Austin Cohen & Justin Turetsky - FlexIt & Evolving from "F Word" to Health

[00:00:02] Hey everybody, welcome to the Future of Fitness, a top-rated fitness industry podcast for over four years and running. I am your host, Eric Malzone, and I have the absolute pleasure of talking to entrepreneurs, executives, thought leaders, and cutting edge technology experts within the extremely

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[00:00:35] experts, five different opinions, and tons of valuable insights for free at FutureofFitness.co. Thanks for listening and on to the show. Hey friends, it's Eric Malzone and I'm here to talk to you about the podcast collective.

[00:00:55] We've been heads down the past year, doing the work, building the network, and delivering for our clients. So what is the podcast collective exactly? In our core, we are a highly effective and efficient business development tool. Allow Sam Miller, CEO and founder of Proteus Motion to explain.

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[00:02:05] network of content creators that we are for you too. Go to podcast collective.io to learn more. That is podcast collective.io. Now on to the show. We're live. Austin, Justin, it's a pleasure to see you guys again.

[00:02:24] I'm excited to be recording some solid podcast content with you guys. It's good to see you. It's good to see you too. It's been a minute since we saw you last at Ursa. Yeah, but like two years ago. Right.

[00:02:35] I mean, that was you guys had your dinner or do we see your memory? Your memory fails you. You had a, uh, you had a Bluestone Wayne event this year. Oh, that's right. That's right. Yes. Yes. Is that the moxie? That was at the moxie. Yeah, man.

[00:02:49] It was, uh, you're right. My memory has failed. It's already been like this year with events and travel and that fast pace. I feel like, you know, as we were talking to peer recording industry starting to recover quite a bit. There's a lot of activities.

[00:03:02] It's just been, uh, it's been a whirlwind of a year, man. It's been great though. Yeah. What's, uh, what's the good news is we still got three, three fourths, two thirds of it left was that event good for you guys? Like what, what was the intention behind it?

[00:03:13] Uh, were we hoping to get out of it? Do you think you'll do it again next year? Yeah. I thought it was really good. You know, as, as my entire, uh, Ursa 2024 goal was, you know, I was

[00:03:23] there to work with EGM and get some content recorded for them. And that was a success for sure. And then also start to pull together, you know, what we're looking to do at the podcast collective, which is really more than just, you

[00:03:32] know, PR and media work and kind of a modern spin, but have, you know, start to pass value onto the content creators through community, you know, uh, shared resources and revenue. So part one was pulling people together and, you know, right out of the gate,

[00:03:47] you know, I met with Lisa Keeker and Matt Genusek who I know you've, you've had on the podcast recently. So we're going to be doing some stuff together, you know, collaborating on some content while we're in New York in September where

[00:03:56] I get to see you guys again, which would be awesome. So it's, I thought it was successful just to bring people together. And, uh, that's to me having, as you guys know, you probably interviewed enough, like bringing podcasters together and talking about the

[00:04:10] medium and what's going on in the industry is just a really cool thing. And you don't really have any specific goals besides just doing that. And so far, so good. So yeah, I'm curious about your guys, uh, experience or Ursa this year.

[00:04:23] I mean, you guys, what were the goals for you? What did you expect? What came out of it? What was, uh, what's your recap? Yeah. I think our recap in our relationship to the trade shows really evolved.

[00:04:35] There was a period of time where we were selling into the industry. It was an opportunity for us to see business partners because we were really focused on building not focused on, but a growing area of business was building white label platforms and virtual personal training for Jim

[00:04:52] chains and other players involved in the space. Also was a great channel for developing partnerships. And we used to sponsor, uh, we, we had a really splashy, uh, involvement just a couple of years before where we had one kind of large central booth

[00:05:08] that had a full living room set up with screens and, you know, people were taking sessions live at Ursa to see what the experience was like. Awesome for brand building. We had Jason Terry, uh, NBA champion who was a Dallas champ and favorite lives in Dallas.

[00:05:26] Uh, he came through and we had people doing a mean green and siding stuff. So he took on a role as a head of athletic performance with us. So we announced that there as well. So it used to be that we were really, really involved in sponsoring.

[00:05:39] And it wasn't anything particular that changed about, about Ursa is really that, that, that where we positioned ourselves in the industry. And I know we're going to talk about this a little bit more later, but really more see ourselves as broader health.

[00:05:52] And we've shifted from virtual personal training as kind of a gym, digital software and, uh, you know, business that's similar to our personal training as they're in gyms. And we switched more to interconnected health, uh, which is providing

[00:06:05] these lab two experiences that we see parallel to the innovations that have happened in telehealth and tele therapy. And we see ourselves feeling more into, you know, towel wellness and interconnected health as we call it, where we're providing services and aren't just personal training.

[00:06:23] Uh, where we just say, this is personal training. You can get it online or through your phone or through your TV or really shifting around, you know, we're a solution provider for the customer that not only has his live two way sessions with your

[00:06:36] personal trainer, nutritionist, yogi, health coach, or in the light, but, but also we have tools around supporting the client, whether tracking tips, reminders and check-ins from an ad powered buddy that accompanies you in your journey. And just other tools that are a part of the flex experience to

[00:06:53] really create a broader health experience and more accountability for the client outside of their, outside of their sessions. So what we did at Ursa this year, we walked the floor, we saw friends. Uh, we saw business relationships. We had a great time seeing what was out there.

[00:07:09] It felt like this year, Ursa, it didn't feel like it was very different from our previous year. I didn't see anything crazy or new or anything that really changed how I looked at some of the industry players. It was kind of more of the same.

[00:07:21] Uh, there's a couple interesting things that popped up. The Navy felt a little out of place. I saw that there was like a cold plunge you could do with your clothes on by like sitting in a plastic bag. That was something that I've never seen that before.

