Latest / Reframe First / Mason Boswell, Maverick Digital & NTV360 Franchise Owner I Thought I'd Just Sit at My Desk

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Mason Boswell, Maverick Digital & NTV360 Franchise Owner I Thought I'd Just Sit at My Desk · Reframe First

• Oleksij Rak: Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Refine First. I'm Alexey. Let me welcome our today's guest, Mason Boswell, founder and CEO at Maverick Digital. Hi Mason, it's great having you here. Mason Boswell: Hey Alexi, great to be here. Thanks for having me. Oleksij Rak: Awesome. From what I learned about you in 23 years, you had quite an impressive path already in business. So you started from franchise consulting, then you did some, you went into digital advertising space, then some... endorse advertising and nowadays you've built successful business and you've turned it into franchise. So that's a lot. And could you tell us a bit more about your path and how you got here? Mason Boswell: Yes, I'm very blessed. I have a a family history of franchising. My dad was kind of introduced to franchising at a young age and he grew up and it became kind of a role model to me in the franchising space and he works with IFPG, one of the the nation's largest broker groups, for franchising. And you know, I grew up being a franchise consultant as well just because of him. And obviously working as a franchise consultant throughout college as a young buck. I I saw myself one to own one of these one day. I was like, man, it'd be kinda cool to own my own business, be my own boss, you know, and not have to, you know, work your typical nine to five desk job. and so kind of took some time to process what that looks like and finally found myself with a franchise here just a few months ago and making things happen day day after day as a twenty three year old entrepreneur. And it's a blessing each and every day to do it. Oleksij Rak: Also, what made you decide that instead of scaling a business, you will scale it in different matters? You will scale it in a form of a franchise. How did you come to this decision point? I understand the family history, right? But still, Mason Boswell: Mm. Oleksij Rak: why do you turn it into franchise rather than scaling it yourself? Mason Boswell: Yeah, for me what it was was I understood that I didn't know everything about business. I don't know the industry, like I I couldn't Oleksij Rak: Thank Mason Boswell: tell you a lot about digital marketing, which is a business that I'm in now. Oleksij Rak: Mm-hmm. Mason Boswell: But I I understood that it is possible to do very well without the you know, expertise. that's where leaning on the team, leaning on the support and leaning on the model comes into play. And so that's what I was able to do with my brand. And I was like, man, if I can lean on a team and lean on a support system. the only thing that I have to do is work. So if I can do that and I know I can, then I'm gonna be successful. Oleksij Rak: Could you tell us a bit more about the business that you're running nowadays? Mason Boswell: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I am the founder and owner of Maverick Digital. It's a a brand called the the franchise is called N T V three sixty. It's based out of Denver. Essentially what we do is I don't know if you ever drive down the highway, right? Drive down the highway and you see a big old billboard on the side of the road and it's probably got a law you know, law office on it or a real estate broker, it probably costs about eight to ten thousand dollars a month to be on those billboards. And small businesses don't have the the Oleksij Rak: Yep. Mason Boswell: budget. To get off on on billboards like that and receive the traffic that they get. Right. And so what this brand does is we take that idea and we put it into a 50-inch billboard, if you will, a 50-inch TV screen inside of your local barbecue shop or inside of your local gym, where your customers are actually doing their everyday life, right? While they're working out, Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: while they're eating, while they're playing. We just we have a d TV that displays ads all throughout the day. throughout these local restaurants where your customers are. And beyond that, Oleksij Rak: Thank Mason Boswell: we do marketing campaigns for social medias, for Google, website creation. We do it all in the marketing space just for small businesses Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: to be able to succeed. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, so it's a way for small businesses to be promoted in certain areas. Mason Boswell: Exactly. Oleksij Rak: It's both digitally and like, I mean, it's both online and offline on some TV screens. Awesome. What does it take to build a franchise? What did it take to to wrap the business into a system and start selling it as a franchise? It's basically you're running two businesses in parallel. So you have your... your own digital media business, and Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: at the same time you have to be selling the system. Mason Boswell: Totally, totally. I rely a lot on my team. Every day I call them with a new question and somehow they don't get annoyed at my my questions that I ask them each and every day. But no, it it's a lot. What I've learned most recently, this this almost difficult season of business ownership is the importance of relentless leadership, right? Because in my opinion, as a business owner, there's always going to be problems thrown your way. Each and every day there's new problem. There's gonna be good days, there's gonna be horrible days. and what I've