Dispatch Issue #4 - Franchise

Jul 23

Jenny Young likes to see kids fail. That sounds harsh until you realize the company she founded, Brooklyn Robot Foundry, helps tens of thousands of kids each year become better problem solvers and critical thinkers. In Jenny’s world, failure isn’t a red flag. It’s a rite of passage.

FAILURE CAN BE JOYFUL

As a child, it wasn’t uncommon to find Jenny alongside her dad in their garage rebuilding a car engine or fixing a lawn mower. She loved taking things apart and figuring out how to put them back together. Her mom encouraged it, too. She often took Jenny behind the scenes at restaurants and other businesses just to see how things worked.

Of course, it didn’t always go smoothly. Failure was frequent. But when the remote control car didn’t move after tweaking its wiring, Jenny didn’t get frustrated. Instead, she laughed and got curious. She tinkered and tried again, always finding joy in solving the puzzle.

A FRANCHISE IN THE MAKING

That spirit - failing joyfully paired with hand-on learning - led Jenny to launch Brooklyn Robot Foundry in 2011. A systems thinker, Jenny noticed early in her career that overcrowded schools, reduced school budgets, and standardized testing didn’t allow much room for students to tinker, explore, or build anything real. So she created a place where they could.

And it clicked. Kids couldn’t get enough of it. Parents loved it.

By 2015, customers who’d moved away from Brooklyn were asking how they could bring the Foundry to their own cities. That’s when Jenny made the decision to franchise.

But the first location wouldn’t launch until seven years later.

PATIENCE IS A VIRTUE

That seven-year gap between idea and execution is what separates Brooklyn Robot Foundry from many other franchise concepts and why it now has nine locations, with more on the way.

Here’s how Jenny explains it:

“We took our time and went to tons of shows, expos, and workshops to understand the franchising landscape and soak up as much as we could from experts in the field. We did a ton of listening and paid special attention to the pain points that people had experienced.

We then came up with a system, and I hired a "mock franchise owner" and had her try out the system to see where the gaps were. We wanted to be very deliberate in what we did. It took 5 years to fine-tune and get it right before we were ready to start offering franchising opportunities.

The end effect is that our systems are very well thought out, our franchise owners feel very supported and we have protocols in place for getting constant feedback from our owners.”

Taking time. Listening. Testing. Iterating.

That’s not how most entrepreneurs approach growth. But franchise success is rarely about hustle. It’s about replicability. And that’s where Jenny nailed it.

In 2025, Brooklyn Robot Foundry was named a Top New & Emerging Franchise by Entrepreneur magazine. And they’re just getting started.

WORDS OF WISDOM FROM THE FRANCHISE FRONT LINES

Dan Reese, President at MilkShake Factory on leading a franchise:

“Train your replacement. My Vice President of Operations preaches this constantly. Relentlessly train and delegate any tasks that are not the highest and best use of your time. Not always feasible in smaller businesses, but the mindset is powerful.”

Kaitlin Johnson, Vice President of Franchise Development at Hydralive on franchise growth:

“We’ve taken a deliberate and strategic approach to growth, prioritizing the quality of our franchise partners over a race to high volume. In the past year, we’ve welcomed 14 franchise partners across multiple states with impressive backgrounds in medical device sales, pharma, biotech, professional athletics, and healthcare.

I’m proud that we’ve resisted the pressure of rapid, unsustainable expansion and stayed true to our values.”