Starter Girlz Podcast

Navigating the Franchise Landscape: Tips and Trends with Jon Ostenson

• Jennifer Loehding • Season 7 • Episode 65

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In this episode of the Starter Girlz podcast, host Jennifer Loehding sits down with Jon Ostenson, a top 1% national franchise broker and CEO of FranBridge Consulting. Specializing in non-food franchising, Jon discusses his transition from the corporate world to franchising, his passion for helping others achieve business ownership, and the diverse array of franchise opportunities available beyond the food industry. They cover the process of identifying suitable franchise opportunities, the importance of following systems, and the unique benefits of franchising, including tax advantages and built-in support networks. Jon also shares insights into overcoming challenges in franchising and the rewarding aspects of his work. Tune in to learn how franchising might be the right path to business ownership for you.

To learn more about Jon and his work, go to https://franbridgeconsulting.com/.

Jennifer Loehding:

Welcome to the Starter Girlz podcast, your ultimate source of inspiration and empowerment. We're here to help women succeed in every area of their lives career, money, relationships, and health and well-being while celebrating the remarkable journeys of individuals from all walks of life who've achieved amazing things. Whether you're looking to supercharge your career, build financial independence, nurture meaningful relationships or enhance your overall well-being, the Starter Girlz Podcast is here to guide you. Join us as we explore the journeys of those who dare to dream big and achieve greatness. I'm your host, jennifer Loehding, and welcome to this episode.

Jennifer Loehding:

Welcome to another episode of the Starter Girlz podcast, wherever you are tuning in today. We are so thrilled to have you. I'm your host, jennifer Loehding. So my guest today is an expert in a unique niche that's reshaping how entrepreneurs and investors approach business ownership. So you're going to get to hear from him in just a few minutes. I'm going to tell you a little bit more about him, but before we do that, we need to do a quick shout out to our sponsor.

Jennifer Loehding:

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Jennifer Loehding:

All right, and with that I do want to make a mention to head on over to startergirlz. com. Make sure you know that that is a Z, not an S Startergirlz. com. There you can keep up with all the latest episodes, blogs that are going out, know what's going on in the community and just keep up with us All right. So with that I need to introduce my guest Jon Ostenson So is a top 1% national franchise broker, investor, author and international speaker specializing in non-food franchising. As the CEO of FranBridge Consulting, he's helped thousands of entrepreneurs and investors explore franchise opportunities. Drawing on his experience as a former president of an Inc 500 franchise system and a multi-brand franchisee, john is uniquely equipped to educate others on franchising and franchise selection. He's also the author of the book on non-food franchising and a thought leader featured in top publications. So, john, welcome to the show. So excited to have you here today.

Jon Ostenson:

Excited to be here, Jennifer. Look forward to jumping in.

Jennifer Loehding:

Absolutely. So let's talk about this, because I know people here that do franchising and there's different kinds of ways to go in. So I would love to know tell us a little bit this whole uniquely position. I want to know what this franchising is for you.

Jon Ostenson:

You know, like so many of our listeners, I spent many years in the corporate world and, you know, helping others build their empires and had that desire to build my own, but didn't know what it looked like, didn't know where to start, how to connect the dots and, you know, was very fortunate to kind of stumble into franchising and quickly realized that franchising is much more than fast food, which is oftentimes what comes to mind when you hear the F word franchise.

Jon Ostenson:

So, long story short, I've had the opportunity to be a franchisor and support franchisees all across North America, as well as become a franchisee myself of a few different brands. I'm now on a stage where I get to spend most of my time helping others explore this world of business ownership, like you said, through franchising time helping others explore this world of business ownership, like you said, through franchising. And franchising is not right for everyone, but for the vast majority of those who are looking to get into business ownership. I just believe that the proposition that it provides training wheels in a way right. It's a much better path for most individuals.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, I know, and I've never been in that space, but I know people that do it. I know people that have run successful franchise. I met a gal the other day that I interviewed, that went into the home healthcare space and kind of crazy story. She went to be a nurse and somehow ended up in that. She sort of does the same thing, but it's just within that niche. So she's teaching people within that specific niche. But I sort of feel like it's different than what I did when I went into Mary Kay 20 some years ago, I than what I did when I went into Mary Kay 20-something years ago.

