00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - If you wanna run a great business,
00:05 then you need to learn from the greats.
00:07 And they're all around you.
00:09 They're the mom and pop shops in every local community.
00:13 The barber shops, the coffee shops,
00:15 the bookstores and the diners.
00:17 These aren't just small businesses,
00:19 these are master classes in community building,
00:21 in customer service, in innovative marketing.
00:24 My name is Jason Pfeiffer,
00:25 I'm the editor in chief of Entrepreneur Magazine,
00:27 and with Walmart Business, we are meeting
00:30 these entrepreneurs to learn what it takes
00:32 to build meaningful businesses that last.
00:34 So join me as we travel the country,
00:37 learning from America's favorite mom and pop shops.
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00:45 As a company grows, its leader must make a choice.
01:05 Either cling tightly to what worked before,
01:07 or reinvent their business and themselves
01:11 to unlock their full potential.
01:12 My name is Jason Pfeiffer,
01:14 editor in chief of Entrepreneur Magazine,
01:15 and I have come here to beautiful and freezing cold Chicago.
01:19 It is seven degrees outside right now,
01:22 because I wanted to learn from an entrepreneur
01:24 who made the bold choice.
01:27 His name is Jeremy Levno,
01:28 he's the founder of Bobby's Bike Hike,
01:30 the longest running city bike tour operator in the country.
01:34 Because to build his great business,
01:36 Jeremy first had to slam the brakes and change the gears.
01:40 Now, he's really cruising.
01:42 Let's go meet him.
01:42 (upbeat music)
01:45 We're here at Bobby's Bike Hike.
01:51 You are not Bobby, you are Jeremy.
01:54 Who's Bobby?
01:55 - That's a good question.
01:56 A question I get quite a bit.
01:58 So I named this after my late father, Bob.
02:00 My dad had a motor coach bus tour company,
02:02 and so I was kind of raised taking trips around the country
02:05 on his motor coach tours.
02:07 - When you were growing up, did you start to think,
02:09 this is what I wanna do for a living too,
02:11 or was this your dad's thing for a long time?
02:14 - It wasn't really necessarily anything
02:16 that I had aspirations to do.
02:18 You know, I basically went to school for marketing.
02:20 I remember thinking to myself,
02:21 you know, I don't necessarily know
02:23 if the corporate world is necessarily for me.
02:26 And I kind of realized that I was gonna kind of pursue
02:30 my own kind of path.
02:31 - That's where entrepreneurship begins,
02:33 when you realize you have a drive
02:36 to create something for yourself,
02:37 but you don't always know what it is.
02:39 So how did you come to think
02:41 that you were gonna continue your dad's legacy?
02:44 - Well, I moved up here a little bit on a whim,
02:46 and I kind of started thinking about,
02:48 what do I want my legacy to be?
02:50 You know, my dad had passed when I was young,
02:52 so ultimately these were kind of big questions
02:54 that were going through my mind.
02:55 And at the end of my life, I wanted to look back
02:57 and realize that I had promoted health,
02:59 and travel, and community, and service.
03:02 And so ultimately those four things kind of meshed together.
03:05 The bike tour business is all about all those things.
03:08 And so, you know, I sold my car, bought about 20 bikes,
03:12 and parked them in a parking garage, and started my venture.
03:15 - You grew up going on your dad's tours.
03:23 Did you feel like you had any idea how to run one yourself?
03:26 - You know, I thought that I, I thought I did, actually.
03:32 I'm, you know, 27 years old and slightly naive.
03:35 - That's all you need sometimes to start.
03:37 - Totally.
03:38 You just gotta put that foot out there,
03:40 and then start walking.
03:41 And then, and then hopefully you'll start, or biking.
03:44 And then you'll, and then you just kind of
03:45 pedal faster and faster.
03:47 My first manager I hired, I want to say in 2009,
03:49 and then ultimately he was a manager for us
03:51 for six years, 'til about 2015.
03:54 We unfortunately lost him.
03:56 The workload was just too much.
03:57 I was very hard charging.
03:58 I kind of, you know, this is how we want to do it.
04:00 Just do it, and let's go, and don't ask questions,
04:02 kind of, kind of situation.
04:04 And we replaced him with three people
04:06 that didn't want to be pushed that way,
04:07 and didn't want to be in that type of work environment.
04:11 And so ultimately we went through a little period there
04:13 where it was just kind of, a little bit of a revolving door.
04:16 And you lose the first couple managers,
04:18 and you're kind of thinking, well,
04:19 they weren't fit out to do this, or this wasn't.
04:22 And then you start kind of realizing
04:23 what's the common thread here.
04:25 - You.
04:25 - It was me.
04:26 - You're the common thread.
04:27 - You know, that's not an easy thing
04:28 to necessarily kind of take a look at.
