In this week’s edition of People at LIME, we speak with Dustin Kosterow, the Director of Franchise Development at LIME. In today’s conversation, we will take a glimpse of his professional journey and personal background, which shed light on his motivation to grow and succeed. As we delved into Dustin’s responsibilities, he passionately spoke about franchise responsible growth and the mutual approval process that allows for collaborative decision-making, ensuring all parties involved are aligned and agreeable to the terms. According to Dustin, a key aspect of franchising is understanding the business you’re buying into, highlighting how success stems from comprehensive knowledge and unwavering dedication; to that effect, he talked about the common fears early franchisees experience, pointing out that they are legitimate concerns, but they can overcome them with the right mindset and approach. What separates LIME from its competition is its focus on sustainability and its commitment to environmental responsibility, giving customers a chance to be eco-friendly. Moreover, Dustin discussed LIME’s relentless focus on innovation and staying ahead of the curve by exploring new technology and innovative business practices. Dustin ended our chat on a personal note, reminiscing about his fondest memories at LIME, highlighting how the organization prides itself on building a tight-knit community that feels like a family.
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We have another special episode of the people at LIME. Our guest is one of our newest members of the LIME family, but most certainly brings a tremendous amount of skill and talent. Our new Director of Franchise Development, Dustin Kosterow, welcome to the show.
Thanks for having me, Nick. I appreciate it.
Thanks for being on. It’s definitely been an exciting start to your time at LIME. We hit the ground running and I don’t see us turning back. A lot of that is your incredible experience, talent, and dedication to the franchise space and your craft. I’ve been able to see that on full display. I appreciate it. It most certainly isn’t taken for granted. I want to dive in and tell your story of how you got to LIME and what it’s been like being at LIME. Let’s get started. Dustin, if you wouldn’t mind taking us on the journey of how you joined the LIME family.
That’s a great thing about it. When you represent a fantastic product, it makes it that much easier to sell. That’s what LIME has been. I’ve known Nick for a very long time. We’ve met through many conferences heading back all the way to almost when you guys kicked things off. That was a great part. I got to know Nick and the vision. To hear a ton about his brand, it’s something you can stand behind. That’s what I love about it. It’s finding the right franchise partners to grow the footprint of this fantastic brand.
What brought me to joining LIME was that I’d been in development for a long time. I worked in a lot of different roles and wore a lot of different hats. Every company is created slightly differently. I was very excited when LIME had the opening to have a development team come and help in-house to bring on the right franchisees to grow what we call responsibly. What led me here was the values of the corporation and the brand I can stand behind. Also, knowing that it works if you follow that tried and true system, is what brought me to working for you, Nick.
It’s been an honor most certainly. Dustin, if you wouldn’t mind sharing, what have been some of the roles that have led to working at LIME?
I was in the mortgage industry for a very long time in the Bay Area of California. I did very well with that. The funny thing that happened was it didn’t correlate to the lifestyle I wanted at home with my daughter. I was working constantly and got the opportunity to move into a franchise finance role. I got out of the mortgage industry and dodged all of those hurdles. If you’ve ever been in the mortgage industry, it’s a tough way to live.
I did very well with it, but I got an opportunity to work for Benetrends. Benetrends is one of the top funding companies. Not that there are no other fantastic companies out there. I got an opportunity to work for Benetrends and absolutely loved it. I got to learn the franchising space from the ground up through the financing that I liked. I got to a point with Benetrends where I reached that cap. There wasn’t anywhere else to go for me.
That’s where I got the opportunity to move into franchise development. I got to wear a hat to cut my teeth over with a gentleman by the name of Gary Findley. He was pretty well renowned in the franchise space. I got to work for his team over there, developed some fantastic brands, and understood franchise development from the ground up. I was able to work there for a long time until they cleaned house. They went in a different direction when Gary retired. I got the opportunity to go work and be a Director of Franchise Development with another company.
The thing you learn with every new role that you have in this industry is every company is slightly different. It makes you appreciate when you find those companies that do have values and are growing responsibly. I’ve been able to take all of that through all of my years of experience and development and bring that in here to help LIME continue their amazing growth as they’re going here.
