Breaking News: Donald Driver Happily Reveals the Secret Behind His Career Achievements….
Donald Driver is a breadman. The Super Bowl champion, who is also the all-time leader in receptions and receiving yards for the Green Bay Packers, enjoys a perfectly baked loaf, and it was the bread encircling a turkey sandwich from Cousins Subs that piqued his interest the most.
Donald Driver stated that he does not merely want to “purchase a bunch of franchises,” but rather wants to have a greater impact on the brand.
“It was the most wonderful sandwich I’ve ever had. I’m like, ‘How is the bread so fresh after I’ve done a three-hour appearance?'” Driver recalls a sandwich he ate more than 20 years ago as a young wide receiver attempting to establish a name for himself in Wisconsin.
“I don’t want to disparage any other brands out there, but we’ve all eaten sub sandwiches from other places, and sometimes you put it in a toaster and it comes out hard, and you think with the first taste it’s the greatest sandwich in the world,” he says. “And then the bread becomes too crunchy for you.”
Driver, who now co-owns six locations (including two in Green Bay) in northeast Wisconsin’s Fox Valley area with Cousins Subs corporate, can eat his share of sandwiches—as well as the cheese curds, french fries, and milkshakes that he claims distinguish the brand in the sub category.
The agreement with Driver, who is a living legend among Packers fans and is best known outside of sports circles for winning season 14 of ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars,” is a first for Wisconsin-based Cousins. It comes as the corporation ramps up its franchise sales operations and prepares to expand beyond its main area.
Home team advantage
Flashing his magnetic smile, the trim, 6-foot-tall Driver settles into the booth at a Cousins Subs in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, talking about his golf round from the day before. “I tell people all the time, it sounds good,” he jokes of his swing. “I don’t know where the ball goes, but it sounds good, right?”
Driver spent the day before our early July interview hosting the third annual Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame Celebrity Golf Outing at Black Wolf Run in nearby Kohler.
A 2016 inductee, Driver is president of the organization and his involvement is one of the reasons he travels to Wisconsin from his home in Flower Mound, Texas, at least two or three times a month. The Donald Driver Foundation, created by Driver and his wife, Betina, is based in Milwaukee, as is Team Lammi, the sports marketing agency where he’s a partner. Last year he bought former Milwaukee Bucks forward Jabari Parker’s nearly 7,000-square-foot loft in the city’s Brewer’s Hill area.
“I spent 23 years of my life in Wisconsin. Maybe I’m more ‘Wisconsin’ than I am ‘Texas,’” says Driver, who played all of his 14 seasons in Green Bay. “This became a second home. But I think for me, it’s just the community has truly embraced me. I didn’t think that would’ve happened when I first came here. But they took me with open arms.”
Selected with the Packers’ last pick in the last round of the 1999 NFL draft, Driver didn’t crack the starting lineup until 2002. That season, he caught a team-high 70 passes for 1,064 yards and made his first Pro Bowl appearance. Driver became a fan favorite, fearlessly running slants across the middle and honing his “Lambeau Leap” into the stands with style and charisma he later brought to the ballroom dance floor. His public retirement party in 2013 at Lambeau Field was a first for the Packers and demonstrative of the mutual adoration between No. 80 and the fans.
“I think for me, that’s why I was able to retire as a Packer and not play for another organization because I realized that I could still play, but I promised something to the fans that I would never wear another color but the green and gold,” he says. “The Packer fans have been family forever. And so to walk away when I feel like I was still in my prime, it’s because I wanted to make sure that the fans knew that they came first. It wasn’t about my career.”
That feels-like-family relationship is critical in the 48-year-old’s commercial transactions as he seeks to establish an identity and leave a legacy beyond sports. Creating generational wealth is also a motive, but it is not widely discussed, he argues. “As African Americans, everything just kind of goes by the wayside,” says Driver, who has spoken openly about his early experiences living out of U-Haul trucks, stealing automobiles, and even selling narcotics.
“And so, as a youngster growing up in Houston’s inner city, being homeless, you understand that such topics were never discussed. How can we persuade others to realize that they are highly accomplished, like-minded, and smart, but we never get to sit at the table?
