"Franchise is a loyalty business"

MORE Podcast: “Franchise is a loyalty business”

MORE Podcast: Transcript

Bernd Rodde: Convenience stores are perfect for the end consumer for easy shopping and a quick snack on the go. But for METRO's trader customers, this retail format is above all a great opportunity to further expand their business with the Trader franchise concept, which METRO offers them comprehensive advice and support.

Bernd Rodde: What the Trader Franchise business segment will achieve in the coming years and how it will contribute to METRO's sCore strategy is the subject of this episode of the MORE Podcast - Wholesale to the max!

Bernd Rodde: A warm welcome to you all, dear colleagues. My name is Bernd Rodde from Internal Communications at METRO AG.

Bernd Rodde: My guest today is METRO's Mr Franchise. He has worked for almost 15 years for various retail companies in the UK. Since 2017 he has been with METRO, starting as Global Director, Retail and Franchise. And since February 2022 he is Senior Vice President Convenience at METRO, Daniel Quest. Hi Dan. Welcome to MORE Podcast!

Daniel Quest: Hi Bernd. Good to be here.

Bernd Rodde: Great to have you here Dan.

Bernd Rodde: You told me earlier that you live in England on a farm somewhere in the middle of nowhere and I guess far away from the nearest shopping centre.

Bernd Rodde: Does that explain your close relationship with convenience stores, simply because you depend on the nearest petrol station shop for your weekly shopping?

Daniel Quest: It could be. I live in the middle of a farm. It's not my farm, it's a house in the middle of someone else's farm. But I certainly don't have any houses that I can see.

Daniel Quest: But so, yeah, very rural. It's a great place to come back to after travelling to different countries pretty much every week.

Daniel Quest: But how did the convenience start? Basically, I was originally in finance. I'm a qualified accountant. I keep it a bit quiet, but yeah, a qualified accountant and I ended up doing a project selling convenience stores to independent retailers and through that I was quite successful and created this link with independent retailers and then I started to learn about convenience and working with these guys and then I was given the brand to be responsible for.

Daniel Quest: I was responsible for the company, the brand in the UK, a premium convenience brand and that really got me into understanding retail and learning from retailers and learning from customers what makes a good convenience store. And yes, I now like to shop in convenience stores rather than supermarkets.

Bernd Rodde: In my introduction I tried to briefly describe what a convenience store is for the end consumer, but for you as an expert, what is the advantage and also the special attraction of a convenience store from your point of view?

Daniel Quest: Well, the attraction of a convenience store is that you want to get what you want in an emergency. You're not looking for a formal shop as such, you're looking for more of a replenishment, so maybe I don't have the right bottle of wine that I want to take to my friends, or maybe I need some sugar to make a cake and I just don't have it. It's about jumping into that convenience store and picking up that product.

Daniel Quest: But we also look at convenience in areas like getting special treats. Maybe you've had a difficult, difficult day at work. You go home, you want to get a treat or a treat on the way home, or you want to eat now. So we do a lot of food for now, whether it's breakfast solutions, lunch solutions or you want to take a meal home to cook really easily at home, so convenience is all about being convenient for the end consumer.

Daniel Quest: I know it's a cliché, but it's very much where you can pick up most of the products without having to go to the big supermarkets.

Bernd Rodde: We will talk about convenience in a moment. And especially about the innovative retailer franchise concepts that METRO offers its retailer customers in this context.

Bernd Rodde: But first I would like to tell you what you can expect here on the MORE Podcast, because today we are going to find out in which markets METRO's Trader franchise concept is being implemented.

Bernd Rodde: And, of course, how METRO is going to develop this concept and what contribution it can make to our sCore growth strategy.

Bernd Rodde: But we also want to know MORE about you personally. That's why we have our little questionnaire “What sCores for you?”.

Bernd Rodde: And for the grand finale, we are especially looking forward to your sound souvenir that you have brought with you to tell us what inspires, motivates or is simply important to you.

Bernd Rodde: But first, let's talk about our business with METRO's trailer customers. At METRO, we always talk a lot about our customers from the hospitality industry and put them in the spotlight.

