Beansquad

The calendar reads mid-February and for franchise owners, that date carries weight. In only a few weeks, the window for a relatively smooth tax season begins to close. By March 1, many CPAs stop taking on new files and start preparing extensions.&nbsp;For franchisees and franchisors alike, mid-February is often the last real opportunity to turn a year of transactions into a clear financial picture.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikegreenblatt/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=beansquad-last-call-clean-books-franchise-tax-season-2731466" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">Mike Greenblatt</a>, vice president of operations and strategic growth at&nbsp;<a href="https://beansquad.com/services-franchise/?utm_source=1851franchise.com&utm_medium=article&utm_campaign=beansquad-last-call-clean-books-franchise-tax-season-2731466" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">BeanSquad</a> — the financial services company that delivers outsourced bookkeeping and compliance support for franchises — said he sees the same pattern year after year. Waiting doesn’t just create stress; it can wind up being costly, too.<h2>The Hidden Costs of Waiting</h2>Some operators believe they can hand everything to their CPA at the end of the year and let them sort it out while preparing the return. Greenblatt said that approach often leads to higher bills and weaker results. When CPAs are buried during peak season, even routine cleanup work can come with premium hourly rates.“If you’re working directly with just your CPA, they revel in this opportunity to charge you their hourly rate and throw journal entries in so they can run a tax return for you that may not even be that accurate,” Greenblatt said. “If you don’t handle your bookkeeping on a monthly basis, even at worst quarterly, and you wait until the end of the year, you’re going to cost yourself an arm and a leg. A CPA can charge you hundreds of dollars an hour just to get your books cleaned up for the year. And that’s a lot more expensive than a monthly bookkeeping cost.”Accuracy tends to be an issue under such circumstances, too. Compressing 12 months of activity into a short window increases the likelihood of mistakes. If revenue isn’t properly categorized, a CPA may treat every deposit as income. That can mean paying taxes on money that’s not even actual profit.<h2>Systemwide Consequences</h2>In franchising, the impact of disorganized books doesn’t just stop at a single location. Weak or incomplete data can affect the system as a whole. Franchisors depend on accurate financial reporting, which helps build dependable Item 19 disclosures in the Franchise Disclosure Document while providing benchmarking information across the network.When regular financial submissions aren’t required, the franchisor may lack visibility into what’s actually happening on the ground. Greenblatt said some brands lean heavily into point-of-sale data, which may capture sales but fails to paint the full financial picture.“Item 19s are incredibly important to a franchise concept, right? If they have a proper Item 19, it allows them to sell more. But I talked to a lot of different concepts where they never required financial submission. Which means they may have been making a lot of assumptions,” Greenblatt said. “So, being disorganized can create a lot of ripple effects.”Without reliable data, measuring true profitability becomes more difficult. It can also stall growth. Plus, lenders typically require clean, reconciled profit-and-loss statements and balance sheets before even considering potential financing. If those documents aren’t in order, expansion plans may fall to the back burner.<h2>Bookkeeping vs. Tax Preparation</h2>Bookkeeping and tax preparation aren’t the same function, and the misunderstanding of these roles can create problems. Greenblatt said&nbsp;<a href="https://1851franchise.com/beansquad/info">BeanSquad’s</a> focus is on preparation: reconciling bank accounts, organizing balance sheets and properly categorizing profit-and-loss statements.That groundwork allows a CPA to step in with a cleaner financial package, but timing matters too. Even the most efficient cleanup team depends on the information an owner provides and the timeline in which it’s provided.“Last-minute cleanups are only as messy as the information presented to you,” Greenblatt said. “At the end of the year, we’re at the disposal of the access points our clients give us. However, there’s a much shorter deadline we can play with.”<h2>Using Data as a Compass</h2>For Greenblatt, the urgency around March isn’t just about meeting IRS deadlines. It’s about giving operators better visibility into their business before the year gets going. Too many franchise owners rely on bank account accounting: judging performance by whether there’s money in the account.Still, that mindset can be misleading. Without financial statements that are actually reliable, owners lose the ability to run a meaningful gap analysis, which can make it difficult to properly assess how actual results compare with expectations.“You don’t want to look up and say, ‘I’m making money and I have more than I did at the start of the year,’ and think that means you’re succeeding,” Greenblatt said. “If I’m supposed to be at a 22% bottom line and I’m at 4%, sure, technically, I made money. But I’m off by 18%! So, I should want to know why.”Cleaning up the books now allows operators to review seasonality, identify trends and adjust course for the months ahead, enhancing the odds of successfully scaling a business.“The financial facts give you the foresight to make proper decisions,” Greenblatt said. “It’s taking what’s happening operationally, what you see with your eyes, and what’s on paper. Then it’s putting them together to make operational decisions that truly impact your business.”To learn more about BeanSquad's bookkeeping services for franchises, please visit&nbsp;<a href="https://1851franchise.com/beansquad">https://1851franchise.com/beansquad</a>.

Tax Season Bookkeeping Tips for Franchisees | BeanSquad Advice

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BeanSquad VP Mike Greenblatt breaks down why disorganized financials do more than just stress out accountants; they actively drain profit through high cleanup fees and missed deductions.

