Franchise or Start From Scratch? How Founders Can Choose the Right Path to Grow with Max Emma

Thinking about buying a franchise, franchising your own business, or just staying solo? 

In this episode, Max Emma breaks down the real decisions behind each path through the lens of an immigrant founder who lost everything in 2008 and rebuilt a global franchise from scratch.

📌What’s covered:

• How to decide if you should buy a franchise, franchise your business, or keep building solo as an early-stage founder.
• A real-world framework for telling whether a franchise opportunity actually matches your strengths, personality, and lifestyle goals.
• The mindset shifts that turn a painful business failure or bankruptcy into a launchpad for your next level of growth.
• Practical insight on building a global remote team (across multiple countries) without ending up working 24/7.
• A fresh way to think about freedom, lifestyle design, and abundance so your business supports your life (not the other way around).

Max Emma is a Certified Franchise Executive with over two decades of hands-on experience in the franchise world. From providing bookkeeping services to over 100 franchise brands across the U.S. through BooXkeeping, to building his own bookkeeping franchise, to guiding aspiring entrepreneurs as a franchise consultant, Max is a seasoned expert in all things franchising.

🌐Learn more about Max Emma https://www.franchisewithmax.com/

🚀The Founder’s Voice Quiz is the foundation for a client attraction system that works with your strengths, not against them. 

💛Share with a friend who would enjoy this conversation.

Thank you for listening in! See you next week.

Transcript

[00:00:00]

Should I buy a franchise, franchise my business, or just keep grinding on my own? This episode is your Decision Lab. Welcome to the Entrepreneur's Kitchen, where we turn real Founder journeys. into practical playbooks for the purpose-driven entrepreneur.

Today we're unpacking, franchising and global teams with someone who's lived every side of it. My guest is Max Emma, a certified franchise executive with over two decades in the franchise world. He's gone from arriving in the US with no English to corporate finance, to losing everything in the 2008 crash Rebuilding.. Launching Booxkeeping and ultimately turning it into the only bookkeeping franchise of its kind in the United States. Now he's run multiple businesses with team members in 10 countries. 10 countries. Did you get that by design?

Not by accident. In this conversation, we're gonna dig into how to [00:01:00] know if buying a franchise actually fits your strengths and personality. What most founders get wrong about franchising their own businesses, the right way to build a global team without working 24 7, and the mindset shift Max had to make after bankruptcy to design a business that supports his life, not the other way around.

So, if you're a founder who wants growth and a life that you are proud of, this one's for you. So let's get into it.

Priscilla: Max is a seasoned expert in all things franchising. I'm so grateful to have you on the podcast. Max. Please let us know who you are and what's your mission.

Max Emma: Hi, Priscilla. Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure. So as you said, my name is Max Emma. I came to the United States. 33 years ago, almost from the former Soviet Union and started my journey without any English in a brand new country. And after getting my degree and four years of corporate experience, I just decided [00:02:00] that.

I want to be entrepreneur. I had no idea what it was, but I wanted to work for myself and started the business and had many businesses, some successful, some not so successful. I strongly believe what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. So I learned a lot and one business led to another. And after a series of businesses, some of them were successful and I was able to sell them.

I started my own bookkeeping company called Booxkeeping, which in a few years we franchise and now we are the only bookkeeping franchise in the United States selling our own franchises. And then few years after that, I also opened a franchise broker. So if somebody's not a good match for bookkeeping, I help 'em to choose over 600.

Different franchises. My services are completely free. Only if they buy, they get, I get a commission from a franchisor, which I'm sharing part of this commission with the candidate, and also paying for nine months of their sales trade.

Priscilla: That's amazing. I'll take you back to the beginning, max, you came. [00:03:00] To the US from former Soviet. And I find with immigrants, one or two things happen. Either they take off and they say, well, immigrants see opportunity everywhere. Or it's the opposite. They long for what was and fail to launch in a new environment.

What do you think? Um. What's your mindset? You know, maybe some people who are listening are not moving to a new country. Maybe they're moving to a different state. Maybe they're trying to enter into a new industry. Maybe they're trying to get a job in a different place. What is the mindset to really launch into something new?

