The IDEAL Investor Show: The Path to Early Retirement

Episode 70: Expanding Your Portfolio Through Franchising with Marty Greenbaum

February 22, 2023 Axel Meierhoefer Season 1 Episode 67
The IDEAL Investor Show: The Path to Early Retirement
Episode 70: Expanding Your Portfolio Through Franchising with Marty Greenbaum
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Show Notes Transcript

More on YouTube? Check the video version on Youtube

Who is the Guest?

Marty was fortunate to grow up an entrepreneurial family. The foundation of Marty’s business experience comes from his personal involvement in opening of 500 stores, serving as Director of Operations and ultimately as Vice President of Marketing. One of the most satisfying aspects of that experience was the relationships he built with the business owners, helping them overcome challenges, and realize their dreams of business ownership. 

Marty’s passion for marketing and his experience lead him to launch a regional creative agency, Creative Dynamics in the early 90’s. Over the next 10 years the agency grew in billings and stature, working with many of the world’s largest gaming companies, healthcare, real estate, and franchising companies.

In 2004, Marty re-entered the agency business with a 100% focus on franchising. Leveraging his personal experience, business acumen, and talents, he created one of the most respected marketing companies in franchising. Under Marty’s leadership, the firm thrived and assisted many of the most respected brands to grow market share, build unit revenues, and grow their system through tactical franchise development strategies. His experience spans nearly 30 years and he has work with over 120 franchise brands to include: Great Clips, Ben & Jerry’s, Smoothie King, Meineke, and more.

Marty Greenbaum earned the distinction as a Certified Franchise Executive (CFE) years ago and continues to be a passionate advocate for franchising.

Today, Marty serves motivated people seeking to reach their personal and business goals through franchise ownership. As a franchise consultant, he draws from 30 years of franchise experience to help people understand franchising, evaluate franchise opportunities, and make smart business decisions. Simply, he helps people find the “perfect fit” franchise that offers the lifestyle, income, and wealth building opportunity they’ve always wanted. 


Visit Him at: 

Website: https://www.smartfranchiseinvesting.com/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/greenbaum/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/smartfranchiseinvesting

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzv6GQ5hvR1IpREeYT_Ye9g


Freebies: Get Your ULTIMATE FRANCHISE BUYERS CHECKLIST at

https://www.smartfranchiseinvesting.com/podcast/


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Axel Meierhoefer:

Welcome to another great episode for The IDEAL Investor Show where we especially in this new year, we want to bring you special guests that kind of round out the portfolio of diversified investments that we recommend for you to do in addition to the residential real estate, that we are obviously helping and mentoring you to acquire and bid the journey to the time freedom point. So today we have a great guest. His name is Marty Greenbaum, and we brought him on because he is a specialist in franchising and helping people actually get into a franchise. And in a nutshell, what we want to show, you know, you've probably heard a lot about this kind of gig economy, people don't really want to work for the big boss anymore, and that kind of stuff, they want to be independent, they want to do their own thing. And franchising is a great bridge to accomplish that because if you think about it in a franchise, you probably all know McDonald's and Burger King and other franchises. And mighty will tell us about some really, really cool ones that you have the opportunity to get into if you're interested to be your own boss, but don't have to necessarily built a whole business from the ground up because those who bet the business to turn it into franchise opportunities have already done that. So let's have a great conversation with Barney to learn how can somebody who wants to have their own business without having to develop it themselves, get into the game and get going and really become a business owners. Hello, and welcome to another episode of The IDEAL Investor Show today we want to do something a little bit different and for that we have a great guest His name is Marty Greenbaum and we will talk to him about franchising and I was triggered to ask Maori to come on the show because I've heard from so many of our clients that in some way or another, they kind of want to leave the rat race they want to leave what was kinda like the standard way of working the standard way of making money. And Marty is an expert in franchising and hopefully can educate us a little bit on how that actually works. So Marty, welcome to the show.

Marty Greenbaum:

Thanks, Axel. Glad to be here.

