How did it get started?
I took an H&R Block course 55 years ago.
Loved it.
12 years later is running 250 H&R blocks.
And my dad decided we should computerize taxes.
So we both quit our jobs and built the first tax software for an Apple computer.
1981, no one wanted it.
Got lucky and found a company in Virginia Beach called Mel Jackson Tax Service.
We merged the two companies, changed the name to Jackson Hewitt, built it into,
built it and sold it for public company for $483 million.
I had a three year not compete, but it didn't cover Canada and having grown up
in Buffalo, I knew the Canadian tax system.
So it didn't cover Canada because Jackson Hewitt never went to Canada, but H&R
Block's very successful in Canada.
We opened Liberty Tax in Canada and within three years became a top 100 retail chain.
Came back to the United States in 2000.
Now I had to compete against my own name, my own company, my own people.
And yet we grew faster than Jackson Hewitt and Block combined.
Liberty Tax opened 4,000 offices in 12 years.
So my two companies, Jackson Hewitt and Liberty grew to 10,000 locations.
Jackson, or Liberty was also a public company worth, worth $500 million.
Sold that and started loyalty brands.
Why do most businesses fail today?
And you have not.
Well, you're right.
That each year over the last few years, over a million new businesses have started up
and 95% fail within five years.
So only one in 20 make it.
So there are several reasons they fail.
Number one is the most important is that not everyone's meant to be self-employed.
Two thirds of Americans want to be self-employed, but half of them don't have
the skill to do it.
They don't have the risk taking or they don't have the drive or the, the, um, uh,
they get up and go, there's no one to tell you what to do when you're self-employed.
You have to do it all.
And you, and that brings up the 10 most important two letter words.
If it is to be, it is up to me.
And most of them don't, or many of them don't have that.
Um, in addition to that, they don't, they, um, are, they don't have stamina.
They don't have perseverance.
The number one most critical component of success is perseverance.
And everyone, I've never met a person on earth that just skated with the easy life.
Everyone faces adversity.
The winners get up like myself.
They got to kill me to stop me.
Um, I never stayed out.
If you knock me down and I've been knocked down a zillion times, I'm at
God humbles me repeatedly, um, virtually daily or hourly, but I just get up and
keep going I'm unstoppable.
So they don't have, they don't have the perseverance they don't have.
And there, and there's no, there's no, there's no, there's no, there's no,
there's no class in the United States on how to be a CEO and how to, or on how to
build the business from scratch.
There's no class.
So I, I've taken for, I've been self-employed for 42 years this week.
It'll be in two days.
It'll be 42 years.
And I learned from the school of hard knocks.
You get knocked down.
That's how you learn.
You, there's no one that can teach you and MBA doesn't teach you to be a business
owner, doesn't teach you how to get in the arena and fight it.
It just teaches you theories.
So, uh, there's, there's a lot of reasons why people fail and most too.
What tips would you have for an early entrepreneur?
Since you do have so much experience.
The, um, in addition to what I've said before, um, you need to set a goal, a
five-year goal and, and then what, what I, what I did from the day that I started
is when I started, um, I set a five-year goal and then, okay, said if I'm going to
be there in five years, then where am I going to be in three years?
And if I'm going to be there in three years, where am I going to be in one year?
So you have to have goals and then where am I going to be in three months?
So you break your, you, first of all, you set up a vision, a, um, a goal for five
years from now, 10, 10 is to anything more than five is just total, total blue.
Scott, who knows what's going to happen to you or your family or your, or your
success level.
I mean, good things can happen to bad things can happen.
When I, when I budget, I have three budgets.
Worst case, best case, and then in between a little bit on the high side in between.
So I have three budgets, uh, great, great.
I mean, best stuff can happen and good stuff can happen.
You can, um, so, but you have to have a plan.
You have, you know, people don't plan to fail.
They failed to plan.
Thank you for being here today.
I'm really happy that you tuned into vision pros live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reaction to the vision pros live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes continue to move forward.
This is going to get more and more fun.
We'll have more and more engagement as well.
We'll invite people to participate in the show and thank you for giving us your time
and attention.
And time building out your vision and becoming a vision for yourself.