What Do NFL Players Do When They Leave the Game? Increasingly, They Open a Franchise. Here's Why.
It’s hard enough to squeeze a dozen people into the prep room of a sub shop.
It’s even tougher if they’re all NFL players.
But that’s who’s wedged between the refrigerator, the bread oven, the meat slicer and cartons of ingredients in the back of a Jersey Mike’s in a strip mall on the fringes of Ann Arbor, Mich., just after the lunch rush. The men are students at the NFL Business Academy -- a program, run out of the University of Michigan’s Stephen Ross School of Business, that teaches franchising and entrepreneurship to help prepare players for the often rocky transition to life after pro football.
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“A lot of players have been led to believe that all they can do is play football,” says Indianapolis Colts nose tackle Joey Mbu, one of the men packed into the tiny space. “We don’t want that to be us.”
Standing before them is Peter Shipman, Jersey Mike’s area director for Michigan, northern Indiana, and northwest Ohio. The men nod as Shipman walks them through the ins and outs of every facet of the business, from sandwich making to customer service, before ending on an inspirational note. “All I can say to you guys is, don’t the unknown. You can adjust; you can adapt. You guys