Max Emma: So I was 18 when I came, and it's not that I had a huge experience working experience in Russia. So my mindset definitely was bring it on, I can do it. I didn't have a choice. I moved here with my family, but I was the only one who was barely speaking English. I came with my parents and. Two of my grandmothers, they did not speak any English.

So on top of finding a job and going to school, I also had to [00:04:00] translate for them and take 'em to all the appointments. 'cause not too many people in San Diego spoke Russian. So we didn't have a choice, obviously. We didn't know what AI was, so we couldn't do Google Translate or anything like that.

Even internet did not, pretty much barely existed. So I had to take him everywhere. And, I understood that I don't have a choice but to succeed. And so I definitely had a mindset that immigrants will get the job done. And I couldn't understand why people are complaining about how hard the life is.

I'm like you have so many opportunities, just go get 'em done, and the opportunities were out there, you just had to go and grab 'em. The biggest challenge for people was they had to make the first couple moves.

Priscilla: That's so true. The biggest challenge is to just get moving. And I can imagine you as a teenager and you've become the trusted translator advisor, and shifting from, typical teenage life, what was that like?

Max Emma: It [00:05:00] was literally happened when we crossed the border at JFK. That was, I just remember, 'cause even though I finished one year of university. Back in the Soviet Union, my parents still treated me as the little kid. And back in the early nineties we were living with parents and, we were like the kids, I had curfew. Obviously it wasn't 8:00 PM and I could come home late, but it was unheard of me not showing up and not letting my parents know that I'm not gonna be spending the night. I could have just called and say, Hey, I'm doing whatever, but I had to call. And then all of a sudden when we crossed the border, it changed.

Now they're listening to me. They were dependent on me, not so much financially, organizational language wise. My older brother already was in the United States, so we came to him, but he was working, he had his own family, had a little baby at home, so he was. Even more busier than I was.

It was a very interesting [00:06:00] change. And again, growing up in Soviet Union, I didn't really have to work. I was a student. I was making a little bit money here and there. It was enough for me. I lived a great life and then everything changed. I had to go. My first job was busing the tables at the restaurant, and luckily I got out of there fast enough.

I got a job at Costco, but again. You just had to make the first steps. I probably would get stuck there because I couldn't find any jobs. I was going door to door like, Hey, do you need help? Do you need help? Couldn't find anything. And then I got a job at this restaurant and then there was an old lady coming to the restaurant to eat pretty much Monday through Friday every day at 4:00 PM And I just was talking to her.

'cause for me it was a practice for my English. And I was nice. I was smiling and she, , always was talking to me. And then after a month or so, she told me she's working at a Costco across the street and I knew that it was almost impossible to get a Costco 'cause they [00:07:00] were paying 50 to 60% more than everybody else was paying.

And they were giving benefits upfront. And, all the Russian immigrants were saying it's impossible to get there. And as, so I was talking to her and she said, oh, I'm working at Costco. I'm like, that would be great. For me one day to work there while I'm going to school. She goes, do you really wanna work there?

I'm like, yeah. She goes let me see what I can do. So she comes back in a few days. We have an interview in two days. So I go in and. Literally, it turned out that her late husband was the guy who was helping. Back then it was Price Club, which became Costco. Later on through the merger, her late husband was the best friend of Solomon Price and he was helping him to get all the land for all the price clubs in San Diego.

And so she was working there since day one. So she just talked to the manager, said, you wanna talk to this guy? So I came in barely any English and they hired me. And I spent five years working there making really good money. Getting all the benefits and they were even giving me scholarship to go to school.

Priscilla: Wow.

Max Emma: Yes. Talk to this lady. I mean that, that's [00:08:00] it. And I had no idea. I was just nice. I was nice to everybody, she really helped me.

Priscilla: That's the first lesson already. , Talk to people, everything you need. There's somebody out there who can help you, but you actually need to talk to people. And then from this, the entrepreneurial bug hits you and you decide, okay, I don't wanna work for people, I wanna work for myself.