Axel Meierhoefer:

So before we tell the audience how they can get into franchising, maybe you can tell us a little bit I always like to start a little bit with the original story. How did Marty get into doing what you're doing?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, thanks for asking. So I started in franchising with my family's franchise business. So I grew into a franchise family as a young man, my family started a brand called PostNet, which are it's kind of like a UPS store where they have the shipping and the packaging and business services. So as young man I was involved in that business, helping open stores, I helped open over 500 stores. And, you know, I had graduated with a degree in marketing. So I ended up moving into marketing, and eventually starting a franchise marketing company where I worked with over 120 brands, everybody like Ben and Jerry's and Smoothie King and Hertz rent a car famous Dave's barbecue, so many different brands. So I've spent basically 30 years in franchising. I owned a significant marketing company in franchising, helping franchise companies grow. And four years ago, I left all that and became a franchise consultant. So now I help people investigate franchising and see what's a good fit for them.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Very good. Yeah, thank you for telling a little bit of their journey and how you came into now helping people directly one thing or one of the stories and situations that has happened, because obviously people come to idea where to go and to me, mainly because they have heard in some way shape or form about our advice on real estate investing. And when it comes to Okay, well, on the one hand, you want to use money that you made and let it work for you. So you don't have to work for it by investing it. But then the other aspect is often also what can I do to increase the income side so that you have more money to invest and when we touched on, okay, one option might be franchising. People ask questions like okay, I heard about, for example, McDonald's, and it costs a million dollars and I don't even know if I'm gonna own the building, so to speak, or if I'm just paying a million dollars for the right to operate and then am I basically flipping burgers. So all this kind of stuff, and I'm just using that as an example. Can you shed a little bit of light, just in the structure component on how franchising works?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, let me first begin by saying I work with hundreds of people helping them look into franchising, and many people are looking to just leave their corporate job and have a different lifestyle and have freedom and not have a boss and you know, and many people Look at this also as a way as, as an investment. So, if I asked most people in their 50s, Have you really gotten to where you think you're going to be comfortable and secure and you know, during retirement, they say no. So it's actually, it could replace income as a job or career. But what franchising also allows you to do is scale. So when you scale and own multiple locations, and hire managers and build your empire, you know, it becomes more of an investment, not just an income generator. So, franchising, depending on who I'm working with, and what their goals are, it could serve as an escape from corporate America, it could serve as a means to generate wealth. Okay. And just yesterday, I was talking to a gentleman, he's a private equity guy with a very high net worth, all right. And you would tend to think that these guys have, you know, solutions to how to build wealth, and they do, but it's funny how they're now looking at franchising. He had a buddy, who was very successful in creating a franchise or joining a franchise and opening up in his market, which was a basically a plumbing franchise, a private equity finance guy opening up a plumbing plumbing franchise, you know, I mean, it may seem odd, but there's a high demand is recession proof, they're scalable, and if he could manage it, well, he still does what he does, and you can, then it's a worthwhile business to get into. So, you know, franchising offers a lot of opportunity. It just depends on what your goals are.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Right now. I think what some people may not be completely clear about is the role of I think you use the term franchisee basically the person who buys a franchise or builds a franchise, what does that mean? Like, let's stay with you example of a plumbing franchise. If I wanted to own a plumbing franchise, and I'm an equity guy. I guess I'm not that great at plumbing. So can you put a little bit like how the mechanics work?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, let me take a step back into you know, franchising and what's the benefits of franchising? Okay, and you kind of brought it up with your McDonald's analogy. So, yeah, franchising is a means to expand business into markets, using other people's money, so franchisors, they're looking to find franchise owners, franchisees to expand their brand into other markets now, for the franchisee the benefits of the franchisee is you're getting involved in a business that's really been figured out really been, I like to use the word distilled down or that notion of, you know, if you have hundreds of franchisees across America, and you have this business model, and they keep on looking at every aspect of the business and improving and building that business to the most profitable, easy business operate with predictable results, right? When you have