The mortgage space is irrelevant to franchising. As you mentioned, you had the opportunity to cut your teeth with somebody who has built some tremendous brands. Restoration 1, they’re with Gary Findley. Clearly, it’s showing through on our end your experience. It’s been nice working with you. You’ve been there. You’ve done it. We’ve been able to get in stride and hit the ground running.
There are so many different points of view out there about franchising and you don’t necessarily say, “I’m going to be in franchising throughout my career.” It has a way of finding you. If there is a perception of franchising, it’s quick service restaurants, like McDonald’s and Burger King. Those are the cliché brands. You don’t necessarily understand that anything that generates profits and is ethical can be franchised. That goes all the way to a paint company like LIME, healthcare services, brick and mortar med spas, and everything in between. I say all that just to say it’s clear that you have resonated with home service brands, non brick and mortar, service-based, but specifically home service. Why have you gravitated toward home service?
The reason I’ve always liked home service is you don’t need a millionaire to get into business. When you look at a lot of these brick and mortar and higher-end concepts, that’s extremely wealthy that are getting into those. I’ve liked non brick and mortar because it’s a way for the average Joe to live out that American Dream of business ownership. You can take that tried and true system, you can implement that into your local community, and you can have success by following that. Not only do I like the availability and affordability of being able to do it, but I also think that home services aren’t going anywhere. What we found out through COVID was that a lot of us have no clue what we’re doing when we have to fix things around the home.
That’s the great part that I know myself came to find out. I can’t put together IKEA furniture to save my life. That’s not the way that my brain works. The thing that most Americans realize, and there have been studies done about this, is we’re now outsourcing all of those home service pieces from mowing grass, painting homes, all of that because we had to do it ourselves. This is the industry a lot with the painting you’re going to continue to see grow, but it’s that dream of business ownership. It’s something that we can do. Home services allow you and it’s filling a niche in the market that is significantly underserved.
Well said. I feel like so many times, folks want to get into business and they don’t know how and where to get started. If you’re starting a company from scratch as a startup, it’s very risky. Generally, that begins this path of colliding with franchise ownership. In many cases, your assumption is that, “My passion should be my business.” The reality is there are investment levels, lifestyle interests, and many different factors beyond just a passion play.
To your point, when you start thinking about Xs and O’s, your everyday individual that wants to benefit from entrepreneurship but you can bypass the brick and mortar and the expense that goes with that. You’re evaluating culture, lifestyle, and viability in your backyard with brands that you’ve probably never heard of and in industries that you have no idea you could own a business in. The more I’m in franchising and the more I have conversations with folks in franchising, the more I appreciate it.
You grow in those multiple layers of perspective toward folks considering entrepreneurship through franchising, and then me on the franchisor supporting those folks. I say all of that to get to a point here of setting the stage around your background. How do you think it is translated and teed you up for success in franchise development, specifically?
That’s a great thing. I got very lucky in getting into the franchise space. I had my role, I knew what I was going to do, and I got blessed because a couple of my good friends were in development. John North is one of those that I’ve been extremely lucky to have as more of an older brother figure in this. He’s done extremely well and I got to learn franchise development directly from him. Coming into this industry has helped me move through understanding that.
My background has helped with that because we’re dealing with average people. Average isn’t a bad thing to say. It’s the average everyday person. Another thing that has drawn me to LIME is we’re not here to sell anything. We’re here to partner with the right people who are looking to grow the brand. When you can show people that that’s what we’re doing, we’re not buying a job with LIME, we’re building an empire here, and that’s following our structure we have put in place. That’s part of helping people understand what the process is like.
That’s what I’ve enjoyed. It is being able to come over and help them know that, “My background wasn’t in franchising also.” I was in Corporate America to an extent, working through the mortgage industry doing 80 to 90 an-hour weeks. It was something that was a constant grind. Not that business ownership isn’t a grind at times. I’m sure you’re very familiar with what you’ve done over the past decade, even back to the pro-painters you have back at Michigan State. Like I said, it’s one of those where you reap 100% of those benefits. That’s always a great thing about business ownership and helping people understand that if they do follow that tried and true path, they’re going to reap those rewards on the other side.
