Frank Growth – Details, episodes & analysis

How to grow a premium service business through trust, referrals, and client retention.
For founders and operators building high-touch services and trying to scale without paid acquisition.

Leigh Rowan, founder and CEO of Savanti Travel, joins Jason Shafton to break down how he built a luxury travel management company serving ultra high net worth individuals, family offices, VC firms, and Hollywood entertainers without ever advertising. He explains how Savanti evolved from helping entrepreneurs unlock value from points and miles into a full-service travel business built around 24-7 support, personalization, and relationships. The conversation covers how his team uses CRM workflows, SOPs, and regular standups to deliver consistent service across five continents, how they ask for referrals after delivering concrete wins, and why they have fired clients worth as much as 25% of revenue to protect the team and the business. Leigh also shares that Savanti has saved clients more than $10 million by using points and miles more strategically.

• Why Savanti chose word of mouth over paid advertising and how that shaped client selection
• How the team uses monday.com, SOPs, standups, and shared context to deliver high-touch service at scale
• Why most people leave points and miles value unused and how Savanti turns those assets into real savings and better experiences
• How Leigh thinks about referrals, client feedback, hiring for judgment, and protecting culture even when revenue is at stake

Timestamps from transcript

• 00:00 — What luxury travel management actually means
• 03:22 — From points and miles to full-service travel support
• 07:26 — The system behind saving clients money with loyalty assets
• 11:42 — Why Savanti never advertised and how word of mouth compounds
• 17:37 — Handling travel crises, hiring for judgment, and firing bad-fit clients
• 21:05 — Client feedback, luxury as personalization, and how to grow by word of mouth

Guest
Leigh Rowan — Founder & CEO, Savanti Travel
Website

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.
Hosted by Jason Shafton.

• Work with Winston Francois
• Subscribe / Follow Jason

How to acquire a profitable SaaS with minimal upfront capital.
For operators considering ownership but hesitant to start from scratch.

Doug Breaker, CEO of Shoeboxed and former CEO of MD Hearing Aid, explains why he chose to buy a 20-year-old SaaS company instead of building one. After running an eight-figure DTC business, he acquired Shoeboxed using an SBA loan with only 5% down. He breaks down how he sourced deals, structured financing, evaluated distribution over tech, and identified upside in an under-marketed business with a million-person email list. The conversation covers the actual mechanics of SBA loans, due diligence priorities, and what it takes to stabilize and grow an acquired SaaS in the first 90 days.

• How SBA loans work for SaaS acquisitions and how he structured a 5% down deal
• Why distribution, customer base, and cash flow mattered more than the product itself
• Common mistakes operators make when evaluating build vs. buy decisions
• How to approach your first acquisition and test interest before committing full-time

• 00:00 — Why buying a SaaS beats building from scratch
• 02:01 — From CEO-for-hire to buying Shoeboxed
• 03:51 — How he sourced and evaluated acquisition opportunities
• 04:41 — How SBA loans and deal structure actually work
• 06:47 — First 90 days after acquiring a SaaS
• 10:25 — Growth lessons and how to approach your first acquisition

Guest
Doug Breaker — CEO, Shoeboxed
Website
LinkedIn

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.
Hosted by Jason Shafton.

• Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast
• Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/

Episode #204: John Kennelly — Founders who hate sales still have to sell

If sales feels intrusive, this episode reframes it as problem-solving.
Built for founders avoiding sales calls, decks, and outreach.

John Kennelly, Founder of I Hate Sales, works with founders who have never had a sales job and actively avoid selling. In this episode, he explains why sales fear is usually a mindset problem, not a skill gap, and why curiosity matters more than persuasion. The conversation covers running discovery without pitching, qualifying people out quickly, and why early founders slow themselves down by building systems instead of talking to customers. Kennelly shares concrete examples from his cohort work, including starting with interviews instead of sales calls and what to track before using a CRM.

What you’ll hear

• Reframing sales from “intrusion” to helping through discovery
• How to run interviews instead of sales calls
• Why broad ICPs, decks, and CRMs backfire early
• The only two metrics to track before you have customers

Chapters

Chapters with timestamps

• 00:00 — Why founders dread sales
• 02:17 — Sales as helping, not intruding
• 03:39 — Curiosity and discovery before pitching
• 05:17 — Qualifying hard and knowing your ICP
• 08:16 — Interviews instead of sales calls
• 13:48 — What to track before using a CRM

Links & resources

GuestJohn Kennelly — Founder, I Hate Sales
Website
LinkedIn

About Frank Growth

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.

Promotional links

• Work with Winston Francois
• Subscribe / Follow Jason

How founders use acquisitions to grow without betting the company.
For operators considering their first inorganic deal.