[00:07:33] There's a couple of things like that. Saw a lot of stuff and so this other players, these wellness players kind of starting to enter the space. So that was one of my takeaways from Ursa. Um, I felt that it was busy this year.

[00:07:45] Uh, the middle of the floor was the same kind of companies that we always see and not have to list the names, but you know, the big equipment companies, uh, they were had all their equipment as usual, showing some new awesome connected equipment. That was great.

[00:07:59] We saw digital health and wellness really have less of a presence. You know, we previously seen the likes of companies like Clymer or Hydro or Speed or who else have we seen in previous shows that didn't have necessarily as much or

[00:08:11] flexed, for example, not having as big of a booth. So I think the connected fitness industry has positions self less than the Ursa realm and more focused on, you know, other things. So we've seen that, that change slightly. Other than that, I thought it was a great show.

[00:08:28] I think after you, you're in, you've been in this industry more than a decade, but after you go to enough, enough conference shows and events that the meeting new people, like you have a lot of really good people that you just see them.

[00:08:41] So it kind of becomes like all your friends are in the same city and all your business associates are in the same city for a few days. And, you know, we haven't really met as many new people as we have in the earlier years because we

[00:08:54] feel like now we look around the crowd, we see a familiar face and then talk to them for 20 minutes and then before, you know, if the show's over, that pretty much happens all the time. And then trying to meet people ahead of time. Hey, let's meet at Ursa.

[00:09:06] You meet at Ursa, you do a 15 minute stop and chat meeting. And like I said, just the time flies by. You know, also people are juggling best people who run their own businesses. They're juggling all kinds of stuff and trying to

[00:09:17] keep the, you know, things moving at the home front as well. So, you know, especially for the folks who are not managing their displays and have like a really strong presence, like there's a lot of things that are pulling you in different directions.

[00:09:29] So that was good of ours experience. Yeah. Yeah. Well said. Any, any other take away for you, Austin? I think if you look back at pre-pandemic Ursa and now we're not called Ursa anymore. I guess this is the first show, not Ursa anymore. Traditional fitness industry clubs and

[00:09:48] equipment manufacturers who made made up the show. And I think what's interesting and awesome now is that that's not the show. The show includes tech players, service providers, boutique fitness, connected fitness. It's so much more. And I think that's testament to a growing industry

[00:10:10] and industry with more players, more optionality in industry. It's more interesting. It's barely scratched the surface of, of where it's headed regardless of what anyone says about Peloton. So I've seen year after year, the like the shift that I think that's a really positive one.

[00:10:30] So I'm excited to keep seeing how that evolves in the next couple of years here. I mean, curious what you think about that? Because you sit in a bunch of different seats when you attend an Ursa. You know, you might have been there for region

[00:10:41] but you know, or the collective vote. You're, you're, you work with other brands. You do a lot of different stuff. So, you know, all those hats considered like, how do you think about that shift from a 2018, 2019 to now? Yeah. Well, you know, in transparency,

[00:10:55] I didn't really go to Ursa until like right when they opened after the pandemic. So it's not been an event that I've gone to a whole lot, you know, prior to, you know, when I owned GMs and I was an operator, I went, a lot of the stuff

[00:11:05] I went to was like coaching conferences or things appropriate to small, you know, SMBs and things like that, you know, those particular events. So as a greater industry, I really started to dive into it like three or four years ago.

[00:11:16] And that's still, you know, I still have some perspectives on it that I think we are healthier than we were four years ago as an industry. I think it's more exciting actually than any time in my last 16, 17 years that I've been in the

[00:11:27] industry, I think, and we'll touch on this quite a bit in this conversation, but the transition from fitness into wellness and kind of as we merge into that category as a whole and what we're seeing at Ursa, like you guys talked

[00:11:38] about like the recovery modalities and, you know, still the major equipment manufacturers, but, you know, just kind of stuff that's a little bit more on the fringe, right? Mass participation events, things like that, I think are really cool evolutions in the industry. I just think it's really exciting.

[00:11:53] And, you know, same as you said, Justin, like you walk around these events and I tried to spend a certain amount of trade for it, but, you know, you end up walking around. You got to meet somewhere next to you,

[00:12:02] you know, you see somebody you're like a half hour, continually a half hour late for everything you're trying to do and sometimes you just miss people and it's just part of it. But one thing I learned after, you know, doing these a few times is that I always

[00:12:12] saved the last afternoon that I'm there for all the recovery stuff because I'm generally my knees and my feet are so tired from walking and standing and doing meetings that I'll go do like the cold plunge stuff and I'll go do the massage chairs, right?

[00:12:25] Like might as well use it while it's there. And yeah, so it's always a really good event. And you know, kind of set the table here too for the rest of this conversation, you guys, is like you guys are in the middle of doing what you talked about.

[00:12:37] I really like the term Justin of interconnected health, right? And I think, you know, fitness is now coming, this is just one man's opinion, but fitness is now a component of health, wellness, longevity as a category, right? It's like one of the,

[00:12:52] what's one of the legs that the chair stands on for one's overall wellness. And you guys are making a strong move by really just going all in on that. And I know, you know, from conversations with people I have in the industry

[00:13:05] that a lot of people are looking towards that. People are going from personal training into health coaching or wellness coaching or, you know, developing their own law. Obviously there's a lot of talk about longevity now. And you know, is that Equinox has their $40,000 you know, program for longevity.

[00:13:21] So it's like we're, but still, I was talking to somebody, Dr. Jeremy Koenig this morning, like the only thing that's really proven in longevity is exercise and maybe creatine, right? Like everything else is still kind of modern, you know, pseudo science that we haven't really proven yet.