hundreds of franchisees and they're able to hit certain KPIs. Now you have a business that someone an investor could look at and say, Well, if you have 300, franchisees and you're able to, you know, do this amount of revenue, and this general profitability, that's a stable investment. Now, the benefits franchise companies offer is they're giving you oftentimes a brand that's well known with some degree of brand power, you have an operating system that you could follow, right? They have great marketing, typically, they have technology that you probably wouldn't be able to afford, if you were an independent, they have training and support, you don't have to know that business or ever been in that business before. They'll train you. They're looking for people with certain attributes. Don't get me wrong, there's certain people that would be better in one type of franchise over another based on their personal attributes, capabilities, skills, and things like that. But they train you and support you. And here's what you need to know about why franchise companies do all that. Okay? The reason why franchise companies help their franchisees succeed they have a vested interest in your success is because you pay them a royalty, right? Right. So a portion of every sale, usually 678 percent, depending on the franchise is paid to the franchisor. Okay, so if you're the franchisor, and you have hundreds of franchisees all paying royalties into you, which is recurring revenue, which really, you know, the bigger those payments are, the more successful you are, the more money you make, the more money they make, the more valuable their company is. So, that's why franchising works because you have these organizations that are really Trying to help their owners really succeed because they have a vested interest in that. All right, for someone buying a franchise, you look at all these aspects, do they have great leadership? I really look at the marketing and technology side. I also encourage anybody looking into franchising, talk to existing franchise owners, right and see, you know, see how they feel about it. So, you know, franchising offers tons of benefits, but I will tell you, not every franchise is a great franchise, and that's where I help my clients, because A, what's gonna be suited to your skills and abilities, what's going to be suited to your goals? And what's really going to be great for the area at the local area. So there's a lot of considerations when you're buying a franchise. And like I said, there's a lot of due diligence to do.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Okay, totally understand, and I think it's a great point that you made about, you know, the area and the skill set the passion for whatever the franchise is about. Now, you mentioned that there is a certain royalty fee, that franchisee who decides to get into that particular business that is already tested and has already proven it is paying from the revenue? That kind of drew me back a little bit the question from the franchisors perspective, why would they prefer to do it that way? Rather than just I have a great idea for a certain business and and just keep growing it? You know, like a restaurant opens more and more restaurants? Why would a franchisor rather have this franchise model than the traditional, I just own everything, operate everything. It's all mine, so to speak?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, let's start with an example. So here in Las Vegas, where I live, there was a couple of ladies who started a cake store called nothing. bundt cakes. Okay. All right. And that business for the first 10 years, they were trying to launch this franchise, they didn't have a ton of money, they started a cake shop, do they have millions or 10s of millions of dollars to expand across the US? No, they didn't. Okay, again, it comes back to they get to expand using other people's money. But let's talk about the financial aspect of that. Okay. If you operate a business, I don't know if your audience knows this. But, you know, most business owners, they're going to net a good net profit from a business 20% is a really good strong net profit. Okay, a lot of restaurants, they'll net 10 to 15%. All right, but if you net around 20%. So think about it now this way. Let's say you have a franchise that does a million dollars in sales, and you have to pay a 7% royalty. All right, 7% off the top$70,000 a year. Okay, let's say of the million they netted 10% or 20%. Excuse me. So that's 200,000 of a million, right? 20%. But you have to pay a franchise 70,000. So guess what, the franchise is actually earning, you know, probably 25 to 3030, up to 35% of the profitability. So they're really at 7% of gross, it's a big amount of net, right? So why wouldn't they have a franchise owner who has a big stake in the business, they're using their money? Yes, they've leveraged the systems technology brand of the franchise, but the model is smart for franchisors, the model really works, because they don't have that investment, they gain the royalties now, don't think that the royalties are all profit, because the franchise still has to have the infrastructure to support franchisees. So even though they may get $70,000, you know, in that scenario, it's 7%. royalty, they still have to invest in technology and marketing and this and that, and they're constantly, you know, they have staff, they've got other people look, but they're building recurring revenues. And the funny thing about franchise organizations, they end up selling at a high multiple, very high multiple, so...