Bernd Rodde: And we are also associated with them externally, but our customers from the trader category, for example smaller retailers.

Bernd Rodde: They are also very important for METRO's business, right?

Daniel Quest: Oh, for sure. I mean, this area of the business independently, we have over 1.3 million customers.

Daniel Quest: And that's 7 billion in total sales and franchise is part of that. But in reality we need support services for the whole merchant community.

Bernd Rodde: But it is also true that small retailers are finding it increasingly difficult to keep their businesses going and to make a living from them. METRO's solution to this is Trader Franchise.

Bernd Rodde: What is the basic concept behind it?

Daniel Quest: So the basic concept is to take an independent trader and give them a service and a solution that can actually compete with modern retail.

Daniel Quest: So we're seeing modern convenience stores coming into our markets, as you would see in Western Europe. Most of our markets are in Central and Eastern Europe or Asia. And we're seeing this development and we need to give them a service, which is the right assortment, the right price, so that they can pass the right price on to their end customers, but also so that they can make a living by having the right profitability, we need to differentiate their products through things like own brand and we have the fine life, convenience, own brand and then solutions to make their life easier like digitalisation.

Bernd Rodde: What exactly is the relationship between a trader-franchisee and METRO? What are the contractual obligations and what services do both parties have to provide?

Daniel Quest: So we have a contract, anybody who makes an investment should have some kind of relationship contract. But actually in the past we've used that contract to say ok this is what our partners should do and that makes us look at ourselves not too deeply versus what is the service that we're providing.

Daniel Quest: So actually, once we've signed the contract, I say to everybody, like part of the contract, this is what our partners do. They put it in a drawer, they don't really bring it out.

Daniel Quest: The only time you should really bring the contract out is in the divorce area where you're actually splitting up.

Daniel Quest: But we don't like to get there and we don't ever want to get there. The key is to provide our customers with the right services and the right solution so that we're continually improving their business, they see value in being part of our franchisee and we get that value back through loyalty and their increased spend with us.

Daniel Quest: And that to me is critical. You know, if all parties can win, the retailers get improved profitability, the suppliers get a solution to the end consumer that is much better than if they were just in independent stores.

Daniel Quest: And then we can make a profit on the back of that. I see it as a win, win, win solution for everybody.

Bernd Rodde: You also described the benefits for the retailer customers. But what are the specific advantages for METRO? What does a Trader Franchise customer bring to us MORE than a normal Trader customer?

Daniel Quest: Well, for us, they bring us a much higher spend and a MORE frequent spend. So basically our customers come into our stores about 7 to 8 times a month.

Daniel Quest: Or they get deliveries at the same frequency and that means they're buying about twice a week. And it actually means that the turnover that we get from our franchised stores is about four or five times higher than an independent retailer. So if we're looking at MORE frequent customers bringing a bigger basket, franchising is critical to that and for other franchisees it's providing a service for them to be able to win and compete and actually have a solution that works for them to improve their profitability. At the same time.

Bernd Rodde: Okay. So, and we will talk about the development and future of the Trader Franchise concept in a moment. But first I would like to take a look back with you.

Bernd Rodde: Dan, when did METROs start with the Trader franchise concept and how many franchise stores have been opened in each country?

Daniel Quest: I don't know exactly when we started, but I think it's somewhere between 12 and 14 years ago. And if the people out there, if you remember, we used to have stores with our own brand. Actually, they were a big growth at one point, but we removed that at a certain stage when I joined in 2017, we had about four and a half thousand stores and today we have 8000 stores. So we have put significant growth on that. But there's so much more opportunity and we continue to expand, and we expect to expand over the next 6-7 years and really increase that volume by at least another 4000 stores. What we see though in the countries is that we see that continued growth significantly so in Romania for example we have 2000 stores and in Romania we are the largest convenience store operator based on the number of stores that we have.

Daniel Quest: And also if you look at Slovakia, we've now reached over 750 stores and so we're number two in the market. We still have a bit of a way to go to be number one, but it's a challenge we're up for and we want to move forward.