[00:13:36] So exercise, fitness, nutrition is still the key to everything, but everything else around it is pretty exciting. Anyway, so here's my question. Like as you guys go from, you know, just flex it as the, you know, remote training, remote personal training where you guys look and democratize

[00:13:54] and make fitness more accessible into what you guys are doing, which is interconnected health. You're adding a lot more layers. You're adding a more complete offering, right? But besides just like changing the website, there's gotta be a lot behind it from a practical standpoint

[00:14:09] that you guys are experiencing that I'm wondering like, how, what can people learn from your experience so far if they wanna start moving that direction? What things did you not know were coming? What things did you plan for?

[00:14:22] Yeah, let us, let us on the inside a little bit. Cool. In that transition, I think there's a couple of things that they come to mind that were lessons. And I think that try to speak more broad terms, but I'll give specific examples.

[00:14:36] I think one of them is when you change what you're calling something, you are messing up sometimes years of SEO and other digital footprint that you've made around term. People still call this VPT. We came up with that. I mean, we love the term VPT, virtual personal training.

[00:14:55] It's easy to Google, it's easy to remember that unique virtual personal training is all over our website. So when we started moving transition to more broad interconnected health, we started to see page ranking issues, SEO, other things because we created a term that people knew us by

[00:15:11] so made it a little harder. So that was kind of one of the, I guess more technical and marketing things that can come up when you do a rebrand. We didn't do a rebrand, but I mean, we just shifted where we were calling our service

[00:15:22] and we thought it made more sense because calling a virtual personal training and then we're offering you a health coach, accession or stretching or recovery or yoga, it's not personal training. And it's confusing too because yogis are not personal trainers. There's certified yoga professionals into 200 hour certifications.

[00:15:38] It's not the same thing as getting an ASSA or NASM cert. It's a different profession, right? It's just, it's hard for people to really understand. So we don't want to miss in that shift. I think the other thing is that the consumption habits

[00:15:53] of certain services are not the same as what our virtual personal training or VPT product is. So one of them is that nutrition, it's not a three time a week thing. So we see that it does really well as an add-on to an existing program

[00:16:07] where someone's doing two or three workouts a week and then they're doing one, two or three or maybe even four a month with a nutritionist or registered dietitian. So we found that that is a good add-on but it didn't make sense as like a standalone program

[00:16:20] because most people, they don't consume it the same way. We also see that and we were hopeful that customers would come in and they'd want to sign up for a non-fitness training kind of movement session as their first thing. But we've seen that typically that has been something

[00:16:35] that has been added on to programs more than people are leading with that. We learned that through doing landing pages and doing promotions around certain words like virtual yoga, we're founding that flex as customers and community we're interested in adding yoga on

[00:16:53] to their personal training or fitness style training and adding yoga more than we found people that were coming in just buying yoga and then adding fitness or personal training. So that was interesting learning is that the consumption trends up and down are all very different health coaching

[00:17:12] that we're still studying their retention on that that's a complete different service. And just because we include that in our offering doesn't mean that again, that the digital footprint of what we're known for people still kind of look at us and think oh, flex it fitness.

[00:17:26] And that's just what we're known for and we built a brand around and our previous product was a gym access product. So uncoupling ourselves without doing a full logo rebrand is something else that I think was an interesting challenge that we're still sorting through

[00:17:39] as we continue to build out offering but we're really proud that we've expanded to over 20 modalities and then you can even say 30 actually depending on how you cut it up. And if someone wants to come in and really learn anything whether it's in wellness, sports, stretching

[00:17:55] and we have specialties down to pre, post, natal, senior fitness, you can come in and just get straight TRX lessons. Boxing, I mean, we don't offer sports like it's coaching but we offer the fitness around that and we have some awesome coaches

[00:18:10] that have specialties in a lot of different things and we're proud that we can personally come in we do a consultation with them and give them something really unique. And the exercise of moving from fitness to interconnected health, which is most simply put

[00:18:25] it's linking modalities to live a healthier, better life started really with one simple phrase which is that we do not use the F word here at the company. Eric I want to put you on the spot here. Yeah. What do you think the F word is? Fitness.

[00:18:43] We don't use the word fitness here at the company and this probably started back in Q1 of 20 but we undertook the effort to move away from fitness and virtual personal training to focusing on cross-functionality, cross modality integrating disparate experiences across the health spectrum.

[00:19:02] Everybody talks about our holistic health, whole health, longevity. There's all these buzzwords, wellness is a buzzword so people talk about the difference between health and wellness but at its core, not using the F word really means for us is we want to help people

[00:19:18] because everybody literally every body. I love it. We've said that before. I'm like it's high banded back for everybody. That's easier rapper back in college. Oh yeah, I know I started that today. They'll get out of it. Everybody's gonna do that. It's gonna work for them

[00:19:33] and the recipe pun intended is going to be different from for them. And so setting our talent, our trainers, our health coaches up to communicate between one another retooling our tech, the entirety of our ecosystem to not only have the different modalities

[00:19:50] but to integrate them in the sales process in the experience of working with multiple professionals when we sell our 12 session a month plan which is our leader which is three times a week you can use three on training one week

[00:20:04] two on training the next week with one on nutrition you can allocate those it's interchangeable the currency is interchangeable for working with a health coach or physical therapist or any other permutation we have again up to 30 modalities. So it all really started with the simple premise

[00:20:19] of we don't want to use the F word here at the company and that all started back at the beginning of 22 but make no mistake about it like fitness training is still one of our core four tenants so it's fitness training, health and nutrition coaching

[00:20:33] physical and occupational therapy and then low impact wellness. Why? Don't use the F word Eric and the remainder of this episode don't use the F word. It's hard because the title of my podcast is the future of fitness which makes me think I need a rebrand now guys

[00:20:46] like now you made me paranoid but we're taking on agency work and that's the goal. That's send me a puzzle. What was the impetus for that? Like was there a moment where you guys you guys just saw that or like, you know what?