And you said several. Businesses before Booxkeeping. How many? Several. 'Cause I want the audience to have an idea. You know, maybe you're on your second business and it's not going well and you're thinking, oh, let me throw in the towel.

Max Emma: I almost threw the towel and I'm happy. I did not, so I worked for. One of the largest employers in San Diego at a time doing corporate accounting and finance doing really well. They were gonna pay for my MBA, but I was just not liking corporate life. I just didn't like doing the same thing day in, day out.

Like I was always making a joke that I was constantly kissing the wrong butt and, I was just not good at it. And, I gave him two big notice and I left and joined a small family [00:09:00] business. Which was like a landscape maintenance route with three employees. And I joined, I learned, I didn't know anything about landscaping and I grew it from three to 96 employees and we became a landscape construction company and we were doing really good until eight or nine hit and we lost everything.

And because in construction, the United States, you have to personally guarantee all the equipment. I had to declare not only business bankruptcy, but personal bankruptcy as well. So with one baby at home and one on the away, we were left with absolutely nothing and we were gonna start from scratch.

So my wife, she was four or five months pregnant with the second baby. And I was just looking what to do and honestly, I thought about giving up and maybe entrepreneurship is not for me. I'm gonna go back into the corporate world. Luckily for me, nobody was hiring. 2008, 2009 in the US there were no jobs. People were getting laid off. There was a real estate bubble, so it [00:10:00] was pretty nasty. So I didn't have a choice, but start the business again and, in that case it was landscape maintenance, way smaller, but we were more successful. We were able to sell it later on.

And while doing that, we were talking about the need of having a bookkeeping company. I had a bachelor in finance. I. Called myself a village idiot. My wife had masters in accounting, so we both understood it, but we were so busy growing the business, we didn't have time to analyze or even prepare financial.

So we like, it would be nice if there was a bookkeeping company and so at some point when we couldn't find the one that feed us, we created Booxkeeping and we started running from the garage. She was doing the work. I was getting the clients while running the other company, which we eventually sold and concentrated on bookkeeping, and then few years in and between, we had different consulting businesses and this business and that business.

There were several, but the major one was the landscaping business, then landscape maintenance business, and then Booxkeeping that [00:11:00] eventually became a Booxkeeping Franchise. So I'd say. Close to 10 businesses in different capacity, but the major ones, I would say about four or five.

Priscilla: an interesting journey and, , so much at stake when you have a family and such things happen. Like you said, that you were very lucky that no one would hire you. , When you look back you feel lucky, but I'm sure in the moment when you're like, oh, I need to go back to work,, and you're thinking, oh gosh, what do I do now?

I suppose it's fate. Max tell us you're running Booxkeeping with your wife and you realize, okay, this could be a franchise. How did that happen? What was the thinking process?

Max Emma: So it's actually even more interesting, Priscilla. I'm running Booxkeeping with my ex-wife now but we are still, working together. We are doing really well and we just, not husband and wife, but we are co-founders and, we talk to each other all the time. She's now a professor of accounting she's got her PhD in Barcelona, Spain.

I live in the United States. One of our kids live in Barcelona. One [00:12:00] kids lives here in the us. We work together really well and. The idea of franchising. We actually started doing bookkeeping for some franchises. One, then two, then three. And I started going to different franchise conferences.

And I was , around franchisors and I really like being around these people. I like the way they talk to you. Everybody wanted to help. Everybody's nice. I always give this example, but I saw it personally, when. Two main competitors of largest franchise brands. Each has over 2000 locations.

We're sitting next to each other at the bar, having a drink and talking to themselves. They're direct competitors. They go after the same talent. They go after the same clientele, literally for the same market. But yeah, they're talking and they're sharing and I'm like, wow, that's awesome because people believe in abundance.

This whole thing of abundance and abundance mindset, that it's enough for everybody and the world is [00:13:00] huge. It's not just, I need this piece, this is awesome. And I always was telling myself, when I grow up, I wanna be like them. And I guess I've grown up. And we decided to franchise Booxkeeping.

But the idea came, I literally woke up with that. One morning I literally came up to me in the sleep. I know it sounds weird, funny, whatever it is, but it's true. So I was visiting my office in Philippines and I was in a hotel in Manila, and I woke up with this idea. Why don't we franchise Booxkeeping?

