Grow Your Family Business

Family businesses are more than entrepreneurial endeavors. They are an emotional
investment, creating deep personal ties with your relatives, employees, community and
yourself. Is it possible to scale and expand one without losing those ties and the personal
touch that made you a success in the first place? Of course it is, if you can learn to
separate emotion from business and run your business like a business.
Brian Moak grew up working in his family business, HEART Certified Auto Care in
Illinois, then bought it from his father when he was 27. Now 35, he is preparing to
expand HEART into franchises across the country.
"I’ve always had this dream of growing the company, becoming part of multiple
communities," said Moak. "I’m looking for a way to create a legacy like what my dad
created."
Moak says anyone who wants to grow something that's small and family can do it, as
long as they don't lose the family touch. He shared his best tips for doing just that

1. Make yourself redundant

For a family business to expand, things need to run smoothly without you or other family
members. So build out your succession plan.
"[My] company used to revolve around me, every question, every strategy came through
me," said Moak. "To turn this into a franchise, I knew I needed to be able to step out."
Create systems that anyone can follow for key tasks like onboarding new customers,
marketing updates, building new locations and hiring employees. Then empower your
existing employees to make those decisions and follow those systems. If you don't
already have a general manager, now is the time to move someone into that position.
Once your business can function without you, additional locations can open decision
making and expansion, rather than dealing with the everyday single store. By creating
systems that everyone can follow, you create consistency for your brand and your
employees, no matter where they are located.

2. Get everyone on board

If multiple family members are owners of the business, all of them have to agree on a
plan for growth. But even if a sole person is in charge, getting everyone on board will
make an expansion go more smoothly.
"Explain what you're doing and why it matters," advised Moak. "If I was a dictator and
walked in and said, this is what we're doing, make it happen, it may happen out n because
they want to. If an organization grows because they want to, you're surrounded by an
army of people who protect and grow your mission."
Just as important as family members are any employees who have been with the business
for a long time. They are as likely to feel a sense of pride and ownership as family
members, and their buy-in matters just as much.
"There are people who work here who have known me since I was four years old," Moak
explained. "Their experience is valuable, their insight is critical. It's my job to respect that
and build on it."

3. Communicate openly with customers

When Moak began sharing news about his franchise, his customers first reacted
negatively, thinking that the local business was going to lose what made it special to the
community.
"We were not as communicative as we should have been," Moak admits. "A lot of
customers felt that we'd sold out or that we'd joined another franchise."
Customers who are loyal to a family business may dislike the idea of change or worry
that your business is going to lose personal touch. To reassure them, communicate as
openly as possible. Use your marketing channels to explain exactly what is happening
and why you decided to expand. And show them through every interaction that you will
still retain the level of service that you've always had.
"We've created scripts for everyone who deals with customer service, we pounded our
customers with emails to explain and reassure them," said Moak. The end result was that
local customers became incredibly supportive and proud of HEART's success.
"Once they understood that this was a real American dream story," he said. People really
got on board."

4. Define your values

For many customers, the values of the owners and the personal feel of services are what
lead them to support a family business. As you grow, it's vital to define and understand
what your business' values are so you can continue those in your new endeavors.
Do you prioritize the experience of your employees? The integrity of your brand? The
impact you have on your community? What emotions do you want people to experience
when they interact with your brand? What compromises are acceptable and what are off-
limits as you expand?
"We might fix cars, but we see it as, we're in the hospitality business," said Moak. "I had
to train my store managers how to give the best experience to people who come in the
front door and the people who clock in at the back door. They've got to do it in a way that
fits our values."
Your employees are responsible for creating an environment that reflects the culture of
your core family business. Once you clearly define your values, they'll be able to
maintain that personal, family feel, even as your business grows.

5. Hire thoughtfully
To grow a business, you will have to hire new employees. This may be something you
are used to doing, or it may be the first time someone outside the family has worked for
you.
In either case, be thoughtful and careful about who you bring on. Every new hire should
represent the values that define your business.
Don't be afraid to turn away qualified candidates who don't feel like quite the right fit.
When your name is on the business, employees do more than represent a company. They
also represent your family and the history behind your work.
"If someone is going to hang my shingle in front of their store, they've got to be the best
of the best," said Moak. "I've turned people away who are interested in becoming
franchisees... If they're going to represent our values they've got to be like us."

6. Be willing to build slowly

Building a family business takes years- sometimes generations-of hard work. Once you
decide to grow and expand, be prepared for that to happen slowly, too.
Whether you are opening new locations, creating a franchise or adding new services,
each step of the process takes time, especially if you want to preserve the legacy of the
original business.
For Moak, removing himself from the business took two years. Building up the systems
to open franchises took even longer. And he is still interviewing potential franchisees-the
business' local locations are still the only ones open.
For him, though, that slow process is worth it, because it means that when the new
franchises do open, they will feel like part of the business he and his father built. "We're
going to build something really special," said Moak. "We're going to build it slowly and
methodically, and then it's going to blow up."
"Nothing happens overnight," he added. "Nothing is easy, but it shouldn't be. Nothing
that's going to survive can be easy."