HeyJaredDear Frannie: Franchise Growth, Leadership and Scaling Advice
Dear Frannie is the franchise advice column you didn't know you needed. Hosted by Katherine LeBlanc, Fractional CMO, and James Vitrano, Franchise Operator, each episode tackles one real question franchisors are quietly wrestling with - from franchisee adoption and growth…
- Indexed episodes, last 90 days
- 5
- Latest publication
- Sep 9, 2026
- Audience
- Checking…
- Earliest in this view
- Jul 15, 2026
Latest episodes
Dear Frannie | My Franchise Pipeline Is Full: How Do I Build Out Without Blowing the Budget? (opens the original)
Read excerpt
You're staring at a full pipeline and want to be intentional about build-out — what should you actually be prepared for? Katherine LeBlanc and James Vitrano sit down with Charlie Guzzetta, founding partner of Depot and former President & Chief Development Officer of BurgerFi (9 to 135 locations and public on the NASDAQ). Charlie now builds and designs kitchens for some of the hottest restaurant brands around, and he lays out how to scale without blowing your budget or your brand: why you should
Dear Frannie | I'm Ready to Grow Franchise Sales — Where Do I Actually Start? (opens the original)
Read excerpt
You're ready to grow your franchise — so where do you actually start? In this episode of Dear Frannie, Katherine LeBlanc and James Vitrano tackle the question every emerging franchisor is asking: where do I start my franchise development process, especially when budgets are tight? Their answer is the one most brands skip: start inside your own four walls. Before you spend a dollar on external lead generation, your fans, employees, and customers are your warmest and most likely franchisees. Kathe
Dear Frannie | My Franchisees Could Scale - So Why Won't They? (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Even the most experienced franchise leaders get stuck on this one: you have owners who could scale — they have the territory, the model, the support — and they still won't move. In this episode, Katherine and James sit down with Sean Fitzgerald, President of TruBlue Home Service Ally, to dig into exactly that problem. Sean joined TruBlue when they had 20 locations. They're now at 120+ territories. He's not guessing about the messy middle — he's in it. They cover franchisee selection (hint: passi
Dear Frannie | How Do I Drive a Successful Grand Opening (opens the original)
Read excerpt
In this episode, Katherine LeBlanc sits down with Madelaine Reis, Head of Marketing at Biscuit Belly, to unpack what a repeatable grand opening playbook looks like in practice. Biscuit Belly's last two openings both crossed $50,000 in revenue in week one — and Madelaine built their entire program from a blank PowerPoint starting at store number four. They talk through the full funnel: PR, paid media, influencers, food drops, friends-and-family events, and loyalty program onboarding. They cover h
What does a franchisee actually own — and what are you responsible for? (opens the original)
Read excerpt
What should you actually expect your franchisees to own — and what's yours to carry? In this episode, Katherine and James dig into the expectation gap that creates more friction in franchise systems than almost anything else. They start with a live observation from IFE — the International Franchise Expo — and a question Katherine's been sitting with: when does a hyper-niche concept become too simple to sustain? And how do you build a moat around an offering before the fad fades? Then the Dear Fr
Publishing over time
Last 90 days. Choose a month to open its work.
Recurring subjects
Named in the text we hold. One piece can cover several.
Audience
No verified audience measurement yet.
About this data
Counts cover the work we have indexed. Tone needs enough text and a confident classification. Excerpts and episode notes are not full articles or transcripts.
Identity or attribution wrong? Suggest a correction.
See coverage about Dear Frannie: Franchise Growth, Leadership and Scaling Advice