#258: Paul Brown, Cofounder and CEO of Inspire Brands – Sell what you sell

Summary

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Episode Overview

Podcast: How Leaders Lead with David Novak
Episode: #258: Paul Brown, Cofounder and CEO of Inspire Brands – Sell what you sell
Date: September 25, 2025
Guest: Paul Brown, Cofounder and CEO of Inspire Brands
Theme: Distilling actionable leadership lessons from Paul Brown’s career, with a deep dive into brand turnarounds, building a successful multi-brand portfolio, and the iconic “We Have the Meats” campaign.

David Novak sits down with Paul Brown to explore his unique leadership journey—from humble beginnings to leading some of the world’s most recognizable restaurant brands. The episode focuses on how direct, authentic messaging (“sell what you sell”), culture, speed, and a clear brand vision power both turnarounds and sustained growth.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Origins of "We Have the Meats" & the Power of Direct Messaging

• The Creation Story: Paul recounts how the legendary Arby’s tagline “We Have the Meats” came from a pivotal agency meeting, focused on playing to Arby’s true strengths.
  • Quote: “Sell what you sell. This is what you have. Sell what you sell… We have the meats.” —Paul Brown [00:00], [11:17]
• Lesson: Clear, direct communication breaks through the noise and defines a brand’s value proposition.
  • Quote: “You don’t go around and tell this complicated story in a 30 second ad. You actually sell what you sell, right?” —Barry Diller (via Paul Brown) [10:20]

2. Formative Experiences and Early Lessons in Leadership

• Childhood in the 80s: Paul credits witnessing his family’s financial struggles during hyperinflation as fuel for his drive and independence.
  • Quote: “It kind of helped motivate me for wanting to be independent and work really hard.” —Paul Brown [03:05]
• Attention to Detail: Early jobs (McDonald's cook, grocery stocker) taught him the importance of doing things right—even when “cheating” would be easy—and the satisfaction of real results.
  • Quote: “If you’re going to do a job, you got to do it right…” —Paul Brown [04:13]
• Customer Experience: Working at his grandparents’ motel built an appreciation for achieving goals and real-world service impact.
  • Quote: “The best time ever was when we were able to flip that no vacancy sign.” —Paul Brown [05:03]

3. Founding Story of Inspire Brands & Portfolio Strategy

• Arby’s Turnaround to Inspire Brands: Paul describes joining Arby’s during a difficult period and working on its revitalization before recognizing a larger opportunity—aggregating brands to achieve scale in a changing, tech-driven landscape.
  • Quote: “We thought maybe there’s an opportunity to do a play in the restaurant industry that’s similar to what happened in hotels…” —Paul Brown [06:25]
• Napkin Sketch: The concept for Inspire was literally sketched out over dinner.
  • Quote: “I absolutely did [sketch on a napkin]. I have no idea where that napkin is, unfortunately.” —Paul Brown [08:10]

4. Lessons from Consulting and Working with Industry Titans

• From McKinsey to Barry Diller: Consulting instilled problem-solving and clear communication, while Diller taught him that bold, direct marketing always outperforms the convoluted.
  • Quote: “Sell what you sell… And that’s where we just came up. It just went straight at it.” —Paul Brown [11:17]
• Hilton & Chris Nassetta: At Hilton, Paul learned the enduring power of a strong, values-driven culture, especially in highly franchised, decentralized businesses.
  • Quote: “What really holds everything together…is culture and values.” —Paul Brown [11:46]

5. Adapting to New Industries and the Restaurant Learning Curve

• Paul shares how entering the restaurant world required adapting to its relentless, fast-paced cadence and product launch cycle.
  • Quote: “This industry…just [has] that pace of relentless product development…” —Paul Brown [14:10]
• He stresses the value of “naive questions” as an outsider and how the intensity of the restaurant business pushes rapid feedback and innovation.

6. Insights from Leading Each Brand at Inspire

• Arby’s: Success came by returning to the brand’s differentiated roots—not trying to be a “burger brand,” but doubling-down on what made them special.
  • Quote: “The closer it got to being a burger brand, the worse it performed.” —Paul Brown [16:13]
• Buffalo Wild Wings: Quality food is non-negotiable—after acquisition, the team systematically improved every item.
  • Quote: “You can have the marketing money…but you have to have great food.” —Paul Brown [17:48]
• Dunkin’: National growth meant “de-averaging” and adapting for new markets—celebrating variety in customer rituals.
  • Quote: “Being part of someone’s everyday life means there’s a lot of different lives…” —Paul Brown [18:47]
• Baskin Robbins: Learning from international success and importing best ideas/products back to the U.S. was key.
  • Quote: “It’s actually our most global brand…” —Paul Brown [19:53]
• Sonic: Their cult-favorite pellet ice became a passionate, differentiating feature—even integrated into new product and ad campaigns.
  • Quote: “In some of our places, we’ll just sell bags of that ice…” —Paul Brown [20:51]
• Jimmy John’s: Embracing irreverence and bold innovation—taking risks, launching combos and toasted sandwiches for the first time.
  • Quote: “It’s fun to have the market. It’s just a fun brand and we play into that.” —Paul Brown [22:01]

7. Balancing Centralization and Brand Autonomy in a Portfolio

• Paul details a “two by two” process mapping which capabilities to centralize (tech, shared services) and which to keep brand-specific (food, marketing, frontline ops).
  • Quote: “Anything that makes a brand a brand…stays brand-specific.” —Paul Brown [25:47]
• The balancing act: enough brand autonomy for authenticity, enough centralization for efficiency.

8. Relentless Focus on the Top Line and Growth

• Weekly “top line” standup meetings create real-time knowledge sharing across brands.
  • Quote: “We have a weekly standup on Friday mornings of the leaders that are responsible for driving the top line. I call it the top liners.” —Paul Brown [27:21]
• Incentive structure is adapted to integrate new brands, reinforcing portfolio collaboration.

9. Culture: Mavericks, Allies, and Maintaining the Creative Edge

• Inspire’s cultural pillars: Encouraging both risk-taking (“mavericks”) and collaboration (“allies”).
  • Quote: “If we all, we have to win together, right?” —Paul Brown [30:36]
• Paul values and rewards autonomy, especially for brands delivering results (“Autonomy is earned.” —David Novak [24:47])

10. The Value of Truth-Telling, Self-Awareness, and Feedback

• As tenure increases, it gets harder for direct reports to be fully candid. Paul counters this by showing vulnerability and inviting challenge.
  • Quote: “I have to change my style a little bit because… I can sometimes be honest, come across as…I know the answers…” —Paul Brown [34:30]
• Leans on peer networks of fellow CEOs for honest feedback and periodic 360s.