[00:21:00] Like maybe we should start to move away from it was it like a sudden aha moment market research, a conversation you had. I mean, you guys have the podcast of course probably numerous conversations with people like what was the key turning point? Three syllables, paletton

[00:21:20] if you follow, yeah the P word so Paletton's an amazing company one that we admire that's impacted millions of people achieved an amazing scale with an amazing product and amazing brand and the public markets have been incredibly cruel to Paletton because they got pumped

[00:21:37] I mean, though they also made business decision and management made mistakes and I'm sure there's things that they many folks wish they did differently but all of that aside they built something incredible and they've impacted a lot of lives and scaled a home bike class

[00:21:51] into something much bigger and much cooler so all that said just how it's impacted players in the industry that if you're either a direct competitor or a company that's related to Paletton even peripherally that you have been impacted by the term at home fitness or connected fitness

[00:22:16] and that is a term that investors market in some cases even consumers are shying away from so the F word being fitness fitness used to be a very hot word I'm a fitness investor I'm looking for new fitness concepts I'm expanding my fitness chain

[00:22:35] or boutique studio or whatever and it started to be the exact opposite where you hear fitness and people who like they get, oh they shudder because investors, a lot of investors just many of whom go to all the trade shows and events that are health and wellness investors

[00:22:51] and really know our consumer space some of them had a lot of tough ups and downs and I think they wanna look at concepts that are different than those and I think it kind of the Pelton story tainted the fitness category because people saw this

[00:23:10] rather than the amazing rise in the story of where that even when they dropped down a lot and their valuation in their market cap they still were somewhere pretty amazing as far as scale for the type of product they are

[00:23:23] that was so far beyond anybody else in the space but the story of the down is the story that people focused on and at the time, I mean now it's actually much worse but there's a time when like people would say, oh Pelton

[00:23:35] they dropped from 50 billion to eight or I was like well there's still $8 billion it's a huge business now it's much slower and I think then they've had a couple of recent headlines that have really complicated everything but I think the Pelton story is impacted how consumers and investors

[00:23:53] and the media has looked at our space but it's here to stay fitness equipment has been in the home for a very long time gyms have been around a very long time moving heavy weights it's just a few minutes it gets and it's just gonna continue to evolve

[00:24:07] and change of how we're thinking about it how connected it is a lot of things can, how it connects to nutrition how it connects to your recovery and other kind of experiences that you might have so in really answering very straightforward

[00:24:21] I mean that's the story of how we started think about fitness it also when we had a lot of conversations with investors and other people in the market and partnerships that a lot of people were just very turned off by the word fitness

[00:24:38] as if that was the thing that's a COVID thing that was back then and I think that since the whole industry has matured since but at that time that's where we were that we really wanted to not have that word define us we wanted our story

[00:24:56] and our experience and innovation around we created a new experience and we wanted to focus on that not just being another growth fitness company Yeah, it's interesting I mean I look at the I think the fitness industry just needed a rebrand

[00:25:11] really, you know when you come down to it I've been in long enough and I was part of the problem and I think pretty sure I'm right that when a lot of consumers thought think of fitness at least in you know up into a couple of years ago

[00:25:25] they think of one two things right and I was part of the problem around weight loss challenges and six weeks I did all these things that probably contribute to the problem right they think of either fitness comes to mind they think fat loss

[00:25:36] or they think of some meat head in a gym right and that you know alone I think in the most consumers minds just needed to change because it's so much more than that and now we're starting to really tell like the benefits of just movement

[00:25:49] and you know as a category and you know I hate this term but holistic right I call that the H word like there's just so much like that comes to it that fitness maybe just pigeonholed itself as an industry into this fat loss weight loss category

[00:26:04] and then this unattractive thing that people found intimidating and I think now we're finding a better way I think it's kind of like the collective consciousness of the industry where we all kind of agree you know quietly that like hey we need to call this something different

[00:26:17] but that's just my two cents I'm curious what you guys think about that as well. I have a question on that so you bring up weight loss what's your opinion on the GLPs and how different companies are starting to get into the space

[00:26:31] and what they're doing with it and then that turning into longevity and other permutations yeah have you talked about that on any episodes recently? Edna and Ozzie yeah like exhaustively I've talked about this and one of my colleagues and clients is writing Eric Dorocs writing a

[00:26:48] it's about 120 page course certification playbook whatever you want to call it's a how to incorporate GLP one from a training perspective nutrition really like how you work with the clinicians how you incorporate into your gym facilities and how you do it so I mean my overall

[00:27:03] we could probably talk about this for a long time is that I think is a amazing opportunity I'm conflicted on it because I hate to see pharma get another foothold in any other category especially something this big but I think overall I think it's very promising

[00:27:18] it's a great opportunity if we approach it correctly but there are some downsides there's trade offs to everything so powerful it works but obviously the side effects of being like decreased muscle mass well everything that really the F word industry does well strength training proper nutrition movement

[00:27:40] mental health like all that stuff is gonna come is gonna be needed to do this successfully adjacent to GLP one administration so I think we're set up really well as an industry to compliment it I don't think when you throw a magic pill

[00:27:54] into a population like the U.S. or North America people are gonna take it and we can be there to help mitigate the downsides of it so I think it's very promising I just think it has to be done well

[00:28:07] yeah so I'm in favor of it at this point but I could change my mind next week so we'll see but what about you guys? What's like that, you know, that's a trend what are the other top trends right like trends that you're really bullish on right now?

