610: Getting a Read on Economic Recovery | Michael Borreca, CFO, LYNX Franchising

Finance leaders who remain skeptical of the prospects for economic recovery inside the 2020 calendar year may want to consult LYNX Franchising CFO Michael Borreca. “I don’t think that it’s going to take us to 2021 to get back to March sales levels,” says Borreca, who doesn’t hesitate to credit three nontraditional metrics for influencing his current thinking on the subject. The first is the volume of disinfectant currently being purchased by franchisees of JAN-PRO—owned by LYNX—which boast of being the largest commercial cleaning franchiser in the country, with over 8,000 small business owners. “The more our franchise network is buying disinfectants, the more this means that more businesses are starting to reopen. They are doing a deep clean ahead of time, and then customers are being welcomed in,” says Borreca, who counts the lengthening commuting times surrounding LYNX’s hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, as yet another unconventional metric pointing now toward a recovery. The third metric influencing Borreca’s upbeat economic outlook is the growing digital sales leads for Intelligent Office, a virtual office business that LYNX acquired early last year. In addition to its à la carte virtual office assistant services, Intelligent Office also provides businesses access to furnished office spaces and meeting rooms. “Folks are looking for private space where they can go to get out of the house and work, but ours is not an open coworking environment,” explains Borreca, who says that as leases expire, the pandemic is already leading many companies to rethink how they use and pay for space. - Jack Sweeney