11. Role and Impact of Technology & AI

• AI is actively being explored for productivity, decision support, faster consumer insights, and personalized marketing—but it’s still a growing, experimental process.
  • Quote: “It just helps you answer questions faster, which helps you ask the next one in even a more effective way.” —Paul Brown [38:18]

12. Creative Partnerships & Marketing Evolution

• The origin story of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s agency pitching Dunkin’s Super Bowl ad—Affleck continues to contribute creatively.
  • Quote: “He did come to us and said, we think we have some good ideas for the brand…” —Paul Brown [41:55]
• Paul highlights media’s rapid shift from TV to influencers/social; centralized demand gen teams help move quickly and share learnings across brands.
  • Quote: “We continue to dial back, linear, dial up, social dial up of influencers and it’s working…”—Paul Brown [44:38]

13. Franchise Leadership: Influence without Command

• Success (especially in franchise organizations) relies on listening, understanding operator perspectives, and co-creating strategy, not mandates.
  • Quote: “You have to be a really good listener. I think you have to start by understanding their perspective…” —Paul Brown [47:52]

14. Personal Leadership Habits and the Lightning Round

• Paul’s self-description: Curious, strategic, maverick.
• Personal rituals: Daily exercise, listening to music/podcasts, driving his vintage Toyota.
• Admits he is “not the CEO of his home”—delegation and humility extend beyond the office.
  • Quote: “If I go home acting like the CEO of a home, that’s not going to go over very well.” —Paul Brown [48:52]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Sell what you sell… We have the meats.” —Paul Brown [00:00], [11:17]
• “You don’t go around and tell this complicated story in a 30 second ad. You actually sell what you sell…” —Barry Diller (via Paul Brown) [10:20]
• "The closer [Arby’s] got to being a burger brand, the worse it performed." —Paul Brown [16:13]
• “It’s all about the people. It’s all about attracting the right people… and getting those individuals to work together…” —Paul Brown [50:24]
• “Autonomy is earned.” —David Novak [24:47]
• “Mainstream media effectiveness has been declining… What’s working more and more is just influencers and social media.” —Paul Brown [44:38]
• “You have to be a really good listener… These [franchisees] are very successful at their business.” —Paul Brown [47:52]
• "If I go home acting like the CEO of a home, that’s not going to go over very well." —Paul Brown [48:52]

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Segment Timestamps

• 00:00 — The genesis of "We Have the Meats" and the art of direct messaging
• 03:05 — Childhood lessons, drive, and attention to detail
• 06:25 — Founding Inspire Brands—vision for scaling in a tech-driven industry
• 10:20 — The Barry Diller lesson: marketing must be bold and clear
• 11:46 — Building cultures that stick—insights from Hilton
• 14:10 — The restaurant industry’s relentless, real-time pace
• 16:13 - 22:01 — Brand-by-brand lessons: Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin’, Baskin Robbins, Sonic, Jimmy John’s
• 23:08 — Portfolio management: balancing centralization and brand autonomy
• 24:47 — Earning autonomy and setting leadership priorities
• 27:21 — Weekly “top line” meetings and sharing practices
• 30:36 — Inspire’s culture: Mavericks & allies, top line focus
• 34:30 — Getting the truth, vulnerability, 360 feedback
• 36:50 — AI in practice—productivity, speed, and marketing
• 41:55 — Collaboration with Ben Affleck & Matt Damon, Super Bowl campaigns
• 44:38 — Media transformation, influencer focus, speed and agility
• 47:52 — Leading franchisees: indirect influence and co-creation
• 48:52 — Leadership at home vs. at work
• 50:24 — Paul’s #1 leadership advice: people and teamwork

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Final Takeaways

• Great leadership is about clarity—selling what you sell, creating direct messages, and focusing on what truly differentiates your brand.
• When building a portfolio, balance efficiency (centralized tech/services) with authentic, distinct brand identities.
• Culture is the “glue” in diverse organizations; values like risk-taking (“mavericks”) only work when paired with teamwork (“allies”).
• Lean into technology and evolving media (AI, social, influencers) but protect speed and creative risk-taking.
• In franchise or decentralized settings, humility and listening trump command-and-control.
• Ultimately, success boils down to people: attracting, empowering, and integrating great teams.

Paul Brown’s advice for aspiring leaders:
“It’s all about the people… getting those individuals to work together as a team in a collaborative way. And that…is harder than the first part.” [50:24]

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For listeners and leaders alike, this episode delivers a powerful reminder: clarity, culture, curiosity, and collaboration are at the heart of breakthrough growth.

Transcript

[Paul Brown]

We were going, we were in the restaurants looking at the food that we served, and we went into. We went into the freezer and looked at the meat blocks. And our ad agency individual even said, look, sell this. This is what you have. Sell what you sell. And that's where we just came up. It just went straight at it. We have the meats.

[David Novak]

When you think of Arby's, I bet one line instantly comes to mind for you. You know it. You can say it with me. We have the meats. But what you might not know is why it works so well. Welcome to How Leaders Lead. I'm David Novak, and every week I have conversations with the very best leaders in the world to help you become the best leader that you can be. My guest today is Paul Brown, the co founder and CEO of Inspire Brands. Now that's the parent company behind some of the biggest names in quick service restaurants. We're talking Arby's, Sonic Dunkin, Buffalo Wild Wings, and more. But before he built that portfolio of brands, Paul was the guy who came in to turn Arby's around back in 2013. And a big part of Arby's revival started with that iconic tagline, we have the meats. You're about to hear the whole story, and let me tell you, there's a powerful lesson in it that I think every leader needs to understand if you want to break through the noise and get your message across. So here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours, Paul Brown. Paul, I gotta start out with a real personal question. What'd you have for breakfast today?

[Paul Brown]

I had a double espresso from Dunkin'. Have that, at least one of those every morning.

[David Novak]

And how about lunch? You know, what'd you have for lunch?

[Paul Brown]

I had the spicy east coast Italian toasted sandwich from Jimmy John's.

[David Novak]

Oh, my God. And I know you gotta be planning dinner. What do you have coming up?

[Paul Brown]

I'm gonna have some steak at a steakhouse. Fortunately, I have a business meeting tonight.

[David Novak]

That's great. You look awful good for a guy who's eating that kind of food all the time. Believe me, I did too, when I was running Young Brands. And I loved every, every bit of it, you know. Now I understand that you were the CEO of Arby's, and when you were there, you helped launch the we have the meets campaign.

[Paul Brown]

Yes.

[David Novak]

That's a fantastic campaign. Did you ever consider auditioning for the voice overactive actor role in that commercial?

[Paul Brown]

I think if I had, it wouldn't have been nearly as Successful as it was over the past 12 years, I don't think I have that kind of voice.

[David Novak]

All right, well, give us your best shot on we have the meats.

[Paul Brown]

We have the meats.

[David Novak]

I think you could fill in. That is absolutely great. We're going to have a lot of fun with this interview. And you've got so much wisdom because your background is just incredible at what you've done in your career. But before we get into just the whole story of inspire, which I'll ask you about, I'd like to learn a little bit about your journey, starting with your childhood. Can you tell me a story from your childhood that really impacted your leadership?

