078: Should You Franchise? How Snip-its founder Joanna Meiseles grew her brand Nationally.

Background on Joanna Meiseles of Snip-Its:

Joanna Meiseles has been an entrepreneur and franchisor for the past 20 years. More than two decades ago, she saw a need in the marketplace for a hair salon focusing on children and launched the Snip-its salon brand in suburban Boston in 1995. As Founder and CEO of Snip-its, Ms. Meiseles ran five company locations, then franchised the concept in 2004 and grew the brand over a ten-year period. Under Ms. Meiseles’ leadership, Snip-its received numerous awards including the Franchise Times’ fastest 55 growth brands, and the Entrepreneur Top 500. Ms. Meiseles was twice a finalist for Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year award. Today, Snip-its franchise owners operate 65 locations in 22 states.

Over the course of Ms. Meiseles’ career, she has worked with lots of entrepreneurs to help them launch and grow their businesses. For nearly three years, she has served as Senior Director of Programs and Operations at MassChallenge, and she mentor and coach at several accelerator and incubator programs in Boston and the San Francisco Bay area. Joanna currently work as a franchise strategy consultant with iFranchise Group, and she is a frequent public speaker on the topics of entrepreneurship, women's leadership, mentorship, and franchising.

Joanna Meiseles is a Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT) with Yoga Alliance, which acknowledges the completion of a yoga teacher training with a Registered Yoga School (RYS). Joanna is an instructor and coach at CorePower Yoga in San Jose. She is also the founder of Turbo 26 Studio, which is a newly opened yoga studio in Palo Alto.

Time-Stamped Show Notes:

[2:23] After making her own business plan and researching about children’s hair salon, without any business background, Joanna confidently opened her first hair salon for kids in Massachusetts.
[5:08] Joanna copied the business plan of a pizza restaurant in order to create her own children’s hair salon business plan. She found that the restaurant’s business plan applies to her hair salon.
[9:50] Joanna found a location for her salon that she really wanted to have. She believed that this particular prime space inside the mall would bring her success.
[15:29] Joanna opened 5 more hair salons in different locations before she opened her business for franchising. She says that it is important to have multiple locations before a business owner goes to franchising.
[17:50] Not earning enough and other money issues were the main concern that stressed her out as a business owner and entrepreneur. Joanna wasn’t really overworked or too busy handling the business, but her main source of stress was money.
[20:50] Joanna advice new entrepreneurs that you have to be prepared for situations that you think would never happen to you.
[24:34] “Nobody thinks that they’re going to have a franchise that will fail, any franchise that will fail, but they will.”
[25:00] During her experience with Snip Its, Joanna felt she was not qualified to be called a CEO and a successful businesswoman. She entered business school to get an MBA.
[32:11] According to Joanna, in order to succeed in franchising, the owner or the franchisor should have done the business several times.
[35:27] Joanna’s newest business endeavor is a yoga studio. Her new yoga studio business is called the Turbo 26 Studio.
[41:27] Joanna felt re-energized and optimistic towards her new business endeavor. She is using her previous experiences from Snip-Its to acquire more customers.
[43:14] One of her main priorities for her yoga studio is to market and advertise her business.
[46:19] Joanna’s goal for the future is to open a few more yoga studios and begin her franchising program.
[48:24] Regarding the Turbo26 Yoga Studio, Joanna says that she made a “conscious decision to start this business with joy, and to find joy and happiness in every step of the way.”
[52:10] Thinking positively and appreciating what you have is very important for Joanna.

Fabulous 4 Questions:

📖📚 Favorite Book(s)? The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
🙌😎 Favorite Amazon.com purchase? Yoga pants
🌱💸 Favorite Tool that's GROWN your Business? Gmail
💭💡 BIGGEST Challenge keeping your Business from GROWING? Marketing