Trevor Houghton is CEO of Pass Galleries and a former private equity and corporate development operator. He breaks down how founders can use acquisitions to increase enterprise value without overextending capital. The conversation covers how deals actually get sourced, why most failed acquisitions start with the wrong premise, and how Trevor structures transactions using debt, seller notes, and earn-outs to reduce downside. He walks through a concrete example of acquiring $5M in EBITDA with no net cash outlay and explains why integration planning must start before the deal closes.

• Why the best acquisitions start as partnerships, not cold offers
• The customers vs. capabilities rule and why you must only extend one
• How no-money-down deals work using debt and deferred payments
• Why day-one integration and early culture alignment determine outcomes

Timestamps derived from the episode transcript.

• 00:00 — Structuring acquisitions with minimal cash risk
• 00:30 — Introduction to inorganic growth and Trevor’s background
• 01:44 — Building acquisition paths through partnerships
• 03:13 — The customer vs. capability decision framework
• 04:07 — Identifying targets through existing customer usage
• 05:03 — Growing earnings and valuation through acquisitions
• 06:04 — Integration planning before close
• 06:29 — Culture integration and no-money-down deal mechanics
• 08:05 — Building an acquisition engine

Guest
Trevor Houghton — CEO, Pass Galleries
https://www.linkedin.com/in/trevor-houghton-th/

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.
Hosted by Jason Shafton.

• Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast
• Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/

John Connolly - Make your growth story hold up in investor diligence

How to present growth so it is defensible, measurable, and scalable.For founders raising and operators building board-ready growth reporting.

John Connolly is a Managing Director at Spectrum Equity, and he explains what he expects to see when a company tells a growth story at the growth equity stage. He covers why founders often stop at simplified metrics instead of going deep on channels, cohorts, and what is actually repeatable. John breaks down two common issues he sees in diligence: when each incremental dollar stops working, and when teams blend organic and paid in a way that hides what is driving performance. He also shares Spectrum’s framing for evaluation: identify what makes the company special, then isolate the few growth drivers that truly move the business.

What you’ll hear

• ​How Spectrum pressure-tests whether growth is durable, not just up and to the right
• ​How to separate organic and paid so you can explain what is really working
• ​What breaks when incremental spend hits diminishing returns, and why teams miss it
• ​A practical way to focus your story: the “special thing” plus a short list of real growth drivers

Chapters

• ​00:35 - Intro: what investors diligence in a growth story
• ​02:48 - The common miss: not going deep enough on growth
• ​03:43 - Diligence issues: incremental dollars stop working, blending organic and paid
• ​05:08 - Compounding advantages and creator-led organic loops
• ​06:36 - Evaluation framework: what is special, then what actually drives growth
• ​08:29 - Why pace of execution matters in fast-moving AI markets

Links & resources

Guest

John Connolly — Managing Director, Spectrum Equity

spectrumequity.com

LinkedIn

Mentioned

Otter

Kajabi

Teachers Pay Teachers

About Frank Growth

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow - real operators, real constraints, real decisions.Hosted by Jason Shafton.

Promotional links

• ​Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast
• ​Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/

Episode #201: Cait Anderson — Building trust into a repeatable growth system

Trust breaks faster than funnels.
This episode is for operators trying to make growth predictable without killing speed.

Cait Anderson is Chief Marketing Officer at Winston Francois. In this conversation, she and Jason unpack what actually makes a growth system sustainable: predictable returns, clear operating rhythm, and trust that compounds instead of resets. They walk through concrete examples, including a B2B SaaS company spending $1M/month in paid media, how experimentation budgets are set at different stages, and why breaking a product promise can wipe out downstream revenue faster than any channel issue.

What you’ll hear

• How Cait defines a growth operating system across acquisition, nurture, and conversion
• Why early-stage teams need wide flexibility, while later-stage teams cap experimentation at ~10–20%
• A real example of reallocating spend that moved ROAS from 2:1 to 20:1—and why that was still not the end goal
• How broken trust (not missing features) kills retention, referrals, and revenue

Chapters

Timestamps from episode transcript

• 00:00 — Aspirational vs. functional promises and why trust breaks fast
• 01:14 — What a growth operating system actually is
• 02:50 — Compounding metrics, referrals, and overlooked revenue
• 04:16 — Early-stage vs. late-stage operating rhythm and spend mix
• 06:49 — $1M/month paid media example: foundation vs. experimentation
• 10:27 — Activation, funnels, and building demand before conversion
• 15:23 — Turning around a struggling ad program and rethinking ROAS
• 17:13 — North Star metrics, buyer intent, and what to track first

Links & resources

Guest
Cait Anderson — Chief Marketing Officer, Winston Francois
https://winstonfrancois.com

About Frank Growth

Frank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.
Hosted by Jason Shafton.