[00:28:22] Well I think what you guys are doing I think transitioning overall from the F word into health and wellness whatever you wanna call it I think you just get longevity I think it's a better approach to the market because generally like I said

[00:28:36] people think about fitness as more of a short term thing like I'm gonna get in I'm gonna get ready for my wedding I'm gonna get ready for that, you know my beach trip but I'm just gonna lose some weight or they're temporarily motivated

[00:28:48] now when you talk about health and longevity that's a lifetime journey like that never ends like you start tying it into mental wellness and like how it makes you feel and how it improves your relationships and your communities and all that that's something that you start to incorporate

[00:29:02] into people's lives for all of their life really until hopefully the last days and so I'm really bullish on that you know, we could talk about AI and how that's gonna disrupt but I just really don't know yet

[00:29:14] I know some very smart people who know a lot about it I think a lot of people talk about it like myself and they don't really know anything about it so you can speculate on that but yeah I think those are the big ones

[00:29:24] you know I love the recovery aspect I love like I love the sauna I love the cold plunge I love all those things right I'm just waiting to find out maybe it's gonna take a year or two where if these standalone boutiques and studios offerings can stand

[00:29:39] that just offer that those wellness services can actually compete long term right like I feel like people are people gonna pay both or they're gonna do health club membership flexit membership right and pay you know $150 a month to go do a sauna and cold plunge

[00:29:56] or they might just find you on the second day of birth so you adjust and hanging out hanging out in the cold plunge foot traffic and all the time what do you think happens to some of those single modality recovery boxes you have it for saunas

[00:30:11] you have it for contrast therapy I mean you name it now there's so many I think there's only really one that's but some scale of a couple hundred units to what they're doing how do you how do you think about that category going forward yeah

[00:30:26] and that's kind of what I was alluding to I think it has to be a very very unique experience I mean I like you know like what you guys have a bunch of them in New York right you got remedy place you got to

[00:30:36] I think other ship is opening there soon like I think these are very unique experiences that people will pay not necessarily you know it will pay a premium price for not necessarily luxury price you know maybe they will pay luxury too but I think those are really cool

[00:30:51] but I think ultimately like most of these boutique style or the small studios would just start to get absorbed into a health club model because why would I pay you know I pay for a health club I pay for a gym

[00:31:03] I'm not about to pay for another one and I'm a probably an ideal consumer like I love all this stuff but I'm not going to do pay both for that long so I mean just from a general point of view that's my opinion

[00:31:14] but I could be proven wrong you know it could be could be the next big thing where do you think people draw the lines on how many memberships they're going to have you got those services now that comb through recurring subscriptions to help you remove the ones

[00:31:28] that you're not using sports teams are no longer calling anecdotally some of their season ticket packages season tickets they're calling the memberships right where people going to draw the line you know you might have your your private members club that you go to socialize at

[00:31:45] you might have your gym membership you might have a membership to recovery box like you just described but the lines start to get worrying like how do you think that shifts and evolves yeah I mean this is all anecdotal but I think it two or three so

[00:32:03] I think that's like the number that most people who are you know already wellness fitness consumers right which is 17% of the population here in North America but I think two or three I mean I look at mine and I actually had to do an overhaul pretty soon

[00:32:17] because it's getting out of control Austin like I got you know got my gym membership I just went to test out one of these wellness studios that opened up here so the sauna cold plunge combo I had my tonal membership like I am my pliability membership

[00:32:31] for my mobility like I just got too much shit right and eventually I'm just going to have to you know pair it down so I think most people are kind of tired I think there's just a general fatigue in the consumer marketplace with all these memberships

[00:32:44] I think they're just going to start pairing down and I think that's where the health clubs come in like they can offer it like ours here the shout out to the Whitefish wave I give them so many props they're building out a hot yoga studio that's great right

[00:32:54] that's like a hundred dollar membership right there that they're just consuming into their own membership so I think health clubs and those are poised to do it are going to really start to to take advantage of that

[00:33:03] and I think people are going to have one or two digital subscriptions to like what you guys have to kind of manage you know they're when they can't make it to the gym but I still think health clubs are going to win out if they had

[00:33:13] they're just too good at offering so I've been dying to ask you about this and it's been really cool watching Eddie over at AtherTex seeing AtherTex start to AT&T and starting to get some really good traction and start to move this year

[00:33:28] she talked a little bit about that partnership that you guys have and some of what you're up to yeah yeah I mean I would say it's more of a friendship than a partnership really I've got to know Eddie for you know a while actually when his newsletter

[00:33:41] started popping up like three years ago I was emailing him and he was never emailing me back so who's laughing now you mega I asked the question you got the megaphone he's laughing now you know yeah yeah well it's turned out to be really good right I think

[00:33:55] you know basically we just decided you know about a year ago like we want to work together we didn't know how you know as a lot of these things start and I'm like why don't we just why don't you guys become a premier presenter

[00:34:07] of the future of fitness he's like nah you know it's why don't we just start our own series so that's what we did and you know since then it's just been basically you know I'm a what I'm called consultant to the company and we

[00:34:17] we just do these episodes because all we want to do is really create create content with a specific purpose you know for for his platform and so far so good so as our relationship and our friendship you know evolves and there's a lot of opportunities

[00:34:30] that we're going to be working on you know this year together so yeah it's it's been really cool man I enjoy him I like what he's doing kind of like the outside perspective you know like you guys haven't have been around the industry for four or five years

[00:34:41] but you bring a lot of fresh perspective from other industries that you've seen success in and I like that and Eddie as well I think that's really refreshing you know people talk about oh you know they haven't been in the trenches or they had not you know lifers

[00:34:53] like I think that's freaking great right because we need more fresh I think fresh concept fresh perspec perspectives in the industry yeah and you guys have an interesting and unique vantage point here which opens up another question for me sure so I'm curious we're curious what are some

[00:35:11] companies that you admire like really respect what they're doing how they've done what they've done in the space yeah you know I I mean I always love equidocs like I never even been set foot into one but for everything they represent as far as a brand and how

[00:35:26] they they're just so disciplined really with how they go about their presence the service the quality like you know I had we didn't read Julia Clem recently I've had her on my podcast once or twice and we just did the unscripted series on ATN and I said

[00:35:41] you know what do you see when people call you a fitness brand she's like I get insulted and I was like that's awesome right like that and then like there whenever they come out with a new marketing campaign piss people get engaged some people love it