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Last Call for Clean Books Before Tax Season: The Hidden Revenue Franchisees and Franchisors Lose When They Wait

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BeanSquad Kicks Off 2025 with Strong Q1 Momentum and Aggressive Growth Goals

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After buying his first&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theupsstorefranchise.com/">The UPS Store</a> in 2019,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/steve-bjorkman/">Steve Bjorkman</a> grew his footprint in the Boise, Idaho, market at a steady clip. Before long, he was managing multiple locations, and the business looked very different from the one he started with. Growth brought opportunity, but it also brought more complexity, especially when it came to the numbers behind the operation.The shift came as the business moved from a single-store operation to a much more layered one. More locations meant more accounts, more reporting and more decisions tied to timely financial information, all at a point when Bjorkman’s attention was needed elsewhere in the business.“I did the books myself for the first store. I know how to do it, but it just became a time thing,” Bjorkman said. “Once we got to three stores, I just could not keep up with everything. There is no way, as a six-store owner, I could even attempt to do the books myself. My time is better spent working on the business or in the business, depending on the day.”<h2>Finding the Right Financial Partner</h2>That pressure led him to look for outside support, though not without some trial and error. After a poor experience with another bookkeeping provider, Bjorkman was referred to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.mcobookkeeping.com/">MCO Bookkeeping</a> through another franchisee. MCO Bookkeeping is a specialized brand owned by&nbsp;<a href="https://beansquad.com/">BeanSquad</a> and built specifically to serve The UPS Store franchisees. While&nbsp;<a href="https://1851franchise.com/beansquad/info">BeanSquad</a> provides bookkeeping support across the broader franchise space, MCO Bookkeeping focuses on the needs of The UPS Store owners, giving Bjorkman access to a service designed around his business model.That shared structure mattered less to him than the practical results. What stood out was accuracy, responsiveness and a communication system that made it easier to manage questions across multiple locations without creating even more work on his end.“The portal is extremely efficient for communication. I can post a question, get a response quickly and have a record of the back-and-forth,” Bjorkman said. “Anytime I have a question or want to talk to somebody, it is very easy to get someone on the phone, and they are very knowledgeable. Of all the vendors I use with The UPS Store, I would say MCO, or BeanSquad, is one of my favorites.”<h2>Better Reporting, Better Decisions</h2>For Bjorkman, the value of that support goes beyond getting the books done each month. Clean, organized financials have given him better visibility into how the business is performing and where changes can make the biggest difference. That has been especially important as he has worked to improve margins across stores and use financial reporting as a tool for decision-making rather than just recordkeeping.“They do reports in addition to the P&amp;Ls, with some analysis, trending and things like that, and that has given me more of a monthly rhythm,” Bjorkman said. “Without MCO Bookkeeping, I would not have the right data to make adjustments. As a UPS Store owner, gross margin is probably one of the most important financial metrics there is. I’ve had a couple of stores where I’ve been able to improve the gross margin from the high 50s to the low 60s. I want to get to 65. Without these regular reports and all the data I get from MCO, it would be really hard for me to do that.”That kind of visibility has also helped him uncover opportunities that might have been harder to spot otherwise. In one case, better reporting led Bjorkman and his team to rethink inventory management across the business. They centralized inventory for all stores and added a small warehouse, a move he said helped them reduce costs and operate more efficiently. For a multi-unit owner, that is where bookkeeping shifts from an administrative function to a growth tool.<h2>Making Scale More Manageable</h2>The biggest benefit, though, may be the way outsourced bookkeeping has changed Bjorkman’s role as an owner. With confidence in the numbers and trust in the team supporting them, he has been able to spend less time buried in financial tasks and more time focusing on strategy, operations and the bigger picture of how the business grows.“Bookkeeping is very important, but it is not the most valuable way for me to spend my time,” Bjorkman said. “I trust what they are producing is accurate, so I can focus on higher-value things. I am working on my business much more now than in it. Long term, that is how I see MCO Bookkeeping helping me. I can have really good data and great reporting so I know what I need to do from a business standpoint with very little effort on my end.”That kind of operational clarity becomes even more important as franchisees add units and complexity increases. Multi-unit growth depends on more than strong sales. It also depends on clean financials, consistent reporting and reliable systems that give owners confidence in what they are seeing. For Bjorkman, that support has helped turn bookkeeping into something more useful than a back-office necessity. It has become part of the infrastructure that helps him scale with more discipline.To learn more about BeanSquad's bookkeeping services for franchises, please visit&nbsp;<a href="https://1851franchise.com/beansquad">https://1851franchise.com/beansquad</a>.

BeanSquad - Franchisee Profile - Steve Bjorkman - The UPS Store - 1851 Franchise

As his UPS Store portfolio expanded in the Boise area, Steve Bjorkman needed cleaner financial visibility, stronger reporting and more time to focus on the business.

Franchisee Spotlight: How One Boise UPS Store Owner Keeps a Growing Operation Financially Organized

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Last Call for Clean Books Before Tax Season: The Hidden Revenue Franchisees and Franchisors Lose When They Wait

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