Allan Young

Striving for a Disruptive Life

Allan Young is Founder and CEO of Art of Drawers Franchise, the premier brand of custom kitchen organizing solutions in the United States. Allan is also actively involved in several other companies he founded including FranBridge Capital, Shelf Solver Technologies, and Onarail Logistics.

At the age of five, Allan founded what he called, “Work Club,” in his neighborhood, doing dirty jobs with the kids on his street like weeding yards or cleaning garages. With that first experience at a young age, Allan proved to be a true serial entrepreneur, founding 14 companies before starting high school. “Each one failed at some point for a variety of reasons,” he remembers, “and I learned painful but critical lessons from each.”

After graduating from college and serving as a Commander the Army, Allan’s ambition turned back to business. He created, acquired, sold, and ran business after business. He founded and sold several companies in the technologies and home services spaces. After selling his business and returning from a deployment in the Middle East as an Army Reserve Officer, Allan founded ShelfGenie Franchise Systems in the Fall of 2008 at the beginning of the Great Recession. The idea was based on failures he had seen in other franchises; there is an upfront investment for franchise owners with some initial training, then they are left in the wind to run all aspects of their business. Allan’s franchise model handled customer support with a world-class call center, media buying, marketing, ordering management, and manufacturing—allowing franchise owners to focus on growing their business instead of working in it. Despite the recession, the business thrived, becoming an Entrepreneur 500 company in 2009 and an Inc. 500 company in 2010. During his tenure as CEO over the next 8 years, Allan founded Noble Brands which included the ShelfGenie franchise, Outback GutterVac franchise, G-O Logistics, and 10XFive Marketing Agency and sold ShelfGenie to Neighborly in 2020.

To date, Allan’s companies have created over $500 million in sales. “A great scoreboard of success that was built on countless failures,” Allan notes.

Allan is a member of the Young Presidents Organization, the world’s premier peer network of CEOs. He currently serves on the SEC Regional Board. When he’s not building companies, you’ll find him voraciously reading, backpacking, freediving, skydiving, and any adventures that put him out of his comfort zone.