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, absolutely. I can. I mean, I know this from my own business, it's one thing, like when we started, we literally had to do everything. And I mean, everything really was a little bit like from a burden perspective, right? I had never done design, so thought about what a logo should be. I've never done anything with a website. I've never looked at a customer relationship management system and stuff. So I've always imagined that those kinds of things, what works for this particular kind of business? How do we actually present ourselves to the market and so forth? It might not appear to be a big thing because those who don't run a business don't ever really see that being done. They just assume it's just there. But it needs to be done. And I mean, there's this kind of analysis See that new business owner had, we had like 20 or 30 different heads, which is pretty much true. So I can see a huge benefit on that. And now since we are typically focusing more on real estate, I can imagine if I was an equity guy with my Bloomberg terminals in my beautiful office, and I want to do a plumbing franchise now. Let's say I'm just super passionate about it. I probably need something right. I need some workshop and probably some place to hear vehicles and stuff like that. So is there an opportunity for people that have real estate to offer that or provided or at least it or how does that work?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, listen, there's two sides to that. First of all, let's say you're looking to get a franchise and you'd like to tie in real estate to that franchise. So there's a lot of different franchises that require real estate. All right. One of the examples I use, I don't know if you have any dogs, but you know, what a dog boarding, dog date,

Axel Meierhoefer:

we have. We've always had dogs in the last year. So we know.

Marty Greenbaum:

So there's some great franchises in that dog boarding space, the dog grooming, boarding and daycare space, where typically is seven, eight to 10,000 square foot building, right? So if I was going into that, and I had the wherewithal to buy a building, you know, why not buy your own building and tie in the real estate and open up this dog boarding business dog daycare business, I mean, that's a great opportunity also automotive, right? If you get into like oil change, or full service, automotive, there's so many great brands, Legacy brands, like, you know, AMCO Midas, and mining key and there's just so many different and then tons of oil change brands. So those are opportunities where you could actually tie in the real estate. Now in regards to most service companies, most service companies will require some type of industrial unit, you know, so yeah, if you wanted by the real estate, knowing the property, sure, you could own the building and operate your franchise out of that building.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, you know, own a dog. I could also imagine, you know, like in real estate investing all kinds of different facets, one facet, just as an example, we touched on a little bit, you know, some people bid and then own storage units, right and half the revenue stream they put a manager in and a few people that basically helped the tenants if you want to move their stuff in and out. So that's one other people do trailer parks, other people do like what we do mainly residential real estate, some do apartments. So you know, I can imagine I mean, as far as more or less under the what's called commercial real estate, you know, where somebody says, Well, if you want to start a plumbing shop, like you mentioned, and you probably need something that can serve as a warehouse where instead of having to buy it, you can rent it and then somebody else can own it. It's a similar model. Now, when you said Okay, so let's assume 567 8% of the gross revenue is going into the royalty. What can somebody who is in the early stage and says, Hey, I really find this an interesting thing, I have this passion in me that I've always been kind of suppressing, because I was afraid to wear these 50 hats and have all these burdens and nobody that can actually hurt me activate this passionate in some way. How would you go about this, Marty, if somebody were listened to us and said, Okay, I've always wanted to fill in the blanks now that I know money is out there. How would that look like?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, let me start by saying, you know, most people that come across franchising, they'll go online, and they'll start looking and when you start searching, you're gonna find these online directories with 1000s of franchises. Okay. And the problem is, most people they don't know how to judge, you know, is this a good franchise? Is this not, you know, what's your reputation? What's your strengths, what's weaknesses? So it's problematic to kind of make those decisions, you have to spend a lot of time reaching out to a lot of franchises to understand, like, what's going to be the right fit for me, plus many people, they'll reach out to franchises and then they'll be talking with franchise salespeople that are going to be, you know, really just selling them or, you know, and walking them through what their franchise is all about. What I do and how I work with clients is quite different. Okay. So what I do is I first and foremost, I learned about people, okay, I want to know what Hey, we're what's your background, then? What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? What specific skills do you have? You know, are you more operational? Are you more sales driven? Right? We talked about their goals. Where are you at now? Where do you want to be? What are your goals in five and 10 years as far as building wealth? Right, right, right. We talked about the market. We talked about it, you know, is there anybody else in the family going to be joining you? Right? Are you gonna have partner So you're gonna have your wife join you? Or do you want something to grow? That you can have your kids take over at some point, right? You know, so we get into the detail and I help them develop their criteria. Okay, the next step is I have helped them really determine out of all these types of franchises, what could be a good fit for them. So I've created this PowerPoint that I use in a zoom. And I basically, I share with them 25 different industry categories, everything from food to fitness, to senior care to automotive to it. I mean, I walk them through various categories of franchising, and I share with them, hey, here's a typical investment. Here's some of the attributes of this type of a franchisee you may not know, but this is a very semi absentee business. This one has recurring revenues, these tend to perhaps cashflow sooner, okay. But you know, you may need a lot of employees, this one, this one, you have the, you know, low employees to start, you could scale easier, it really depends. But, you know, imagine someone brainstorming through these different categories with you, you may know some things, but a lot of things you're gonna be like, Wow, I didn't realize that about that type of franchise, maybe I would be interested in that type of franchise. And ultimately, as I go through each category at the end of each one, as I share things with them, I say what do you rate that one to 10. So as we get through those 25 category, and they categories, and they've given me their rating, after we've discussed it, now I have the preferences. So if I understand who they are, and what their criteria is, and now I understand what they've kinda like, and where they see themselves, because most people, they're going to picture themselves in the business, they're going to make these decisions based on, you know, emotions, they're going to make the decisions based on past experience, right? So they're going to kind of let me know where they stand with these different categories. And from that, I'm able to effectively do my research and come back to them with some really good recommendations. So, you know, and then that's just to get to first base, by the way, that's just to identify, Okay, what franchises could make sense for you, right? And then there's, once I do connect, my clients were franchise companies, then it's, Hey, what is the proper due diligence look like? Right? Because, I want...