And then, I literally went downstairs to a coffee shop in the hotel. I remember every time I go there, I go to the same place and I sit down and I like just, I get new ideas coming in and I just literally started writing it down. The first few formulas were on napkin. I wish I saved it then, I started doing a notebook and then eventually we made a business plan and franchise the business, but the idea literally came to me during sleep

Priscilla: you've lived a very interesting life. I'm picking the few [00:14:00] things I know about you so far. I said this should be a movie.

Max Emma: Hopefully my life is not over. I'm not ready to just, give it up yet. I think I have a lot in me. At least I hope I.

Priscilla: I hope so. I'm sure you do. Max. , Tell me you've come up with this idea, you've got the business plan because a lot of people are thinking, oh, that's a big leap, how to prepare a business for it to become a franchise. And maybe if you can give us sort of some stories to kind of give someone a picture of what those first steps when you've got your business plan in hand and you're going after this.

Max Emma: So the first step was to admit that I don't know what I don't know. 'cause it's one thing working for franchise, it's another thing franchise, as a concept. And a lot of the things that I thought would be. Working. They were not working. I'll give you a good example. So one of the things that you do when you create a franchise, it's so-called brand manual.

So that really becomes the Bible for the company. It's everything. So it's the process is technically, the idea is that once you read it all, you can do the whole [00:15:00] business. So it's business from A to Z. Of course there is a practical training in every business, but technically the idea is that it's all in there.

And so I found a company that, that was their specialty. They were helping to put brand manuals together. I'm like, I'm not gonna pay them. We know all of that. We created the business. It's successful business. We're gonna do it ourselves. So I got the team together, started doing it. After doing the outline and, starting working on it, we realized that we have about 30 pages total of everything that we know.

And I'm like, you know what? People not gonna pay us money for the franchise fee for 30 pages of stuff. There gotta be more. And reluctantly, I did hire this company once they were said and done, and most of it was them interviewing us to get information from our heads. They got over 600 pages. Okay. 600 pages, 30 pages.

So that's a huge difference. So that was, i'm glad I spend this [00:16:00] money, so I'm glad that I talked myself into that even though it was a lot of money, but I did it. But at the same time, we did a marketing plan, but very interesting fact, the day we got permission to franchise United States was day we went into lockdown, just with my luck.

So it like literally happened in March of 2020 when the US got shut down on Tuesday. And on Tuesday I got the email. as you can imagine, for the first year and a half, if not two, nothing was done. 'cause I had offices across the world. I had to make sure if we think in the U.S. we got shut down hard.

It was nothing. Like my office in Barcelona and office in Philippines, they couldn't go outside more for than 30 minutes. A day or something like that. We could freely go anywhere. Yes, we had to wear masks, but it was different. So we had to move them from the offices to home. And at sometimes at night, we had, they had to sneak out and get the computers and move it and get the, it was a, very interesting process.

So my point is, we did the marketing plan, which I paid somebody to [00:17:00] do. Also a lot of money. We didn't use anything because when we came out of COVID, everything changed. So nothing that was working not nothing, but most of the things that were working before were not working. So it would have to be done completely.

So that was a waste of money, but it was a great experience that, now when I do part of my business portfolios, I do franchise consulting, I went back to school, got my certified franchise executive. Designation and I help people to franchise their businesses or to buy franchises, but when I help 'em to franchise, I just tell 'em, you know what? I think this piece and this piece you can do yourself. This one I can help you. So you don't have to make mistakes that I have. And that's why you want to hire consultants. It's not that you know you want to, they'll know everything. They just know. What to do and what not to ultimately, you may up your own decisions.

I'm not saying right now I would not do a marketing plan Right now, marketing plan has, I'm sure it looks completely [00:18:00] different from, what was done five, six years ago. But now I already know a lot of that and I have marketing company working with me. I have a PR company working with me, so they my partners in that.

So I don't really need somebody to give me a plan because they're ultimately doing that.