You had the opportunity to pick your next opportunity prior to joining LIME. You mentioned something pretty interesting throughout our conversation. You’ve mentioned a couple of things. You’ve been able to experience firsthand, franchising done right and not done right. You are picking your next opportunity. You mentioned, “We’re very intentional about growing the right way and picking folks that are a great fit, qualified, and capable to be successful at LIME.”
We had a Meet The Team Day. It’s not anything that I necessarily am happy about or proud of, but we had to pass on an owner that is four locations, a real empire-minded potential partnership there. Ultimately, we knew that there wouldn’t be success in the long run. As difficult as that is, the reality is that we want to grow responsibly. That’s clearly not our first approach. That’s relatively uncommon. We do so much due diligence prior to inviting somebody to Meet The Team Day. We take that very seriously. At the end of the day, at the finish line, it was clear that the potential was not there and it wasn’t in that individual or our best interest.
Doing franchising the right way and growing the right way, you mentioned that. You also mentioned this aspect of being able to build an empire at LIME. I’m curious if you could elaborate. You’re sitting back considering your next opportunity and you were able to jump in headfirst with LIME. Can you elaborate a little bit on the empire aspect of LIME? Also, folks that you’re educating and consulting throughout the discovery process, how you’re able to prepare them for an empire approach through the LIME model?
One of the things that got me right away from speaking with you was how transparent we were upfront. A lot of home service brands and opportunities out there represent themselves incorrectly in the market space. A lot of that is that semi-absentee ownership where, “Throw some money at it, ten hours a week, you’re going to be successful and you’re going to be having tons of money coming in.” I know we spoke right upfront about that because that’s incorrect in the industry. If you’re going to throw some money at something, it’s more of manage that manager role. Upfront, you’re going to be putting in a lot more than 10 to 15 hours per week unless you have a rockstar employee in place.
That’s the great thing about business ownership. The better your employees are, the easier it is for you as an owner to sit on that with that beach and beer money where it continues to come in. That was one of the things that got me upfront with you. We understood right away that we were growing responsibly. We were looking for hands-on owners who were looking to exit or be corporate refugees, get out of there, and work for themselves. Not that our model can’t work in the semi-absentee model. Again, we’re helping recruit, implement, and hire those employees as we get to that, but we are looking for people who understand business ownership.
The great thing about the empire builder here versus buying a job is you’re not going to come here, you’re not going to book a job, paint the house, and do all that. I love that we have our national partnerships in place that are doing the work, recruiting the subcontractors, our artisans as we call them, which are those top tier in the communities because they’re vested in our corporation because we’re selling all of their high-end products.
Top to bottom, the thing that I’ve loved about it is being transparent upfront and letting people know, “This might not be the right fit for you.” It’s a mutual approval process. I’m not here to sell every candidate that walks through the house. We’re trying to make sure that we’re figuring out if we’re the right fit for them while we’re figuring out if they’re the right fit for us. That was a main point that drew me to it, but that empire builder, what we’re doing is we’re overseeing the business here. We’re working on the business, not in it.
What that means is we’re going to slowly build our team and we’re going to scale this business. That’s a lot where we’re overseeing it with our systems, software, procedures, and everything we have put in place. That’s the great thing about what you’ve built already here. All I have to do is explain that to people, help them understand it, and then it’s night and day difference from other brands that they’re looking at here.
If you’re a first-time business owner and you’re hoping to invest in a business where you can manage the manager, you have a huge learning curve there to create success while you’re learning how to be a franchise owner model and you’re learning a new industry. That first-time business owner, get in and wear the hats in the business. It’s a simple business. It’s a painting business. There’s a sales hat and an operations hat. Get good at producing success with that so that when you start building a team, you have clients to lean on, you have infrastructure that exists, and you know the levers to pull to create success so you’re able to scale duplication of your effort because you know how the business works.
We’ve been able to see that play out time and time again where folks that come in are a corporate employee, whether they’re an executive or a director, they leave Corporate America, they make a complete career transition, and they do it with the intent to master the business, and then they start scaling toward the end of their first year into their second year building their team. They’re able to retain employees much better. The experience overall is much better. It’s rooted in deep infrastructure and confidence. They can focus on what matters, the behavior, versus being overwhelmed with all of these firsts. It creates an experience that isn’t as enjoyable.