realized recently is if you can stick through those horrible days, the good days are so much better. And so really just like pushing through the hardship, pushing through each and every day, knowing that the light is on the other side and that there is going to be a a great result Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: of all this hard work that I'm doing at such a young age. I've never been exposed to this before. It's gonna be worth it, right? And so really just when it comes down to it, consistency has been my determining factor of making this brain work and seeing success each and every day. Oleksij Rak: How many franchises do you have in your network? Mason Boswell: Yeah, for our for our brand, I believe we're at over a hundred franchisees right now. So we are pretty much Oleksij Rak: Okay. Mason Boswell: all throughout the United States. Oleksij Rak: Do you make some kind of gatherings for them? How do you handle like hundred purchases? When did it start actually? What was the story? How many years is that in a row? Mason Boswell: Yeah, so so the brand started a little bit over a decade ago, but I believe they started franchising just a few years ago. So maybe two or three years ago they started franchising. They're out of Denver, and man, they just do such a great job of supporting each and every franchisee. And seriously, they consistently scale, consistently grow their systems and their teams to be able to support all the new franchisees. They've taken in over thirty this year. Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: It's crazy growth. It's crazy. Oleksij Rak: I see, I see. What mindset, psychology does it take to become a franchisee and an entrepreneur? What's your take on that? Because usually from what I hear, I've spoken with quite some amount of consultants and most of them say people are stepping in, average age is 40 plus. You stepped into that mindset like... 20, right? 20. How does it feel like to be a franchisee as such an ace? And what Mason Boswell: It's hard. Oleksij Rak: mindset does it take to be a franchisee? Mason Boswell: Yeah, man, it's hard. I get a lot of people that say, Mason, you're so young, what do you know? Right. A lot of people are like, You haven't been in this industry long enough to know anything. But I I've actually been in it my whole life because I've constantly gone to trade shows from the time that I was two years old, consistently met and and built relationships with experts and pros. Just surrounding myself with these people who know what they're doing and in doing so kind of learn learning from them along the way. and as I've I've developed this relationship with just so many great people and consultants and franchisees, I've kind of learned like, hey, this is these are the people who I need to surround myself with each and every day because they say you are who your five closest friends are. Right. And so the way that I've done it is be ready for people to look down on me because I am young, but I only use that as a way to keep pushing. Because if I can prove them Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: wrong. Man, how many, how much how much can I do, right? If I can prove the haters and the people who don't think I can do anything wrong, what what amount of impact can I actually make? And that's kind of the the driving force of our franchise. How much impact can we make on the people around us? Right? Not necessarily how much can money can we bring in, but how much can I do? How many how many Oleksij Rak: Mm-hmm. Mason Boswell: people can I serve and how much impact can I have on those people? That's that's that's our mission of our brand. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, I see. Is there a benefit of being such a young age in running a business? what's your take on it? Because at your age, I was not really running a business. So I started doing that at around 30. And what's your take? How does it feel? Mason Boswell: It it feels great, man. you know, people say there's often two sides of business ownership. There's the awesome side of not having to work a nine to five bet d less job, but there's a sucky part of having the financial burden of of supporting your brand and also your employees. And we do have a few employees as well. And so managing that at a young age it is is a daily battle, right? I I have the I have a lot of a lot of burden on me, but also a lot of good things to come. And so just constantly looking forward and not looking back is is kind of the way that we handle it. But I love what I do and it's a blessing to do it each and every day. And I hope I can do it for a long, long, long time. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, for sure you will. Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: The trendy topics nowadays, AI, AI automations. The older generation is not like this. They see that AI has a big impact, but they are not using that to that extent. How do you Mason Boswell: Mm. Oleksij Rak: use it and how does it benefit? How do you benefit from AI, from these tools on day-to-day work that you do with franchise? Mason Boswell: Yeah, great question. Ultimately what we use it for is to save time, right? We don't use it for any of our advertisements. Anything that we do that's client facing, we don't use AI for. What we do use it for is to maximize our workflows, right? When it comes to maybe getting some financial data down or maybe sending emails a little bit quicker, or maybe it's making sure that we're in constant communication with our team. Ultimately the the use of AI just benefits our customers all the more. Because we're more available. so that's kind of how we we've used AI. We we typically see a lot of small businesses Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: use AI for their digital media production and putting up their Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: new brand logo. And in my personal opinion, it looks really bad on the brand because AI just just isn't there yet. Right. I think that people are still need to be the front of the advertising space. People still need to be pushing out their brand and going to other people to help push out their brand. AI just doesn't have the power to do that yet. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, I see. So basically using it to automate singles, like small, so small, to just simplify your work. Awesome. Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: How did you get, like, what was your path into this, into the Mason Boswell: Mm. Oleksij Rak: franchise? I guess it's not like... typical because you were a consultant and you are related to a big family consultancy group. But still, what was your past like? How did you get to know this franchise? How were you introduced to this franchise? What were the Mason Boswell: Yeah girl. Oleksij Rak: obstacles in your past? Mason Boswell: Yeah, yeah. Growing up in franchising, I learned there's a few important things, but there's also a lot of things that are kind of gonna be thrown your way and you're gonna be told, hey, this is what's important and this is what you need to look for in a franchise when you want to own one. but really what what matters is what's important to you. And if if you can find what's important to you and and push that out, Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: man, you can be so successful. And so I surround myself with people who I knew kind of had a good head on their shoulders, right? There's a lot of crazy people out there. I surround myself with people and they say, Mason. Here's what you need and this is what I came to believe. You need a brand that has recurring revenue, right? Because whenever you go out and sell a fence, you know, a fencing franchise, you're just selling a one-time product and you're never gonna see that customer again. Oleksij Rak: Yep. Yep. Mason Boswell: Right, potentially. so recurring revenue, and second we're multiple revenue streams, right? Because if if I want stability as a franchise owner, so I want multiple different streams here. and third, in my opinion, the most important is the people behind the brand. Are the people just after your money or are they after your growth? Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: as a franchisee, building a relationship with you each and every day. And I truly believe there's a lot of pleasure in building relationships. I don't know about you, but I've had just such a a great amount of joy just building relationships with this awesome youthful group of of supporters. the franchise does such an excellent job supporting me and supporting our other fellow franchisees. And so whenever I came and talked to all these fellow franchise consultants who just Oleksij Rak: Yeah. So. Mason Boswell: had been working in the industry for years and years and years, they said, Mason, these are the three most important things that you need to look Look for when it comes to owning a brand. And a little bonus point here: if you can get on top of the AI age, right? Because AI is coming fast. No one really knows what jobs are going to be taken and what jobs aren't. But this brand in TV hits all those rare markers. There was not hardly any brands that hit these markers as much as this brand did. And so that's what led me to choose this brand. And Oleksij Rak: Yeah. you. Mason Boswell: to this day, I'm I'm still very happy with my decision. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, that's a thorough consideration, I would say. But how did you understand that they are after your success, but not after your money? Mason Boswell: Ha ha ha. Oleksij Rak: It's not so easy to understand upfront, you know? Mason Boswell: No, I mean, I've learned when you when you chase the dollar more than you chase the the success of the customer or the relationship of the customer. your days are a lot more miserable because you're gonna have a lot and a lot of failures, especially as a twenty-three year old. I've had countless failures, probably more than most people, right? and so that that's really led me to shift my mindset. Because as a business owner, you expect, okay, I'm gonna be a millionaire. I'm gonna be making so much money, I'm gonna not even have to work. That's not the case. You gotta hustle, you gotta grind, probably more than most nine to five workers do. to all all to make an impact on those around you. And that constant impact of seeing, hey, here's what I'm doing for these people has led me to a full cup each and every day and has just constantly supplied me with a lot of joy. And so that's what that's why I love what I do, because of the joy of those that I surround myself with. Oleksij Rak: What out of the franchising world that you were thinking about franchising a couple of Mason Boswell: Is he? Oleksij Rak: years ago wasn't really true? What would you like to know five years ago, three years ago when you were stepping into this path? Mason Boswell: Man, the the answer that comes to mind is without question the value of sales. I I got into this role thinking, okay, I am not going to have to do anything. Like Oleksij Rak: Yeah, for sure. Mason Boswell: I'm just gonna have to sit at my desk and tell people what to do, right? And that sounds Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: all fun and games. No, no, no. I do I do sales every day. I call random people each and every day and telling them about what we do, building relationships first and foremost, and then seeing if what we do can add value to what they do. But man, if I would have known getting into this job that sales is the name of the game, like, my gosh, I would have been so much better off having prepared then than preparing while handling operations and everything that it that it is to be a business owner. So to all the franchise the potential franchisees and people who want to own a brand out there, man, sales is going to be your job. That is just how it is. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, for sure. Sales, marketing, and all that kind of stuff. Mason Boswell: Yes, yeah. Oleksij Rak: Does your franchise help with sales, with marketing efforts? Sometimes franchises do help their franchisees with all these efforts because it's it's under one umbrella and pushing marketing effort under one umbrella is probably easier than like every franchisee doing it individually. Mason Boswell: Hm. Yeah. We we definitely do a lot of marketing. So when it comes to our consumer facing marketing, typically our screens are the best possible service, right? Because their client facing their friend of quite literally hearing Dallas millions of people every single month with how many locations and how many screens we have up. So we advertise for our own brand on those screens. Why not? Right. And so beyond that, our team works as a super awesome support system to handle all of our campaigns, all of our expert work that me, Mason number, you know, twenty-three year old, not you know, nerdy person knows how to handle different campaigns. Our team does, they know what they're doing. Oleksij Rak: Okay. Okay. Mason Boswell: so that's why it's such an awesome part of working. them and handing off our our awesome clients to them they really really see the results that they were wanting and so the support team does a great job they don't really do any sales with us they help manage and train our sales processes but when it comes to sales me and my operations manager are the the head of this operation Oleksij Rak: Awesome. What tools did it... How franchise team bring and share with you? Are you using some standard tools that they provide or do you choose some tools, some software tools by yourself? How does it work in your franchise? So is it across all the franchisees or like each of you has some different tool set? Mason Boswell: Yeah, it's it's pretty much a standard tool set across the board. Right? We have a a s a CRM that pretty much every franchisee uses to keep track of our clients, keep track of the relationships Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: with them. When's the last time we got in contact with them? things of that nature are all pretty much standard across the board so that we can really Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: figure out any problems or anything that might not be going right on a day-to-day basis. And then when it comes to it, Google Meet is the name of our game. We love to do Zoom calls and Google Meet calls kind of just like this. Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: with franchisees. All across the United States, so that we can also build relationships with each other, see what's working, what's working, you know, over in California versus what's working in Texas. And combining our thoughts to see, hey, here's what I could be doing better. Always learning. Every single day, we're always learning and making sure that we're doing what we can do best to get the best results Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: for our customers and for our brands too. And so that's kind of an answer to your question. Standard tools set across the board. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, it makes sense for sure. It quite likely is different between like the... But it might... Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: The financials... What was promised and what it is in reality. Does it match or does it not? Mason Boswell: That's a great question. I can't get too much into that. obviously their franchise disclosure Oleksij Rak: Yeah, for sure. Mason Boswell: document is is disclosed out there, but yeah, so we were told certain results that we would be profitable within a certain time and we've actually gotten very close to that time. with with the the whole idea of growing each and every day and expectations are far different from reality. We all know that to be true. Especially as a franchisee who wants to do well but doesn't really know what the work that you have to do. put in looks like. Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: Our expectation was, hey, we're gonna be making dough in the first month. Like we're gonna be rolling in it. But reality was, no, Mason, there's two, there's a a fair split in the ways that you're gonna grow this franchise, right? Where can we put up the screens? Can we go partner with the venues that need to have our billboards in place? And then round two, going to find the people to fill that real estate on those screens. Oleksij Rak: Yep. Mason Boswell: Right. So there's a a phase of not making money. There's a phase of making a lot of money if you can do it right. And so we didn't really know what the timelines look like there. But we able to we were able to do it really well. We grew at a fast pace, faster than I would have actually hoped. and we're very happy with the results that we've seen. Oleksij Rak: How many screens do you have actually around your state? Like in your territory? Mason Boswell: Yeah, we have we have forty different billboards across our