Axel Meierhoefer:

So basically,

Marty Greenbaum:

I guide them.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Hold their hands throughout the whole journey, I guess, if I interpret that, right?

Marty Greenbaum:

Yeah, but I never I'm not here to sell them. Right. I don't pressure them. You know, it's more of education, it's more of guidance and counseling. And, and, you know, I, it's, it's, you know, the way I make my living doing this is very similar to real estate agent, where you don't pay me my clients don't pay me, if we find a brand that makes sense for them, they go through the right due diligence, I'll never pressure them. But they ultimately come to the determination, they really love this franchise and feel it's a great fit for them in their community, and so on, then I make a referral commission from franchise companies all be the same. So, you know, so I'm, you know, I try to be a resource, but I will tell you, I was in business myself for, you know, 28 years. And this is a big decision for people, I give it to them straight, I help them learn. And ultimately, it's their decision. But I want to make sure that they get educated and they know what they're getting into.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, and that's exactly why I was so intrigued to bring you on, because that's kind of like our model as well, we're not real estate brokers or anything or money brokers or anything, we have basically gone through a journey to reach what we call the time freedom point, I can tell you the story, I can explain the story. But the biggest beauty on the whole thing is that I have obviously, as long as we had the business developed all these relationships, and they are available to our clients. That doesn't mean that I say you have to use this lender or you have to buy this house or so forth. But they have that and obviously much easier opening of doors and relationships than doing it all on their own. So I think we're very similar in that. Now before we come to the end. I want to touch on one thing, because I've seen so many times whether it's real estate investing world or starting a new business or go into the gig economy, that there is a little bit of this perception of taking the plunge and I heard you mentioned in between the lines a little bit. It can be very hands on but it can also be somewhat hands off. So is there a way where you can describe a little bit how the transition can look like if we proceed? Yeah, I can see myself go from whatever they do right now to earn an income To hoping that my franchise and demo will work, can you give a little bit on, like a softer way on how that could work?

Marty Greenbaum:

You know, when you say that I think of, you know, everybody that I work with is going to have some degree of fear and anxiety. Right? I mean, so taking the plunge, right, right. So that's in that and I kind of prep them upfront, I want to say, Hey, listen, right now you're learning, okay? Let's not like worry about it too much. Let's just get educated, right. But as we get closer to making those decisions, it becomes, you know, quite tough. But, you know, listen, sometimes you have to fight for your goals, right? I view people they go on to, they're on a journey on a path, right? And they could be working for corporate America, they can be some may be in another business that's not quite working the way they planned or wherever they may be, or they're doing well, like my private equity client that's doing well and just wants better, right. But eventually, you have to decide is, you know, the only way for you to get to your goals is art is to get onto another path that's going to take you there, right?