Jennifer Loehding:

I'm not in that any longer, but when I started that it was kind of like a business in a box for me At that time. I liked that idea. I'm not equating that to franchise, but it's the whole idea of the mentorship and the assistance. That's what I loved about that space because it was almost like I didn't have to reinvent the wheel. They had a brand following, they had sort of this idea and I could come in and make mine. And then, of course, when I went on my own it was like hello, now I'm not in that box anymore, I've got to read reinvent all this and make my own thing. So I could definitely see how franchising could be an attractive model for somebody looking to have something sort of established and have that mentorship and guidance.

Jon Ostenson:

Absolutely. You know to be cliche. You start on third base, right. A lot of the business model has been proven out in other markets. Yeah, but it's so much more than the brand. Again, that's kind of where people's mind goes when you say franchise. Now, a lot of these industries, the brand may not be recognizable. There are certain industries we just don't recognize the companies. But it's everything that goes into the support side. So having a team baked in on the sideline that's supporting you, that franchisor is kind of like a mentor or coach. You've got other franchisees living the same thing day in, day out, exchanging best practices. It creates a community. So you're in business for yourself, but not by yourself. And certainly there's supply chain efficiencies and marketing data that can be shared and other tangible benefits, but some of the intangible, like you said, the support side really goes a long way.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and I like that. You said you're in business for yourself, not by yourself. You know it's funny because I was talking about this the other day. I sort of sometimes kind of miss. I mean I have a community here. We network a lot here in Dallas I'm sure you guys do in Atlanta, where you're at too. So we have a great community and things. You sort of have this like you know you can not, that you recognize other people outside of that community, but you sort of have that uniqueness and that sameness at I'm doing, you know, because now I have to talk to other people, you know and stuff. So I could see that being an important factor Word of line the other day.

Jon Ostenson:

you know, if you're a business owner and you spend time with other business owners, the conversation is just different, right? I mean the things you're talking about, they can understand and relate to you. You're going through the same things I exposed. I'm a member of the Entrepreneurs Organization, so I get exposed to owners of a lot of different types of companies in different industries and it's just so beneficial and a lot of times you can innovate and bring some of their best practices into your industry. And it's interesting, jennifer, a lot of those business owners approach me and say, hey, we'd love to get into franchising. Do you think it's a good idea?

Jon Ostenson:

For some of them they're too entrepreneurial. They want to put their thumbprints all over the business and have to explain to them hey, you think you're the smartest guy in the room, no matter what room you're in. Right, it's not going to be a good fit. But for so many others, like you said, they remember all that hard work that went into their first rodeo. They don't want to have to do that again. They say we'd much rather have a running start and be able to focus on execution rather than figuring out our technology stack and our marketing go to lead generation strategies and everything else.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, marketing can be. That can be a beast. That's one of the areas I absolutely for me personally as an entrepreneur, I absolutely hate it. I'm building out a program right now and I'm at the tail end of it, right, and I was talking to someone the other day that's kind of in a similar, does a little bit of similar work, and he's like, how are you going to market that? And I'm like, well, obviously I'm probably going to put it in my podcast somewhere. I mean, that seems like the most feasible way, but that's the thing you got to think about.

Jennifer Loehding:

And I'm like, beyond that, I have no idea, you know, because I hate marketing, I like to just create and sell things, you know, like I like to make things and I like to to put things out of the world, but beyond that, no. So, yes, I I'm with you on that part of it and that's what I loved being in what I was in before, because the marketing was there. I didn't have to make that brand, you know, or whatever. It was kind of already out there, so to speak. So would love to ask you, because we talk about like non-food, right, and when you said that at the very beginning, I'm thinking like Chick-fil-A and like all these you know food places that are franchisees. So what are some of the companies like type of companies that you guys are working with?

