🍟 Thursday 3: Dominos v Pizza Hut, A Dog Training Franchise, & More
(Yes I know it's Wednesday)
Welcome to The Wolf Report, a 2x/week email covering up & coming franchises & small business entrepreneur’s. If you’re reading this but haven’t subscribed, you can do so here:
Good morning and Happy Thanksgiving Junior!
Today’s newsletter is going to be a regular second edition that I’ll send out each week. Typically it will be sent on Thursday’s, but given its a holiday week I’m sending this one on Wednesday.
As you’ll see with the format below - it’ll be one article, one podcast, and one franchise breakdown. While the articles and podcasts will expand beyond franchises, the goal is to tie it back to lessons that any small business owner can learn from and use to their advantage.
I hope you enjoy, and of course don’t hesitate to reply to this email if you have any feedback (positive or negative) on the format!
One Article:
How Dominos Surpassed Pizza Hut By Innovating In Tech (& Not in Pizza)
This article written by The Hustle in 2019 is such an interesting case study in what can happen to leading companies when they aren’t thinking a few steps ahead.
Pizza Hut’s biggest focus for decades was inventing new products like stuffed crust or the triple decker pizza. Meanwhile, Dominos started testing online ordering as early as 1994 🤯
I think we all know by now how important that internet thing turned out to be…
One Podcast:
Off The Chain: Morning Brew Co-Founder Austin Rief
If you’re subscribed to this newsletter and happen to work in media, you’re especially going to love this episode, but if not, there’s tons of great takeaways for any entrepreneur. My top 3 takeaways:
Building brand affinity takes time (you can’t force it with venture capital $).
You regret the employees you hired too quickly, not the ones you took your time with.
Be scrappy and do things that don’t scale - Morning Brew founders hustled around their college campus and got as many students as possible to subscribe to their newsletter. How can you “do things that don’t scale” to find more customers?
One Breakdown: Dog Training Elite
Fast Facts
Background
Founded in 1995, franchising since 2015
Based in Sandy, Utah; 59 units open as of 2021
Franchisees provide in-home dog training as well as socialized group training for dog owners
Fees + Investment
Franchise Fee: $49,000
Royalty: 8% of gross sales
Brand Fund: 1% of gross sales
Initial Investment: $82,800 - $104,750
Financial Performance
The below numbers are taken directly from the franchise website, and reflect performance of franchisees in 2020:
Average Net Profit: $337,856
Average Gross Revenue: $786,059
Top Performer’s Net Profit: $801,110
The Wolf’s Take 🍟
There’s no denying it folks - with the investment at the high end being $105k, these are some super impressive unit economics, and the first franchise I’ve seen with an investment to profit ratio of 1:3.
Given that the dog training is done inside pet owners homes, you are not required to own or lease any real estate for your business, substantially bringing down the investment and operating costs.
With pet ownership nationwide hitting new ATH’s as much as Bitcoin is, it’s a great time to be in the pet business 🤑.
Recent News
That’s it for this edition of The Wolf Report. Feel free to reply with any questions or feedback, or leave a comment. If someone sent this your way and you haven’t subscribed yet, you can also do that below. Thanks and see you next week!
NOTICE REGARDING FRANCHISE INFORMATION
The Wolf of Franchises does NOT guarantee the financial performance of any franchise mentioned. The decision to purchase a licensed affiliate or franchise must be based on your own independent research. The Wolf of Franchises is not liable for any representation made by an affiliate, associate, marketing material, or Franchise Disclosure Document of a franchise with respect to real estate, financial, operations, or marketing performance of the business being acquired.
This information is not intended as an offer to sell, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, a franchise. It is for informational purposes only, and any financial data is based upon information provided by franchises in their respective Franchise Disclosure Document. The offer of a franchise can only be made through the delivery of a franchise disclosure document, from a certified seller of the brand, which The Wolf of Franchises makes no claim to be. Do not consider any information here as a guarantee of financial performance. The Wolf of Franchises has no affiliation or relationship of any kind with any of the brands covered in this newsletter, but simply provides data that is publicly available online or in Franchise Disclosure Documents.
All data from Franchise Disclosure Document’s is based on past performance, and if you were to purchase a franchise covered in the Wolf of Franchises newsletter, there is absolutely no guarantee that your business will perform similarly to existing owners of said franchise.