[00:35:56] most people hate it I think it's fantastic so I love what they've done is just really being a luxury brand within the marketplace I think it's something to aspire to and I think we can all learn quite a bit about hospitality and branding from them so that's one

[00:36:08] you know I'm biased because as a friend of mine but I also like the Maddabalk brand and what they do you know from a boutique standpoint like they really stick to their guns they know their audience they're not looking to be inclusive necessarily of everybody they know exactly

[00:36:22] who they're talking to and and they that's who they talk to that's the language they use they don't they're unapologetic about it so I think that's really cool and I guess the trend is I'm talking this explain it to you because I really like people who

[00:36:33] pick their lane go all in right and don't try to be everybody you know everything to everybody so those are a couple I really like yeah I'm curious from you guys is there any you guys have done quite a bit of interviews you've done

[00:36:46] quite a bit of research you know a lot of people in the industry is there anybody out there that you really admire when you look at at the overall that's really hard question I mean there's a lot of people it's like that's like making you pick your yeah

[00:36:57] your son over your daughter by the reason that I don't I don't want to answer that is because if I say somebody that excludes people so I think that in looking at different areas within the the industry I think that there's people to admire I think

[00:37:15] at the highest level I think Austin I tend to admire people who build things from scratch and I think there's a lot of amazing people that come into an already big company and help it get bigger and move up the ladder and we love that but like

[00:37:30] I think there's something that other entrepreneurs that start from zero look at and then see people who are founders and still CEO as the company continues to get bigger but yeah and a lot of people on the side of my tongue here that I'm holding back because maybe

[00:37:46] we might even be having really meaningful conversations with some of them about partnering but I think in the in the connected fitness space there's a bunch of the connected fitness companies that are still run by founder and CEOs and I think that's something that we

[00:38:01] we very much admire I didn't get a chance to weigh in and I want to change your subject but I didn't get a chance to weigh in about the single modalities and I like to look at other industries and see when single modality does it

[00:38:15] does it make sense is there an opportunity for a really specific experience so Austin I actually have lunch at a place that only does hand rolls gets a good cousin or and I'll do hand rolls and I really liked it that's all I do hand rolls there's like

[00:38:29] tend to pick from and you get a hand roll could that be an offering at a restaurant that has a million things of course do I think when a steakhouse starts in sushi I'm kind of like oh that's good you're serious come on they would take home

[00:38:41] a steakhouse that has as good sushi as like a second this is an easy one who I mean you love Maestro's Maestro's sushi is no it's good but Eric Eric I'm going to record him he's not even going to know the next time we go there

[00:38:55] about how much well just you know we're going to Maestro's is over a decade together but I three decades I think that that looking at it changes his mind any upon whatever is on the plate for I don't know how hungry I am fine okay

[00:39:09] if I'm really hungry Maestro's tastes great but I'm talking more about like in any industry can you get really specific and really like a unique offering that's very narrow and sometimes it can really work well I think also because maybe the type of people who brings together

[00:39:25] versus people who like generally like something you want to just check the box like they give an example in fitness I used to do yoga classes that's helping racket club rest in peace great great club one of my favorite gyms I've ever been a member

[00:39:36] I've been a member at a lot of different gyms I just loved it there's the right amount of them but not too many it was never too crowded but it was busy the people that were there were great at racket ball I loved it but she's not

[00:39:46] the pickle ball and I really learned yoga at an health and racket club it was a great offer but you get just regular casual yoga people which it might just be someone who just randomly wanders in and I want to try yoga today and they're not

[00:40:01] that serious about it I also went to this this other yoga studio called souk and also one called the lion's den and it is hard core like really the people there are so dedicated and they're so passionate the conversations you have before the conversations you have after

[00:40:17] the community the engagement around people who really really love yoga it's like 10 times more so is that going to like when there's a single like we have some of a friend who's actually in the sauna business and like he's opening sauna studios like other people are really passionate

[00:40:32] about that you make really good friends and people that have come together for that specific modality I think there's definitely some value there will the scale as big as something that's multimodality that covers more people I think also you know whether we like to admit it or not

[00:40:46] in the fitness industry that breakage and people find it for membership and not going is a big part of the business so like a lot of times the best thing about HVLP is that's easy to sign up it's hard to cancel it's an easy sell like 30 bucks like

[00:40:59] I can become healthier and then I'll go so you know I think that as the focus and shift becomes more around utilization and actual health not just the health of your your P&L I think that also creates some shifts in the industry so sorry to like hijack

[00:41:13] your question a little bit but I wanted to make sure I just kind of my thoughts there actually just having that thought today is like have some some industries will have like just super narrow experiences and then like you know that you can get ice cream and deserted

[00:41:27] a five-star restaurant but like it's something special about going to like a dessert place or like an ice cream shop where all I do is make ice cream it's great you know so let me let me ask you this because I think I think we're actually

[00:41:39] on the same page with this is that when you go to that place it's just hand rules would you say it's a unique experience it's super evening you sit there and you have a piece of paper you just check the boxes the six things

[00:41:50] that you want to eat and then they go with me I'm asking them why they won't do cut rolls yeah awesome he loves it right big secret menu guide can you just cut the hand roll onto a cut take two hand rolls cut them each by three

[00:42:00] all five yeah six pieces of roll if you give him like here's a hundred bucks cut them they'll be like no that's just that's just how that they do it and there's a line and there's like 15 seats at that place and like if the wait line to get

[00:42:11] get it when we solve two or open we happen to be walking past getting a coffee like we got to take those like the rope but so you know it's I think unique experiences I think there's there's a story that the fact we're talking about it now right

[00:42:23] I'm not talking that's the not sure so is that like a unique thing is it easy repeatable you want to go back and do it again do you want to talk about it is it you know so also I had a friend bring me the lines