On the flip side, if you are hiring a manager right off the bat at LIME, that’s great. Do you have that business experience that qualifies you to do that right from the gate? We’re working with folks who fit that mold. It’s very different than saying, “The door is wide open. If you have a pulse and you’re interested in franchise ownership, come on board.” Having opened many locations from coast to coast, it’s very clear what success looks like. We’re doubling down on that.
There are lots of folks that are not wanting to buy a job. They’re wanting to scale an empire and do it in a framework of all the different aspects that a business like LIME offers that we’ve talked about. They commit to being hands-on in year 1 and year 2 to get in, learn, and master it so that as they are in their fourth, fifth, or sixth year, they can lean back on those reference points of being in the business and truly be in the business for a ten-year agreement. It is not a short-term stint because their tank was exhausted because they had all these firsts and the experience wasn’t as streamlined as they had hoped.
There is a lot there with that, but regardless, the point is that we’re ultimately looking to help folks be successful in franchising. That’s been something that we’ve taken very much to heart. There are all these different fears and uncertainties with franchising. I’m curious from your perspective, what do you think are some of the common early fears when somebody is considering going into franchise ownership?
That’s the biggest fear in itself. Everybody wants to be their own business owner, but nobody wants to do it when it’s time to go. It’s all fun and games until things become real. That’s been a lot of mine because, upfront, you can let people know, “Let’s get back. Let’s take a peek at that financing and make sure we can.” That’s a big fear of, “Can I afford to be my own business? Can I buy this? Can I do it?” The thing I always explain to people is let’s make sure we’re looking at a Bentley when we could be looking at a Honda or that we’re looking at a Honda when we should be looking at a Bentley. That’s the big thing, making sure financing makes sense.
As we go through that, it’s making sure they understand, “We’re going to speak to people that were in your seat before. We’re going to go through validation. We’re going to speak to actual franchisees who made that decision to join LIME versus joining other brands or other concepts they were looking at.” They’re going to be able to tell you about the support. A big thing isn’t buying the model, it’s how we’re going to support you in getting that model up and running but also driving towards profitability and sustained operations. Helping make sure they know that 7% royalty, the whole point that that’s there is that service that we offer for you. Not only the model that we’ve taught you but continued ongoing support to make sure we’re running the model correctly.
That’s the big thing. As we check those fear boxes off, then it gets to the point of, “Am I ready to make that jump?” That’s the great part about it. We’re not here to sell people on making that. It’s, “I know you’ve had enough of Corporate America, you’re sick of working for somebody else. We figured that we could replace your income. Everything checks every box. Now, it’s your time to make that decision. Are you ready to be an entrepreneur or are you not ready?” That’s the great thing with a brand like LIME because you can stand behind it. Our franchisees are happy, they’re excited. They love speaking to potential new franchisees and letting them know about the support we have here, which you don’t see all the time in different brands in the marketplace.
That’s key, the proof in the pudding. I want to transition a little bit and settle into some of the Xs and O’s. What are the different components of LIME that differentiate it? As I’m considering these franchise opportunities, what are those differentiators at LIME that make it a viable and exciting opportunity for somebody looking to go into business for themselves?
That’s the great thing. When you’re looking at LIME, it’s revenue streams. We have 40 different offerings that we’re doing, but the thing I love about that is you don’t have to be a painter. The great thing in this industry is our national suppliers are helping recruit, hire, and implement the artisans for us. They’re training them and making sure that we have everything correctly put in place. What you’re doing is you’re managing and overseeing a business. That business is a painting company, but the great thing is there’s no competition in our marketplace. We start at the gutters and we end down at the stamped concrete. We do everything in between there.
That’s the thing I’ve come to love about LIME. What you’re telling people is we’re walking the entire home. We’re educating that homeowner versus making sales. Only about 40% of what we do is painting. The rest is going to be surface restoration coatings. We’re doing commercial and residential. The great thing about this model is even though we target that top 30% of home ownership, we’re covering every home in the market, and we’re doing all commercial buildings throughout that too. The great thing about this model is it differentiates itself as soon as you begin to look at it because there’s nobody doing what we’re doing in the marketplace, which is premium paint services.