Bernd Rodde: What is the market structure in these countries in general? Is it a very fragmented market in the franchise business there?

Daniel Quest: It's different from country to country, you know. So in Poland, for example, the franchise team has to compete with Zabka. Zabka has 9000 stores. We have about 2000 stores in Poland, so there's a difference in that context. In some other countries we don't have a structured franchise. For example, in the Czech Republic they have their own "Zabka", it's not the same, but they have about 140 stores.

Daniel Quest: And then the cooperative is the biggest competitor, but it's a disparate group of stores rather than a structured franchise I would see in that context. So for us we actually see that structure as creating a really valuable brand. And that's what we've seen in the countries. And as we develop each of the countries or the country team develops the individual stores with our partners, it's really important that we create that consistency as much as we can while still making sure that they're independent, OK, This is not a hard franchise business or a structured convenience that we're trying to build because actually the franchisees bring what we call the magic dust into the actual stores and that magic dust means that you can have a store that's relevant and I've seen many of our customers in many different markets bring that, that can be local products, it can be local services, it can be local engagement, sponsoring the local football team or sponsoring the local community location. All of these things come from our franchise partners, they are really embedded in the local area where they live.

Bernd Rodde: Okay. So, localisation is an important part of the Trader franchise business.

Bernd Rodde: And as we all see, you also have different market conditions in each of the countries. You mentioned Romania as an example and Romania is also a role model and a pioneer in many areas within the sCore strategy. And this also applies to the development of the franchise business there over the last few years.

Daniel Quest: Absolutely. I mean, the Romanian franchise team has done a phenomenal job, but not just the franchise team. You know, the store managers, the colleagues, the sales team, HR, everybody's really so focused on developing not only METRO, Kashkari and Romania, but also La Doi Pasi, which is the franchise name that's operated there.

Daniel Quest: So it's a really committed country in terms of driving that, and so it's really developed since 2017 when I started, they had about 350 stores.

Daniel Quest: I would say not always of great quality and what the team has done, and particularly with Irinel leading the team there, has really driven home the importance of getting the right retail standards in the stores and a level of consistency in developing a brand around that. But it's not just that, it's a focus on the things that are. We're now all adopting the wholesale transformation.

Daniel Quest: So what they were looking at was really getting the right assortment to the customer, you know, making the right decisions. Do we have the right product in the right case size, for example? Then they were leaders in Buy More Pay Less and that is really important. Having that product at the right price that I can add a margin to resell to my customer is critical to a successful franchise and Buy More Pay Less is a great tool to be able to do that. And they were leaders in creating that everyday low price without the need for consistent promotions driving their customers into the wrong buying habits, I would say that really drove that and that has created confidence not only with the team there but also with the customers and the loyalty of them customers. I cannot say enough, you know the Romanian team have really taken franchising from a small 350 store business to a quite significant scale business with over 2000 stores, hundreds of millions of turnover, which in reality could be as big as a country.

Bernd Rodde: Really impressive what our Romanian colleagues have achieved, but also our colleagues in the other countries, what are the general success factors for making such a strong development in the Trader franchise business?

Daniel Quest: So all of our colleagues are really focused on three things. The first one is getting the price right. Secondly, as I said, being able to sell to third parties and then being able to have the right availability on the products.

Daniel Quest: You know, I always want to get what I order, whether it's on delivery or basically when I come into the store, it has to be there. So those are the kind of principles that our teams in the countries, our franchise and dealer teams in the countries are really focused on and then what we do is we add services, OK and that could be in the development of formats, it could be in the development of our own brand, our fine Life phone brand that we've now transformed over the last 18 months to really be a convenience product that actually has a guaranteed margin for our customers.

Daniel Quest: And why are we doing all this? Well, all of these services drive loyalty because franchising is a loyalty business. It's not a contract business. It's literally creating a service, creating a relationship, and through that service and relationship we get rewarded through a higher purchase from METRO.

