From Grit to Greatness: Chaz Wolfe's Journey Selling Multiple Seven-Figure Companies

The episode clears up valuation myths, covering valuation multiples and discounted cash flow. Wayne Zell and Ryan Berry discuss business valuation’s role in sales, the effects of customer concentration, reasons valuations can be costly, key value drivers for lower- to mid-market firms, and the importance of strong management. They also cover strategies to boost valuation and close with McLean Group contact info and a teaser for future episodes.

Key Points

• Discipline and integrity are crucial values that drive long-term success in entrepreneurship.

• Building a community like Gathering the Kings helps entrepreneurs combat isolation and gain valuable insights through shared experiences.

• Achieving balance in business, family, health, faith, and lifestyle is essential for living an exceptional life as an entrepreneur.

Timestamps

0:10 Introduction to Blueprint for Wealth and Chaz Wolfe

4:21 Chaz Wolfe's entrepreneurial journey and Gathering the Kings

9:03 The five dimensions of being a king and entrepreneurial isolation

13:33 Structure and diversity within Gathering the Kings

20:55 Managing mastermind group dynamics and vulnerability

23:53 Exit strategy and advice for young entrepreneurs

27:03 Addressing mental health in entrepreneurship

29:26 Joining Gathering the Kings and closing remarks

Quotes

"The antidote is courage. Right? That's all that we really need."

- Chaz Wolfe

"Entrepreneurial isolation is real. We've all experienced it."

- Chaz Wolfe

- Chaz Wolfe

"Gathering the Kings is my life work."

- Chaz Wolfe

Transcript

Wayne Zell: Hi. This is Wayne Szell and welcome to Blueprint for Wealth, your fast paced half hour video cast blog that's designed to help you realize your personal dreams of wealth and freedom. And it's really directed towards the entrepreneurs out there who wanna learn more about other entrepreneurs and how they've achieved success. And today, I've got a really successful gentleman joining me today. His name is Chas Wolf.

Welcome, Chas. Welcome to the show.

Chaz Wolfe: I appreciate it, Wayne. Thanks for having me. It's, been a pleasure getting to know you, and I look forward to our, back and forth here.

Wayne Zell: We always we always will have good back and forth, but today, we're going forth with you and your background. And I think before we get into some details about, you, let me tell the audience a little bit more about you. You're a serial entrepreneur. You've built and sold multiple 7 figure companies, so I wanna hear more about that in franchising, construction, real estate, consulting. And you've got a strong focus on discipline and integrity.

Integrity is one of my top values too, and I think that's a really important focus. You excel in operations and sales. I've noticed that from a lot of your recent podcasts, and you drive growth and profitability in both domestic and international markets. So I'd like to hear more about that too. And your approach is designed to combine tailored strategies with execution, straightforward execution.

So first of all, Chas, let the listeners know a little bit more about you. Where did you come from? I know you were the product of a single mom household. Tell us a little bit more about your background.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Grew up in the Midwest, middle of, of Missouri. I live in Kansas City now, but, yeah, grew up single mom family as you mentioned. And as I've said, you know, probably hundreds of times, I'll probably say it thousands more before I'm gone, but that taught me just, like, grit. You know?

Figure it out mentality. And, my mother is, you know, probably one of the hardest people, if not the hardest working person I know. And, just just a never quit, high tenacity, just let's go. And, you know, being in that circumstance gave me a perspective of life that not many get to have. And, and so I think it, may force me to grow up a little sooner than I had been designed to, but I'm thankful for it.

And, I got two

Wayne Zell: doing that was so that showed her tenacity and perseverance?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Well, I mean, the the the easy one is working two, three jobs. I mean, she still does it to this day. You know, I think that, I think a lot of business owners kinda wear that chip on their shoulder that no one can outwork me. But I also think that there's a lot of folks on our teams, including, you know, my mom is not on my team, but she is, an employee of a of a large company and and a executive assistant basically to a pretty large CEO.

