In 1988, Brattland approached Brian Tracy, a prominent sales
expert and professional-development speaker, and made a proposal.
If Tracy would appear before audiences and provide financing,
Brattland would manage advertising and promotion, send out sales
representatives, and handle a thousand and one other details for a
series of seminars throughout North America-details that Tracy had
no experience with.
Tracy agreed, and Brattland recruited two men to help with the
sales and promotion chores, making them equal partners in his half
of the enterprise, dubbed Brain Tracy Seminars. In its first year,
1988, Brattland's operation netted $50,000. It wasn't much,
but it was enough to pay Tracy back his initial investment and
more. In three months, Tracy's $15,000 investment netted him
$30,000.
If finding Tracy was Brattland's first big break, his second
occurred when his road show reached Houston in 1989. There he met
Kerima Thomas, who introduced Brattland's traveling trio to
telemar-keting. Hiring Thomas meant the partners could leave the
cold-calling to someone else, freeing them to focus on what they
did best-sales.
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Soon Thomas was heading office operations for the firm, which in
1989 had been reorganized into a new business, PPI. "The year
before Kerima came aboard, we grossed maybe $200,000," says
Brattland. "The year after she came on board, our gross was
$437,000."
Thomas continues to oversee PPI's daily operations as vice
president, while Brattland focuses on long-term planning and sales.
Something equally important jelled as well: In 1992, Dan and Kerima
were married.
Despite its growth, however, PPI was still traveling from city
to city, putting on a single show and moving on. The evolution into
its current format of presenting serial programs came about by
necessity: After initially increasing, attendance began to
decline.
"We figured the reason was, when people went to one-day
seminars, they could learn and be motivated-but it was
short-lived," says Brattland. "By offering a series, we
gave people more chances to attend more seminars [and make the
changes stick]."
The strategy worked. "In 1992, we introduced the series
format," Brattland says. "By 1994, revenues had soared to
$6.5 million." By entering two or three new markets annually,
he expects revenues to climb to $20 million by 2000.
Until 1990, he had offered only one speaker-Brian Tracy. Sales
guru Harvey Mackay, author of the bestselling Swim With the
Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive (William Morrow & Co.) and
a much sought-after speaker, was Brattland's first choice as an
added attraction. But with his resume, Mackay could take his pick
of promoters. Why did he agree to go along with a relative upstart
like Brattland?
"Dozens of Dan Brattlands make calls to me, trying to sign
me up," says Mackay. "The reason I went with this Dan
Brattland was that in checking with other speakers, I found he had
an impeccable reputation. If there's one chance in 100 that a
promoter is not ethical, you're putting your own reputation at
risk. And in life and business, your name is all you've got to
trade on."
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