Meet Jerry Akers, Million Million Dollar Mentor

by Elizabeth Denham

About Jerry

Million Dollar Mentor Jerry Akers is President of Sharpness Inc., DBA Great Clips, and MOCA Inc., DBA The Joint Chiropractic. He also serves as Regional Developer and Franchisee for The Joint Chiropractic. As a lifelong entrepreneur, he has owned a wide variety of businesses in his 40-year career. For the past 13 years, he and his wife have grown their Great Clips group from one salon to 36, and now, with the entry of their children into their business life, plan on adding several more.

Akers currently serves on the board of the International Franchise Association (IFA), on the Great Clips MARC franchisee leadership board, the International Franchise Association’s Franchisee Forum, the National Federation of Independent Business State Leadership Council and the Iowa State Cosmetology Board.

About Jerry’s Career

After 20+ years of researching franchise opportunities, the stars finally aligned when Jerry was approached by a business broker to buy an under-performing Great Clips location. Utilizing the business skills he and his wife had acquired in their 25-year corporate careers, they were able to vastly improve the business and use it as a springboard to continue to grow.

After hitting the million-dollar mark within the first three years of franchising and growing to 36 locations in less than 17 years, Jerry and his wife have a plan to grow to 50 locations by their 20th anniversary in the business. Together, they have grown individual, under-performing salons by two times within three years after acquiring each one through better operations, team building and training and superior marketing. They typically break even on new stores in less than 12 months.

Jerry’s Mentorship

While working plenty of hours, Jerry enjoys the fact that he can do it from anywhere in the world rather than at the office.

“We have adapted our life to include traveling to places we may not have been able to go prior to franchising,” he said. “We bought a lake house where we spend about half our time, and we entertain family and friends. We enhance our life as we choose with fewer financial concerns.

Jerry and his wife are excited that they have brought the second generation into our business with the addition of two daughters and a son-in-law who currently run the day-to-day operations of our Great Clips franchise.

“We are impacting multiple generations of family through franchising,” he noted. “Giving our employees and family more opportunities, more income and a better future has now become a driving factor in our decision-making so that we can positively impact hundreds of lives.”

Jerry is looking forward to growing his role as a leader in franchising through the Pillars of Franchising Million Dollar Mentor Program.

“I believe my strongest business abilities are long-range strategic thinking, problem-solving, superior marketing skills and team building,” he said. “My love for franchising and what it does for individuals and families as well as what it does to strengthen our country overall is at the forefront of my thinking at all times. I believe in building something that is profitable and changes the lives of franchisees and, by extension, changes the lives of hundreds and thousands of employees!”