From Family Shop to National Brand with Shawn Orr | Episode 351
Real Business Owners
Trevor Cowley
4.9 • 713 Ratings
🗓️ 17 February 2026
⏱️ 68 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
If you are ready to level up personally and professionally, go to joinrbo.com
In this episode, Trevor sits down with Shawn Orr, founder of Tifa Chocolate & Gelato, to break down what it really takes to scale a franchise the right way.This isn’t a fluffy “build it and they will come” conversation. It’s a raw discussion about stress, sacrifice, leadership, funding, and why most franchise brands flame out within a decade.Shawn shares how he went from family-run storefront to 15 locations (with 50+ on the horizon), why he refuses to sell out, and how thinking backwards is the key to long-term scale.If you’re building a brand, considering franchising, or thinking about business ownership… this episode will challenge you.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Being an entrepreneur sounds cool, but the reality of building a business is very, very difficult. |
| 0:07.0 | Every level that you hit, there's a lot of things that suck that you just won't want to do. |
| 0:11.6 | What you're capable of is on the other side I don't feel like it. |
| 0:15.5 | And if you're committed to what it is that you're trying to do, nothing is going to stop you from getting there. |
| 0:23.9 | Welcome back to another episode of Real Business Owners with myself, Trevor Cowley. |
| 0:27.9 | Today we have an amazing guest, Sean Orr. Sean, he is a listener of the podcast and reached |
| 0:34.1 | out to me, shot me an email, and I'll tell you what, I get plenty of emails. Usually they're from PR companies, though. Sure. Like podcast companies that are getting people on podcasts. What was cool is that you reached out to me directly, which I was like looking at the email waiting for like looking to who's C-C'd on it or whatever. Because all these, nine times out of ten i just ignore it right you know like |
| 0:56.0 | it's just like dude i only do in person so all these PR companies that are reaching out saying hey |
| 1:02.2 | get so and so on your podcast it's like most of them aren't going to travel for sure you know so i |
| 1:07.4 | used to respond and say hey they're in person we'd love to have sorry, you know. And so it's like I'm just kind of done. |
| 1:15.3 | Sure. Going back and forth with these people for them just to say, no, it's a waste of time. But when you reached out, you know, I was excited to hear your story. Originally, he's told me that he has 15 locations. |
| 1:27.9 | And so I thought these were his locations come to find out as he arrived today. |
| 1:32.2 | He actually owns the franchise. |
| 1:34.3 | So how many of these locations do you own? |
| 1:37.3 | It's, it's Tifa? |
| 1:38.4 | Tifa, yeah. |
| 1:39.3 | Tifa, chocolate, and gelato. |
| 1:40.8 | Right, that's right. |
| 1:41.4 | Yeah. |
| 1:42.3 | So we've got, I had two corporate locations that we're at in, just outside of Malibu in Southern California, at Gora Hills and West Lake Village. Okay. Which is where I live. And I actually recently sold those about 18 months ago just as the franchising really took off, you know, you're never going to, |
| 2:01.6 | you got to be able to dedicate yourself fully. Yeah, you know what I'm trying to be the store |
| 2:05.8 | owner plus. That's right. Focus on scaling a franchise. Sometimes you got to take things off your |
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