Jon Ostenson:

Such a wide variety. So we work with over 600 different franchises and industries outside of food. These are companies that are looking to grow. They still have good markets to expand into. We're constantly adding to that. So you know it's industries like home and property services, everything from gutters to dumpsters, kind of the non-sexy stuff. But then you have a lot of design components and you know there's some that I'm invested in, this custom pull-off shelving for kitchens and your pantries. You know very non-salesy consultative type approach, you know, but our franchisees are just killing it. There are just so many different design type businesses as well as paint lowering, all your basics, but those are things people will continue to spend on.

Jon Ostenson:

Industries like health and wellness, everything from you know. We just had a client recently purchase a business that has multiple recovery modalities under one roof, so everything from infrared sauna and red light to cold plunge and cryo and you know everything in between. Certainly, fitness is the component of that, but you know testosterone replacement or hormone replacement. You know on the female side we've got a great business coming out shortly that focuses on the hormone replacement side, which is top of everyone's minds these days. Right, you know businesses around, I'd say kids, like youth soccer. We've had clients do incredibly well with youth soccer. Actually, we just had clients purchase trampoline parks in your backyard of Dallas. They're going big purchased quite a few trampolines.

Jon Ostenson:

That was a big, big deal for them. They're former McDonald's franchisees, ironically making the transition from food, but the youth space could be STEM or what have you tutoring youth sports? The pet space everything from grooming to boarding, everyone's got a dog.

Jon Ostenson:

We even have a pet cremation franchise, which you know, takes a special individual to be in there, but margins in that business and it's a needed service. Certainly in-home health, like you mentioned, the senior space, you know I placed probably a dozen clients there last year no-transcript, because people want to age in place. So there's just a lot of the tangential type of businesses that support that as well. So I'd say in a nutshell, the overall theme we're seeing is what are understandable cash flowing businesses that aren't the next trend, the next you know, fashion forward style, but what are things that are going to continue to do well regardless of the economy.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and I could say all of those. You were listening. It's funny because I see stuff on that all the time. I get emails all the time about franchising opportunities and I crack up at them because I have an LLC and they'll be like, hey, I think you'd be good for this and it'll be like cement now maybe pets, stuff like that, because I've got pets and I know that's a big because everybody here has pets. Right, you were taught the cremation when. I'm like that's an intriguing because I know a company here around the corner where we take our dogs for boarding and they do. It's a family-owned business where they do pet boarding but they also do cremation services. They have a cemetery that I'm thinking it's the only one I know in this area that I know that. I'm sure there are more that I don't know about. That's something I'm familiar with, so I could see how that could be a growing area for somebody who is wanting to take that. Not me, I don't want that one.

Jon Ostenson:

Everyone approaches us with a different mindset, something I'm passionate about. Like we just had a doctor in Birmingham that bought a sunless tanning.

Jennifer Loehding:

That's kind of the proprietary elements.

Jon Ostenson:

It's a recurring revenue type business. They of things. Proprietary elements it's a recurring revenue type business. Yeah, they're passionate about it. But then I have others, myself included. I actually have a concrete business. We focus more on the asphalt side asphalt paving, aligned stripings for your parking spaces and wayfinders and parking lots, parking garages. We own all of Minneapolis and St Paul and do very well with that, so you know there are riches in the niches. I've got a business up in New York that provides temporary walls, containment walls around renovation projects and construction sites. That's run by a female.

Jennifer Loehding:

Hey, you know what you never know. Like I met a gal in Colorado I don't know if she has her own business, but she was a former, I want to say, went from like school teacher to, was working in a construction office and then created her own construction company and she's doing phenomenal in Colorado a female construction company owner. So you just never know. Which is going to lead me to my next question, because we're talking about all these different opportunities that are out there. I'm sure you have a process, for how do we identify? Because obviously you've got to find interest, right, Like we've got to figure out where these people fit and what's the best fit. So what's the process?