[00:42:34] down in New York and I I wouldn't want their otherwise and it was an experience like I remember that but like I'm not going to say again the yoga a lifetime Marie Prenta I think the yoga there's great but you're not going to get the same kind of

[00:42:46] people that are really it's a lifestyle for them it's a community it's a passion very different well let me give you an example I think that illustrates what I'm what I think about it too is that I was recently traveling was in Central Asia for our tenure

[00:43:00] which is you but use back a stand right so I was in the city of Bukhara and I'd went to this bathhouse been around for hundreds and hundreds of years you know go in I saw it on a Anthony Bourdain episode I'm like I try that same right

[00:43:17] and you walk in and put all your stuff in the locker you get on your towel and you go sit they push you in the sauna right just the sauna it's a hot stone song you sit down in there it's ancient you look in here like

[00:43:27] oh my god this thing's been around forever then after that you know they bring you in they do this guy like gives you a soap bath right and then you get on this table as hard table and they start doing stretches that were you know almost painful right

[00:43:39] and then then they wash you down with cold water you go back in the sauna for awhile I'm like I walked out of there my wife came in she actually took pictures women were supposed to be in there but she took pictures and they allowed it

[00:43:49] and it was cool now if I had come across something that was like around here that just said sauna massage I'd be like meh meh right but if you call like an experience like that was now I want to talk about it on this podcast with you guys

[00:44:04] and it's different like you're delivering something that's unique and talk and something that's worthy of talking about versus just access to a service and I think that's where the people who you know will win this category I think there's a lot of room I think people

[00:44:15] who do sauna really well and incorporate into a whole experience like other ship I haven't tried it yet I'm dying to but I think there's there's a lot of room for that and it's just and listen I mean the US is just catching on to the sauna thing

[00:44:26] I mean you go to Finland or you know in these places that have been doing you know sauna cold plunge for thousands of years or over a thousand years you know like that's that's something that I think you know has a lot of legs but it may take

[00:44:40] a little while for the the western consumer to really kind of jump on board so I don't know so I want to show you a picture of me this is back in 2019 the early origins of flex that I I mean people listening might never ever see it

[00:44:52] but it's mainly here I'm reading sauna magazine in Finland little beer literally I once was sauna there and it was like unlike any you've ever seen also I might have to do a research trip you want to do this we'll go to Finland in Helsinki

[00:45:05] and you go there there's men there's women and it's very very serious and now they approach sauna it's social but it's like it's a part of life so you go there men side women side and you go there and it's just you're going back between cold shower

[00:45:20] super hot sauna and then they have you can have beer you can you can have food and you can read sauna magazine it's really it's really something else so I took a picture of me relaxing read sauna magazine but you know as you said it's been going on

[00:45:34] for a long time it's a really big part of culture and just like they're probably laughing in Americans finally picking this up but you know I think between the cold therapy stuff people were doing those polar bear plunges for also hundreds of years I think people

[00:45:46] swim in cold water because I mean that that to me the alertness is a very obvious benefit I mean if you're sleep deprived you're thinking I'm so tired I need a cup of coffee like jumping a cold plunge you're not going to be thinking about how tired

[00:45:57] to repair the cold you are so at a minimum you'll forget how tired you are for five five minutes I actually put that through the test I was jet lagged in LA and then our hotel had a cold plunge so I did my own version of conscious therapy

[00:46:10] there I was sleep deprived and I got through the day I think much better off than without it and I'm a believer I don't think I really enjoy it that much I don't think it's meant to be enjoyed but I I do believe in the benefits of it

[00:46:23] it's air on your chest for men and women yeah I agree there's a lot of benefits to it 100% and I think you're right I would look I would imagine like if if the finished look at how we're approaching this whole contrast even calling a contrast therapy right

[00:46:36] they're probably laughing like these things we've been doing for a thousand years and that's just what we do right we're capitalists we want to take advantage of it can I ask you guys I just a question I've been dying to because last time we talked you guys

[00:46:52] hadn't launched the podcast but you guys have been the first episode I think you guys launched in March 2022 why like why did you start a podcast you guys are busy dudes right you got a lot going on podcasting can be very time consuming I find I know

[00:47:08] I can tell you why I do it but for you guys particularly why did you want to do it and why do you continue to do it to two and a half years later Justin been chewing my ear off for the last 18 years and I I needed

[00:47:21] out with to funnel that through that's the actual answer that's hilarious I I think there's a lot of positives of it and I don't want to like you know say things that maybe I don't want to say like being weird I think we love we are so thrilled

[00:47:37] and I don't want to say we take it for granted because the part of the podcast is the exact opposite of that we have amazing conversations every day I think if you if you the three of us were just talking this would be a very similar conversation that

[00:47:54] we would have we talked about something specific but we would have some industry talking and this stuff is like we talk industry stuff in our sleep right we barely even prepped we didn't have any research tear sheets we just know and talk about it and we live this

[00:48:07] so I think being able to offer that to people you know we're not doing a Joe Rogan audience here but we get a nice amount of people listening to Just Like The Podcast I'm sure you do too and those people really appreciate it and we have great relationships

[00:48:18] and we're sharing them I also think that there's been some amazing stories that we want to capture and I I'm very drawn to like audio as a means of information consumption because I like to be really efficient when I'm on a run I listen to podcast

[00:48:33] I'm on a road trip or driving I listen to the podcast I just like to listen to burst to the podcast and you know I I wanted to not only contribute to that but also capture some of these amazing conversations that we've had with people where they

[00:48:47] tell their story like one of them that just jumps out is like you know Alberto at at Zumba like he's a crazy story and he doesn't tell the story not it's a great founding story it's really cool and he's just one person thinking a lot of people who've

[00:48:59] told of their story of founding company and I think being able to capture that it's been great on the business side that you might ask why are you guys making money on this and whatever no this isn't a core tent of our business but what it has done

