Empathy, Community, and Connection in Franchise Leadership with Larisa Walega

**SPEAKER_2** (0:04)
The Bliss Business Podcast, the show about empathy, connection, and consciousness in business. Today's episode is brought to you by Zero Company, your paid search, social media, and programmatic ad experts.

**Stephen Sakach** (0:18)
Well, welcome back to the show everyone. I'm Stephen Sakach here again with my co-host Tullio Siragusa, and we have a special guest who will introduce in a moment.
Franchise growth is often measured by numbers and new locations, new markets, revenue, brand recognition, you name it. But the strongest franchise systems are also built on something a little more human. And we've talked about this for empathy, connection, trust, community. And so we're looking through that lens today. Well, diving into the automotive industry again, and check out our podcast, I think it was two weeks ago on with R&R Tire Express Franchise. That was excellent. And so we're now we're going to have another excellent one today. So we're looking at auto detailing franchise today and going under the hood. Yes, I went there of what it takes to build a franchise with a great customer experience and how empathy can help leaders build stronger and more connected businesses. And we've had some excellent guests on this show in this industry. And we've got another one today. Tullio, introduce our guest today.

**Tullio Siragusa** (1:28)
Yes, our guest today is Larisa Walega. She's the Chief Growth Officer of Ziebart International Corporation. And Larisa helps drive growth for one of the largest, one of the world's leading automotive appearance and protection franchise brands with a focus on creating a more seamless customer experience across every touch point. Ziebart provides services that help clean, protect, preserve and extend the life of vehicles to a global network of franchise locations and service centers. A certified franchise executive, Larisa is passionate about empowering franchise owners, building strong brand cultures and helping businesses grow with purpose. She's the former chair of the IFA Women's Franchise Committee and has been recognized as a leading voice in franchising and market.
IFA royalty, yes. Larisa, welcome to The Bliss Business Podcast.

**Larisa Walega** (2:18)
Thank you so much for having me. This is great. I'm really excited to dive into this conversation. Thank you.

**Stephen Sakach** (2:26)
Larisa, the topic today, we're talking empathy, community and connection in franchise leadership. From your perspective, why has empathy become such an important part of modern franchise growth?

**Larisa Walega** (2:37)
Yeah, I really think that empathy is truly a leadership strength. When we think about franchising, and we think about somebody literally taking that next step, whether it's their first franchise, 100th franchise, I mean, there's so many variables within franchising. I do believe that one of the strongest traits that a leadership or leader in franchising can have is that opportunity to understand franchise owners' needs.
You know, it doesn't really matter if it's franchising or any other business entity. Listening is really at the heart of driving that opportunity, and listening to what your customers, and we can talk, I know we'll get into this, but talking about who your customers even are in a franchise community or franchise brand. There are several critical stages of communication, but it all does start with listening. And I think that when you're listening to someone and understanding what their why is, that's where that beautiful magic comes into play of building those incredible heartfelt relationships in franchising across the space, across not only your franchise owners, but your partners, your team here, and so on and so forth. So I just believe that as we think about growth, it is probably one of the most important opportunities from a relationship standpoint, and that's one of the metrics that I focus on the most in growing our brand.

**Stephen Sakach** (4:17)
Tell a little bit about your company so everyone has a little bit of background from your perspective.

**Larisa Walega** (4:23)
Yeah, absolutely. So Ziebart is celebrating its 67th year in franchising. We are one of the oldest franchise systems in the world. There's only about 50 or so in the world that can say they've been around for over 65 years. So we're very grateful for that opportunity. The company was founded in 1959 through a German chemist, Kurt Ziebart. That's where the name comes from. He invented the rust protection process of vehicles, and then from there sold the company, sold the process, and then growth shifted from there. So founded on a one-service opportunity. Today, the company is in over 36 countries with 400 locations, 1,000 car dealership partners, and we service vehicles to clean, enhance, protect it for as long as you want it.
So we do that through services like detailing, window tint. We still, large part of our business is rust protection, and I would say our up and coming service is ceramic coatings.