Jon Ostenson:

You don't have to go into everything. But what does that process look like for you? Yeah, you know we try to streamline it for people. So first off I'll say it's entirely free to work with us. I'm essentially a real estate broker, but for franchises. So we simply get a referral fee on the backend. None of that's passed on to our clients. So it's a nice clean model. But you know of the 600 we work with. So if we start there, these are the franchises that are looking to expand, looking to grow outside of food.

Jon Ostenson:

You know I'll get to know Jennifer in Dallas and you know she'll reach out and oftentimes she's read our book Non-Food Franchising. It's kind of gotten some ideas percolating for her. But you know I'll better understand her situation, her background, what she's looking to do. I take a lot of notes when I get on these calls and that gives us a good starting point and so from there I would then reach out to the companies that I believe could be a good fit for her, based on my experience, based on what I'm seeing in the market. Quickly, that narrows us down from a. You know oftentimes territory is not available. You know that's our biggest challenge is that good markets like Dallas move incredibly fast. But you know. So we would start to narrow it down based on her interest, the role she's looking to play in the business, what's available in the market.

Jon Ostenson:

That brings us down typically to around a dozen or so opportunities, and from there I would then present those to her. We'd walk through them together and oftentimes she'll identify three or four that seem most intriguing. We'd make those introductions. From there, the franchise brand will take her through a series of calls and presentations. She'll even get to talk to other owners within their system. She can hit pause at any given time. We can always course correct and bring in different opportunities based on what she's learning. But what we found is by getting the conversations going, getting the ball in play, that's where the magic happens. That's where she's going to have her light bulb moment and you know she may turn to her husband and say I want to go do this or hey, this would be great for you to go run with. Oftentimes we do see couples do it together, but then oftentimes we see one of the two also run with it and make it their main thing. Everyone's situation is different, yeah.

Jennifer Loehding:

And you have to have a process.

Jennifer Loehding:

But I love that you guys are really doing legwork of trying to figure out where to fit people, because there's nothing like getting into a situation where somebody's trying to push you into something but you don't even really know if that's your fit.

Jennifer Loehding:

I mean case in point, like it's a different story. But when I was looking at tile in my house and you know the difference of having like a contractor come in and then you have somebody that comes in and does an actual presentation, you know and you get to the end of the presentation and you realize that's not even the tile I want, you know, and they're trying to force you into the sale, you know. So I love that you guys. I know it's a completely different story, but it's still a selling process. It's still trying to get the customer to convert and do something right, and so I think that it really gets into this whole finding out what the need of the client is and positioning them in the right place so that you have a favorable outcome on both ends 100% and we hold their hand through the process and we've got funding partners we'll bring in or have a franchise attorney review the agreement for them or have a recruiter help them find key people.

Jon Ostenson:

So it's kind of a you know, end-to-end process. No, I had a client just this past week outside of Dallas that came back and bought an additional youth soccer territory they'd purchased about six months ago. Done incredibly well. That's where I get my validation. That's what gets me excited. When they refer, you know they're good friends to me. It's all about their success at the end of the day and that's our success.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, you can't win if you're not getting everybody else to winning with you. That's for sure. We know that. So I want to talk about maybe some of the because I always say on this show we're real. I like to talk about the good, the bad, all of the things in business, because I think people listening to this think everything's always perfect and, as you and I know, it's not because we were just talking about, you know, prior to jumping on here, my hectic December. You know, I think all of us have challenges, so I'd love to know some of the challenges that you find sometimes in, you know, getting this going, like getting somebody going, or maybe putting them in the right place, anything that comes up for you no-transcript 10 clients that we placed with this and you know they most had done very, very well.