Axel Meierhoefer:

I agree with you. I mean, I find so many people who, in a sad way, I would actually say have concluded for themselves. Well, when I was younger, when I got out of college, or even when I was in high school, I had all these ideas, what I would want to do with my life, and I had these passions, and I always loved something right, fill in the blank, what I always love, but I was afraid it wouldn't make money or it was peer pressure, I was too young or whatever, and then ended up going into a certain career. And you know, so that's one one way I believe is that there is a suppressed passion that ultimately says, Okay, I want to be let out of my cage, I want to live into this. And I want to really make it happen. And that the other part, like you said, you know, like building confidence, I always try very strong to get people in what I call the creator mindset, rather than seeing themselves as risk based victims of the circumstances of the environment of politics of whatever the economy, but really being in charge of their life. And that has a little bit to do with maturity is where the mind is, in my opinion, and experience is much harder for people to do this, if they don't inherently already have it when they're younger. And as they mature, it becomes a little easier to do that. So I really appreciate that, you know, I have you on the show, because it is I'm very, very convinced the whole paths, especially when it's changed. And humans, I think we both agree, really have a high resistance to change because of the associated fear, to know that somebody like humanity that is willing to take them by the head and see how far they can take this potentially suppressed passion and interest that makes it so much more comforting, right? And I want to really thank you for explaining that to us.

Marty Greenbaum:

Thank you. Well, listen, it's all about once you go through your due diligence, and you start checking off the boxes, you start realizing, hey, wait a minute, I can do this. The big thing for people is gaining their freedom, right? Gaining their freedom, being able to work on their terms, not having a limitation on how much money they can make and where they can take their lives. And, you know, listen, we're all into this to improve, not just our lives, I just had a discussion with my buddy yesterday. It's really about our family, right? It's really about how do we create security and comfort for our family in these times of indecision, right, or in these troubling times of where we're at and with the economy and everything. So sometimes you just have to make a change, be strong, be determined. It's never easy, but you push through it. And that's how you see these people that own, you know, 10 McDonald's or 15 of this or 20 of that. I mean, it's crazy what people have been able to accomplish. I do want to say, because I kind of talked about the costs of franchising. The fact is, though, if you get with the right franchise, franchises tend to be first of all, they're more secure, less risk, because they have proven performance, okay? And the fact is, is most franchises outperform independence, where the average independent 80% of Independent Businesses will fail and within five years, franchising, you have 234 times better success rate, I think it's supposed to three or four, so you have a better success rate. You have support, you have a community of other franchisees to you're now out in and alone, imagine having three other 100 franchisees that know your business intimately? And will you could reach out to other franchise owners that are successful and say, Hey, I'm having a problem with this. What do you do to fix that? Or where are you?

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, no, I totally I think that resonates with our audience a lot. I mean, it goes back to the very beginning, I guess we're coming full circle, you call it at the very beginning kind of like a distilled business, right. And obviously, a distilled business is better than the raw input that goes in. And that's, I think, a great analogy to somebody who just has an idea as passionate about and wants to start a business. That's why 80% fail in the first five years is because they underestimate all the things that you need to be good at, or reasonably good at to make it work. While it is still business obviously has gone through that already, if it's worth turning it into a franchise. So I think that's great that we basically came back to why that is such an advantage. So at the end of the show, I always ask every guest the same two questions I want to ask you as well, Marty, the first one is, if you could meet anybody past or present, who would it be and why?

Marty Greenbaum:

My grandfather, okay. My grandfather was an incredible man, very successful business owner in Chicago, started working for a printing company and eventually became the owner of that printing company. And now at this point in my life, I'd love to have another conversation with him.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Okay, we'll ask them if all the rumors are true, and other myths.

Marty Greenbaum:

I lost my grandfather, you know, when I was too young, you know, now that I'm a different place, I'd love to have another conversation. But I come from a family of entrepreneurs.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, that's very cool. Yeah. I mean, now that you mentioned, I would love them to if I could, because my grandfather gave me a lot of these kind of single sentence statements that I remember, to my surprise, I don't know why maybe out of respect or something, like, you know, never trust a statistic that you didn't manipulate yourself is one of those. So, and I would love to be able to go back and say, Hey, Grandpa, I can't even tell you how many times you were right. Even though when you told me I had no clue.