And so I’ve always thought that if I could sit at the table, the opportunities would expand.” According to Driver, the joint venture arrangement with Cousins Subs was a logical fit because it allowed him to become a store owner with a business he has respected for years and that shares his deep devotion to family and community.
Cousins Subs was founded in 1972 by Bill Specht and his cousin, the late Jim Sheppard. It is still family-owned. Christine Specht, Bill’s daughter, was chosen president in 2008 and CEO in 2015, after her father retired.
“I looked at Cousins from a distance and saw what Bill had done for their family. “He’s always talked about generational wealth and how the business is family held,” says Driver, who laughs as he recalls calling the company shortly after landing in Green Bay and never hearing back.
It was providential that he met Christine Specht during the Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame golf event in 2021. “I said that I don’t want to be a franchisee. I just don’t want to own a lot of franchises.
I want to be a partner of your family so that I know that this can spread across my family,” adds Driver, noting that he envisions his three children owning a stake one day.
It took more than a year to reach a deal that required Driver to spend financially to become a part owner in those six businesses, with the alliance announced in November 2022. Driver also has an athlete endorsement agreement with Cousins that allows him to market the brand and requires the firm to give $150,000 per year for three years to sponsorship opportunities with charity groups. According to the agreement, Cousins will provide 50% of the initial franchise fee collected from any franchisee that Driver directly recommends to the company through philanthropic sponsorship.
Specht, as she gets into the booth next to Driver and the two begin riffing, refers to him as a part of the family and claims they hit it off immediately. Both agreed from the start that they sought a cooperation that went beyond a marketing ploy.
“We agree that he isn’t our brand identity. “He’s our brand ambassador, and he compliments the brand, but he doesn’t replace it,” Specht adds.
Cousins has maintained a “believe in better” purpose since its founding, extending beyond the quality of its meals to the communities in which it works, according to Specht. Noting Driver’s “magnanimous demeanor,” she says there’s alignment between his ambitions and Cousins’—this year, they created the Driven at Heart Scholarship Contest, for example—while also appealing to the brand’s core market of younger, male sports fans.
“After these years of his fame in Wisconsin as a Green Bay Packer, as just one of the elite, he still has such a draw for people,” says Specht. Beyond the connection to the Packers, she continues, Driver’s entrepreneurism and yes, his success on “Dancing with the Stars” endeared him to an entirely new fanbase.
“I love that about him because he could have easily claimed, ‘I’ve had a wonderful football career. I’m good. And simply retire and unwind. But he hasn’t done this. “I think from there, he’s opened himself up to a whole other group of people,” she says. “He’s expanded his entrepreneurial ventures, and he has such a spirit and drive, no pun meant, but I think it’s commendable. And his energy is incorporated into our brand, and it never gets old.”
That energy is having a tangible impact—aside from the throngs of ecstatic customers lining up at Cousins stores for signatures and embraces. (By the end of our interview and photo shoot, it is evident that Driver hugs everyone.) Sales at the Fox Valley locations are up 14% over last year, outperforming the rest of the system by 8%, according to Specht.
Driver has made many shop appearances, and Vice President of Marketing Justin McCoy is brainstorming new ways to leverage that star power—and capitalize on a last name that’s ideal for a brand looking to expand its off-premises business.
“There’s opportunities for him to be the face of some delivery-based promotions,” says McCoy, and in February the company shot a 30-second advertising spot, with Driver as the delivery driver bringing subs to hungry customers. Cousins also ran 80-cent delivery promotions—a nod to Driver’s jersey number—during the NFL playoffs and NCAA March Madness.
At the national level, McCoy says Cousins will look to utilize Driver in its franchise development efforts as it prepares to relaunch growth outside its home state. That’s an undertaking Specht & Co. don’t take lightly as Cousins evolves for the next generation.
Tackling a rebuild Cousins Subs, based north of Milwaukee in Menomonee Falls, has 92 outlets, with all but four in Wisconsin. Ten years ago, there were approximately 140 outlets, but when Specht and her leadership team evaluated the system, they discovered that, while product quality was great, the restaurant experience was stale, inconsistent, and in need of reinvention.
“We needed a second foundation constructed, therefore that was my driving objective, to develop a second foundation for the brand because I saw it as so potential,” says Specht. “We basically wanted to make some changes, so we made significant investments.”
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