Jon Ostenson:

But we had a client that went out of business and I called the franchise and said what happened? Here Everyone else is doing well. He said, john, we've done everything we can. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. We've flown into his territory, you know, met with him, tried to help him follow the system. We've coached him In the day. He won't follow the system, and so that is. It sounds cliche, but that is so true.

Jon Ostenson:

When I was a franchisor and I saw all these people running the same business across the country, our top performers were those that followed the system, that humbled themselves and said, hey, I don't want to be the smartest guy in the room. So I'd say that is one piece. I myself had a failure a few years ago. I had a business partner. We brought in an operating partner to run the business essentially for us, and this was a very confident young guy and we probably went with what he said a little too often and didn't validate and check the data ourselves on the back end. Instead, we just took his weekly updates for face value and it turns out he didn't know as much as he thought he did and was overspending and kind of put us in a hole and we had to dig out of that.

Jon Ostenson:

My other partner did not get along after that. So partnerships can be tough and you just have to have that accountability and that alignment. The beauty of a franchise system is if you have a good person running that day to day, the franchisor's team on the sideline can really support them and allow you to be semi-absentee or semi-passive. I prefer the term semi-involved because you're still going to be involved. You know, I don't want to sugarcoat it, but franchising does allow for that approach more than just a startup would.

Jennifer Loehding:

Now, this is good, that first part about the willingness to be, I think, the coach, the mentor part, because the work that I do I feel like it's the same thing, like I work with entrepreneurs in a different space. I'm not bringing them into franchise, but a lot of these people when they come to me, they're trying to build their business and it's the same thing. It's like you know, you'll go through and I'll work with them and I always say, like somewhere around fifth or sixth week, if they make it there, we have, like this coming to Jesus moment where it's like, because I'm direct, I get to the point where I'm like saying the same things over and over and then I'm like, okay, we're not moving the needle here and you're paying me, so like we figure out, like are we just not getting this? Are you just not doing it? And most of the time it's that what you're talking about is not the willingness to actually do what they need to do. There's something there that's blocking them from moving. I don't know what it is. It's either they're too entrepreneurial and they want to beat to their own drum, or they just have something that's freezing them and stopping them from making the step right, and so a lot of the work I do is to help them kind of get over that like get through that muck that's keeping them stuck there.

Jennifer Loehding:

But I feel like so much of that happens, and even when I was building teams, what I noticed is that the people that would do well were like that they would just kind of follow the system and meaning that they wouldn't try to reinvent the wheel, they would see what works and they might tweak it a little bit, but they would kind of go the people that you would say do this, and they just go off over here and do something else and you're like what are you doing? I guess you got to learn. You bump your head and then you come back to the path and realize you didn't need to take those 10 steps, that direction. You could have just went over here. It might have been easier, you know. So I really resonated with that when you said that.

Jennifer Loehding:

But also about partnerships and stuff and something we learned you know like you can hire like an accountant, but learn how to do your own taxes, because you're doing business with somebody and if you don't know how to do them, you don't even know what to look for Right, and so if you've least experienced it, you know what to look for. But then you can delegate that off and get somebody to help you with. So I think there's so many points to what you said on that front.

Jon Ostenson:

And the whole tax thing. I've had to move through several CPAs myself because I was the one bringing the ideas to them. I nerd out on that stuff, but then actually it's a good transition to a quick thought that I like to mention. You know, with business ownership for those that are not business owners today, from a tax standpoint, right, you know, I call it the trifecta You've got cash flow, you're building an asset that you can sell. It's not just another job, but you're I mean, the tax code was written to favor the business owner, right? Because the government wants to incentivize us to create jobs and such. So there are so many things like that. I would really encourage people to give thought to that aspect, because I think oftentimes people overlook it.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and I like the kid part. I used to do that with my, but they're all big kids now, so none of them want to work for me, although, funny enough, I was talking about a pet sitting thing the other day with my middle child. She's like yeah, let's do it, let's do a pet thing, you know. So it's funny because when they were little, when I was running my business, I would get them to do things like count, inventory or help me sort things or little things that they could do, and I could pay them and kind of use that. So, yes, I agree with you on the tax, that there's a lot of cool things on that front. So I would love to know what you love about this work that you get to do, because I can tell you're passionate about it. You know what you're doing, so there's something there. So I'd love to know what it is for you that draws you to this.