Back in my college days, there were marketing lecture halls. One of the first classes I was learning about was positioning in the market. You have two axes. You have the X and the Y. One is quality, one is price. If you’re low price and low quality, that’s your place in the market. You can think of McDonald’s. It’s quick and convenient. You don’t expect to go there and pay more to get more. That’s not their positioning. That brings a lot of value to that place in the market.
On the flip side, if you’re high price and high quality, that is a different experience. Everything about the business model is tailored to be positioned in the market right there. That changes whether you’re in Boise, Idaho, in Los Angeles, or Denver, you’re looking at $500,000 homes, $1 million homes, $2 million homes, depending on that market, we want to focus on the top third. Every market’s going to be a little bit different. That doesn’t mean that just because you have a market where it’s $500,000 homes plus that they’re not interested in quality.
We’re talking about a paint job. We’re not talking about buying a Rolex or a Maserati where it’s truly that top 2% of income earners nationally. We’re talking about the top home values within a market and taking an approach of giving folks an option to have a quality solution. If you think about in your backyard, if you’re in an area that has $500,000 homes, they’re steakhouses. It’s not all filled with McDonald’s.
I want to make that point because so much of the model allows for us to be differentiated. We retain our subcontractors because we’re working with the best clients in the market. Our suppliers are highly invested in our success. We have three national partnerships with Sherwin, Benjamin Moore, and PPG. They’re all very invested in our success because we’re ultimately recommending their products to the end consumer, and 75% of their business is done from contractors. Not folks coming into their storefronts. It’s contractors recommending their products.
LIME is a national distribution for their luxury products and their high-grade coatings. On our end, we’re able to give the consumer a product that’s $100 off the shelf for $40 because of our national purchasing power. That $500,000 homeowner is able to work with an artisan in the market. You can think of this a lot like Uber Black, you select a nicer vehicle. That’s our job, leveraging those national partnerships. Those reps in the local market know the subcontractors. They know which ones are the artisans and they’re able to tee us up with those intros. We’re able to give clients the artisan and quality products at a value.
It’s not going to be the cheapest price because we’re not using the cheapest painters who are not artisans and using low-grade products. We’re giving that client a relative price for quality products and quality craftsmen. That nationally is not being done. We are the first, the only, and the largest national paint company. There have been other brands that have come before us. They’ve standardized the paint market. They’ve proven out that you can standardize a very fragmented painting space. We’ve piggybacked a lot of that infrastructure that’s been proven out, but our expertise has been in that high price and high quality. That makes our model special.
So much of what we’re able to do and how we’re able to scale, talk about that empire mindset, our clients want to pay for a team approach. They want a sales consultant and a production person doing quality control. They want the turnkey expertise upfront. On the backend, the quality control is willing to pay for that experience because they don’t want to pull their hair out chasing around a contractor because they’ve already experienced that fragmented experience in probably a previous home or a previous paint project. That’s where we sit in the market and that’s what makes us so special.
To Dustin’s point, we’re not looking at paint as just paint. We’re looking at it as a type of coating. These high-grade custom homes in the market have many surfaces that deteriorate from sun and water. We’re doing from the gutters down to the concrete, as Dustin mentioned, that makes up 40 services on the inside and outside. I was having a conversation the other day and the gentleman was realizing, “If I’m investing with LIME, I’m investing in multiple franchises,” because our service offerings, our technology, and everything about the model are about giving clients the full service from start to finish as opposed to giving them some of what they need.
To your point about educating the clients versus a transactional sales approach, we’re able to train homeowners to look at their home for what it is and to evaluate the paint being a coating. Every surface is deteriorating from the sun and water. How do you restore those expensive assets? You would never drive your car and say, “I’ll let the fluids run out and I’ll replace the engine.” You maintain it, you get the fluids flushed, and you do your oil change.