Priscilla: Yeah. It's interesting because, you thought 30 pages was everything that you do, but I'm sure you took for granted some of the things that it's obvious . It doesn't need to be written down because surely someone will know to go from here to here and 30 pages and 600.

That's a huge lesson for, ' entrepreneurs sometimes we try to do everything ourselves. And the value of experts and finding consultants and people who have that specialized knowledge.

You're talking about offices in Barcelona and Philippines. You are from Russia, you are living in America. And I'm thinking how was this happening?

Max Emma: I also have an office in Columbia. My executive assistant is in El Salvador, and then I have somebody in. India. So between three businesses that I [00:19:00] running currently, I have people in 10 countries.

Priscilla: Um.

Max Emma: Okay. So we are as global as it gets. Okay. Which makes it a lot of fun. 'cause I'm learning from these people and I'm meeting new people, I'm meeting new cultures and it's awesome.

If I would not have office in Philippines, I probably would never go and would not fell in love with this. Beautiful country. Columbia is relatively new for us, I'm going in about a month and just right before our podcast I was just researching a restaurant where I'm taking my team for our holiday dinner and it's like really awesome that get a chance to travel and absolutely love it.

So it's Interesting The downside that everybody works in different time zones. So sometimes, it's late hours, especially for my team, but most of everybody is working the US time zone which we made it except the Philippines [00:20:00]office. Everybody else is working US time zone and , that was done by design.

So we have life after hours because, I know the companies that literally the CEO is working around the clock, and I refuse to do that because this is not ultimately my goal. I want to enjoy life. I love what I do, I'm definitely seeing more values in life than just, working 24 7.

Because I don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow with me. I am on a mission to see as many countries as possible. God willing, in 10 days I'll get to my number 50, and that was done by design. I wanted to do it before I turned 50. I am one year behind, so I'm one week late after, turned 51.

But I'm fine with that. Okay. It's okay. I can do that, but it's gonna be 50 countries. And then my goal is to see all the states in the United States. I am two thirds done, give or take, so that's also something that I love doing. So when I go to [00:21:00] conference convention before I used to come in, come on Monday, conference ends.

I'm back as soon as it ends. Now I get the day before, day after, just to explore, to play, take a city tour and go and see new places. And it's awesome. And I teach my kids like travel whenever you can. My 15-year-old been to 27 or 29 countries. Okay. Because, and it's easy for him to do because he lives in Barcelona.

Everything is one hour away. But me and his mom, we taught him to travel whenever he can. He's now an exchange student in Brazil. And, he just went for two months because his mom I was joking that, his monster mom decided that four languages is not enough for poor 15-year-old.

So she sent him to Brazil to learn Portuguese. I'm joking. Of course. I think it's a great opportunity and he loves it. He's coming home in a few weeks, but, eight weeks in a different country, living in a family, it's absolutely great. And now he's speaking Portuguese like native tongue.

Priscilla: Wow. That's [00:22:00] amazing. I love your approach and I think that what you are already doing. The future of how people will work together, that global team. I think there's a lot of hesitation, A lot of , how will it work or can it work? Is it the best way to work? But I'm glad that you speak to, that you have an amazing team and you travel to connect with them.

I'm interested for the entrepreneur that's listening, that's thinking, okay, I've thought about having a global team. Do I go there? If I go there, how do I do it? Do I do it online? Do like, how would you say the first step.

Max Emma: first of all, you need to decide what country, what region you want to invest in. Like I would not suggest we just started doing 10 countries at the same time. We are. At 10 countries just because a lot of people who were, for example, in Barcelona office, they moved to their home countries.

And so that's also how we got spread out. We used to be just Philippines and Barcelona and the U.S. but eventually it started, spreading out. But my [00:23:00] advice would be, of course, visit the country and understand the culture. And the first time I went to Philippines, I went on a business tour where they actually showed us the history, the culture, and showed us different options, how you hire people.

And they showed us Manila and they showed us regions outside of, Manila, I've never been to Asia at this time. So for me it was like the eyeopener, , I remember it was 2016 and that was, like a huge, change for me, going there. And then once I came back I'm like, okay, I think I'm ready.