And she she runs the gamut, like, I mean, early, late, and and, it's just a huge commitment, you know, to that. And, she ran an apartment complex for me for years, has has just done a a so much, not just, like, like, not even just, like, her experience. I just mean, like, the the the ability the capacity is probably the better word, the capacity to watch her do literally whatever it took, to to win. And winning as a single mom is tough because guess what? There just was less support, you know, less help.

I mean, I have four kids of my own now. I'm married for sixteen years. We've got four kids under the age of 10, and I often scratch my head, you know, and go, I'd I'd I literally don't even know how she did it, Wayne. You know? So when I think of that, that's what I think of my upbringing.

Like, it just

Wayne Zell: it it gave

Chaz Wolfe: me a perspective.

Wayne Zell: My my my wife and I have been married thirty four years, and, we have four kids. They're all much older, but I don't know how she did what she did because I was always working. And then she was always working too. So she was working, I was working, and then she was raising four kids. I give I give credit to your mom, and I give credit to your wife for doing the amazing things that they do.

Tell tell us a little bit about the 7 figure businesses that you've been able to grow and sell before we dig into, the things that you're doing today.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Yeah. Edible Arrangements is a franchise system that I started with, bought my first location, when I was 20.

Wayne Zell: That around '25.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Pretty household name at this point. Twenty five years or so in business.

And, so I went from, you know, owning my first one. I just turned 25. And four years later, I had seven locations in three states. And, it was a a whirlwind of growth. I was just talking to somebody the other day, and I I think I had used four or five different biz banks to help in that growth process.

You know, being 25, it's not like I had millions of dollars. And so I scrounged up my initial savings and, along the way, had borrowed a little bit of money from some family. But, you know, SBA loans, equipment loans, like, I just bootstrapped all that together, and, I've exited five of the seven and, still own two in in in, Wichita, Kansas and and Pensacola, Florida and got great teams there and and pretty hands off at this point, being thirteen years in now. But, I've also been in, like I said, you know, real estate, just sold, an apartment complex just a a month and a half ago. That was a, another 7 figure deal there.

And so, anyway, just lots of different opportunities. I love the creativity of doing different things. Gathering the Kings as the Mastermind community that you mentioned a few minutes ago is really, my kinda like my life's work, my main focus now. I'm I'm probably more so trying to get rid of things just so that I can focus more on that, but, I I do like the creativity of kind of, dabbling in multiple projects, keeps me interested.

Wayne Zell: How did you how did you go about creating Gathering the Kings?

Chaz Wolfe: Well, I had been a part of some groups, what I would say, like, group coaching, and I got a ton of value from that. But but it's not a mastermind. And I think that there are a lot of people who, you know, call their group a mastermind, and and that's okay. It's just the wrong word. A mastermind defined by Napoleon Hill in chapter 10 of Think and Grow Rich is two or more minds working in harmony together unto the achievement of something very, very specific.

And it's agitation of thought. It's this this room of of things flowing back and forth and creating something that didn't exist with the single parts by themselves. And so, I had not seen that done well. And so I just said, okay. I literally I remember where exactly where I was.

I went over to my whiteboard, and I was like, okay. I got a clean slate here. How would I create a real mastermind? And how often will we get together? And how what would be virtual?

What would be in person? And and who's gonna be in the room, and what kind of entrepreneur is there. And and so what we what we have now, you know, three years in is a a a very solid group of down to earth, family oriented, you know, entrepreneurs that just wanna win in all areas. We we we that definite chief aim, that that singular focus that that we have as a group is to live the exceptional life. I've defined that as winning in all areas.

To me, you know, very much how you described your your history with, you know, even with your wife. Like, my my wife tells a story of early on in our entrepreneur, journey of of being a single mom, not because we were divorced, but because I was an entrepreneur and she was mom. And and, and so she describes as being a single mom because I was all in on one dimension of kingship. And was I even a real king at that time? It would be a better question that I would ask myself.

And so, I think raising that

Wayne Zell: gathering of kings and not gathering of queens.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. That's a great question because, you know, I I'm a dude, I guess. I don't know. But king is not masculine. It's it's mindset, and we've got about as many female members as we do, male.