[00:49:14] is it helps solidify great relationships um you take someone say hey I I like talking to you enough and you say great things and I want to interview you on our podcast it just kind of solidifies your relationship and creates a moment that's outside of just normal

[00:49:27] zoom calls and text stating emails right emails is you don't build great relationships fun emails you build a meeting in person podcasts experiences you know having fun you know having the food together so this is another way that you've built a great relationship I also think that

[00:49:42] it's allowed us to get to know people better too where there's some people that you know maybe you're not have a lot to do in the business world and you're both really busy so you don't really prioritize you know the building your relationship so we've used to get

[00:49:55] closer to people too where we buy them on our podcasts and say hey let's record this story and you have that little nugget you know between you guys forever and then you know if in the future it makes sense you can always revisit and

[00:50:05] it's been some great people we've got to know better and sometimes there's value in a relationship you don't even see in the outset maybe they introduce you to someone who completely changed the trajectory of your career or your life so it's just good to have this as a

[00:50:19] relationship building for him and we've also like we said wanted to share some of the amazing people that we've been lucky enough to meet and get to know and creating flex it awesome awesome anything to add yeah and Austin just wants to hear you know he wants to

[00:50:31] just make jokes about me he loves me for it though I love for it and also another funny story about us is that like I'm I'm joking here because we he pointed at me like be like the cue each other but who's going to respond to each other

[00:50:41] yeah I know to tell each other but I started to get like he he pointed like a little point I'm doing the bigger point so I'm trying to like out point him so maybe that's what you saw on the camera in a wide view that know we

[00:50:51] have fun doing this and and I I think also it's a little mindful moment right you take a pause like right now I'm not checking emails texting calling talking to you thinking about the industry and I enjoy that mindful moment just taking a pause and

[00:51:04] sharing what we know and thinking and and asking tough questions and answering tough questions yeah I think for me it's like just and I've done a lot in academia and it's the same premise there you know sharing knowledge sharing platform opening up to people to hear from others

[00:51:19] that have done it you know could help them to think about a different be and everybody's got a different outlet they turned to where combination of outlets so this is just another one and it's awesome like you know for the audience like we get to catch up

[00:51:32] with you are before this after this right there's a meeting in there for us too so it's just a lot of really awesome stuff that it comes from that's been a blast with no plans of slowing down if anything we recite or ramp it out yeah awesome

[00:51:48] you guys I mean there's the just going through your gas I really urge people to to check I mean taro loans right you guys have fortune 500 executives you know industry insiders you know you know you had both Eddie you had Anthony from Fit Insider like you just

[00:52:04] you've really covered a lot of ground investor groups it's it's really it's really good you know I know a lot of the names some of them I learned for the first time so very wide breath of what you guys are doing I have to say I concur

[00:52:15] with everything you guys said is that there's so many unexpected benefits of podcasting that you know this will be my third today to be honest with you and you know the I was recorded one was on another and now this one's kind of a mutual for your audience

[00:52:28] Eric stands Eric stands he doesn't sit right now I'm sitting but yeah usually stand you're here that's standing desk well yeah but it's all that stuff is amazing and you know I have a look to my phone once I got to know you guys much better than

[00:52:42] I knew you before and I think even the people you've known forever you get them on a podcast interview you ask their back story and your ships like holy I didn't know that like you went through that and that that bond you know is really it's just

[00:52:56] hard to describe so you know is podcasting for everybody no could everyone benefit from podcast yeah should they do it no but I think it's what would you say it's for who's podcasting for I think people are just really curious I think people who had a

[00:53:10] hold a certain level of curiosity and that's just you know this is on the interview format right I think a lot of people you know like I had I got to interview one of my favorite one recently was Sal DeStefano from mine pump if you guys humongous

[00:53:26] you know they're a little bit different they sit there and they just spill information out onto a podcast right he even invits it there's a little bit of narcissism that's involved in that but like I think there's different people like if you like the interview format I think

[00:53:37] you have to be generally curious you have to like people you have to value relationships at a certain level you know or you just really want to get the information out there you see the content as a medium for you know your mission I think that's maybe too

[00:53:50] I think you have to have a pretty strong mission because after you know 10 episodes or so it can become a grind if you don't enjoy what you're doing or you see why you're doing it so yeah I think that's that would be my short answer awesome we think

[00:54:02] this will once so well we're going to republish just on the Just Blasted podcast with a little brief intro so this is a blast it's a little different than our usual format but we really enjoyed being a guest on yours and this was the last yeah yeah it's

[00:54:14] it's a pleasure you guys is like people are listening within industry you guys are facing right now if people are going to reach out to you how can they help you we are we're looking to continue pressing forward on the path to making telewildness accessible

[00:54:31] in the way that telehealth and teletherapy are top of mind's distribution anyone that's adjacent and wants to get into the business of doing this we do a lot of white labeling work well partnership so reach out info flex at that fit that's info FL EX IT that FIT

[00:54:48] always happy to chat and give advice whatever it is that we can do to be helpful right now Justin awesome thank you fellas pleasure pleasure hey wait don't leave yet this is your host Eric Malzone and I hope you enjoyed this episode of future of minutes

[00:55:05] if you did I'm going to ask you to do three simple things it takes under five minutes and it goes such a long way we really appreciate number one please subscribe to our show wherever you listen to it iTunes Spotify cast box whatever it may be number two

[00:55:20] a favorable review number three share put it on social media talk about it to your friend send it in a text message whatever it may be please share this episode because we put a lot of work into and want to make sure that as many people

[00:55:34] are getting value out of it as possible lastly if you'd like to learn more get in touch with me simply go to the future of fitness dot CEO you can subscribe to our newsletter there or you can simply get in touch with me as I love

[00:55:47] to hear from our listeners so thank you so much this is Eric Malzone and this is the future of fitness have a great day