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Cutting to the chase at Tommy Gun’s
http://www.azfranchising.com/cutting-to-the-chase-at-tommy-guns/
Photos courtesy Tommy Gun’s
By John W. Hannon
When my Tommy Gun’s Original Barbershop opened in 2014, it marked the chain’s first franchise in Ottawa and only the second anywhere in Ontario. As such, I’ve benefited from the combination of a well-established business model and the chance to locally pioneer our fun, modern, male-oriented approach to haircuts. Now, I’m ready to go multi-unit!
Early lessons from hockey
I was born in Montreal. My family lived there until I was five or six, moved to Toronto and eventually headed back to Montreal for my teen years. I have one sister who’s younger than me.
At school, I enjoyed chemistry and gym classes. I was big, big, big into hockey and my dream was to play professionally in the National Hockey League (NHL) one day.
I was super-competitive at the game all my life. At 17, I moved away from home to play in a Junior A league in the Toronto market for one-and-a-half years. During that time, I studied at Sheridan College in Oakville, Ont., for one semester, until an injury forced me to pack it in.
My father was in sales and marketing and I thought I might go into a similar line of work. From Toronto, I moved to Ottawa and studied business at Algonquin College.
Through playing competitive hockey, I’d been exposed to and become comfortable with a lot of people who wanted to talk to me and I’d prioritized the idea of performing well. That all transferred into business, which is also competitive in nature.
I wanted to be not only good at what I did, but better than most other people; and I knew that to do so, I would have to work harder and be more innovative.
And unlike hockey, where my injury had cut my career short, I knew in business there were no limits. You can keep going and become more successful with time. You can sell as much as you want to sell.
Hair and beauty salon franchisor Chatters developed Tommy Gun’s to reach male consumers.
Honing my business skills
When I finished my business degree, the economy was in the middle of a recession and jobs weren’t forthcoming. I found work selling print ads for Sun Media, the publisher of the Ottawa Sun, but I was there for less than a year.
Next, I went back to school to become a driving instructor. I enjoyed that line of work because of the direct feedback and response, which is a bit like what teachers enjoy every day. I did that for about three-and-a-half years, from 1991 to 1994, until graduated licensing came into effect, which put an end to demand. There was a one-year hiatus or blackout, when every new driver had to wait longer to get their licence, so we had virtually zero students!
By this point, I had a family to support. I responded to an ad for Federal Express (FedEx). With my driving record, I became a courier for them and then I worked my way up to management.
That was really the point in my career when I got more of an understanding of big business. I was with FedEx for 11 years, from 1994 to 2005, managing human resources (HR) and other areas.
At FedEx, I learned a lot about professional-level service. Their goal is 99.9 per cent customer satisfaction, from which I derived a five-star approach to everything I did in my career.
Working within a corporate structure can be a very ‘safe’ place, but you can also feel like you’re just identified as a number. I realized I wanted to work just as hard, but for myself instead of for someone else. I also wanted to transpose what I’d learned in a big business to a venture of a smaller scale. And that led me to franchising.
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Tommy Gun’s combines old-school services like hot towel shaves with modern technology like Apple iPads.
My first franchise
Franchising also provides a bit of a safety net. The brand is recognizable to consumers. And you as the franchisee have some level of assurance by knowing the brand is behind you. You’ve also seen the results that have been favourable to other franchisees. At the same time, however, you need to know how to manage a business yourself.
In 2005, I bought an Oil Changers automotive franchise, which is comparable to Mr. Lube. As you might guess from my experience as a driving instructor and a courier, I liked dealing with cars and trucks!
From my past experience with FedEx, I understood the importance of showing people I was grateful for their business.
If you can deliver what’s expected at a reasonable price and on time, they’ll stay with you as customers in the future.
People are both transactional and emotional in what they value as consumers. This is why you need to super-impress them. And it’s why I track the frequency of repeat business.
My wife was also a big help with my franchise. She’s a chartered professional accountant (CPA) and, as such, she really understands the back-end corporate side of a franchise system, while I’d learned business management.
A beauty of a deal
A friend of mine was at a franchise show one day and learned about Chatters, the hair and beauty salon franchisor headquartered in Red Deer, Alta. They were negotiating to build a beauty product superstore in Ottawa, which intrigued me as a ‘power centre’ play to get involved with. They would carry all of the best products under one roof in a big-box store. It would be cheaper for customers to shop there than to go to a salon.
My franchise occupies a great location in Bayshore Shopping Centre, right next to the food court.
This struck me as a pioneering approach. I have a friend who owns seven Tim Hortons franchises. With a brand that’s so well-established, you may need that many locations, to do well financially. If you can be first to market instead, though, there’s a huge upside.
Unfortunately, Chatters’ new superstore was taking a long time to get government approval. They were also trying to get into the Toronto market, but that wasn’t going well. I pulled out of the negotiations and pushed ‘reset.’
Then, out of the blue, I got an e-mail from Chatters after they had developed their Tommy Gun’s brand. There would still be attractive pricing for beauty and care products in the retail section, but also a lot of new ‘bells and whistles,’ like free cold beverages and scalp massages.
While it was a related concept, in some ways it was the complete opposite. Where a Chatters franchise was about 90 per cent product retail and 10 per cent salon services, Tommy Gun’s was 90 per cent service and 10 per cent retail. Where Chatters was female-oriented, Tommy Gun’s was male-oriented. It was a ‘guy thing.’ Given about 65 to 70 per cent of my Oil Changers customers were men, there was a high level of comfort in that for me. I understood my clientele.