territory. and we're very happy with our locations and in the places that we can get in front of. All the different target audiences and all the different kind of groups of people that we can get in front of. Oleksij Rak: It sounds like a marketplace. Marketplace is always chicken and egg problem. To get buyers, need sellers. To get sellers, you need buyers. In your case, it's kind of similar. To be able to place those screens in certain venues, you need to have buyers of the real estate on these screens. Because the venue needs to make also their revenues share. How did it work for you? How did it grow organically? Or did you find some growth hacks? How at all did you manage to scale it to 40 screens? Mason Boswell: Yeah, yeah, great question. we utilized a lot of different networking sources. from day one, we went out and did cold door cold door knocking, right? Everyone's worst fear. We went knocking on Oleksij Rak: I got that. Mason Boswell: businesses and said, Hey, we want to offer you free advertising. And they say, get out of my store, what's the catch? And we said, No, seriously, it is free. Here's what we want to do. We want to use this wall space that's not making you any money right here, and we want to put a TV on it. We're gonna pay for the TV, we're gonna pay for the install. We got it. And in return for letting us use this wall space, we're gonna put your ad on it and on our other billboards throughout the area. How does that sound? And they say, okay, okay, I kind of see this. And so cold door knocking from day one. Oleksij Rak: you Mason Boswell: Once we got out to about ten to fifteen screens, we started leveraging and using our networking groups and also networking our locations that we actually had. Because we went back and and asked our hosts, hey, how do you like your ad? How do you like how it's playing all throughout the Dallas area and getting you free results? Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Yeah. Mason Boswell: They say, I love it. I have a buddy who actually owns a restaurant down the street. He would love this. And so that's kind of how we can handle growth from there because people just love our product. They love what we do and they love our team, right? We're youthful, we're we're driven, we're ready to go. And so a combination of just results and the energy our team brings, as well as the network, is just a match we need to heaven. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, yeah, it makes sense. So you find some growth hacks. And so you basically hack the ability to place these screens on the walls. And Mason Boswell: Totally. Oleksij Rak: then you sold the real estate. Did the system come from the franchise itself, or did your team invent it? Mason Boswell: It it came from the franchise. I wish I was that smart. It was a it was a fantastic idea. And you know, you kinda use the bartership idea a lot throughout the franchise itself. For instance, we actually had a video a professional videographer and a professional photographer come out to do a shoot with us last week and we're doing shoots with them every single month. And it's Oleksij Rak: Yep. Mason Boswell: in exchange bartering out advertising space on our screens to help us grow. Right, we're not even paying any money, they're not paying any money. It's a complete bartership deal. And so we're able to do that to help us grow across the board, whether it's through installing screens for free, whether it's having photographers and videographers out, or whatever it may be, we're able to barter out a ton, a ton of services to help us grow. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, after all, pay your royalty for that. For the system. Mason Boswell: Yeah, right. Oleksij Rak: And you pay the initial fee. Did you know that upfront that that will be helpful to that extent? Could you find this information somewhere? It was just advised by some consultant. How did you get to this confidence level that, this is the right franchise to me, I'm ready to step in? Mason Boswell: Validation calls were the were the play. And I I talked to a lot of franchisees. I wanted the ones who were not doing good. I want to talk to people who felt like they might have hated their job, right? Or hated their business. And I wanted to figure out what they were doing wrong. And and then of course talk to the ones who were doing successful, hear how they're doing, how much are they making, if they would tell me that. And and that gave me a lot of confidence because more often than not the problem was, Mason, I don't like to go out and sell. I don't like To to but go and build relationships. They wouldn't say it that way, but similar to that. And I'm just not that way. The way that we do business is we love to go talk to people. We love to go see what's going on. What are we doing right? What are we doing wrong? And seeing how we can offer a solution to help them love what they do more because people love what they do when they do it well. And it's it the tr that is no more true for business owners ever than right now. Right, when you do well as a businessman, you love what you do. And helping people realize that and understand that and help them do that is why we love what we do. And so Oleksij Rak: Okay. Mason Boswell: our team is full of people who are full of opportunity and just love, love, love to go out and talk to people. Very extroverted people. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, yeah, so you did chat to the franchisees and yeah, you that you need to talk with people, that the browser was a big sparring and you were basically fine with that. yeah, it did make some... Did you choose among few franchises or was it the only one and you just confirmed that it's the right Mason Boswell: I did there was a few franchises that I did actually end up deciding on. there was one in the commercial cleaning space that was very very attractive, right? Commercial cleaning is something that's very important. Obviously it's not really going anywhere. Everyone's gonna need it. Oleksij Rak: Yep. Yep. Mason Boswell: and it's a recurring r revenue source as well. there was a brand Oleksij Rak: It's kind of fucked up in the chills, Mason Boswell: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And there was another brand that did like seal coating for parking lots and concrete and it just a very interesting kind of recurring revenue source potentially there. but really when it came down to it, I was like, how much impact is AI gonna have on this next generation? And truthfully N T V just solved that problem. And so there were a ton of brands, but this one really just hit the market better than everyone else. Oleksij Rak: Okay, okay. Are you considering opening a new territory? Or you are not done with existing one? Mason Boswell: It's great question. We obviously want to grow and we have a territory picked out that we do want to expand into in the North Dallas area. but right now, man, our territory is huge. We have so much to grow and not enough you know area filled in our own territory yet. And so as soon as we can kind of fill up this territory in the next two years or so, we'll definitely go and move up more north and take out that territory that we have picked out. Oleksij Rak: How big is the territory? That you're saying it's huge? I understand there are a lot of cafes, barbershops or whatever, but still, how big is the territory? Mason Boswell: Yeah, so here here in DFW, the the way that the franchise does it is based off of business count and based off of population, not geography. and so whenever it came down to it, we were we were most interested in business count because I don't care how many people are in the territory if there's zero businesses in it. and so I believe that ours has about fifty thousand businesses roughly in the territory, if that tells you how big it is. Pretty pretty big territory, right? It stretches price basically across six or seven different suburbs of the North Dallas City. so we're very happy with our area. Oleksij Rak: 50,000, is it breaking the border businesses or like overall businesses? Mason Boswell: overall businesses, whether it's remote, whether it's brick and mortar, whatever it may be. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, that's a huge one. Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: Is there any toolset Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: that would make your easier? That would make your life easier right now? Or would make your life easier when you were starting your franchising path? Mason Boswell: Totally, totally, totally. right now what we're actually looking for and what we're working really closely with a partner on is building our own custom AI workflows. Right? Because Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: oftentimes after meetings, I'm sure you know it, you have to send reminders to the people that you met with, or maybe a follow-up email after the meeting, maybe an agreement, maybe a proposal. There's a lot of Oleksij Rak: All right. Mason Boswell: things that you have to manually do that take up a lot of time. Time that you could be out selling your product and growing your business that you have to handle Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: manually instead. And so right now we're working on that. obviously we wish that we had started using a a CRM from the start. We didn't. We did a lot of manual writing of our customers and our our relationship with them. And so a CRM was a great one to have. A calendar is the foundation of what we do. if we didn't have a calendar we would be a big blob of mess. And w thankfully we're not and so calendar Oleksij Rak: . Mason Boswell: CRM and these AI workflows that we're building are definitely gonna help us continue to grow our business. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, so something like transcript pipelines and Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: items, calendars, events and so on and so forth. Yeah, is there any solution for that on the market? Do you choose something or do you build it yourself? How do you approach it? Mason Boswell: For the AI workflows? Oleksij Rak: Yeah. Mason Boswell: Yeah, so we actually partnered up with a a member in Chamber of Commerce that we're also in and bartered Oleksij Rak: Okay. Mason Boswell: out the service for that. We said, hey, do you want to be on our screens? We'll offer you free advertising if you want to build us AI workflow to help us grow our business. He's a no-brainer, let's do it, Mason. And his business, I'll give him a shout out. It's called AI, Revenue with AI. And Jason Wall is his name. He does a great, great job of learning about your business, learning about what you do and what do you want AI to do for you essentially to work as an extra employee for you. And it's definitely been a great process. Highly, highly recommend him and his services. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, I see. In your initials, when you were considering which franchise to choose and when you were analyzing, comparing them and so on, was there any kind of software that would help you? Did you use any kind of software to compare all of them? You definitely use some chat GPT or whatever, but let's do it. Mason Boswell: Yeah, I I used a a lot of Chat GPT. a lot of researching the brand, researching how long they've been around, maybe a lot of the failures that the brand has seen in the past. And honestly, N T V was kind of an emerging franchise whenever I bought into it. They didn't have a lot of franchising repertoire, right? Reput reput reputation. so they've been around for a while, but not in the franchising space. And so I was kind of making a bet on myself. I said, Mason, this is a brand that hasn't been around. They don't have a lot of results. you kind of gotta make a little bit of a bet on yourself and Hope this thing works out, right? Strap in because we're going. And that's exactly what I did. It's one of the risks. But when it came down to it, obviously AI played a big part in that too, and helping me reason with myself, making sure that this was a smart decision to make, on top of all the other decisions I could make, right? What's the opportunity cost here? And ultimately, I'm glad I made the decision I did because I think that our brain is doing just fine at the amount of growth that we're seeing. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, for sure. Especially since you have the huge territory. So it does make sense. It sounds Mason Boswell: Tell me. Oleksij Rak: like an interesting business niche, so I should consider it easy. Mason Boswell: Definitely should. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, with regards to franchising market trends, what trends do you see nowadays? Especially since you are from an old franchising family. What trends do you see? What does your family see? What do you discuss? What's changing? market. It's quite an old market, know, and in certain areas it behaves really like old school-ish. But Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: still, what trends are there? What do you think? Mason Boswell: Yeah, so obviously I have a lot different of a perspective as a young entrepreneur than maybe some of the older entrepreneurs out there. But my opinion and my perspective is I see the franchise world shifting a lot more towards the needs-based businesses. Right. And typically where that is right now when I see the the most success is the home service brands, right? Whether it's HVAC, whether it's painting, whether it's plumbing, the blue-collar businesses s tend to do very, very well. obviously Dallas is a very saturated market for these spaces, but it still continues to do super well. just because there's such a large market, everyone needs these things. You can't not do without these things. And so the the the home service brands sector is doing very, very well right now and it continues to do well. It's growing each and every year, right? Because homes are constantly being built. another space that seems to be doing well is the senior care space, right? Senior care, I don't know if you've heard, has a pretty bad rep right now. Just because of the employees and the people that tend to work in the facilities, don't always treat the seniors correctly. but whenever you can kind of shift that and say, Hey, here's a franchise that actually does it right, I think, man, those franchises do so well. I I saw the numbers recently. They only need like a few dozen seniors to to be profitable, which is just nuts. So senior care facilities seem to do very well well. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, senior carer, pet carer, and all the other caring facilities. And besides, the essentials. It's Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: recurring stream of revenue. Awesome. Awesome. Thanks a lot for interesting discussion and for your perspective of franchisee and the young franchisees. Mason Boswell: Yeah. Oleksij Rak: That's different perspective because usually people step in in the age of sense. different. So thanks a lot for this perspective and for sharing. Thanks a lot. Before we wrap it up, Mason Boswell: Thank you, Alexei. Yeah. Oleksij Rak: is there anything else you would like to Mason Boswell: Man, from from my perspective, obviously, I I'm a young business owner and I you know, you could argue that I do this for the money and and the answer to that's no. I I I mentioned I I joined this business. I'm started this business to make an impact on other people. And the real reason, you know, impact was to beyond this world, to s to spread the light that is beyond this world, right? Because so many people, I believe, live each and every day just seeing what's happening at the end of the day, or maybe what's happening tomorrow. But what happens At the of our lives. And so what I've been able to do in my position is to effectively spread the gospel in a way that brings light to the Lord and light to Jesus and says, Hey, maybe there is something higher than myself. Right. Each and every day we serve ourselves, each and every day we look to see what we can do to maybe feel better, make more money. And that doesn't bring us a lot of joy, right? We we kind of find the end of ourselves very often. And what I'm able to tell people is, hey, there is something greater than this. And and the answer to that question is Jesus. And so that's what I've been able to do. And it continues to build my cup teaching every day. And so to all those who might be listening, I just want encourage you, look for look for the light that is Jesus. It's not going to be in it in and of yourself. It's going to be in him. And the place to find that is is in the Bible. And so Alexei, I appreciate you giving me the platform to share. That's why I do what I do. It's why I love what I do. It gives me a platform to spread. just the most important message known to me, and that is Jesus. And so thank you for having me again. Oleksij Rak: Yeah, thanks for joining. Thanks.