I think I can work with talent from Philippines. And I just made the first hire. Same was in Columbia, went to Columbia. I traveled, I ate the local food, was playing a tourist for three, four days. And when I came back I'm like, yeah, I can do that. And then I started hiring in Columbia the first step would be to know the culture, because look, every culture is different.

It's not good or bad, it's just different. So you have to [00:24:00] know who you're gonna be working with. So you have to understand and you have to embrace it. You will not change people. You absolutely, maybe they'll change for a little bit, but then eventually they're gonna come back to what they're used to.

So you have to just say, yeah that's part of the game. And I have to just know who I'm hiring and who I'm working with.

Priscilla: so good. Thank you for that, max. Now I want to talk about people thinking about starting a franchise., we think McDonald's, KFC, but, you mentioned there about 600 or so. What is it that you commonly. Hear or maybe misconceptions about starting a franchise that you often have to clarify with your clients,

Max Emma: So Priscilla, are you talking about people buying a franchise, become a franchisee, or franchising their business? 'cause they're two different things.

Priscilla: people wanting to buy a franchise.

Max Emma: Wanted to buy a franchise. Yeah. So as part of my franchise consulting , as I mentioned, my services are completely free, we get paid by a [00:25:00] franchisor. But I just have a conversation like a lot of. Companies are just giving you a test and based on your results, they we think you should be doing this business.

I don't believe in doing that. I've just had a conversation for an hour or two and, taking people on a journey where they want to be three years from now, how much time they want to spend. Do they want to work with people? Do they want to , sit in the office? Do they want to do sales?

They don't want to do sales? I'll give you an example. Franchisee of, let's call it Taco Bell, doesn't have to go and do any business development. Taco Bell is doing of that. You're not gonna see them going around giving flyers. Please come to Taco Bell. Everybody knows what Taco Bell is, right?

So their job is to fulfill. So when I go to Taco Bell, it's gonna taste exactly the same as the Taco Bell, 3000 miles from here. Same for McDonald's. I use Taco be as an example. If you buy a Booxkeeping franchise for example, part of your job, you have to go and do business development.

You have to find new [00:26:00] clients. We as the franchise will help you with fulfillment. You will have to go and find the CPAs and these businesses that will be sending your business or will be referring business to. Okay. , Part of my job is to understand what they want to do.

'cause some people absolutely hate sales, but they might be great in fulfillment. And some people the other way around. And again, it's not right or wrong, people are different and you have to hire to the things that you don't like doing. I, for example, not an accountant, so please don't ask me any accounting questions.

I will suck at it. But knowing that. I hired a bookkeeper. Actually my wife was doing it at the beginning. Then we hired our first employee. But I can talk about bookkeeping and accounting for hours. I can sell it., I definitely understand how it works. I just haven't opened quick books myself for the past, 15 or 20 years.

Does that make me a bad person? Of course not. Just not mine. And I know that I'm not trying to be [00:27:00] doing everything myself. And a lot of franchises actually put in the agreement that a franchisee cannot work in the business. They're like you have to step out and you have to grow the business.

We don't want you to do all the work because you will miss out on, growing. 'cause franchises make money on royalties. So the bigger the business, the more money they're gonna make. So they don't want the franchisee to buy themselves a job that's a conversation I have with all of my candidates for Booxkeeping.

I'm like, I don't want to sell you a job. ' cause that's an expensive job to buy. If you really look at it as business, then yes, we can talk. But if you're just looking for X number of clients to make , X amount of money, then probably I don't wanna sell to you.

Priscilla: Yeah, that's interesting. . The idea that the franchise should match what it is that you wanna do. 'cause you're not trying to, recreate the wheel. , You want to use your strengths and then apply it to a franchise that matches that.

I'm wondering for people who [00:28:00] think, okay, I could build my own business and then. Turn it into a franchise, or I have a business number, could I turn it into a franchise? Or maybe the best option for me is to take what I have and get into something that's already established, like already a franchise.

What would you say to those two different people?

Max Emma: Every case is different. You have to really know your options and you have to look at different things. Look, people make a mistake sometimes. Going back to your original question, people mix their hobbies with the business. They saying, I always give this example my grandmother has this secret recipe of pizzas the best pizza.