Promotional links

• Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast
• Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/

Welcome to Frank Growth, the podcast where husband and wife duo Jason Shafton and Alyssa Fox explore the intricacies of business and personal growth. In this episode, they interview Hank and Carly Schlissberg. Hank is the CEO of Evio Pharmacy Solutions, and Carly is a stay-at-home mom to their three daughters. Hank and Carly discuss their experiences as parents and entrepreneurs, sharing insights on managing time, setting priorities, and finding balance. They emphasize the importance of hiring exceptional people and prioritizing what truly makes a difference. Hank discusses how aligning incentives in the healthcare industry is key to growing and creating a sustainable, member-focused company. 

Follow ⁠Winston Francois⁠ https://winstonfrancois.com/ 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/winstonfrancois/ 

X - https://twitter.com/WFdoesgrowth 

Instagram: - https://www.instagram.com/WFdoesgrowth 

TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/@WFdoesgrowth 

Follow Jason Shafton: 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton 

X - https://twitter.com/jasonshafton 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jasonshafton/ 

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jshafton 

YouTube - www.youtube.com/@JasonShafton 

Follow Alyssa Fox:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/afox19/

Evio: 

https://www.evio.com/

X: https://x.com/EvioTeam

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/eviopharmacysolutions/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hank-schlissberg-17843/

Welcome to Frank Growth, the podcast where husband and wife duo Jason Shafton and Alyssa Fox explore the intricacies of business and personal growth. In this episode, they interview Brian and Sam Rose, husband and wife duo and partners in Mvnifest, a single platform to manage your commerce operations, from concept to customer. Brian and Sam met in college and have been growing businesses and people together for nearly 20 years. They share their approach to parenting, business, and creating an environment of fun and generosity of spirit. They are no strangers to a late night and have created their own luck and success. Their mutual admiration, respect, and trust have fostered many successful businesses and three thriving kids.  

Follow ⁠Winston Francois⁠ https://winstonfrancois.com/ 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/winstonfrancois/ 

X - https://twitter.com/WFdoesgrowth 

Instagram: - https://www.instagram.com/WFdoesgrowth 

TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/@WFdoesgrowth 

Follow Jason Shafton: 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton 

X - https://twitter.com/jasonshafton 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jasonshafton/ 

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jshafton 

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@JasonShafton 

Follow Alyssa Fox:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/afox19/

Mvnifest: 

https://mvnifest.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mvnifest/

X: https://x.com/sorryrobots

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-rose-endless https://www.linkedin.com/in/samanthatrose/  https://www.linkedin.com/company/mvnifest/

Welcome to Frank Growth, the podcast where husband and wife duo Jason Shafton and Alyssa Fox explore the intricacies of business and personal growth. In this episode, they interview Jessica and Marshall Morris, husband and wife duo and partners in HomeLife brands. They discuss the importance of relationships in business and parenting and the need to understand and support individuality. They also share their approach to parenting, which involves following their children's passions and providing guidance without stifling their creativity and independence. Jessica and Marshall Morris also share their resilience journey and how they have built businesses with impact that focus on saving animals and helping veterans. 

Follow ⁠Winston Francois⁠ https://winstonfrancois.com/ 

LinkedIn -https://www.linkedin.com/company/winstonfrancois/ 

X - https://twitter.com/WFdoesgrowth 

Instagram: - https://www.instagram.com/WFdoesgrowth 

TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/@WFdoesgrowth 

Follow Jason Shafton: 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton 

X - https://twitter.com/jasonshafton 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jasonshafton/ 

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jshafton 

YouTube - www.youtube.com/@JasonShafton 

Follow Alyssa Fox:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/afox19/

HomeLife Brands: 

https://homelifemedia.com/

Instagram: @marshallsmorris @Jessicamariemorris

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marshallsmorris/

Welcome to Frank Growth, the podcast where husband and wife duo Jason Shafton and Alyssa Fox explore the intricacies of business and personal growth. In this special Father’s Day episode, Jason flies solo and interviews Nick Aubin, the co-founder and CEO of Commons Clinic, about his experience as a dad and an entrepreneur. They discuss the challenges of balancing work and family life, the importance of being present and proactive as a parent, and the joy of watching their children grow and succeed. Nick shares his insights on the healthcare industry and the mission of Commons Clinic to provide accessible and affordable care. The conversation is filled with humor, honesty, and valuable advice for dads navigating the complexities of fatherhood and entrepreneurship.

Mentions and recommendations: 

Ikigai

Yoto

Tonies

Nanit

Follow Winston Francois: LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/winstonfrancois/ Twitter/X - https://twitter.com/WFdoesgrowth Instagram: - https://www.instagram.com/WFdoesgrowth TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/@WFdoesgrowth Follow Jason Shafton: LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton X - https://twitter.com/jasonshafton Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jasonshafton/ TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jshafton YouTube - www.youtube.com/@JasonShafton Commons Clinic: https://commonsclinic.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nick-aubin-56883647/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/commons-clinic/