Jon Ostenson:

Yeah, you know, again, I spent so many years working for others in the corporate world and had a great run and appreciate that. But gosh, in the past eight years since working for myself, I just pinch myself literally every day that I get to do what I do, I get to help others, I get to do it on my terms, I get to be creative and develop processes. I mean, yeah, it's probably why I love franchising is I'm very process driven and so I will say I'm the hardest boss I've ever had. You know, I jokingly say that, but it's also true End of the day. Just the stories.

Jon Ostenson:

I hear the notes I get from clients saying, hey, you've changed my life. Hey, give me this freedom. Hey, it hasn't been easy but it's been so rewarding and I'm now. You know I had a client the other day say you know, I've done all I can on the sales side within the corporate world. He's like, end of the day, I'm capped. He's like I don't know what my full potential is. You know I'm capped and kind of handcuffed there. So you know, I just love seeing people break out, because that's been my story and I've just seen so many case studies of that. Not everyone's intended to be a business owner. I do think the vast majority of people could be with a little bit of help, and I think they owe it to themselves to at least explore it at some stage of their life.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, you'll be surprised, because you know there's like that whole idea. You know, like leaders are made, not born Right, and I think so many times we get hung up on thinking there are certain type of people that should be entrepreneurs. And I think there are people that exhibit leadership, that have stronger leadership skills, but I do think they can be developed. I mean, I've seen people that were this one way and have evolved over time. I think my son, I think we probably all have most of us that have been in the entrepreneur space. We're evolving continually.

Jennifer Loehding:

So I think it's interesting because sometimes I'll meet people in the entrepreneur space and I would have never thought, because I do these interviews, I will ask them like what's their background? Like I studied accounting, true story, and then I got to tax law and I was like oh no, no, we are not doing this. And then I had a guy come on my podcast who ran with Zig Ziglar for 21 years on stage, stage. When he came on, he's like you did not need to be doing accounting, you know. So you will be amazed, like when I hear these backgrounds where people you know like what they were doing previously and how they moved into the entrepreneur space, or they started doing a franchise or something, and it would have just not even seen that coming, because they were doing something that was not, at that time, even close to being entrepreneur.

Jon Ostenson:

I mean, I guess it could be, but it wasn't 100% I'd say close to 90% of our clients end up in a field that was not only did they not have a background in, but it was an industry that was never on their radar. And so that's so much fun for us. And I love that surprise of you know, exposing them, you know, despite their background to hey, we've had doctors and lawyers purchase this type of business. Middle managers or existing business owners get involved in something totally outside. They enjoy stretching that intellectual muscle and they say, hey, there's some transferable skill sets that I can bring over here. Lean on the franchisor for the industry experience. This is a need I see in the market that I really hadn't thought about. But it's like when you're getting ready to buy a white BMW, all of a sudden you notice all the white BMWs on the road right. It is neat to kind of hold their hand through this evolution process of their thinking, but also just the realization of what can be.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and I think, too, you get past this whole idea that you studied in this area and that's where you need to be stuck and you start realizing there are certain things that do really well. It's kind of like. You know, like even when I find this, you know people, you know, like I tell them like their journeys will go from here to here and they will have started here and they end up here. I mean, I even talk about it in my journey, like here, how the skills have all transferred. They're completely different things but the pieces have kind of if you connect the dots, if you were to go from there to there, nothing would make sense. But if you watch the latter progression, you'll see how the skills like you're talking about have been transferable and have landed where people are today or where I'm probably you to all of us, I think you know. So I think it's interesting.