Marty Greenbaum:

What I have to have a discussion with him at this age, part of my life, where I've gained a lot of wisdom along the way, would be much more valuable than when I was in my 20s and didn't really be I wasn't able to have those conversations.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, exactly. perfectly right. Now, the other question, the last question is, if you had a time machine, you could go anywhere you wanted to, you know what, you know, you're not allowed to change the time space continuum, obviously, when where would you go in line?

Marty Greenbaum:

I love history, I was always into Greek mythology. So going back and into Greek mythology, you know, probably 1000 ad, I just, I just love Greek mythology and that whole area. So just, I've traveled through Europe, and just love the histories and love, love to be in a simpler time in life. Now, I know, everything wasn't simple, you know, but you know, everything's moving so fast lately. And it gets more as we it's so funny over the last 1520 years, it continues to get speed up. And I think it would be wonderful to be living in the past where it's a lot simpler, and we wouldn't have all this going on, you know, it would be such a different lifestyle than today.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, I hear you. And I can't imagine, although I've always been wondering, you know, like, if you have that many different gods, but all kinds of stuff. You know how much work it is? Keep in mind,

Marty Greenbaum:

the only the only problem about some of the past is there was still conflict, there was wars, there was terrible things happening. There were there were plagues, but you got to find, you know, I'd have to do some research. But I'd love to find a more simple life where we just didn't have this. You know, we weren't always going every second of the day.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Absolutely. I mean, for me, I have, since you mentioned Greek, right, like, Greece has a couple of particular very special wines. One helped me greatly when I got to meet my wife of many years now because I introduced her to something called Samos. And it took only tiny little amounts, change her work and perspective of me. Immediately Suzanne was in very fond memory. But you know, instead of the things you read in history books, where it's I believe mainly the description of the authorities and the gods and the kings and the Emperor us and what have you. I've always because of that that's why I mentioned the wine. Imagine the opportunity to talk to one of those winemakers who supplied the pellets or stuff like that right more like somebody that would be fascinating to see how do you live life in an era like that without being you know the one of the few that ended up In the history books, so, very cool now that we answer those two questions, and obviously we are kindred spirits with similar interest when somebody says okay, I still find it intriguing not necessarily learned everything there is ever to learn about franchising in one podcast. But Mani seems to be a good guy I want to get in touch, I want to see how I can maybe make a first step discuss my goal is how do they do that? And how do they get in touch with you Marty?

Marty Greenbaum:

Well, my company is smart franchise investing. So my website smart franchise investing.com is a great place to start my emails, Marty at Smart franchise. investing.com. So I welcome anyone who wants to have a chat and explore franchising, feel free to reach out to me, I'm here to help. I'm not here to sell you a franchise? You know, I'll educate you. We'll we'll see what makes sense. And yeah, I mean, I love working with people. I love what I do. Now, I'm very fortunate to, you know, be in a position where I get to help people with their future. So I'm happy to speak to anybody.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Yeah, that's wonderful. And all those links and email and stuff, we will put in the show notes. And one thing I want to mention at the end of the conversation, but first of all, Mary, thank you for your time early in the morning. The second thing I want to mention is if you're one of Marty's follow us, or if you're one of our followers and listeners, what you can really do to help this show is instead of just clicking it, to let it run and listen to it, if you can download it, because we have recently learned that downloading the show makes a huge difference for the rankings. And you would help us greatly if you download it and then listen to it. It makes really no difference. I don't understand why that's the new thing. But I wanted to at least mention it so mighty grateful for you to come on to tell us how franchising works. And I hope at some point we can do it again.

Marty Greenbaum:

Thank you. Pleasure being here.

Axel Meierhoefer:

Thanks for listening and I hope you enjoyed today's episode of the The IDEAL Investor Show more info and the links we mentioned during the show in the show notes or you can go to our website at Idea wealth grow a.com and sign up for the Apple podcast link. And if you'd like to talk to me sign up for a strategy call. Hopefully you want to share what you learned with your network and bring more people in we're really eager to hear your comments and until next time, be well stay safe and ciao.