Daniel Quest: And that happens, you know, there's always the odd one that maybe wouldn't follow the same principle, but 98% of the time, if we're doing a good job, I could tell you our customers, they're just going to buy more and more from us.

Daniel Quest: So, and we've seen it in the sales improvements where we've actually as a whole country teams, they've doubled the sales in the last four or five years of the franchise business and then we're going to double it again and we're going to double it again. So there is no doubt that the opportunity is there for the next few years.

Bernd Rodde: OK, so much for the success factors of the Trader franchise. But now Dan, we want to find out something about your personal success factors and what is important to you in general and for that I have this section and our little questionnaire "What sCores for you? Are you ready, Dan? So let's get started.

Bernd Rodde: Dan, what is your core? That is, what are your particular strengths?

Daniel Quest: Sure. So for me, I think the core of what we do has to be the customer focus. And for me that's really critical. And every time I look at any conversation that we have, any development that we have, I put myself in the customer's shoes first and that's really, really important. And that's always, you know, can be a bit difficult.

Daniel Quest: Especially when you're not always in the country as well, you know, especially around METRO AG, you know, it's really critical and I think the fact that we've got pretty much everybody.

Daniel Quest: Of the leadership team has been in a customer this year I think is fantastic. We need to do a lot more of that. Just look, there's a lot of people in restaurants.

Daniel Quest: So if you've been to a restaurant this year, maybe next year you'll go to a supermarket. That would be my request to everybody.

Bernd Rodde: And this is also a personal strength of yours to be empathetic and to walk in someone else's shoes?

Daniel Quest: I think that's something I've learned over the years. I think I've learnt from understanding independent retailers from the very beginning when I sold the stores, the guy before me had struggled to sell the stores and I realised that he actually hadn't understood what the customers wanted and what their constraints were and so it was very easy for me to kind of step into their shoes and build the business model that worked for us and worked for them. And then we sold all the shops.

Daniel Quest: So for me it's pretty much the same in all businesses. If I can understand what the customer needs, I think we can build the right solution. If it's a negotiation, I always see it as a win-win situation. So if I can see what the other side is trying to achieve, I can actually understand what the negotiation needs to be. So for me it's maybe a value, but it's certainly a way of doing business, I would say.

Bernd Rodde: What goals, big or small, have you set for yourself?

Daniel Quest: I am constantly pushing myself to be healthier. I think as I get older it's more of a challenge and I think you have to work harder at it. I think it's a small goal, but maybe it's starting to be a big goal from that side. But no, the big goal for me is that I really believe that we can create a convenience business that is a leader in Central and Eastern Europe and in some places like Turkey. And I really believe that there's a gap in the market and I believe that METRO has the ability to deliver that.

Daniel Quest: So something that I have a fundamental goal is to actually achieve that development within the next few years anyway for sure. And that's probably the biggest goal that drives me today.

Bernd Rodde: And how do you achieve that?

Daniel Quest: The way to do that is we've got the development of the franchise, and I think our success has allowed us to now invest in what we started with zero investment in digital and zero investment in the franchise. We've got the Elevate programme now. I'm sure we'll come and talk about that and we've got the structured convenience development that we're doing. So I think what we've also done in the last 18 months is we've brought in the right people. So, we've now brought on significantly more people from a leadership team perspective who understand convenience.

Bernd Rodde: Okay. So, are these themes that you mentioned also the milestones that you use to measure your progress or how you measure your success?

Daniel Quest: OK, you've got the KPIs, so that's number one. But in addition to that, the way I measure is actually when people join us to join this team. That's critical because we're building a new business, but also in reality alongside all these KPIs.

Daniel Quest: Are we getting the right engagement from our colleagues? You know, if you actually go into some of our stores, the customer experience and the customer feedback is really fantastic and you know the NPS scores are off the charts. So really the customer engagement, the colleague engagement, the positivity, I see and measure myself on that much softer than the delivery at the end of the day, we're all paid to deliver and I think that's a really important kind of hygiene factor.