With surfaces on a home, clients don’t always understand that that’s the case. It’s like that frog that boils over time until it’s too late and you need to replace it. We’re able to point out to clients how paint is a type of coating. It differentiates us in the market. They get other competitive quotes and the other painters are saying, “You got to call the gutter guy. You got to call the stamp concrete guy. You got to call the metal guy.” To do what we do for them, they need to work with multiple vendors, which is more work and more risk with logistics and scheduling.
We truly are defining the luxury experience nationally. I can talk passionately about that all day long, clearly, but I wanted to hit on that and move on here. It’s such an important part. I love how we’ve progressed through this conversation and where we’re going next here. Dustin, you’re in this role. How do you view yourself empowered to help others level up through the LIME painting franchise model?
That’s the great thing about it. I know I keep going back to the same answer, but it truly is easy to sell this model because people can see themselves being owners. To go back to what we were saying before, not to go back into all of our offerings and everything we’re doing so wonderful, we have a premium service that we’re offering. We’re not overcharging for a service. Like you said, we’re getting 40 to 60% discounts off on premier coatings and offerings that we have. How I’m helping people level up is getting them to understand. You can take that initiative, work for yourself, and handle all of that, but then be your own business owner by following our system.
That’s the great part. We’ve already been able to bring on some new franchise partners since I’ve been here in such a short amount of time. That’s the exciting thing, to see them understand what they can do. The next part’s going to be wonderful. Keep in touch with them as they launch, as they hit their markets, and then hopefully become franchisees and new validators in the system. That’s the great part about that, which is seeing that this model can work and helping people realize that they can be them. It’s not just a dream that they can’t reach.
I’m curious. What has been your most rewarding part of working at LIME so far?
My most rewarding part has been the couple of the new franchisees we brought on. We’ve had a couple that looked at 14 to 15 other brands and nothing made sense to them. It’s exciting to show somebody a brand that from A to Z makes sense, and they’re like, “Let’s get going.” The great part about that is we’ve already had those little mini successes of bringing new and we just restarted development. We’re 60 to 70 days in and bringing things back on.
The great part, which is another test of what you’ve been able to do was you’ve shut down development for a while. We want to make sure that we have the support in place. We brought all of the franchisees up to space. That everything was open and running, which was another testament to why we decided to come over and help you with the level 2 expansion, if you will, or LIME 2.0 as we’re going forward. That’s the great part about this is it’s very easy. I know I keep saying the same answer over and over again, but it’s easy to stand behind a brand like this because it was built correctly, the values, and the strategies are all put in place correctly.
There’s been a lot of runway in my career. Going back fifteen years ago when I started Spartan College Painters, did that for five years, and took the time to apply my Business Marketing degree. Moved to Denver and spent four years proving out the unit economics. Spent the following three years joining the International Franchise Association, learning, franchising, and being methodical and patient about the rollout. Frankly, I’m not a methodical person. I’m the opposite. I’m a “Let’s go.” I remember for a three-year period, my word for the year was patience.
I think we all could imagine what that was like, but being aware of the fact that we have time. I started my career very young, so it’s crazy to think that it’s been fifteen years now. We started our expansion after working out some initial bottlenecks in the business with our early adopters and started expanding in 2020. In August of 2020, we had 7 locations and we had about 70 locations in about a 15-month period. Focused on building out our departments, acquiring the talent on the team, building out the operations and the support, and evaluating and being patient around how our model is working out.
We talked about semi-absentee and what that looks like at LIME. The version of the model that’s highly successful that validates like crazy. It was that period of eighteen months where we went deep on support and operations. Here we are now in 2023 back to growth and it’s very exciting because we have versions of the business that are at multiple iterations. It’s exciting to be back in the growth mode with this perspective, to have you on the team, and for us to have already hit momentum and are getting in our stride. It’s been exciting, most certainly. To that point, what is a memory that stands out to you since you’ve been at LIME?
The thing that’s been great is working through the process, understanding LIME, and all of that. Getting to learn a lot about you and what we’ve built here or what we’re currently building. One of the great memories that I’ll always remember as one of our current franchisees, just looking at that, I know I’ve touched on it a couple of times already, but looking at handfuls of brands, 15 to 16 different brands, and then deciding Lime was the right fit for them. It’s one of those where I’ve always understood franchising. I’ve understood working for brands. I’ve come to find out more when I’m working with you that this is dialed in and you’ve built a fantastic concept here.