And then on top of that, we have this family dynamic that nobody else really has that, I mean, we have, you know, a family and on a marriage dynamic, I mean, that, other people it's just like you can get marriage and family or you can get business. But it it what I find is that the interesting piece is that, like you described in your history, is that it's hard for entrepreneurs to figure out how to do them both together. And so we try to marry those things together along with Right. You know, health and and faith and lifestyle, all the dimensions of kingship. Because I wanna win in all areas.

I don't wanna just be a one legged, you know, pony or flamingo.

Wayne Zell: So when you define exceptional life and you define all the facets of what comprises us in exceptional life, I think you had mentioned previously that there are five dimensions. What are the five dimensions of being a a king?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Before I give that to you, the the king, the air quotes there, I love that because, you know, a a king is this, you know, this mature version. Right?

It's not like a prince. A prince is kind of this, you know, this youthful, you know, idealistic, you know, version of himself. A king is is really mature, you know, mentally, spiritually, physically and and has really honed his craft. And so when we talk about the dimensions of the king, these five dimensions kind of represent that. So we've got family first. That's dimension one. Dimension two is faith, which is your relationship with your God or your higher power or your purpose.

And then dimension three is finance. Dimension four is fitness. And then dimension five is freedom. And these five dimensions make up the exceptional life. And when I say that, there's a a true and tested thing that I talk about, and I call it the king's stack.

You wanna have a strong body, a clean heart, a focused mind, a wise soul, and a clear vision. And if you think about, if you've got those five things stacked, you're doing pretty darn well in life. Now, it doesn't mean you're perfect in all five dimensions all the time, but the idea is to to strike a balance or a harmony among all of them.

Wayne Zell: That's great. I love that. I love that. And one of the things that I really respect about you and the work that you do is that you're trying to create this legacy, and you're trying to create a place where entrepreneurs can go and grow and thrive and, you know, become better versions of themselves, not just in business, but in all aspects of their life. Can you talk a little bit about your vision for Gathering the Kings and where you see it going?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. You know, I think, I mean, I think the vision right now is to scale the mastermind, keep building the community, keep adding new opportunities for people to to to get around other great entrepreneurs and really kind of help them win in all areas. You know, at the end of the day, I think it's important for us as business leaders to understand that when we win in all areas, our kids and our families win too. And, you know, my legacy is not just gonna be Edible Arrangements or a construction company or a real estate company. It's gonna be the mark that I leave on the people that I influence and the community that I build and the family that I raise and I've created through a lot of what we're doing with Gathering the Kings and connecting these amazing entrepreneurs. And on top of that, you know, I think about my kids when I'm like in my sixties, seventies, or eighties, and I think, what would I want to pass down to them?

And it's my job, in my opinion, to create something so big that the expertise or the skill sets or the desires of my children and grandchildren fit inside of it, and we can do it all together. And if that looks like Gathering the Kings, great. At some point, Gathering the Kings will run its course. I don't know what that looks like exactly. It's not really, you know, like, I would probably buy another master

Wayne Zell: community, but I don't know how many people would

Chaz Wolfe: do that.

Wayne Zell: Gathering the princes.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. There you go. That's right. That's right. Yeah.

We got GTK kids. Right?

Wayne Zell: Dukes and lords and ladies and all the other things that

Chaz Wolfe: That's right.

Wayne Zell: Relate to kings. But that's that's pretty interesting. One last question for you. And and, you know, it's it's a good question, that you asked me to ask you, but I think it's a good one. And it and that is, what key piece of advice would you give to a young aspiring entrepreneur who's just in their twenties or maybe just starting out?

What's the single most important thing that they should focus on?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Great question. And and that that would've that would've come from my team, so it's not like I've had a chance to think about this. This is good. You know, I think if

Wayne Zell: Oh, under tree widens.

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Yeah. I think if I'm looking back, you know, to the 24 year old Chaz who was purchasing an existing, you know, Edible Arrangements franchise, I would say to him that it is going to be harder than you think it's gonna be. It's gonna require more time, money, effort than you think. But, man, it is so fun and so incredible to build, and you'll have so much impact on your team and other people in the community and your family.

