Bryan Flowers is a Serial Entrepreneur who started very young and now owns a chain of 22 bars along with other businesses. He is also writing a book on “Growth Mindset“. We recently interviewed Bryan Flowers to know more about his businesses and his upcoming book.
Bryan, Thank you for talking to us. Kindly describe your journey as an Entrepreneur so far.
I started making money from around 11 years old, knocking on doors to walk dogs and washing cars, helping people around my area, I had 2 paper rounds for several years with many other failed ideas and dreams. At 14 years old, I had my first part-time job, and when I was around 17 years old I started on eBay, selling digital products which gave me a very good income, I then moved that to 2 websites.
By the time I was 23 years old, I was making more websites, doing SEO, internet marketing and I have been doing that right up to my age of 36 years old. I moved to Thailand when I was around 25 years old and at the age of 30, I started buying bars using investors money, I went from owning 1 bar in Thailand, up to owning/running a group of 22 bars, with around 7 investors in total. We currently have around 350 staff to manage, so I have a lot of experience employing people, setting teams up, setting up systems and processes. I am now free to work on other projects, while I oversee the business and 13 managers. I am obsessed with self-development and now that I have a very good income sorted, I would like to start helping people with their mindsets and personal growth.
What were the initial challenges that you faced in your endeavor and how challenging is becoming an entrepreneur?
The personal challenges I faced were listening to people around me, outgrowing most people, trying to ignore the noise, listening to what the market wants and not to be controlled by haters/negative comments. We have to adapt our skills, toughen ourselves up, learn to be patient and spend at least 3 hours a day learning is a must!
The biggest challenge was undoing many years of conditioning from my parents, friends, school, and relatives. I started by seeing Tony Robbins at a seminar and he changed my mindset and made me become a person that works on myself, my beliefs and how to get a growth mindset. Once I was in the self-development world, I was able to find more motivation, better ways to deal with people, more understanding, I have also been able to help many people around me.
“Personal Development is Directly related to success”. Being a big proponent of personal development, kindly tell the readers more about your views on the subject.
A lot of people seem to think personal development books are like some sort of cult, or they don’t work. I have had many people joke about this subject and its almost like its a subject that cuts deep into peoples wounds because they are trying to avoid growth, they are trying to avoid thinking about their potential, maybe they are scared of what money will do to them. I find studying successful people and their habits can catapult you into great heights, empower you and give you that growth mentality.
Tell us more about your upcoming book?
I am writing a book on growth mindset because I realised that many people simply do not have this mentality, I see it in the trading world, I see it in the business world, they either do not have the ambition, the drive, the know-how or they don’t have the risk appetite. I want to teach people how to get disciplined in all areas of their lives, so they can apply it to their daily business/work/learning tasks. I want to give people unstoppable motivation, control over their minds and teach them all the key habits of successful people. I study success, mindset, self-development, psychology all as a hobby mixed with all my investment/trading and internet marketing skills. My book will be out around next year because I am still finishing off the sections and adding to them. I am also creating a growth mastery course to help people, which may include 1 on 1 coaching.
You are also an owner of a chain of 22 bars. What are the key ingredients in a running a successful chain of stores?
The key to running 22 bars with 350 staff is to lead the business more than manage it, think big, remove negative people, train people to lead, honest and open methods of operating. You have to adapt to the markets, think out of the box constantly to settle staff disputes, to adapt systems as we grow out of them, be a strong leader that listens and see the best in people and try to work around their weaknesses with other staff filling in. We have over 60 chat groups to communicate with each other between different sets of staff, a communication flow is very important, everyone relevant needs to know what’s going on. I am also a strong believer, if you are not growing, then you may be sinking, so I keep buying more bars for our group and we keep expanding.
As a successful Entrepreneur yourself, what suggestion would you like to give to aspiring Entrepreneurs?
My suggestions for new entrepreneurs is to not waste time with courses/university degrees. All you need to do is read books 2-3 hours per day every day and you will get so much value for next to nothing. People have spent millions in mistakes to learn what they are going to tell you in the book. I have over 600 books on my phone right now and I get through around 1-3 books per week, but I do cheat and buy them on audible, so I can listen while I multitask, we have so much untapped time that we can utilise, if you are a driver and you are looking to start a business, then you are in a very very good position to learn and do your homework. I see people that learn all day and don’t make a go of anything, I see people then learn nothing but only take action, but they are always successful. It’s important that you learn and take action. I am guilty of over learning and not taking enough action, but I have taken enough to get me to a good place. I am taking more action by writing this book and growing my other businesses.