Jennifer Loehding:

I've met some doctors that have gone into real estate I mean completely different, you know or people that were doing this and ended up into something. How did you get into that? Like what led you to that door? You know, like why that? And that's why I love doing this show, because I always want to know, like, what got you to this? And when we're passionate about it, then we are able to convey that over to the people that we're talking to as well.

Jon Ostenson:

Totally. And you mentioned real estate. You know probably two-thirds of our clients invest in real estate as well. I personally do too, and I think it's an all of the above strategy. Real estate you can do things on the passive income side. Here you can do things on a little more of the active income side, which from your tax days you probably remember. Those are two different animals. But I do think that it's all of the above and we're seeing more and more people with a real estate interest moving over to franchising and business ownership now, because you have very low inventory out there in the market and high interest rates and there aren't too many good deals to be had in the real estate world at the moment. So a lot of them are saying where else can I find tax advantage yield as an alternative investment? So we see them moving over.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, I love it. So books, tell me about that. You've got a book. You've written multiples. Am I correct?

Jon Ostenson:

I've only published one Proud of it May publish another one, but it takes a lot of work. But yeah, I'm very proud of it. Non-food franchising came out right at two years ago and I would love to share a free digital copy with all of your listeners if they come out to our website. We try to pack as much content as possible within 90 pages and really help people fill in the gaps in their understanding of what's out there from a franchising standpoint, how franchising works and whether it could be a good path for them.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, books are. I have written one too One, and I never really said you could do another and I kept the same kind of symptomatic thing you do. Maybe I'm not promising, I don't know, I did it. Yeah, I say you have to do at least everything you know within reason, at least once, and then you can decide. I've seen people come in here that have got like multiple, like I'm talking six, seven, eight, nine, and I'm like how did you like have time to do all?

Jon Ostenson:

that, I just that, I just yeah. No, I'm sure it's easier the second round, but yeah, uh, we're gonna let this one run its course. It's still uh positively impacting people maybe one day. But yeah no, I'm with you, try everything once. I went skydiving once and my son's trying to get me to go again. But I don't think I'm gonna say yes at this stage of life I haven't done that now.

Jennifer Loehding:

I don't know if I want to do that one now. I don't know my husband might be with you on that, but I don't know. I tell you, like the Grand Canyon one year and my husband kind of traveled down in there and I was like the whole time was just I couldn't even walk on the outer edge without my heart just thumping, like I was like, oh my gosh, so me and Heights. I don't know about that one, but I'm a firm believer that if you want to do something and your heart is calling you to do it and you just feel that drive and it doesn't do, it's not bad for you, then you should try it, and book writing is definitely not bad for you.

Jon Ostenson:

Amen.

Jennifer Loehding:

So good stuff, good stuff, all right. So the question I want to ask what do you feel like you've learned in this process moving from the corporate to? You've said a lot of good things, so I know there's a lot of takeaways in this, but what do you feel like you've learned about yourself in this journey? You know?

Jon Ostenson:

I learned what I'm good at and what I'm not good at and what I enjoy doing. The beauty of it is I get to kind of design my days. You know I work really hard to myself, but I get to design my days and say yes to the things I want to say yes to. And my first journey into entrepreneurship eight years ago I had a large team. I had 40 employees and had grown that business. It wasn't highly profitable and it was not a franchise and that's part of the reason I appreciate franchises. Now I was trying to create a new business model and ended up winding that business down, didn't have a big exit and it was a tough call.

Jon Ostenson:

At the time learned a lot of lessons. But I also learned about myself that you know I don't enjoy leading a large team day in, day out. I spent too much of my time on HR issues and other topics. So many people are so good at that. It just wasn't my thing. I love being out there at the tip of the spear working with clients, working on strategy. So I feel like I'm doing what I was meant to do day in, day out now and I love it. So you know, unless you try new things like we just talked about. You don't realize what you're passionate about. That impacts what your daily activities can look like.