Daniel Quest: That's a given for me that we have to do it, but the softness of understanding the commitment of the colleague is really quite critical to be a milestone and or a kind of measure.

Bernd Rodde: So now we know what is important to you and what is important to you in business, but also in life.

Bernd Rodde: And now I'm even more curious about your sound souvenir. But as always, we will hear it at the end of this episode.

Bernd Rodde: But first, let's get back to the Trader Franchise and how it's evolving, and this is about the Elevate programme to take our franchise stores to the next level.

Bernd Rodde: Dan, what exactly is the Elevate programme?

Daniel Quest: As I said, we didn't have any investment. And I'm very pleased to say that over the last three years we've been investing in that.

Daniel Quest: So we created a programme called the Elevate Programme, which was to start to elevate our solution. OK, so we knew we had a concept, but we wanted a much better concept. Whether that was in terms of delivery in the private label that we offer in the format that we offer in the sales force and the partner management support that we offer, we wanted to do a better business and that is why we came up with the Elevate concept.

Daniel Quest: What we then did was to really invest in getting it off the ground because people really need to feel it and see it. And to be able to feel it and see it, we really went for the modern convenience store. So like I said, we took all the graphics off the front. We make it open, we put in the right lighting, we put in the right shelving, we put in the right refrigeration, but more important than the actual equipment and the money you spend is actually having the right layout. So having fresh food, having a fresh offer when you come into the store.

Daniel Quest: Or really looking at things like the right solutions like coffee solutions, food to go solutions and then providing the right services, whether it's a ticket machine or a lottery machine, et cetera.

Daniel Quest: So really becoming the hub of a community so that I can get everything I need from that community store. But what we have done is just made it a much more modern environment than what people have probably seen before in some of the countries.

Bernd Rodde: When you say that we invest in these stores and they get new shelves for example, is all this equipment paid for by METRO?

Daniel Quest: No, it's paid for by the franchisees. So we have to have the right concept. That's really critical and we have to show them and to be able to show them what that has led us to is to create ambassadors. And ambassadors are really important for us to kind of set the benchmark of what we want to end up with.

Daniel Quest: So what we found was like minded retailers and retailers that absolutely want to evolve and develop their business. And we found like minded retailers that wanted to work with us and then we redesigned the store in partnership with them and actually set the benchmark of what that looked like and that was having the right own brand, having the right look and feel in the store, having a much more modern environment, having a food counter that included things like food to go, And the ambassador stores have been a phenomenal result, each country now has between 5 and 10 ambassadors, depending on the country, and they really are the showcase.

Daniel Quest: And the reason we created that is because retailers listen to us completely, no matter how much we think they are, you know, standing up and having a PowerPoint. They don't work the same way, retailers listen to retailers and that's why our customers want to feel it and see it.

Daniel Quest: And that's how we created it. We created the investors so that we can take new customers or customers who want to remodel their stores into these ambassador stores and pretty much 9 times out of 10 what we get, the customer walks out and says "I want this". And when we hear that, we know we've got it right.

Bernd Rodde: And what other targets have we set ourselves in terms of the Elevate programme and the Ambassador shops?

Daniel Quest: The Elevate programme starts with growing retail sales. So the sales are not about the sales to METRO. So a really critical minimum of 20%. But we're seeing 40 to 50%. I mean we're really seeing, particularly in some of the investor stores, a significant increase in customers from that side. So increased customer frequency as well.

Daniel Quest: And then their revenues are growing as well. And what we've seen in some of the stores, some of the investors, is an increase in their margin of over 2 percentage points as well. So that's literally a percentage increase of around 10%. So phenomenal, you've got that on top of the top line growth, actually a growth in their overall income. It means that the profitability of these stores is increasing significantly. So then back to us. So that's what's been given to the customer and the driver for the customer coming back to our sales is an increased share of wallet. So how much are they buying? So we're seeing really significant increases, 60 to 70% increase in purchases because it's actually a relationship and it's not because we've got a new contract.

Daniel Quest: Yes, we have a contract term and a minimum term, but they're well beyond that. You know, I can't think of any Ambassador or Elevate store that's at that level.

