Meet Express Pietermaritzburg’s Franchisee, Reynold Easthorpe and read his inspiring success story since partnering with Express Employment Professionals.
“My journey with Express began many years before actually purchasing the Express PMB franchise. In 2004/5 I shared an office with Carolyn Diaz who had just started her new recruitment business (Dynamic Recruitment) and that set the scene for my first encounter with a staffing business. I had the privilege of first hand observation of that business being established and then seeing Carolyn convert to an Express franchise. I had left the corporate world and had started my own consulting business working mainly with SMME’s and over time I continued a relationship with the Express brand. Between 2005 and 2013 I continued in my own business involved in manufacturing and business consulting. The latter led to some work being done with the Express PMB office and it was at that stage, having had a much closer look at the business model and its potential, that I saw the opportunity to become a franchisee. This is my fifth year as an Express franchisee.
There are many success stories to share but possibly the single most significant accomplishment has been to re-establish Express PMB as a premium brand in our market and to win back clients that had been lost in the past. Our business has grown year on year and in comparing our performance in 2014 to where we are right now, both our net sales and gross margin have trebled. We have focused hard on growing a presence in the healthcare sector and this has borne fruit as a niche market that differentiates is amongst our local competitors.
As part of a franchise we as franchisees receive a host of benefits not least of which is a franchise system that certainly sets us apart in the marketplace. It’s the system that runs the business whilst the people that we employ run the system. That’s so neat. In many ways it fulfils the words of Michael Gerber in his book “The EMyth Revisited” – “It is a proprietary way of doing business that successfully and preferentially differentiates every extraordinary business from every one of its competitors”. I guess it allows me to build a business that works with predictability, with little effort and with daily profitability. The fact that we are ISO9001 accredited is also a huge benefit.”
Reynold’s personal advice to a future franchisee prospect?
- The Express franchise opportunity is definitely a business worth pursuing
- Have a clear purpose that is uncompromisingly undiluted and pursue that
- A franchise allows you to leverage ordinary people and ordinary skills to the point of consistently extraordinary results
- Welcome to the Express family, because that’s really what we are