One of my memories was that a-ha moment when they saw it. It’s easy for you to stand behind something because you believe in it, but when other people see, “I’ve validated. I’ve asked every question. This is the brand for me.” That was one of those memories that will always stick with me, where it’s like you’ve looked at some of the top FSO brands in the organization, even brands that are significantly larger than we are. Seeing that we’re not only a small kick-in-the-pan kind of brand, we’re that brand that’s going to continue to explode. Helping that, that was one of those cool memories that I’ll always have where it’s like, “This is something that does work,” which I believed in all along, but it’s cool to see other people know that too.
I love that you said that. That’s probably been one of my favorite memories and favorite parts of expanding and being in franchising. I never thought I would own a paint company. I never thought I would be in this space. Going back to my college days at Michigan State, I was going to South Florida to do real estate commercial development. I was going to go to the University of Miami and get a JD and a Master’s in Development. I was going to South Florida and that was my career path. This opportunity to carve out this luxury experience nationally, I never thought I would be where I am now, but it was a value for me back then. It’s been a value every year to my life and the folks who are impacted by LIME. That has been the testament to why we’ve been able to compete.
Going back to August 2020, we had seven locations. I remember going against some of the best brands and hottest brands. Folks were going to other D-days and coming to ours and choosing us. We grew 70 locations in 15 months because of the validity of the business model, the intentionality behind the infrastructure, and the offering being so differentiated. Yes, it’s a busy and crowded paint space, but we’re the only ones in our space. It’s very much an honor to be defining our space. The owners and our team talk about that all the time. We take that very diligently. I want to wrap up. We have all these values, love, integrity, mission, and excellence, but which one is your favorite value and why?
I’m pretty sure from hearing me speak that everybody can choose what mine’s going to be, mine’s integrity and it always is. I think integrity is extremely important. It’s doing things the right way, even when people aren’t looking. That being said, that’s the way that we do. Responsible growth is what we’re doing. We’re being transparent upfront, explaining to people what they’re doing and what they’re getting into.
You’re getting into a niche in the market that’s significantly underserved, but we’re not telling people, “It’s going to take you fifteen hours a week and a dump truck full of money’s going to show up and you just stare at your phone all day.” We’re explaining to people that, “This is what it’s going to be. There’s going to be growing pains in it. There are growing pains in everything that you do. We’re here to support you through those. The great thing is we have over 80 franchise territories open currently that have all gone through what you’re going to come through.”
The great thing is the support is there. I love that it is a family setup here that we have. Every brand says they’re a family, but I would encourage you to jump on a couple of our validation calls. You’re going to hear our franchisees speak about it. The support is here. We actually have an infrastructure built for our franchisees to make sure that you guys are doing your job and helping our new franchisees come on. That’s not set up in a lot of other companies or franchise systems that are out there. When I look at it, I know that integrity is the most important to me. That’s why I chose to come and work for you, Nick. That’s why I’m so excited about what we’re going to be able to do to continue to explode this brand, but responsibly with the right owners so that we’re growing this brand the correct way across the nation.
Responsible franchising. It’s the way of the future. It’s what will maintain integrity in the franchise model. We are very honored and humbled to play a small part in leading that approach as franchising continues to be one of the greatest ways to create wealth and generational wealth through entrepreneurship and capitalism. It’s the American Dream. Most certainly, I appreciate you tuning into this episode. Dustin, thanks so much. I appreciate you.
Thanks for having me, Nick. I appreciate it. Looking forward to continuing to grow this with you over the next handful of years.
Dustin is LIME Painting Director of Franchise Development. His exceptional skills, honed through years of experience and industry exposure, equipped Dustin with the knowledge necessary to be a guiding light for aspiring entrepreneurs. But more than just imparting knowledge, he possessed a natural talent for helping others understand the thrilling possibilities that lay within the LIME Painting family. So, if you find yourself longing to break free from the monotony of the corporate world and venture into the exciting realm of franchise ownership, look no further.