Daniel Quest: They're buying a lot more from us because the relationship of that driving their sales and their profitability has actually led to a stronger relationship and a stronger partnership with METRO. So we've got an increased share of wallet and where we really want to be that key supplier that's critical to us is our brand.

Daniel Quest: We should be the biggest supplier going into that store, but unfortunately that hasn't happened in the past. That's absolutely our goal and that's what's happening with the stores right now.

Bernd Rodde: Part of this development is also the expansion of the digitalisation of the Trader franchise business. What are the key points of this digital strategy?

Daniel Quest: The key point of our digital strategy is really to make it easier for our customers to do business with METRO.

Daniel Quest: We are developing solutions like our ordering solution called M-Shop. We have developed a connected EPOS solution that we can connect to multiple EPOS providers, which allows us to send product information and invoices directly to our customer's system, which again saves them from having to type in information and take valuable time away from either the team on the shop floor or themselves sitting behind a computer.

Daniel Quest: On top of that, we have developed things like bringing in a planogram solution, which comes from some of the convenience expertise of space management tools from around the world.

Daniel Quest: So we're really bringing in areas where we can give recommendations to our customers on what products to put where, and all of this is managed through a close collaboration process between METRO digital in the countries and my convenience digital team, which we've placed close to our customers in Romania, and ensuring the implementation and execution of the solutions to add value to our customers and of course to METRO as well.

Bernd Rodde: Interesting. In addition to the Elevate programme, you're also working on another retailer franchise. You also mentioned the so-called hard franchise. What can you tell us about that?

Daniel Quest: I prefer to call it structured convenience stores. The term is a bit better. But really what we want to do with this new business is to find the right locations and create a business that is much more convenience focused than what we have now.

Daniel Quest: So a lot of our stores now are much more rural. They're much more focused on food and a small supermarket type of solution within the convenience environment. But what we see in some of the key cities is a gap in the market around convenience and we want to fill that gap around convenience. So we're looking for stores where we can add a lot more coffee solutions, a lot more breakfast solutions, lunch solutions or evening solutions on the way home.

Daniel Quest: So we're just trying out some concepts in that context. And what's interesting about some of the first stores that we've opened, you know, it's really taking off. You know, the first store that we opened and subsequent stores, the number one product is hot dogs, so it's number one. It's the best selling product that we have.

Daniel Quest: And we've got a lot more to come. You know, things like pizza and so on. So we've still got a lot of development to do, but we really want to become the kind of well-known operator of good coffee and good food to go that actually has some support grocery, but convenience food becomes more of the core.

Bernd Rodde: Now we want to talk about sCore because the Trader franchise business, like all of METRO's business, is focused on our sCore strategy.

Everyone is now talking about METRO's wholesale transformation and the elimination of retail elements in our stores. You are now explicitly addressing the issue of retail in the context of the Trader franchise. How do you see the overall picture? Or to put it another way, not quite seriously: Do you ever feel excluded?

Daniel Quest: Absolutely not. Not at METRO, I would say. But what I would say is that we have to understand our end customer and our end customer is a retailer. We need to be really good at understanding that and then understanding from a wholesale principle how do we deliver the product to them and what is the opportunity from a wholesale business. So we're not building a pure retail business. We're building a retail business that actually buys wholesale product and boxes from METRO.

Daniel Quest: So in reality, we're fully aligned with the wholesale business. We're fully aligned with the objectives of sCore and the wholesale transformation. We're just a really critical part of that to understand the retail element because that's how the customer element works. And so if we understand the retail element and really develop solutions that work for that retail element, we'll be a better wholesaler and we want to build a multi-billion dollar business within the franchise business over the next few years to 2030.

Daniel Quest: That would be the target date, so it's really important that we have that understanding and that we use the retail understanding, the retail expertise. As I said, from the teams to build what are the right solutions for customers and how do we build that within the wholesale environment.

Bernd Rodde: And from my point of view also our pricing strategy, BMPL offers concrete links between our wholesale transformation and the retail business of our Trader franchise customers. Is that really attractive for the Trader customers?