[Paul Brown]

Well, I am basically a child of the 80s. And what that means is that the early 80s were very different than the late 80s. And so I grew up when hyperinflation was happening. CPI went up 40% in three years. Gas prices tripled. Mortgage rates hit 16%. And what that meant is I overheard my parents talking about how difficult it was to make ends meet, even though they were working both jobs. And that kind of left me with the impression that I don't want that to happen to me. It kind of helped motivate me for wanting to be independent and work really hard. And I had jobs all throughout my childhood. My first job was at 15 years old, working for McDonald's, when you could actually work behind the grill. At 15 in Georgia. I had to quit that job because my father, I couldn't drive. He got tired of waiting in the parking lot at midnight to pick me up after the night shift and then moved on to grocery. Had some great jobs there. And I'll never forget this story. I was a night stalker. One of the things, one of the tricks if you're a night stalker is that you don't turn all the labels the right way. You can kind of put the cans on the shelf and cheat a little bit, and my boss would go through and inspect all the cans. And it really taught me that amount of detail around the fact that if you're going to do a job, you got to do it right and make sure that the customer pulls that can off the shelf actually gets the right one.

[David Novak]

Yeah, I remember being in the Pepsi Cola business and riding with the route salesman and, you know, they had to get those facings just right, you know, and that attention to detail really matters. And it drives sales. There's no question about it.

[Paul Brown]

Absolutely does. And the fact that he cared so much where I, as an overnight manager to actually do that really has stuck with Me forever, quite honestly. And I think it's just so important.

[David Novak]

Now, I understand your grandparents also served customers. And when you were watching them do that, do you have a story that has left sort of a mark on you?

[Paul Brown]

Yeah. So my grandparents bought an old motel in Forsyth, Georgia, which was about an hour outside of Macon. And when I say old hotel, it was more like kind of a Schitt's Creek kind of hotel. Right. But I would work the front desk with them, and the best time ever was when we were able to flip that no vacancy sign. Right. That was just such a great event. Didn't happen that often, unfortunately. But my grandfather would say, paul, you get to go over there and flip that switch and turn on the no vacancy sign. We can stop selling for the night. And so that was just such a great, great experience.

[David Novak]

So you saw the power of having the satisfaction in results at a very young age, for sure.

[Paul Brown]

Absolutely. And I really learned to love to work. I just actually liked the fulfillment that it gave me, and so that's carried through. The other being a child of the 80s is at the end, you know, at the 80s, it was actually cool to be a CEO. Right. If you think of all the secret of my success and Alex B. Keaton and all those kind of movies that came out, it seems like everybody wanted to be a CEO in the future. And I think that's one thing. Just, you know, being a child of the front end of the 80s as well as the end. I graduated college in 1989. You know, it got me, really, the drive to ultimately one day be a CEO.

[David Novak]

And now you're this restaurant mogul. You have these great brands that we just talked about. Tell me the founding story of how Inspire Brands came to be.

[Paul Brown]

Well, it started out as Arby's. So I joined Arby's in 2013 as CEO, and it was a turnaround story. Arby's had been through a very difficult period coming out of the Great Recession, had been purchased by private equity firm Roark Capital about a year and a half earlier. And I came on to do the turnaround, and that's when we repositioned the brand, came up with the we have the meats campaign and a lot of things that went with that. So we were sitting there in 2015 having the business do very well and thinking about what do we do with the business? Do we do the typical private equity play and take the. Either take it public or sell it. But we're also looking around the industry and saw a lot of signs in the restaurant industry that were similar to what I had seen in the hotel sector, where technology was coming into the business. It was just changing everything about the way that customers interface with the brands. It also is causing a change in the investment required. Technology is expensive, and a lot of the restaurant brands, Arby's included, just weren't at the right level of scale to make those kind of investments. So we thought that maybe there's an opportunity to do a play in the restaurant industry that's similar to what happened in hotels, where aggregating these great concepts that are individually great concepts, but just subscale by themselves and pull them together in a combined company, sharing common platforms, capability platforms and technology, and at the end of the day, have a collection of great brands operating under, again, a common set of shared services. And so that's where the idea was born. Sitting in the same steakhouse, quite honestly that I'm going to tonight, to be honest, around the same table, kind of penciling some of this out.

[David Novak]

Did you get out the napple and the napkin and write on it? I did that at one time.

[Paul Brown]

I absolutely did. I have no idea where that napkin is, unfortunately.

[David Novak]

I wish I would have saved mine, too. I really do. And I'm going to get back to inspire and how you're leading.

[Paul Brown]

Inspire.

[David Novak]

But you actually started your career as a consultant and you ultimately became a partner at McKinsey in London. What did that experience as a consultant teach you about leadership?

[Paul Brown]

Well, I think it's a great way to start a career, particularly out of school. I learned how to solve problems. I learned how to go into foreign, if you will, situations in industries that I really had no experience with, and learned the business, learned how to be a good communicator. One of the things that a consultant has to do is do a good job of communicating. Got very comfortable around senior management. One of the great things, particularly with the top consulting firms, is you do have an opportunity in early tenure in your career to actually interface at some of the most senior levels in business and communicate. And that was something I learned. You know, I got just a lot of great experience and had a great vantage point to see what kind of industries I wanted to be in. And hospitality and travel was what really interested me the most. And that's where I focus my time and energy.

[David Novak]

And speaking of travel, you go on to be president of Expedia, and you worked alongside Barry Diller. And I was lucky enough to have lunch with him just a few weeks ago. I mean, he is an incredible leader, just such a visionary. Thinker, one of the best entrepreneurs in the world. What's the story about the biggest lesson you learned by being around Barry?

[Paul Brown]

Well, biggest lesson I learned is I had just taken over as president of Expedia.com and we had to pitch the new marketing campaign to Barry. So I'd been in the job maybe two months and had no experience really of actually running a brand and having to do this sort of thing. So we went into his office in New York and pitched with my chief marketing officer and the head of the head of the agency. And it didn't go very well. That's probably an understatement. And in fact, quite honestly, in my heart of hearts, I had a feeling it wasn't that great. But I was new to the job, so I said, let's just go with it. So at the end of the meeting, which again, Barry made it very clear that he was not happy with the marketing campaign, he asked me to come into his office that was adjacent to the conference room. And I'm like, oh, oh boy, here we go. And so he takes me and sits me across the desk and actually says, you know, a lot of that was just kind of for show because the point needed to be made that that was not an acceptable approach. And then here's how you think about brand management, here's how you think about marketing consumers. You go straight at it. You don't go around and tell this complicated story in a 30 second ad. You actually sell what you sell, right? And he goes, and he gave me just a 30 minute lesson on kind of marketing 101, which I've taken those lessons with me from that day forward and I'll never forget it.

[David Novak]

Well, absolutely, that Arby's campaign is a great example. It's like you don't beat around the bush. You say, we have the meats.

