Todd Beckman gets up
early. He says the
drive to be successful propels him out of bed at
5:30 a.m., to the gym for a
good workout and straight
through a 10-hour workday
at The Tan Co., the tanning
franchise company that he
founded.
That drive gives the president and CEO the energy
he needs to keep his company on the edge of change
and also serves as inspiration for his employees,
who have helped him grow
The Tan Co. to 72 stores in
13 states and $30 million in
2007 revenue.
Smart Business spoke
with Beckman about how
to earn the respect of your
employees and why CEOs
should always have their
phones on.
Q. What advice would you
give to other CEOs?
Build respect with your
employees and the leadership to where they want
to look up to you and to
the point where they want
your job. Show your
appreciation to them.
You need to show them
that you’ll do the work,
too. Show them that
you’re not worried about
telling somebody to do
the job that you won’t do.
That’s what’s got me to
the level that I am at with
the respect of our employees.
That friendship and that
love between the CEO and
their employees just has
to be there. They just
have to like you.
Q. What are pitfalls that a
CEO should try to avoid?
A big one is just taking
their eyes off of the game.
Leaders can’t be thinking
that everyone else is going
to do it for them. They
need to stay on it every day
themselves and make sure
they’re in control and have
a great team underneath
them.
You should be involved
every day. I’m on it every
day, seven days a week. I’m
never more than one
phone call away.
From every franchisee to every manager, they all have my
number. That’s just
always been my
motto. I’m always
going to be there.
Q. How do you attract
quality employees?
We start from the
ground up with most
of our employees. We
look at them from
young kids to growing
into management.
When we train them
from the very beginning when they first
get a job, they end up
being the most successful
employees we have.
They live it, and they
learn it the way we want
them to learn it, and they
love it the way we love it.
It makes them so motivated
to love that brand. That’s
what makes them strive to
be a winner.
We really work hard in
developing winners — all
the way to where we hope
they can own their own
franchise store.
Q. How do you train
employees?
I try to lead them with the
way I would want the business run. There’s a lot of
motivation, a lot of training.
Understanding what they’re
doing is important — living
the job, loving the job.
Expressing that throughout
the whole team; that’s pretty
much what I focus on.
If they’re not liking what
they’re doing, then we’ve got
to find somebody else.
Q. What are some other
ways you motivate employees?
We have a complete commission structure and bonuses for
them to receive. We have your
normal 401(k) as well as a car
program. We will logo their car
and pay them to be advertising
on their car.
That’s a really big incentive. They really love it, especially the younger kids. It
helps them buy a new car.
We put $5,000 toward their
franchise fee after they’ve
been with us for one year.
We’re always driving to keep
them happy.
Q. What has been the
greatest challenge you
have faced in business?
The greatest challenge for us
is just getting to the customers, getting to the possible
franchisees and letting them
know what a great plan we
have. Just getting the leads to
show people how successful
this brand and program is to
get them involved.
Q. How do you communicate
your vision to your employees?
We have a newsletter that
goes out every Friday, which
keeps franchisees updated on
every single thing that’s going
on from a week-to-week basis.
We have a VP of operations
who can handle any e-mails
back or phone calls back from
all franchisees.
Everyone has my telephone
number, too. So if they see
an issue or see something
that is not getting done, they
can call me.
HOW TO REACH: The Tan Co., (636) 305-8222 or www.thetanco.com
