Brands has built a proven platform and know-how for scaling businesses focused on serving families. Its mission is to impact the lives of every kid by providing fun, engaging, and inspiring experiences that help them become who they are destined to be. For more information, please visit www.unleashedbrands.com.