[Paul Brown]

Well, that's exactly how it came up is we were going, we were in the restaurants looking at the food that we served, and we went into, we went into the freezer and looked at the meat blocks and we were looking at it and our ad agency individual even said, look, sell this. This is what you have. Sell what you sell. And that's where we just came up. It just went straight at it. We have the meats.

[David Novak]

I love it. I love it. And then you left Expedia to become president of Hilton. What did that teach you that you carried on through the years?

[Paul Brown]

Well, Chris Nassetta, CEO of Hilton when I joined and still CEO today, is such a great culture carrier. And I really learned the power of culture, particularly in a franchise business and a multi unit franchise business, because kind of what really holds everything together at the end of the day is culture of the values of the individual brand. And is the franchisee and the frontline team member clear on how in this case to deliver the Hampton experience or the Hilton experience? And it can't be done just through operating manual. And to be honest, coming from consulting, I probably did not fully appreciate the value of that until that particular experience. And I learned from Chris and other leaders there, and I've taken that with me as well. That's what we've really worked hard to do, is create a great culture of inspire that is complementary to the individual cultures of the brands that we have acquired and put as part of the portfolio.

[Kula]

Hey, everyone, it's Kula from How Leaders Lead. And if you've watched our podcast for any number of episodes, you probably know that a common theme from all of the great leaders we interview is that they are active learners. They have this commitment to continuing to learn and grow so that they don't stay stagnant and so that they continue to see success in their leadership and in their life. This theme of active learning is so important, and it's what David's latest book, How Leaders Learn, is all about. It's all about helping you develop that skill of active learning so that you too can continue to see success in your leadership and in your life. The book is really entertaining. It pulls stories from some of our greatest podcast guests and pairs those stories with insights that you can incorporate into your leadership and into your life. Right away, grab How Leaders Learn on Amazon or wherever books are sold. And I think you're really going to love it. You feel David's personality through the pages and through his storytelling, and it's a really powerful way to level up your leadership.

[David Novak]

You went from the hospitality business, you know, with Expedia and then Hilton, to be the restaurant CEO of Arby's. You know, it was a new industry. Now, you talked about how you were at McKinsey and that taught you how to go into new industries. But what was the steepest part of your learning curve to get into the restaurant business? And how did you go about getting up to speed?

[Paul Brown]

Well, there are a lot of similarities, and actually, the fact that I wasn't from the restaurant industry helped me come in and ask a lot of potentially naive questions early on that I was given the license to ask because I was from the outside. But I think the biggest difference is just the pace of product development every month, putting out a new product or two or three, a new marketing campaign of the calendar. And I remember the first time I showed up and said, somebody said we've got to review the calendar. And I'm like, review the calendar, watch the calendar. And now you laugh being the business. Well, the calendar is everything, right? If you actually do, you have the right products, the right time and the right messaging behind it, and you have to do it over and over again every single month. So I think this industry versus almost any other industry, certainly in consumer, just that pace of relentless product development and new launch is what makes it so exciting, sometimes frustrating. And also an industry that, as others coming from solar industry sometimes have a.

[David Novak]

Harder time adapting to the daily intensity of the restaurant businesses is hard to really describe.

[Paul Brown]

I tell people we can drop a new product, a new marketing campaign today and tomorrow. I can tell you whether it worked or not.

[David Novak]

Yeah, I always said it was the closest thing to direct response marketing you could ever, ever come because you can do a new, you know, launch that advertising, and within three days, your mix can be 10% of a product, you know, which is crazy, but that's the way out works. And you know very quickly whether you've hit the mark or not, because it.

[Paul Brown]

Can also not be 10% of the business.

[David Novak]

Hey, believe me, I've been there, you know, but here you have. You started out at Arby's and now you built this incredible portfolio. And it is a great portfolio of leading brands in their respective categories. I'd like to start to just by getting sort of a sense of what you learn from and what you've learned and how it's shaping your leadership from each one of these brands. And let's just start with Arby's. You know, what did you learn at Arby's that you know you're going to take with you forever?

[Paul Brown]

Well, what I learned at Arby's is, especially for the turnaround of a brand, I think the most important thing to do is go and look back and at the essence of what made it successful when it was doing well, and then tap into that essence and then find the modern incarnation of that. Right? Don't just go back and copy what it was doing 40 to 50 years ago, but say, why was it winning versus its competitive set? And Arby's, again, it's a differentiated product. It was not trying to be a burger brand. It was not trying to compete with McDonald's. It was actually trying to differentiate itself from it. And over the years before the spin out, it had just become more and more like a burger brand. And the closer it got to being a burger brand, the worse it performed. So we just had to step back and again go back to. We have. We democratize products that you can't get anywhere in qsr. Right. And by bringing the brisket or bringing the gyro or bringing those kind of products and doing them well, it actually had the right to succeed. And we've tried to kind of capture that and take that with us as we bought subsequent brands and turned them around as well.

[David Novak]

Yeah, I remember when I first saw the first commercial where we have the meets. I said, they've got it. They're going to go on a run for a long time. And you've done it. And then you have Buffalo Wild Wings, you know, or what a lot of people call b dubs, you know, as I understand it, you know, has such a big loyal fan base. I mean, what's the leadership takeaway you picked up there as you're running that brand, keeping a passionate audience, engaged, these raving fans?

[Paul Brown]

You have to have good food. We're ultimately in the restaurant business, and when we took over the brand, I got an earful from the franchisees around the fact that we aren't serving good food. The wings aren't the quality they need to be. The burgers are terrible. They just went down the list and they were actually right. And so you can have the marketing money, you can have the buildings, but ultimately you have to have great food. And so we went through and we did every single item on the menu and everything you see on the menu today. And Buffalo Wild Wings is either new or has been redone in the past several years. And we learned some of that from Arby's because we came with some pretty good culinary chops coming out of those five years of the Arby's turnaround. And we applied that to Buffalo Wild.

[David Novak]

Wings and then Duncan's, which is obviously a part of your daily life and it's a ritual for millions of people. What's a leadership lesson you've learned about being part of someone's everyday life? I mean, how do you. How do you get into that, that. That kind of habitual, you know, this is my brand.

[Paul Brown]

Yeah. Well, one, being part of someone's everyday life means there's a lot of different lives that you're part of. Right. And so, you know, you have to actually de average. There's just not one recipe. And particularly a brand like Dunkin, where if you go into parts of the Northeast. Right. It's. It's a very different product that we sell in a very different passion than if we go into others. And in fact, Dunkin has historically been a fairly regional brand. Right. It's been a Northeast kind of brand. And I think what has hamstrung it in the past is it tried to do some of the things that worked in the Northeast, but didn't necessarily appeal, whether that be different food products that you need to have of not just coffee, but iced beverages, which is where almost all of our growth is coming from today day. So kind of relaxing the constraints, if you will, and doing what you need to take a brand from being a mostly regional brand to a truly national and international brand.

