How To Pick a Franchise Brand and Build an Empire

Rylan Miller has built a small empire in the franchise industry, opening a whopping 29 units with smoothie concept Tropical Smoothie Cafe and becoming one of the first franchise owners with 810 Billiards and Bowling, the emerging “eatertainment” franchise out of South Carolina. Miller’s multi-brand growth has established him as one of franchising’s Big Fish, but Miller did not enter the industry with the resources and investment experience typically associated with the industry’s largest franchisees. Miller carved a path to success in franchising by trusting his instincts as a consumer and investing in brands he had a personal affinity for. 

That approach, Miller says, is key to establishing large-scale growth opportunities in franchising.

In a recent interview with Nick Powills and Charles Internicola for franchise mastermind group FranX, Miller discussed his journey to multi-unit and multi-brand ownership and his advice for fledgling franchisees hoping to achieve similar growth. 

Researching Franchise Brands

Miller first became interested in franchising during his time in the Navy, where he served as a commander and UAV pilot. While stationed in Virginia Beach, Miller visited a Tropical Smoothie Cafe that had some literature about franchising with the brand. (Critical tip for franchisors: Invest in four-wall marketing!) 

Miller says he was a fan of Tropical Smoothie Cafe, and the literature piqued his interest in franchising, but he was savvy enough not to dive head-first into the first brand that caught his eye. Thus began a long research process, in which Miller says he did due diligence on dozens of franchise brands, including Hardee’s, McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts.

After diving deep into the franchise operations of so many brands, Miller says Tropical Smoothie Cafe proved to be the best entry point, both financially and operationally, for his ultimate goal of going into business for himself.

“Part of it was return on investment — the value proposition,” he said. “What it costs to get in versus the average unit volume. When you open a franchise, there are really only a few metrics that make a big difference. Rent and debt service are the two big things. You can take care of the cost of goods, you can take care of labor through oversight — being in the store, being present and having good managers — but your other big things are rent and debt service. If I can take care of those by making the right decision with the brand I choose, then I’ve got a leg up, because with a franchise system, you can just mirror their model.” 

The Path to Franchise Growth

Right off the bat, Miller says he hoped to open a lot of locations, “but it wasn’t clear to me that we could.” Miller had the grit and determination to succeed, and his military career prepared him to comfortably follow a preset operational plan, but he’s the first to admit that “I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“I needed the franchisor to take that risk on me, having no business background,” Miller said. “We came up with the capital to make it work, so we checked that box off, but at the end of the day, it’s an interview process: Do you like the potential franchisee? Do you believe in them?”

For its part, Tropical Smoothie Cafe was willing to take that risk on Miller, and it paid off. Miller started with what seemed then an ambitious plan to open five stores with the brand, but he quickly realized that to build an effective team that could manage those five stores, he’d need to give them opportunities to grow. “If they can’t find that opportunity with me, they’ll find it with someone else,” he said. So Miller started thinking bigger.

“There are franchisees way bigger than me that set the bar. If they can do it, surely I can, too — or at least get somewhere close to it,” Miller recalls thinking. 

So, Miller grew. He hit his initial five locations, then moved on to 10. Then 20. Today, he is nearing the 30-unit mark with Tropical Smoothie Cafe and is actively moving on a development deal for new locations in Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina.

Going Multi-Brand

Just six years old, 810 Billiards and Bowling is one of the younger brands on the franchise scene, but it is growing rapidly. Expanding out from its initial three corporate-owned locations in South Carolina, the brand recently opened two locations in Arizona — one in Phoenix, one in Chandler — and another in Houston. 

Miller will open 810’s next location in Greenville, South Carolina.

Much like his introduction to Tropical Smoothie Cafe, Miller says he first encountered 810 as a customer, visiting the brand’s flagship location near Market Commons in South Carolina frequently with friends. 

As a customer, “I kind of fell in love with it,” Miller said. When he learned the brand was launching a franchise opportunity, 810’s departure from the comparatively traditional foodservice offerings he was used to struck him as a potentially lucrative diversification opportunity.

“I have no problem with McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, but if I opened some of those, it conflicts with what I’m doing with Tropical Smoothie Cafe,” Miller said. “I wanted to do something that paired well with Tropical Smoothie — something that would be on a parallel path.”

Miller says he is fully aware that investing in an emerging brand is inherently risky, but in the case of 810 Billiards and Bowling, those risks are offset by the rewards of getting in early with a high-value brand whose white space may disappear quickly.

“If there was a new Tropical Smoothie competitor, and a prospective franchisee is thinking about being one of the first 100 to open, I’d say, ‘Don’t do that. Don’t go with the brand new franchisor.’ Not that there's anything wrong with them; it’s just that you are taking a larger risk because you don’t know if it’s going to be successful,” he said. “When considering a brand that is bigger-box and is boutique — I don’t think you have to wait for that brand to become established in order to become successful. I think you are actually better served by getting in early because there is not a ton of retail space for these 20,000- to 30,000-square-foot facilities.”

As Miller prepares to open his first 810, he’s already thinking about the next unit. And the next. And even the next brand. In an interview with 1851 Franchise in November, Miller said he plans to grow his franchise empire to more than 1,000 units across brands.

“My growth plan is to invest in brands that complement each other,” he said. “I believe that you have to be completely behind a brand and believe in its mission and values. The second-most-important thing for me when considering a new concept is that the business needs to be scalable. I’m not interested in brands that can only open one or two locations. I want to continue growing my portfolio and help foster professional development within the investment group.”