Jennifer Loehding:

That is so good that you said that. I had a gal on the other day that was a federal litigator, like a trade negotiator for the US government, united Nations Neat lady. But she's also ADHD. You would not even tell because she's not a fast talker, not a you know bouncing all over the place. But it was a good conversation because I had two of my kids have been. I had my oldest, my youngest were diagnosed with it and they were complete different personalities. One was very calm, one was the typical like all over the place Still is to this day.

Jennifer Loehding:

But it was interesting because we were talking about being interest driven and she said you know, typically, she said a lot of entrepreneurs have some of this ADHD and they tend to be interest driven, which I never thought of it that way. But even in the line of work that I do it's funny because I've talked about this all the time I meet people like this that the work that a lot of us do we have to do because we're really passionate about it, we're drawn to it, there's something about it we really really like. You don't have to be ADHD and be interest-driven. But she said that a lot of entrepreneurs are and I think they get overlooked. And this is how they operate, make great, you know, in leadership skills and things like that, because they can make, you know, decisions and all of that.

Jennifer Loehding:

But the big draw in that conversation was this whole interest-driven work and you know I find that a lot when I talk to entrepreneurs is when I ask this question is this, this passion that's behind it? You meet people that are just doing work because they're just doing it, because I think they should do it, but then you meet the people that are passionate about what they're doing and that's the ones that I get excited about, because I can feel it in their voice, I can hear it.

Jon Ostenson:

For me as that relates. I get to see new business models constantly, I get to have relationships with the franchisors, but I'm meeting new people every day that I'm getting to serve and help and understand their situation and then help them broaden their horizons and their mind to the fact that others that we've worked with with a similar background took that step of faith out and here's how they're doing now in this type of field. And so love sharing case studies with clients, helping them expand their thinking, giving them the confidence to take a step. You know, if the timing's right, I mean well, the timing's never right, right to start a business.

Jon Ostenson:

But everyone's situation's a little bit different and it's just so rewarding to see those. I've got so many stories of people that have stepped out and then they look back and say, gosh, so glad you encouraged me to take what they thought was a risk, but I knew it was a calculated risk.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, that would be exciting.

Jon Ostenson:

I always love to hear success stories, so what would you love for anybody to say? Maybe somebody's out there right now listening and they're at that considering stage of you know, maybe I C comes out of left field. So I think, just getting in the game, activity breeds activity. So I'd say it's a very easy first step Just come out to our website, franbridgeconsultingcom, and download a copy of our book, non-food Franchising, and if you'd like to take a next step and book a call, more than happy to chat further. Again, entirely free to work with us. Free to work with us. You're not making any commitments of any sort by reaching out. And what we found is, again, the book's a fairly easy read but helps people kind of get the juices flowing and understand it doesn't make sense to give us more time.

Jennifer Loehding:

Yeah, and I agree with you on that, sometimes just getting things rolling gets the ball moving and even if it's not that specific idea, sometimes it triggers something else and gets you in the direction you need to be. And you know it's a process. I think that everything that we do is like that. But I think you just sometimes have to step out. You know, make that step. So I like all that good stuff Awesome. Well, this has been great, john. I know I could chat with you forever. I've got lots of good stuff there. I like what you're doing. I like the passion behind it, the sincerity, and so thank you for all of your time and your wisdom. We'll make sure, when this gets out, that we get a link in there so everybody knows where to find your company and find you and all those good stuff. Pick up the book, all of that. So we appreciate you.

Jon Ostenson:

Great Thanks for having me, Jennifer. It's been a pleasure.

Jennifer Loehding:

All right To our audience. Of course, we appreciate you as well and if you found this episode informative and inspiring, share, like, subscribe, comment all of the things so we can keep sharing all these fabulous stories. And, as I always say, in order to live the extraordinary, you must start, and every start begins with a decision. You guys, take care, be safe, be kind to one another and we will see you next time. Thank you.

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