[David Novak]

That's. That's such a great insight. And. And then when you look at Baskin Robbins and it's all about variety and creativity, it seems what's. What's a key insight you've learned from leading that brand?

[Paul Brown]

Two thirds of Baskin Robins is outside the United States, so it's actually our most global brand. And so some of what we've been doing is looking at what was working because it's quite successful outside the United States. It's been successful inside the United States, but not nearly as much as outside, and taking some of those ideas and bringing them to the United States, which includes products that are not just the dipping ice cream products, and also working harder to get it into grocery stores than they did in the past as well.

[David Novak]

One brand that I absolutely loved and admired for many reasons is Sonic. You know, Sonic. But, you know, one of the things about Sonic is they have this ice. This ice is like, I don't know what you call it, crushed ice or whatever it is, but I, you know, when we listen to customers talk about Sonic, they loved that ice. What have you learned about the ice at Sonic and what does that teach you about, you know, branding and building a business?

[Paul Brown]

Yeah, so people do love that ice. It's that little pellet ice, if people have had it before. And it's unique. In fact, in some of our places, we'll just sell bags of that ice in the summertime, I think.

[David Novak]

It does not surprise me. It's like tortilla chips in some restaurants. You know, you sell the chips.

[Paul Brown]

It's relatively high margin, too, so. And so there's a passion for that. So what we've really learned is how do we continue to, you know, make that more of a core part of how we're messaging our whole drinks platform? And actually, the fact that the ice, in fact, we're taking into an iced coffee platform. And the differentiating thing about our iced coffee platform are the various flavors, but also the fact that it's iced coffee on sonic ice and that makes it different than any other iced coffee you can get.

[David Novak]

I have to tell you, I now have pellet ice in my homes. In my home. I love it. It's something that I absolutely love. And Jimmy John, speaking of, I love Jimmy John's great sandwiches, you know, and it's known for reverent marketing and a pretty bold voice, I'd say. What have you taken away from running a brand that isn't afraid to be a little edgy and you guys have a little fun with yourself at Jimmy.

[Paul Brown]

John's we do have a lot of fun with ourselves. And one of what's driven the growth with Jimmy John's is we've done things that the brand was not doing before. We've added LTOs, we added combos. We actually of doing a toasted sandwich platform, which the brand has never done. We launched toasted sandwiches this year, kind of stretching back to the point of taking risks, doing some things with that brand that the brand was not necessarily allowed to do in the past. And that's driving some great growth there. And it's fun to have the market. It's just a fun brand and we play into that.

[David Novak]

Mom, look what I can do.

[Paul Brown]

No, mom, look what I can do. Ta da. Toasted roast beef and cheddar from Jimmy John's. Warm French bread, melty cheese. Speaking of toasted.

[David Novak]

Hey, pal.

[Paul Brown]

Looking crispy toasted sandwiches at Jimmy John's. Oh, that's good.

[David Novak]

It's interesting because you've got a real balancing act here. It's like part of the success for you is to really understand what made the brand work in the past. And then you also have to stimulate progress and stretch the brand and move it into new categories. How do you think about that?

[Paul Brown]

Well, it's also particularly hard to do in a portfolio environment where every brand is different and so keeping the integrity in the brand and enough autonomy at the brand level to do these types of things. Because what's right for Jimmy John's is not what's right for Arby's or not what's right for Dunkin. But at the same time have them benefit from being part of a common platform. And so, you know, we've gone through probably one of the biggest lessons I've learned is what's the right balance between managing at a portfolio level and what should be organized at a portfolio level versus what needs to retain the integrity of the brand and be organized at a brand level. Because I cannot manage each individual brand and come up with a marketing campaign for each brand. The teams have to be empowered to do that and they have to have the clear vision to do that. I think that's what makes the portfolio work.

[David Novak]

So when you think about your role, then what would be the three to five things you focus on to make sure that this portfolio is moving in the right direction?

[Paul Brown]

Well, it was the biggest transition in my career, actually going from being CEO of an individual brand to being a portfolio CEO and kind of I did have to change what I did every day. Very different. What I primarily focus my time on is people and making sure that the leaders of the brands actually have the resources they need, they get the direction set, clear vision and strategy. At both the portfolio level, I do actually dig in more where there's an underperformance issue. So the brands that are doing well get less of my time and attention and the brands that may be doing a little less well, I spend a little bit more time on them. And so they get the benefit of that.

[David Novak]

Yeah. What is that saying? Autonomy is earned. Right?

[Paul Brown]

Exactly, exactly. So that creates an extra incentive to actually do well. So I get out of their business and then I obviously am spending a lot of time managing the balance sheet, managing the financials and also the shared services platform that we're building because we are as much a technology company when it comes to the number of people in the support center as we are a restaurant company in many ways.

[David Novak]

That's interesting. I want to talk a little bit about that because you saw this opportunity to buy more brands, bring them into the fold, create a common platform, leverage the commonalities of the brands, but still provide their independence. How have you managed through the process of saying this is going to be centralized? This is where I know we can drive efficiency and effectiveness versus the decentralized nature of the brands. Because you know, when you were running Arby's, if somebody came in and said I'm going to run this or that for you, I'm sure the hackles kind of went up, you know. And that's pretty true.

[Paul Brown]

Yeah, well, that's part of what was on that napkin. And so we threw a two by two, basically looking at every single capability that goes into making a restaurant company a restaurant company and said what should be centralized versus what should be brand specific and why do we think we actually will drive outsized competitive advantage and What? So at least the investment and at the end of the day we start with anything that makes a brand a brand in the eyes of the customer, in the eyes of the franchisee stays brand specific. So in the restaurant industry, that is the food you serve, the beverage, so culinary, the marketing, the messaging teams, franchise operations, brand standards, all that has stays at the brand level and rolls up to the brand president. Obviously it's a push pull. If you all you're trying to do is take cost out, then you go more centralized. And I saw that in my other experiences at Expedia and Hilton, which were also multi brand companies, to where we went back and forth and finally found that right balance. The challenge is not getting too enamored with the we could take more cost out if we simply, if we centralized more and go too far. And so we've really tried to draw.

[David Novak]

The line hard how we always looked at it and I'm not saying it was the only way to look at it, but in terms of driving shareholder value or value for all your investors, it was critical. You drive same store sales growth, add new units and you always have a high return on invested capital. You do those three things, basically your share price would grow. How do you think about that and how do you communicate the keys to everybody's success to the rest of the organization?

[Paul Brown]

Well, it is very clear in this business that it's all about the top line. If the top line is not moving, there's not enough levers anywhere else in the P and L, particularly in a franchise business to actually drive that. So we really talk a lot about that. In fact, we have a weekly standup on Friday mornings of the leaders that are responsible for driving the top line. I call it the top liners. And we actually just share and talk about the top line all the time. That doesn't mean the other levers don't matter, but ultimately that's what our job is as a franchisor, is to drive the top line on behalf of our franchisees. And so that's just part of the conversation all the time. And conversation. Even if we're going to add a dollar of cost, is that dollar of cost going to generate ultimately more on the top line on behalf of our franchisees? If not, then what? We have a really hard discussion on whether we're going to add that dollar of cost.

