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Franchise & Multi-Unit Operating Executive

I build the operating system behind growth.

I lead franchise and multi-unit businesses through expansion, portfolio improvement, and operating change across operations, real estate, development, and franchise infrastructure. Available for select executive, fractional, and private-equity-backed operating mandates.

I diagnose the constraint, build the operating system, and stay accountable through implementation — in a permanent executive, fractional leadership, or defined project mandate.

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Tavis Scholz, franchise and multi-unit operating executive

Selected operating scope and results

8X locations scaled nationally
21 → 173
system sales growth
~7x
store projects delivered
~160
franchise infrastructure built from the ground up
US + Canada

Where to start

One operating system. Two ways to bring it in.

Put an operator in the seat

Executive leadership — for companies seeking a senior operator to own growth, development, portfolio performance, or operating transformation.

View Executive Track Record

Add the capacity without the hire

Advisory & fractional — for leadership teams that need defined operating capacity without immediately adding a permanent position.

Explore Advisory Work
Private equity

For investors, the work takes the form of defined operating mandates inside portfolio companies — from diligence support to the operating seat. Discuss a portfolio mandate

Growth doesn't create chaos.Weak operating systems do.

The Situation

The business is bigger. Why does it feel slower?

More people. More meetings. More approvals. More exceptions. Less momentum.

Nothing is technically broken — everything simply takes longer. Growth didn't create the problem; it exposed it. Some businesses are built for growth. Most are reacting to it. The difference isn't effort. It's the operating system underneath.

The right time to call is before growth becomes a crisis.

What it looks like from the inside:

  • The company has outgrown the founder. The calendar hasn't.
  • More meetings. Fewer decisions.
  • The same problems keep coming back — every Monday feels strangely familiar.
  • Opening location #120 feels harder than opening location #20.
  • Everyone knows which locations are losing money. Nobody decides.
  • Everyone is busy. Nobody owns the outcome.
  • The franchise offering exists. The platform to support it doesn't.
  • A new owner, investor or executive team needs a 90-day operating plan.

How I Help

One multi-unit operating problem. Three areas of execution.

None of this means the team is failing. It means the business is running on a system built for a smaller company — and good people are working harder every quarter to compensate for it.

The work begins with execution, not abstract advice. Every engagement produces a system, process, team structure, or operating plan that internal leaders can run.

Operating Structure & Leadership

When every important decision reaches one person, growth stops feeling like growth — it starts feeling like traffic. I build the decision rights, accountability, KPIs and management cadence that let a leadership team run the company instead of escalating it.

  • Operating plan, accountability map and leadership cadence
  • KPI scorecards and performance visibility
  • Organization design and decision rights

Outcome

The leadership team executes without every issue escalating to the founder.

Franchise Growth Infrastructure

A franchise is easier to sell than to support — the gap shows up after the agreement is signed. I build the platform behind the offering: candidate qualification, territories, unit economics, onboarding, support and opening processes — from someone who has built one from zero through its first closed deals. Business support in coordination with your counsel, not legal advice.

  • Development process, qualification standards and territory strategy
  • Unit economics, onboarding architecture and support model
  • Operations standards and opening processes

Outcome

A franchise platform that can recruit, open and support franchisees — not merely sell them.

Multi-Unit Development & Portfolio Performance

Every location tells you something — invest, fix, relocate, or exit. The mistake is pretending not to decide. I build one accountable system connecting unit performance, field execution, site decisions and lease discipline, so those calls happen against a model instead of case by case.

  • Portfolio segmentation with invest / fix / relocate / exit criteria
  • Field structure, sales planning and performance cadence
  • Site criteria, pro formas and opening / closure playbooks

Outcome

Every location has a decision, a plan and an accountable owner.

Every location gets a decision,a plan, and an accountable owner.

Selected Results

Systems that held up under real growth.

Selected operating results from prior executive leadership roles.

System footprint, 2014–202550100150212014252016952019173PEAK2022142EVALUATED202494RETAINED2025
Fig. 1 — System footprint, 2014–2025: scale, peak, rationalization, keep decision

Scaled — then rationalized — a national portfolio

173 locations · ~7x sales growth · 142 evaluated

A 21-store specialty chain with national ambitions. Across successive sales and operations roles I helped grow it to 173 stores with roughly 7x system sales growth — then owned the harder work of rationalizing the portfolio. The 154-store evaluation and triage model I built in 2022 drove the 2024 keep/close decision across the 142 stores then trading — with median occupancy cost brought from 22.1% to 17.1% — inside the 15–18% target band — and same-store sales returned to growth.