And this is how you build legacy. So even though it might get hard, it's gonna be just fine, and you kinda just gotta do the thing for a little while to create the machine. You know? That that piece I talked about earlier that that that the tactics and the people, you you gotta figure those things out. Otherwise, you're just always a self self employed person.

You know?

Wayne Zell: Right. You're just working for yourself. I mean, a corollary to that is I would imagine that there's a lot of mental health challenges that entrepreneurs face. And what piece of advice would you give them to, to deal with that struggle that often comes up. Doubt, you know, self doubt, lack of self confidence.

You hit a you hit a bump in the road. You hit a roadblock. What's the what's the advice that you would give them as one who's been there and done that?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. I mean, the antidote is is courage. Right? That's all that we really need. As an entrepreneur, I I could eventually use help of the tactics.

Like, someone could tell me how to build a community or build a construction company or generate leads or exit my business. Like, all those things are amazing. We find individual people like Wayne to do those individual things for us. That's that's fantastic.

Wayne Zell: Right.

Chaz Wolfe: But as an entrepreneur, outside of the tactical of those things, all I really need is belief. And in order to gain belief is I have to get around people who are doing incredible things, who can also then transfer that belief or courage to me, which is which is why Gathering the Kings exists. In fact, I've got a video that kinda explains this, but it's funny how you're right. It's not just, you know, like, doubt. It's it's, like, actual, like, medically, you know, conditions, you know, of of of how stressed we get, basically, and how and what that leads to all the way down to even suicide.

And it's like, okay. Well, so we're under this immense pressure and stress because of the situation that we put ourselves in as an entrepreneur and how we're building something from nothing. Okay. What makes sense here? I was like, why need I need more juice.

Right? And the juice for me, which I think is true for everybody, is courage. It's belief. And so getting around other entrepreneurs who can breathe that into you, whether it's through actual relationship in a mastermind setting, or it's just you being around someone in a room and they're like, wow. Well, if that guy can do it, he didn't have anything that I don't have.

You know?

Wayne Zell: Yeah. I mean, I think you've hit the hit the nail on the head. It's it's surrounding yourself with like minded people who have the same drive and the same passion about what they're doing and can learn from you, but also live with you and grow with you and be

Chaz Wolfe: That's right.

Wayne Zell: Become part of your community, which you've, you know, amazingly created out of whole cloth, and I I congratulate you on that. When we're talking about Gathering the Kings, we're talking to Chaz Wolf, the founder. If people wanna know more about not only Gathering the Kings, the mastermind, group, but also want to hear your podcast, wanna, you know, become part of your community, how do they do that?

Chaz Wolfe: Yeah. Yeah. Great question. They can just go to gatherinthekings.com. They'll find all the information about the mastermind, my history, of course, our podcast, which is being rebranded right now to driven to win.

And so they can find our 500 plus episodes. You can even find Wayne's episode there for Gathering the Kings. We've interviewed over 500.

Wayne Zell: It's hidden it's hidden deep in the podcast, Amber. Yeah. It was a good one, man.

Chaz Wolfe: It was good. They should find it.

Wayne Zell: We'll do it again. I mean, you tell me when. Yeah. But this has been a great podcast and videocast, and I really appreciate your, being on with us today on Blueprint for Wealth. Thank you so much, Chas.

Chaz Wolfe: Thanks, Wayne. Appreciate you and and your listeners. So just if they find value in this conversation, anything else you're putting out, they should go leave you a five star review and and connect with you on social. Those things really, matter and are impactful. So we appreciate you listening.

Wayne Zell: Yes, sir. Thank you. I appreciate that appreciate that plug, and they should do the same with you because you're doing good for all of these entrepreneurs who are part of your community. So thanks again and thanks for being a special guest on Blueprint for Wealth. And everyone, thanks for listening and watching and join us next time for another special guest and special topic that we'll discuss on Blueprint for Wealth.

Have a great week.