[David Novak]

Yeah. In the restaurant business, if your sales go south, you get tremendous deleverage as an operator and you can't have that as a franchisor. And you make your money from the franchise fees, which come from the sales moving forward. So that makes a lot of sense. And how do you, as the leader of the overall company, how do you think about target setting for each of your businesses? Tell us your thought process behind that.

[Paul Brown]

We have a real process where we have, you know, we go through and do a lot of analytics around what is going on in the marketplace of how our brands are actually working versus the competitors. And we start with the top line and work our way down. You know, I really try to have the businesses own that as much as possible. But as you can imagine the CEO, there's a little bit of a pushing for just a little bit more in the right areas going forward and then obviously holding everybody accountable for that. Now, from an incentive standpoint, over the past several years, we've chosen from the senior leadership team to have everybody, all their incentives on Inspire's overall performance, less on the individual brand performance. And the reason we did that is because we are in the process of integrating these businesses and we want to encourage everybody to share capabilities and work together. We'll probably pivot over the next several years back a little bit more toward pushing the incentive down in the individual brands. Because my belief is how you incentivize individuals actually is a factor of where that business happens to be at that moment in time.

[David Novak]

And when you're trying to centralize a number of functions, you're kind of swimming uphill when you're dealing with the decentralized brands. And so you gotta get. I think Jack Welch told me once, he says nobody makes it to shore unless the Queen Mary does. I think that's kind of your approach here.

[Paul Brown]

That has the approach and culturally it's. It's very difficult, particularly when you're buying individual businesses that have been standalone. And not only they have to think of themselves as part of a brand portfolio, but they have to think about them sharing services with each other. That has taken several years. It always takes a few years for kind of that to start clicking with individuals.

[David Novak]

And you mentioned earlier just the power of culture and how important it is. When you think about the Inspire culture, what's would be the single most important behavior you're trying to drive and reinforce across all of Inspire?

[Paul Brown]

I'll give you two mavericks and allies, right? So I think. So those are two of our core, the top two core behaviors. Mavericks. Because we really want to push the envelope and do things differently. But if you don't do that in a ally type of environment, also in the franchise environment, I think you have to Have a culture of being an ally. You have to work together. Cause if we all, we have to win together, right? There's not a franchisor wins if the franchisee loses or vice versa. And so those two, particularly allies is the real culture, the values that we push the most.

[David Novak]

I love your top line meeting on Friday where you have all your top line leaders stand up and talk about what they're doing. It's a process to share best practices, I imagine. How do you see leveraging Inspire's know how across these brands?

[Paul Brown]

Well, we always talk about the fact that before these were part of a portfolio, each individual brand president would have liked nothing better than to be able to compare notes with the other brand presidents. Right. You just weren't able to do that when they were competitors. So we're like, let's play into that. So we're constantly saying what's working over here? What worked, what didn't work? What lesson can we learn? What are some things that we may have looked at doing at Arby's that don't make as much sense for Arby's, whether it be culinary or marketing that can actually do that? And another brand, we share media as we think about again, demand generation activities, what's working. So a lot of it's just really sharing best practices and doing it in a real time way. In fact, because we have that stand up on Friday and everybody knows it's coming, we first started doing it, people were sharing a lot of these practices for the first time in that meeting. It's funny now that most of that has already been shared ahead of time, so there's kind of less of that real time surprise happening in that meeting itself with me in the room.

[David Novak]

We'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Paul Brown in just a moment. But as my fellow golf fans know, the Ryder cup is this weekend and one of this year's captain's picks is Justin Thomas. I think leaders can learn a lot from athletes because of their incredible mentality. And Justin has so much wisdom on that front front. Especially this bit about learning from mistakes. It's tough.

[Justin Thomas]

I mean, it's something I think at least me personally, I just go in waves. You know, there's times where it seems easy to. When you get done maybe from a bad week, it's, it's okay. Well, you know, this week I did a lot of good things, but I maybe just got a little bit ahead of myself there in the end of that Friday round and I, I was too aggressive in the start of the back nine on Saturday. And, you know, I took a couple chances that I shouldn't have taken. And if I don't do any of those things, I have a chance to win versus there's some weeks you might do the exact same thing and you get done and all you can think about was how dumb those mistakes you made were and why did you do them. And always just looking at the negative side of it. But the sooner that I realized that I have those opportunities to learn from the mistakes that I made, definitely the sooner, better off I started playing better golf and, and having a lot better things happen for me. So it's really just trying to, I mean, it's the same as everything, you know, it's. It doesn't matter whether you're David Novak, Justin Thomas or Tiger Woods, Rory McRo, whatever it is. It's like if you, you just wake up some days and you're just not in it, you know, you're just. Whether you don't get, you know, good sleep, your swing doesn't feel good, or you maybe don't like the golf course as much as just your irritable. Whatever it is. But those are the days, I think, that separates the good and the great players is managing those days and weeks the best.

[David Novak]

You can go back and listen to my entire conversation with JT episode 135 here on how leaders lead. Great leaders always have truth tellers around them and they want the whole truth and nothing but the truth. You know, what do you do to show that you want to get the real skinny? What's really happening out there?

[Paul Brown]

But to be honest, I found that that is getting harder and harder the longer I've been CEO. I'm going into my 13th year as CEO and I found that people assume incorrectly that I have more of the answers than I do. And so I have really tried to go out of my way to your point of actually having people around me, encouraging people to kind of tell me the truth. But it's been a lesson I've had to learn. I've had to change my style a little bit because my style, I can come sometimes be honest, come across as, you know, I know the answers or I have the path, I have the plan. And trying to make myself a little bit more vulnerable to the team and making it very clear that I want to have the contrarian idea is really important.

[David Novak]

I love the fact that you have that self awareness and you admit that these are things that you're working on. Do you have a personal process you use to assess the where you're at as a leader and how you're going to sharpen your axe or is it just happened day to day?

[Paul Brown]

A lot of it happens day to day. But I'm fortunate to have a lot of really good friends that are in business themselves and you know, I spend a lot of time sharing things with them and you know, they're pretty good at calling me out and saying, you could have done that one differently or you could have handled that situation a little bit differently. And you know, in a way that it's hard for your employees or your, you know, the people that work for you directly to call you out. And so, you know, I think they have been really instrumental in helping me continue to grow as a leader.

[David Novak]

Do you ever just take a formal look at yourself and say, this is what I need to do or is that iterative as well?

[Paul Brown]

Periodically. In fact, a few years ago I did an assessment, leadership assessment of 360. We did that across the whole leadership team, including me, and we're going to probably do that again. I think that is a useful exercise to do periodically. I think not every year. And it was eye opening and I've made some adjustments because of it.