Daniel Quest: All the things we're building in the wholesale transformation, Buy More Pay Less is one of them, but also assortment optimisation, delivery, sales force excellence, CRM. These are all things that are really critical and certainly support the development of our franchise business.

Bernd Rodde: Our sCore strategy aims for strong growth by 2030 and I assume that the Trader franchise business will be no exception. How will the franchise business contribute to sCore? What targets have you set for 2030?

Daniel Quest: As I said, we want to build a multi-billion dollar business, but we want our customers to see METRO as the main supplier. So we want a share of wallet of at least over 50%. And from that perspective, we also want to build a profitable business around this convenience area.

Daniel Quest: So we see the facets coming together to support the sCore strategy in 2030, but really it's a growth strategy. You know, we're at the very beginning. You know we started very small. Franchise was not a focus, I would say a couple of years ago we brought it into focus. The country teams have done a phenomenal job of driving that for this business.

Daniel Quest: But really for me now it's the next decade and the next evolution and that's continuing the Elevate programme and continuing with that, better quality stores and really focusing on quality and also developing the convenience business.

Bernd Rodde: Very ambitious goals. We have already talked about METRO's Trader franchise activities in Romania. And if you, dear colleagues, want to see the other side, the perspective of our trader customers, then you should definitely visit MPULSE, METRO's online magazine and storytelling platform. Here you can read the story of Iuliana and Costin Ghinea from Bucharest, who successfully transformed their café into a small grocery store during the Corona crisis. Or the story of Mihaela-Simona from Ovidiu, also in Romania. She took over the trader business from her parents and now runs two METRO Trader franchise stores with a lot of heart and soul, and with a lot of success.

Bernd Rodde: As I said, you can find this and many more great stories about our retailer customers and the METRO franchise concept on the website of the online magazine Impulse, at MPULSE.de, and the link to it can also be found in the show notes of this episode.

Bernd Rodde: And that brings us to another great story, the story of your sound souvenir, Dan, the sound of your core. Like all my guests here on the MORE podcast, you have brought with you a sound that inspires you, motivates you, or just makes you happy. So Dan, please don't keep us in suspense any longer and let us hear what sound you brought with you?

Daniel Quest: Sure, no problem.

Bernd Rodde: Okay. I guess some outside activity?

Daniel Quest: Right. But you know what?

Bernd Rodde: What is it? Dan, please tell us.

Daniel Quest: Ok. So this is just a quick, quick recording on a Sunday morning. I like to get up early, usually around 6:45 or 7:00. I'll be out in the woods with the dog and that's me running in the woods with the dog. And I like to do that kind of Sunday morning. Because I don't have a lot of time at home, I travel a lot, so I like to get up before everybody else and get out in the fresh air. It's a great time to think. It's a great time to sort of reflect on the week, understand what you need to do next week, but then get back in the house. I usually make breakfast. I've got three kids, so it's usually pancakes and waffles, and that's trying to force-feed fruit. On top of that, if we can feed them really, really well. In general it's great to get up and do something and it really motivates me for the next week. It's really energising or re-energising, my dog loves it. I'm not sure if she's getting a bit older now so she's a bit slower towards the end but she comes out and it's great to be just the two of us and that was us in the woods. It was a very wet day, splashing through the mud.

Bernd Rodde: It sounds great Dan. Thanks for the great sound. And most of all, thank you for the very nice and interesting conversation. I'm sure we've learned a lot about METRO's Trader franchise today.

Bernd Rodde: Good luck, Daniel, and all the best for you.

Daniel Quest: Great. Thank you, Bernd. It was great.

Bernd Rodde: And METRO colleagues, thank you for listening. Stay tuned for the next episode of the MORE Podcast and please also check out our previous episodes. You can find them, like this one, on United and wherever else you listen to podcasts, such as Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Bernd Rodde: Please do me a favour and subscribe to us there and recommend the MORE Podcast to all your colleagues. Thank you so much. Bye, bye and take care.