04:31 But ultimately, you know, I wanted to grow,
04:33 and I was passionate about growing,
04:35 and I kind of realized, like, if we're gonna grow,
04:38 you know, the most important thing
04:39 that I gotta change around here is me.
04:41 - So describe the culture now,
04:45 because it sounds like what you've built is really cohesive.
04:48 - Yeah, we have a strong team.
04:50 More importantly, we have an organization
04:52 that really runs and is predictable, and built for growth.
04:55 There's a lot going on behind the scenes now
04:57 that I don't necessarily need to be a part of anymore.
05:00 And that's the biggest benefit that's come out of this,
05:02 is propagating people to be leaders within the company
05:05 that know how to take charge, solve issues,
05:08 and more importantly, just have a business
05:10 that you love and care about,
05:11 and that's the culture you wanna have.
05:13 - It's that exact culture that led Bobby's Bike Hike
05:17 to become a top touring company.
05:19 And the man behind it is gonna give me a VIP tour.
05:22 Let's hit the streets.
05:24 - That's an interesting building, what's that?
05:28 - Yeah, so this is the Wrigley Building.
05:30 It's actually the first building built
05:32 north of the Chicago River.
05:34 - Huh.
05:35 It looks like the Arctic out there.
05:39 - Well, and they also bring an ice splitter through here,
05:41 so sometimes they'll break it all up.
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06:01 - Jeremy, when you started this business 23 years ago,
06:04 you called it Bobby's Bike Hikes,
06:06 and it focused on bikes.
06:08 But you've since added a lot more,
06:10 kayaking, food, summer camps, why?
06:14 - Yeah, so we saw an opportunity.
06:15 There started to become an interest in, say, food tourism.
06:18 I mean, there's no better way to experience a city
06:22 or experience a culture than through its food.
06:25 And when you see those trends come in,
06:26 and you can see how they can make sense
06:28 within your own business model.
06:29 So we started bike tours, launched into food tours,
06:32 launched into walking tours,
06:34 and now we're even doing summer camps.
06:36 - You're also expanding into different cities.
06:40 I know, for example, that you are now operating in Miami.
06:43 So how did you prepare for such a big change?
06:46 - Yeah, so basically we wanted to find an area of Miami
06:49 that would be suitable for what we wanted to do,
06:51 which was walking and food tours.
06:53 We wanted to be really nimble,
06:54 so we haven't operated bike tours just yet down there.
06:57 So there were other food tour operators,
07:00 but we saw an opportunity in this neighborhood of Wynwood.
07:02 Great art district.
07:04 The Wynwood Walls is the highest concentration
07:06 of graffiti art in the country,
07:08 and they have an amazing food scene.
07:10 And really, no one was offering food and walking tours,
07:13 and so we saw an opportunity there
07:15 that we wanted to get started in about a year ago,
07:17 and so we did.
07:18 - And you're not stopping in Miami, right?
07:20 - We're not stopping in Miami.
07:21 So ultimately, we're looking for major cities
07:24 that are culturally rich, that are food-centric.
07:27 And so if that fits the bill,
07:29 we'll probably see us in there.
07:30 - And Bobby's Bike Hike might be hiking there.
07:31 - You might be seeing us there, yes.
07:33 - What's your advice to someone building a complex business
07:37 with a lot of different parts
07:39 and making sure that it all works together?
07:40 - You gotta focus on the big things,
07:42 like quality guides, quality equipment.
07:44 But ultimately, you gotta always focus
07:46 on the small stuff as well, like the inventory.
07:48 - And how do you manage all that?
07:49 - We have somebody at our shop, Mallory,
07:51 who actually takes care of all of the ins and outs
07:54 of the stockroom, because it is an important part of it.
07:56 - Jeremy, before we wrap up,
07:58 Walmart Business actually has a surprise for you.
08:01 They're setting you up
08:01 with a six-month Walmart Business Plus membership.
08:05 So that's free shipping and limited-time offers
08:07 on products for business owners,
08:09 and 2% rewards back on purchases over $250,
08:13 and you're getting a $1,000 e-gift card
08:16 to spend on whatever you need at business.walmart.com.
08:20 - Wow, thank you, that's amazing.
08:22 We actually just ordered some bins from Walmart,
08:24 so thank you so much, I appreciate it.
08:26 That will help us quite a bit.
08:27 - That's awesome, well, now you can buy stuff
08:29 to put in the bins.
08:30 - Perfect.
08:31 (upbeat music)
08:35 - As I toured Chicago with Jeremy,
08:39 I kept thinking about something
08:40 that a real estate developer once told me.
08:42 He said that if a city isn't growing, it's dying.
08:46 And I realized the same is true
08:48 for a business or its founder.
08:51 Growth and change are the only way forwards,
08:55 but the road ahead can be bumpy.
08:57 So don't forget to wear a helmet.
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09:10 (whooshing)
09:12 you
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