[David Novak]

Oh, good, good. You know, and you mentioned earlier the importance of having this common technological technology platform that you can leverage across the brands. And in almost every conversation I'm having today with leaders, AI is impacting the way they're thinking about their business. Has it changed your thinking and your strategy? How are you looking at AI in the restaurant business?

[Paul Brown]

Well, I'm looking at a couple of several buckets. The first is just productivity gains. So there are a lot of activities that are very repetitive activities if you think about in the multi unit business with thousands and hundreds of thousands of team members. So automating those tasks, anything that was asked of a service desk, for example, where people are having to get information that can be much more efficiently done tasks like obviously a technology. So there's a lot of productivity that we're getting just from using AI in a better way. The second is making better decisions. It's really, really fascinating around how from a product testing, from an idea testing, that you can actually do these through Personas in a way that you had to go in the old way. You had to go out and obviously talk to customers and spend all the time. And you can do a lot of that up front. It doesn't substitute obviously from actually getting in front of customers, but it kind of helps you kind of at the top of the funnel of idea generation to go a lot faster and then obviously customizing marketing messages and just doing a better job of talking to the individual customer the way they want to be talked to, and ultimately even targeting promotions and pricing to a certain extent at an individual level, that one's a little further along, but it's changing very rapidly.

[David Novak]

What are you doing with AI to help enhance your leadership and how you approach your job every day? Do you have any tricks of the trade that you could pass on to us? Because everybody's trying to do this. Everybody's trying to get up to speed.

[Paul Brown]

To be honest, I'm still getting comfortable as a tool for myself. We use copilot and we have that, so I have access to that. And I've been using that is a tool to kind of help me ask a set of questions that quite honestly, I might have walked down the hall and asked an analyst first, but I can actually get that first round of let's looking into this. And it helps me ask better questions right at the end of the day. I think from a benefit from AI on leadership, it just helps you answer questions faster, which helps you ask the next one in even a more effective way.

[David Novak]

This has been so much fun, and I love how you're attacking this business. It's fun to talk to somebody who's actually running a business that I used to have a little fun with them myself. But I want to have some more fun with you with my lightning round of questions. So are you ready for this?

[Paul Brown]

I'm ready.

[David Novak]

Okay, here we go. The three words that best describe you.

[Paul Brown]

Curious, strategic, and maverick.

[David Novak]

If you could be one person for a day besides yourself, who would it be?

[Paul Brown]

I'd like to be a classical pianist. I always wished I hadn't stopped lessons, and just to be able to sit down and entertain a room would just be a lot of fun. Your biggest pet peeve, People making excuses, Particularly leaders. Not owning the issue, but making excuses.

[David Novak]

Who would play you in a movie?

[Paul Brown]

Matt Damon.

[David Novak]

Speaking of movies, Ben Affleck was in Duncan's super bowl ads. If the two of you swapped jobs for a day, what role would you give him at Inspire?

[Paul Brown]

I would probably put him in the ideation, the culinary. He's a very creative person, so he's come up with some pretty interesting product ideas. And he still works with us today on the advertising side. So I think he would come up with some pretty interesting product ideas for Duncan.

[David Novak]

That's cool that you have him work with you on the marketing side. That's great. What's the best and worst parts about.

[Paul Brown]

Living in Atlanta, the best part is the friends we have and generally the weather most of the months. The worst part is the weather in the middle of the summer and the traffic.

[David Novak]

You get two tickets to anything you want. Where are you going and who are you going to take with you?

[Paul Brown]

Two tickets would be to the World cup finals. I've been several times and I think that is by far the most exciting sporting event and it's just great. And I would take my wife and my two kids, or two kids. I only get one.

[David Novak]

Well, I'll let you take three. We're not going to cut anybody out here. What's the one thing you do just for you?

[Paul Brown]

I like to go on long walks with my dogs and I put in my AirPods and listen to either music or a podcast. It just lets me get away for just a little while.

[David Novak]

Besides your family, what's your most prized possession?

[Paul Brown]

It is probably my 1982 Toyota FJ. I just love driving it around. It's the one car that I get everybody waving and smiling. I think it makes everybody happy around me as well as myself.

[David Novak]

What's something about you that few people would know?

[Paul Brown]

There's a lot of things that people don't know. I've tried to stay a fairly private person. In fact, a lot of things I said today I've never said before, so.

[David Novak]

Good. Let's hear another one.

[Paul Brown]

Oh, I was a failed piano player and a failed singer in my old age, younger age.

[David Novak]

What's one of your daily rituals besides drinking Dunkin Donuts, coffee or Dunkin. You know, something that you never miss.

[Paul Brown]

I try to get some form of exercise every day when I'm in town several days a week. I get up very early and work out with the trainer. And when I'm out of town, I just try to find, at a minimum, get outside and walk around.

[David Novak]

Great stuff. And you're out of the lightning round. Great job, you know.

[Paul Brown]

Thank you.

[David Novak]

I want to come back to Ben Affleck. He. He helps you with your advertising and your marketing. How did that start?

[Paul Brown]

Well, he and Matt Damon created an agency several years ago and we were. Duncan was their first client. And so they kind of came to us. He did come to us and said, we think we have some good ideas for the brand and we'd like to actually see if you could become a client. And that was where the first super bowl commercial came from for Duncan.

[David Novak]

I don't think you should do this. Last year she came to my work. Now I gotta show her what I can do.

[Kula]

He's here.

[David Novak]

Flack on the track. What up, bro? For your consideration, here comes the Boston Massacre. The Dun Kings. Touchdown Tommy on them keys, player, coach.

[Paul Brown]

Got it.

[David Novak]

I'm open and need no introduction. My partner.

[Paul Brown]

It's really hard to be your friend, man.

[David Novak]

You said you were gonna support me. Girl, why you dunking?

[Paul Brown]

How do you like them donuts?

[David Novak]

I'm so sorry you had to see it, but I forgive you. Lay us on the track.

[Paul Brown]

Are we gonna be on the album?

[David Novak]

We talked about this. Let's go. You're blinded by them pinstripes. Wrap it up. Here goes Babe Ruth.

[Paul Brown]

Tom, you can stay.

[David Novak]

You remember when I told you I'd do anything for you?

[Paul Brown]

This is anything.

[David Novak]

Chill.

[Paul Brown]

They're naming a drink after us. They are now still part of our AGC lineup and they do a lot of great things for us. So we're very, very happy with them.

[David Novak]

And, you know, we talked a little bit earlier. You started out as a consultant at McKinsey. You, you, you had this meeting with Barry Diller where he gave you the 30 minute, one on one in terms of marketing. And what have you learned about inspiring creative people? Because in your business, you got to have great ideas and you got to have great marketing. You got to keep those sales going that comes from creativity and innovation. What have you learned about managing that part of the business? Those kinds of people that are creative.