Thus I'm gonna go open pizza franchise. I'm gonna buy, call it Pizza Hut or whatever. And I always explain to them, pizza hut or any other pizza will not care about your grandmother recipe. You'll have to do the same pie that's gonna taste exactly the same in San Diego, in Australia and in China.

It has to have so many pieces of [00:29:00] pepperoni. Not one more, not one less. They not gonna let experiment. So being a great cook doesn't make you a great franchisee 'cause you pretty much have to manage people. An average McDonald's has over 15 employees, one location. So this is the people's business.

It has really nothing to do with, how great the burgers are. We can argue, I can argue that if I want the best burger in the world, I'm not gonna go to McDonald's or Burger King if I want fast. Burger. Yes, I'll go there. But it's not the place to go and enjoy, like on a date night.

Okay. You're probably gonna go to a nicer place, but they're not designed for date nights. So again, it has nothing to do with the quality of food, the taste. This is just, it's different market. So only because, and. I believe you don't have to know how to paint to have a successful painting company.

'cause then your job is to make [00:30:00] sure you find the right people. You schedule the jobs, right? You estimate the jobs. Nobody expecting you to go and do the painting yourself. So if you want to franchise your own business, you have to understand is that something that you want to do? Because let's say it was a bookkeeping company.

Your customer was. John Smith and you were doing bookkeeping for his law office. Now your customer is not John Smith. Now your customer is your franchisee. He or she is the one you have to listen to and make them happy. They, in turn, are working with John Smith, but the whole concept changes. You are no longer an accounting business.

Business. You are no longer a pizza business. You are a franchise. Your customers are your franchisees, and a lot of people just don't realize that. Plus, I wanna say the franchising is not for everyone buying a franchise. If you [00:31:00]being entrepreneur all your life, it's gonna be very hard for you to come in and follow the rules.

In franchising, there are rules which you cannot change. So I don't know if I would be a good franchisee. 'cause if I come and become a franchisee of another bookkeeping company and they'll tell me, you have to do it this way. I'm always gonna go back to my old days. And but this way is better.

But the franchise gonna say, we don't really care. We have our own ways. That's how you're gonna do it. So it's a discussion. So franchising is not for everybody, but if that's something that is good for you, it gives you a lot of opportunities because. It already clears a lot of, time, give you a lot of time back because I call it opportunity cost.

You can figure out any of these businesses, but how long is it gonna take for you to figure out how many pieces of pepperoni goes on each pile and how to set up a kitchen? It's gonna be trial and error. You're gonna burn a lot of dough before you actually, figure it out. They already tell you exactly what equipment to buy, how much flour to put in, [00:32:00] how much tomato sauce.

Everything. It's a science, so you know, if you follow the recipe, it's gonna come perfect. It's gonna be there five minutes and 37 seconds, whatever. It's, I have no idea. You don't have to figure out, is it five minutes, is it six, or is it 5 37? They tell you exactly what to do, so it comes out perfect.

Okay.

Priscilla: Yeah. I think knowing what business you're in,, maybe it's not burgers, it's the people business. Are you happy to go into the people business? And then also understanding who is your customer now, that if you are a franchise, you have franchisees, then who is your customer now? Very interesting.

Thank you so much, max. This was such an enlightening conversation for people who are. Thinking this way or wanting to do this Max. Where can people learn more about what you do and where can people follow you?

Max Emma: So the best way to reach to me would be go on my website, which is franchise with max.com. It's franchise with max.com, and then they can decide do they want to talk to me as the broker. As the owner [00:33:00] of Booxkeeping franchise or as the CEO of an accounting company can help you with the accounting, they can literally choose and then go into different direction.

They will talk to my team first, but I promise eventually they're all gonna get to me. So again, franchise with max.com is the easiest way to get ahold of. Me.

Priscilla: thank you so much. I'll link that down in the description franchise with max.com. Three options there. Very exciting. Max, thank you so much for your time. To the audience, thank you for listening. Please come back next week.

Max Emma: Thank you, Priscilla. It's been great.