My path into franchising started with a bad day at work and a dog daycare in Northern Virginia. I was a Dogtopia customer, and one afternoon I walked in and told the team, half-joking, “I wish I could do what you guys do all day.” Someone said, “You know… we’re a franchise.” I didn’t even know franchising was an option until that conversation. Two months later, I was sitting at Dogtopia headquarters for a Discovery Day.

I’d left the Navy a few years earlier, where I served four years most recently with Carrier Air Wing Five, deployed during Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. When I learned Dogtopia offered a veteran franchise discount, it turned “maybe someday” into “why not now.” In 2009, I signed on as franchisee #26, back when Dogtopia’s entire franchisor team was about five people.

I opened my doors in March 2010, just over 30 years old and a first-time business owner, in an economy still reeling from the 2008 recession. I made every mistake a young owner makes, and I was underfunded from the start. What kept me going was the franchisee community — the peers who were fighting the same battles I was. What I had less of was support from headquarters; Dogtopia was still an emerging franchise, without yet a dedicated coach or a built-out playbook to catch someone like me. I didn’t even know what a Franchise Business Coach was until I got my first one in 2017, seven years in. Everyone I talked to told me I was “doing all the right things.” What I needed wasn’t more effort — it was a more mature system behind me.

That gap is the reason I went back to school for my Master’s in Organization Development and my Executive Coaching Certificate, and why I spent two years coaching business owners one-on-one after selling my Dogtopia location. I didn’t want another business owner to have to piece together that kind of support solo, the way I did.

By the time I joined Burn Boot Camp as a Franchise Business Coach in 2021, I wasn’t new to the brand — I’d been a member since 2016 at our Tega Cay, SC location, on and off, long before I thought about working here. Stepping into that role felt like both a natural fit and a chance to build something I once needed. Since then, I’ve grown from Franchise Business Coach to Franchise Business Coach Manager, to Director of Field Support, to my current role as Senior Director of Operations. Today I lead strategy and operations for a system of more than 410 franchised gyms, overseeing our Learning & Development department and business operations.

What I’m proudest of isn’t a single project. It’s watching the numbers move because franchise partners have the kind of headquarters support I didn’t have starting out. Over the last three years, our system has delivered double-digit same-gym sales growth, and our “Million Dollar Club” of top-performing gyms has grown 65 percent from 2025-2026. Every one of those numbers is a franchise partner who took a risk, built a team, and served their community, backed by the coaching and resources it took me years to find.

That’s also why I applied to serve on the VetFran Committee of the International Franchise Association, specifically the Veteran Education Focus Group. Our work is geared toward educating veterans and active-duty service members on franchising as a career path after their service. Most veterans, like me, don’t even realize it’s on the table until someone tells them. Veterans make exceptional franchisees and franchisor team members because military training builds exactly what a franchise system needs: people who can execute a proven playbook, lead a team, and stay steady under pressure. What I want them to know took me years to learn myself: expect the franchisee community to show up for you. But also expect real infrastructure from headquarters — dedicated coaching, structured training, a clear playbook. That’s exactly what I’ve spent my career since building.

Franchising gave me a second mission after the Navy. Somebody telling me, “you know, we’re a franchise,” changed the entire direction of my life. Now it’s my turn to be the one who says it — to a franchise partner opening their first gym, or to a veteran who has no idea yet that this path exists, or what real support should look like once they’re on it.

To find out more about franchising your own Burn Boot Camp location, visit Burn Boot Camp. To find out more about VetFran, or to support veterans in franchising visit VetFran.