[Paul Brown]

I think it's setting a view of what could be possible. The art of the possible, stretching the view, challenging them to tell a story that hadn't been told before, and breaking through, which, by the way, is harder and harder these days to break through in any kind of messaging, actually challenging them and giving them tough feedback when they need tough feedback to kind of try to stretch a little bit more.

[David Novak]

In the past, there was that 30 second TV commercial that would really drive the sales. And I know it has huge impact even today when people think people aren't watching tv. It's hard to believe when you see what happens when you put advertising on the air. How are you, how are you thinking about media this day in terms of mainstream television versus the TikToks and, you know, everything else that's available to you.

[Paul Brown]

Mainstream media effectiveness has been declining very, very rapidly. Linear TV outside of live sports, live sports and streaming has been holding, but just we're taking that down less and less. What was working more and more is just influencers and social media. It is absolutely fascinating how quickly that can move the needle. And we like that because we Think we have great products. And so if you have good products, then that works very, very well. And it also works well for some smaller brands. But we continue to dial back, linear, dial up, social dial up of influencers and it's working for us really, really well.

[David Novak]

And how have you restructured or organized to really go after the influencers and being world class at social?

[Paul Brown]

Yeah, so we have our demand generation group centralized. The brands have influence in that and then we have a group that actually manages influencers with people within that group dedicated to the brand. So what that lets us do particularly now is share learnings across and we're using a few different influencer agencies. And so right now we're testing which one works best. And that's part of the top liner meeting on Friday. A lot of the conversation is we did this last week with these group of influencers and it worked, or vice versa, it didn't work. And so you should try that. And what's great about that is you can kind of turn on a dime, if you will, from an influencer standpoint. Whereas, you know, you know, the big old fashioned marketing campaigns, if it wasn't working, you kind of had to wait until next month to change it, right?

[David Novak]

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. It's the speed is everything now and how much is just speed and sense of urgency, something that you work hard at driving?

[Paul Brown]

We talk a lot about that. Got to be able to pivot very, very quickly, particularly over the past several years. Right. This has been a very, very dynamic business environment, particularly coming out of COVID and things that used to work aren't necessarily working the same way anymore. So we've got to set ourselves up in a way to pivot, not be throwing stuff against the wall necessarily to see what six, but be able to pivot very quickly. That means sometimes shooting various options on marketing campaigns. That means working with franchisees to say we're going to run this for a couple of weeks, but here's the backup plan. If that's not working, let's get that pre approved so we don't have to actually sit and go through the standard approval processes to pivot midpoint during the window. And it's a muscle that we learned pretty well over the past several years, you know.

[David Novak]

Well, one of the things that, you know, when people talk about leadership, it's one thing when you have control and power of over somebody per se, okay. To be able to lead them. It's another when you don't have all the power, you have to have indirect influence and you, you you deal with these huge franchise networks where they run their business and they're paying you a fee, and that fee is expected to drive the top line. You know, how do you. What have you learned about leading teams that you don't have the direct influence on? It's more of an indirect influence. How do you think about that?

[Paul Brown]

I think you have to be a really good listener. I think you have to start by understanding their perspective, listening to them, by the way. They have a lot of great ideas. Right. And so. And if you come in and I've seen people fail in this business, where you come in just telling people what it is, or you walk into the room at the franchisee advisory meeting and you throw it up and say, here's the plan for next month versus starting out and having a conversation. You may end up ultimately still getting to the same place. Right. Or with a few tweaks. But a lot of it's just the style. And because these individuals are very successful at their business and they probably know the front line a lot better. What's happening on the front line better than I do, certainly. Right. And so I've got to take that into account.

[David Novak]

You mentioned earlier, if you had the World cup, you take your wife and your two kids, you know, what's something that you've picked up at work that you've taken into your personal life and, you know, that's helped you become an even more effective leader at home.

[Paul Brown]

Well, one thing I've learned is that I am definitely not the CEO of my home. And so if I go home acting like the CEO of a home, that's not going to go over very well. Quite honestly, I've learned as you have to in business, around what can you influence and spend the time and energy on things that you can influence, then what are others better at doing than you and let them actually manage it. So that's a kind of division. I tend to like to control things like a lot of people. So I've had to learn not to necessarily approach it that way.

[David Novak]

And I'm sure your wife is a very good truth teller every now and then. Right.

[Paul Brown]

And the kids are even better. Absolutely.

[David Novak]

Well, you're lucky to have such a great family. You know, what do you see as your. Your unfinished business?

[Paul Brown]

I think there's still opportunity for Inspire to grow, certainly organically, but even inorganically over time. Time. I think we are building something very special here. And I think there's a lot of opportunity in this industry for continued change. And we want to be at the forefront of it. The timing of that is obviously very variable, but we think that. I feel really good about the fact that we've built something that is very sustainable and very differentiated and will add lots of value over time, and that will obviously turn into increased shareholder value as well. So, you know, I've been at this for a while, but I still feel like we're very early in the journey. A lot of exciting things ahead of us.

[David Novak]

And I have one last question for you here. It's what's one piece of advice you'd give to anyone who wants to be a better leader?

[Paul Brown]

It's all about the people. It's all about attracting the right people. It's about retaining the right people, and it's helping set them up for success. And sometimes, hopefully not frequently, you know, making the hard decisions about people that are not part of the team. And it's not just about the individuals, but it's about getting those individuals to work together as a team in a collaborative way. And that second part, I think oftentimes is harder than the first part. Right. Finding great people is hard, but getting those great individuals to work together and be better together than they are individually, I think actually is harder.

[David Novak]

Yeah, that's some tough sledding. And particularly when you've got a business like yours where you've got these independent brands, independent franchisees, and. And you're trying to find that balance between the centralization and decentralization. But I have to tell you, you're obviously doing it very well because you're winning in the marketplace and you've got a great approach that I admire and respect. And I want to thank you for sharing your insights on this show and wish you continued success.

[Paul Brown]

Thank you again. It means so much coming from you, David. Appreciate it. Foreign.

[David Novak]

Like Paul learned early in his career, it's easy to over complicate your marketing. But the best messages get right to the point. Just like we have the meat stuff for Arby's. Paul said it himself. It's getting harder and harder to break through the noise. That's why leaders have to know how to sell what they sell, clearly, directly and with confidence. This week, take a fresh look at a recent piece of marketing. Together with your team. Ask if it clearly sells what you sell and if not, how could you sharpen it to be even more direct about what makes your brand special? So do you want to know how leaders lead? What we learned today is that great leaders know how to sell what they sell. Coming up next on how leaders lead is Sarah Gibson Tuttle, founder and CEO of the popular nail polish brand Olive and June. So be sure to subscribe on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts so you don't miss it. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of How Leaders Lead, where every Thursday you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world. I make it a point to give you something simple on each episode that you can apply to your business so that you'll become the best leader you can be.