ANNE: My vision for the future is, number one, to stay in business.

We want Auntie Anne's to be here long after we're gone. And it's easy to start a business, but I think it's harder to keep a business thriving and successful, because you have to make so many changes along the way, to keep it fresh and vibrant.

What I decided to do was select carefully team leadership and allow them to actually run and they need to do their jobs in their departments.

I want to give you a bite of this one. This is the way you eat an Auntie Anne's Pretzel.

I'm still a part of the decision-making process at Auntie Anne's, but I'm not operationally involved in each department like I was 10 years ago. I mean, you can't be. But what's tempting, for you as the founder, is to say, 'I don't like what you did,' you know, so I want to get involved.

HATTIE: Get in there and muddle it up.

ANNE: That's right. I can't do that anymore. So we're putting together a team and we have a great team in place to carry Auntie Anne's to the next level.

SAM BEILER: When I began in 1989, it just looked like an opportunity that my wife and I were pretty excited about.

HATTIE: Sam Beiler became president of Auntie Anne's in 2000.

SAM: You know, at that point, it was in the very early stages, and I was really focused on entrepreneurial efforts, and there was a lot of room. The systems weren't established yet, and there was a lot of room for that creative energy.

ANNE: So he's been in every phase of the business all along the way, and so we chose him because we trust him, which is critical. If you don't trust, your foundation is going to crumble.

SAM: I think that the strongest link between Anne and I is trust, and some of that comes about because my focus for years has been to learn what's important to Anne and Jonas and then live that. I have tremendous freedom within the job to do what needs to be done for the business, but it's all built on a foundation that recognizes what Anne and Jonas have brought to the company as the founders and to keep applying that and to keep trying to train that and use influence to lead others to follow in that same way. So a lot of it's based on trust. That's what it comes back to. Now with Anne and her focus on the mission and vision, the purpose, the philosophy of the company, it takes away the short-term decision-making pressure that so many public companies are under. Her focus is on people, on creating opportunities for people, and in the meantime, we're running a very profitable company.

ANNE: It's a hard place to get to. I mean, really, because I'm hands-on. I mean, sitting here talking to me, you can't see that, but that's the way I grew up. I mean, you do it yourself. If it's going to get done, you're going to have to do it. So my mind-shift has been major in the way I think today about getting the job done vs. 15 years ago when I was completely hands-on.