Built a repeatable development engine

~160 projects · 5-day retrofits · 10-person team

A development department with zero staff and a portfolio transformation ahead of it. I owned store development, built a 10-person organization, and wrote the cross-functional playbooks for every site lifecycle event. Roughly 160 store projects delivered — 21 openings, 30+ relocations, 100+ wind-downs — with retrofits standardized to a five-day cycle.

Built the operating platform behind a new franchise program

US + Canada · 3 agreements awarded · 10 months

Pepper Palace had committed to franchising with nothing behind the ambition — no FDD, no territory model, no sales process. I owned the development function and built the infrastructure required to move from ambition to executable growth: counsel coordination, a 600+ market territory model, candidate qualification, onboarding, support architecture, and operating standards — a development process lean enough for one person to run end to end. The company awarded its first three franchise agreements (Canadian conversions) within ten months of launch.

Coverage, June 2026:PR NewswireYahoo FinanceMorningstarL'Express Franchise

First Engagement

Start by identifying the operating constraint.

Companies facing this usually weigh three routes: a permanent executive search, a strategy consultancy, or stretching the team they have. Each has its place. This model exists for the gap between them — senior operating capacity on the problem now, building systems your team keeps, accountable through implementation rather than through a report.

Operating Constraint Assessment

A two-to-three-week review of the business, leadership structure, performance information and critical workflows.

Discuss an Assessment

It ends with:

  • A clear diagnosis
  • An estimate of business impact
  • A prioritized 30-60-90-day plan with named owners and decision points
  • A recommendation on whether the work belongs internally, in a focused build, or in a fractional engagement

Where it goes from there

Focused Build

A defined system built to a finish line — a franchise growth platform, a multi-unit operating system, a development process.

Fractional Operating Leadership

A defined operating agenda inside the leadership team for a set number of days per month.

Ongoing Advisory

Structured monthly review of performance and key decisions once internal owners are in place.

Engagements are scoped around the business problem, the level of involvement required, and the outcome you need — not a rate card.

Growth should reduce pressure.Not increase it.

Executive Leadership

Executive leadership earned from the store floor up.

Across six roles in twelve years, I advanced from store manager to vice president while leading sales, field operations, recruitment, training, real estate, construction, development, and franchising. That progression required me to set strategy, build operating models, and stay accountable through implementation.

View Executive Track Record

About

The hardest growth problems sit between functions — and I've led both sides of those handoffs.

I build the systems franchise and multi-unit businesses run on — operating structure, franchise infrastructure, development process, portfolio discipline. The range matters because growth problems rarely stay inside one department: they happen where franchise sales meet support, where real estate meets unit economics, where leadership decisions meet field execution.

That judgment comes from having worked both sides of those handoffs: six leadership roles in twelve years at Pepper Palace, the national specialty retailer, as it scaled from 21 locations to 173 — sales, operations, training, real estate, construction and franchise development, usually building the department before running it. I build with modern tools, including AI where it genuinely compresses work, without making the technology the story.

Executive profile & full operator track

Who I work with

  • Emerging and rebuilding franchisors
  • Multi-unit retailers, kitchenless QSRs, and low-infrastructure service concepts
  • Founder-led companies entering a more complex stage of growth
  • Private-equity-backed businesses that need operating depth
  • Companies preparing for a major expansion, acquisition or portfolio restructuring
  • Established franchisees building a true multi-unit operating organization

The short version

  • Twelve years operating a national multi-unit retailer — store floor to vice president
  • Six leadership roles across sales, operations, development, real estate, and franchising
  • Usually built the department before running it
  • Former franchisee
  • MBA, Washington State University
  • Based in Tennessee · working across North America
Download executive brief (PDF)

Next

Your turn. What are you hiring for or trying to solve?

Whether you're hiring an executive, evaluating an operating mandate, or working through a business challenge, I'd be interested to hear the context. Share the opportunity, the situation, and the timing.

Based in
Sevierville, Tennessee · Working with companies across North America

Hiring or evaluating?

Start with the documents. References and the detailed operating record follow on request.

Executive brief (PDF) Résumé (PDF)