Born in 1984 in Eagle Pass, Texas — where the United States and Mexico blend together. Ten industries built, several of them at night while I held a full-time job and had a family. One system my father installed in me at age 5: Mentalízalo.
His philosophy: give him nothing material and he'll build everything. He made me work for everything — every summer as a kid I spent across the border, at my grandmother's house in Piedras Negras, working in my cousins' restaurants or in the mechanic shop of a friend of his. He never handed me money. He was a star player for the Borregos Salvajes of Tec de Monterrey, an incredible architect, and a real-estate developer and investor — and he taught me a lot. He installed one thing in me at age 5: Mentalízalo. See it before it exists. Go get it.
My mother kept it simpler: "Be number one at what makes you happy, and don't stay quiet — ask for what you want."
That's the whole operating system.
I made my first film at 19 — no money, no film school. I talked the sheriff, the chief of police and the mayor of Eagle Pass into acting in it. I sold distribution to Univision and Venevisión. The Walmart, Blockbuster and Netflix-DVD era. A second film set off a bidding war. I walked away after more than 10 years. Mentalízalo built all of that — and knew when to step back.
From promotions kid to Music Director at BMP Radio in San Antonio — no degree. I opened concerts for MANÁ and Luis Miguel. Then came the offer: Program Director of my own station in Austin — house, car and a big salary. I said no. I left everything, moved back to Eagle Pass to live with my parents, and started my second film from scratch — no money, no salary, nothing guaranteed. I'd already done it at 19 with El Escape de los Santos and sold the rights; this time the payday was going to be even bigger. Then the 2008–09 housing crisis hit. We sold the rights, but it never premiered. A big failure — and a bet on myself I'd make again.
Marketing and Leasing Manager at Jones Lang LaSalle. I took Mall de las Águilas from 60% to 99% occupancy. I didn't just lease space — I built entrepreneurs. I taught people in the community how to open LLCs and run businesses. When I left, CBRE said: "We're not hiring JLL. We're hiring Frank Flores." JLL — leasing malls all across Texas, from Eagle Pass to Killeen — was my full-time job through all of my 30s. And that whole time I was building businesses on my own. The side businesses below I built at night and on weekends, while still at the full-time job — all before I turned 40.
While still leasing malls at JLL, I built LeasePin — an app that connected tenants with landlords — for my own work, with zero coding experience. I landed a $50K investment offer. COVID killed it. The lesson: Mentalízalo builds things. Timing decides whether they survive.
Still at JLL, with $500 in the bank, I negotiated a lakefront property for $500 down and $1,500 a month. I built "Mars on the Lake" — a food truck park I named after my late younger brother, Marcelo. I had 5 tenants paying rent before a single food truck showed up. I sold the whole thing for $480,000. Close to $180K profit in 8 months. That's the story I tell when people ask if you can really start with nothing.
Before the carnivore wave, there was a vegan wave — and I caught it early. I drove to Austin a lot (my brothers were at UT, my mom lived there) and watched the whole city go plant-based. I'm always trying to turn a hobby into a business, so I went vegan and launched Vegan Biceps, a fitness apparel brand — built from scratch on my own while still leasing malls full-time. I learned to build not just a brand but a community: I started sponsoring athletes with huge followings and people went crazy for the apparel. Hats, tees, hoodies — designed and drop-shipped via Amazon and print-on-demand. More than $60K in the first six months. I stepped away after a year — I wasn't really vegan and I wasn't going to fake it for the community — but it proved the only thing that matters: start with nothing and grow fast.
The ranch came before COVID — I bought it when I got married, for the hay business and with a plan to build cabins around our 15-acre lake and rent them on Airbnb. We never finished the cabins, but we ran the Airbnb out of the house — $70K in 100 days. Then Carmelita's: handmade flour, corn and nixtamal tortillas plus homemade salsas, shipped across the country — more than 200 sales on Etsy, five-star reviews, zero preservatives, all made fresh at dawn and packed by hand. But food with no preservatives is brutal to ship — weather, weight, spoilage. That pain pushed me toward digital: the Carmelita's cookbook was my first digital product I actually sold — and toward a lighter, shelf-stable, higher-margin product, SECA Carnivore Chips, riding the carnivore wave before it blew up. First year: six figures — from my kitchen.
During COVID, stuck at the ranch, I taught myself leatherwork — full-grain, hand-stitched with a saddle stitch, no fabric lining, no machines, no shortcuts. Wallets, bags and — once I got into cigars with my dad and my older brother Ramón — a line of leather accessories for the cigar world. I made my wife a bag; I made pieces for friends. The idea: something you'd pass down to your grandson, built to outlast the big brands that charge a fortune and line the inside with fabric. When travel came back and I returned to the malls, I set it down — it's the one I'll pick up again someday, purely for love of the craft.
My final chapter at JLL was as a commercial real-estate broker — I helped FEMSA, the company behind OXXO, bring stores into the U.S. market. Then, at 40, I left JLL to go all in on my own. SECA Carnivore Chips still ships — and the newest thing: a new SECA now produced in the United States at a USDA-inspected plant. And I'm building two software companies, turning everything I learned into tools. FamiliaLista — the encrypted digital manual, in Spanish, that organizes everything that matters (accounts, insurance, wishes, contacts) and hands it to your family the day you can't tell them yourself. A will says who inherits; FamiliaLista tells your family what to do. And SedeIA — the home base for AI in Spanish: quote, invoice and get paid in seconds, with seven tools for your business and the Sede IA Institute with courses and certification. Reset With Frank is the thread that ties it all together — the same story, the same face behind everything.
My younger brother Marcelo disappeared on a trip to Acapulco. I identified his body and brought him home. My father died during COVID. My second film collapsed with a market crash. I don't tell these stories because they're sad. I tell them because they're the reason I can teach Mentalízalo without flinching. The system holds even when you're burying people.
My wife is a dentist, from Mexico. I asked her out the week I was leaving Eagle Pass on a motorcycle. We married three months later. Three young kids. I build this business so we can travel and educate them at home through experience.
Everything I teach comes out of this family. Everything I've built is the system they installed in me.
If you read this whole page, the next move is to download the free 2AM guide. It's the one question my father taught me to ask myself when I'm stuck.