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I was also attracted to the notion of combining a high level of customer service with a laid-back, casual atmosphere. Tommy Gun’s wouldn’t be taking appointments, for example, but instead customers would walk in, enter their name in a self-serve kiosk to check in and be placed next in queue for their requested service. It was about blending old-school services like hot towel shaves with the convenience of modern technology. Waiting customers could leave the store and be notified by text message when their stylist was ready.
The shop is easy to find because I have a bright chrome barber pole spinning for all to see.
And if customers chose to wait at the store instead, they’d be entertained with big TV screens showing sports, along with Apple iPads and arcade-style games. There would even be TVs in the middle of the mirrors, so they could keep watching a game in the middle of their haircut!
The people behind Chatters and Tommy Gun’s knew what they were doing, given their success in Western Canada, so I felt there was that layer of safety—but I would also get to be their first franchisee in Ottawa, which provided the upside I’d been looking for. Those factors combined are why I signed on.
Bringing a barbershop to Bayshore
I opened my Tommy Gun’s franchise in August 2014 in Bayshore Shopping Centre, one of Ottawa’s busiest premium malls. Initially, I was baffled when the franchisor suggested the notion of operating a barber shop in a mall, but they knew it had worked out west. In an enclosed mall, everyone knows where you are!
Bayshore went through a major, $240-million renovation. My franchise opened when the mall reopened. I got the last retail space before the changeover and it’s right next to a huge, new food court. At 900 square feet, my shop is smaller than the typical Tommy Gun’s, but you could say we have a ready-made waiting area with the food court there.
I couldn’t pass that location up. When I do radio ads, I tell the audience we’re in the Bayshore mall at the food court. They can’t miss us. I have a bright chrome barber pole spinning for all to see.
The main focal point of the mall renovation was a Target store, set to open in January 2015—but as that U.S.-based retailer failed in the Canadian market and pulled out, it never opened! Fortunately, my business grew well before they were set to open anyway, so we knew we didn’t need them as the anchor tenant. Meanwhile, Walmart saw the space and took it over instead.
The only reason we had a slow start was parking. The construction of the new garage was way behind the rest of the project. Thankfully, the management of the mall started getting security guards to help people find spaces more efficiently, put money into new signs and even started a valet service for the Christmas 2014 shopping season.
There also wasn’t full tenancy in the food court yet by the time I opened, but now it’s all full and it’s fantastic.
Our retail section greets customers at the front of the shop.
Standing out with sports
I got feedback quite quickly and it was super-positive. We were told we’re filling a void in the market. People love the design of the store, with its video games and TVs in mirrors. They don’t see that anywhere else in Ottawa. It’s nice to be ahead of the curve.
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I’m on my own for advertising and I know where to focus my efforts. In addition to advertising in the Ottawa Sun, where I used to work myself,
I do ads on male- and sports-oriented radio stations, like The Sports Network (TSN) 1200, and through sports-related social media.
In October 2014, for example, after my soft launch, we held a special grand opening event with Steve Warne from TSN 1200 on-location, along with the Ottawa Redblacks cheerleading team. Proceeds from each cut went to the Spectrum Intervention Group to help local kids with autism.
Speaking of kids, while the Tommy Gun’s franchise concept and marketing may seem ideal for targeting adult males, I get more kids coming in than I ever thought I would. We work to associate ourselves with hockey and soccer. By sponsoring kids’ teams, organizing fundraisers and donating products to raffles, we’re seeing grassroots growth. I understand where our future customers will come from in this market. And whenever one of the players on Ottawa’s NHL team, the Senators, comes into the store, I take a photo and tweet it out.
By checking sales reports and tracking staffing levels, I adjust schedules to ensure customer service remains convenient throughout the day.
Branding the business
When I started my Tommy Gun’s franchise, I spent long hours on the buildout, hiring and managing schedules. I now have lead stylists who can look after the business when I’m not there, just like I have a great manager for my Oil Changers franchise. My wife is working full-time on my businesses now, too.
I meet with my staff a few times each week. I look at our scheduling requirements, check sales reports to see where we’re at and track staffing levels as necessary. I want to know if we’re losing customers and, if so, when and on which days. We have an app where they can check the wait times for our chairs.
I’m always looking at the consistency of the delivery of our services to our customers, to ensure it’s at a standardized level. My employees wear uniform shirts featuring the Tommy Gun’s brand.
I also focus on the look of the shop, maintenance, our retail displays and ordering new inventory.
A second store
Most recently, I’ve signed a letter of intent to lease another location in an up-and-coming suburban area, Barrhaven, for my second Tommy Gun’s franchise. Instead of a mall, this one will be a bigger store in a ‘power centre’ retail development. I’m hoping to open it in the summer of 2017.
Barrhaven is in the southwestern part of Ottawa, right off Highway 416. Back before amalgamation, it was part of Nepean. The population is currently between 80,000 and 85,000 people and there have been lots of new car dealerships, hotels and large stores going in.
The typical Tommy Gun’s store is between 1,200 and 1,300 square feet and that’s approximately what my second franchise will be. With that amount of space, you have a long, rectangular layout with retail in the front, couches in the waiting area, no less than eight red leather barber chairs (four on each side) and, finally, quarters in the back for washing and drying hair. Some franchises even have pinball machines!
That gives you an idea of what a positive, fun business it is to be in. I’d say Tommy Gun’s is on the cusp of becoming ‘top of mind’ for men’s haircuts the same way Tim Hortons is for coffee. It’s exciting to be on-board for the early part of that journey.
John W. Hannon is a Tommy Gun’s franchisee in Ottawa. For more information, visit www.tommyguns.com/store/ottawa-bayshore.
TOMMY GUN’S
Established: 2009
Date of first franchise: 2009
Franchise/corporate units: 52
Investment range: $350,000-plus
Initial franchise fee: $30,000
Website: www.tommyguns.com
E-mail: info@tommyguns.com
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