Biography
I never planned on ending up in franchising… and definitely not for 15 years.
But life rarely goes how you script it.
I grew up bouncing between states, foster homes, and psychiatric wards, not as a patient, but as a kid trying to make sense of a bipolar mum and a dad who worked overseas nearly full-time.
That kind of chaos does weird things to your wiring. You learn to adapt. You learn to survive.
You learn to read rooms fast.
And somewhere along the line, you learn to build things.
Timeline of a Very Accidental CMO
Born in Melbourne.
Moved to Perth at four.
Back to Warrnambool at twelve.
Mum was in and out of Greylands psychiatric hospital.
Dad was in Saudi Arabia working almost year-round.
So foster care and mates’ houses became home more often than not.
No one explained anything.
You just had to figure it out.
That’s probably where I learned to “mask” — loud, confident, sporty at school; quiet, anxious, and trying to hold it together at home.
2007: Law Commerce degree → two days a week at Jim’s Group
Born in Melbourne.
Moved to Perth at four.
Back to Warrnambool at twelve.
Mum was in and out of Greylands psychiatric hospital.
Dad was in Saudi Arabia working almost year-round.
So foster care and mates’ houses became home more often than not.
No one explained anything.
You just had to figure it out.
That’s probably where I learned to “mask” — loud, confident, sporty at school; quiet, anxious, and trying to hold it together at home.
2007: Law Commerce degree → two days a week at Jim’s Group
Worked in the compliance department.
Then insurance.
Then web.
Then legal.
Basically, anywhere there was a mess, I wandered in and tried to sort it out.
Turned the insurance brokerage from losing six figures to making six figures in a year.
Built the TVU system to automate compliance.
Poked my nose into digital marketing long before anyone wanted me to.
Presented at a divisional meeting — not something a junior staffer normally did — pointing out our websites were slower than dial-up.
People actually listened.
That was the moment I accidentally became “the digital guy.”
Took over the Facebook page because no one else wanted to.
Started pushing for content, speed, better websites, and modern marketing.
Got obsessed with Gary Vaynerchuk’s books.
Started applying everything he talked about.
Filmed business tips with Jim.
People loved them.
Then came the big one: Ask Jim — a weekly live Q&A where people could ask the founder anything.
No scripts.
No PR polish.
Just raw transparency.
It changed everything.
People joined the franchise because of it.
Hired videographers.
Started posting daily. Launched podcasts, long-form interviews, day-on-the-road videos, TikTok clips — the whole lot.
Copped abuse from franchisors, franchisees, random people online — but kept going.
Why?
Because new franchisees walked into training saying,
“I joined because of your videos.”
That’s all the validation you need.
I’m now CMO of Jim’s Group, the largest franchise network in Australia. The content strategy we built helped scale the network by thousands of franchisees.
But the real story isn’t the numbers.
It’s this:
I grew up in uncertainty.
I craved stability.
Jim — an eccentric, brilliant founder — became more of a father figure to me than my own dad ever was.
And in that strange, messy, unexpected environment…
I found something that felt like purpose.
Now I’m building the Trust Engine — the system I wish franchisors understood years ago.
Human content.
Founder transparency.
Long-form storytelling.
Depth over polish.
Consistency over campaigns.
And a brand built on honesty, not hype.
What’s happening now
Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book.
It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged.
It was popularised in the 1960s with the release of Letraset sheets containing Lorem Ipsum passages, and more recently with desktop publishing software like Aldus PageMaker including versions of Lorem Ipsum.
The Franchise Marketer Newsletter
One useful email each week with practical insights on franchise growth, trust, content and modern marketing.
Short. Honest. Based on real work inside one of Australia’s largest franchise networks.
Ready to grow your brand with trust and clarity?
Tell me what you’re trying to solve and I’ll point you in the right direction.