Verdine Baker - From StretchLab to iFLEX, Sequel Brands' Twist on Dynamic Stretching

Hey friends, welcome to the Future of Fitness, a top-rated fitness and wellness industry podcast for over five years and running. I'm your host, Eric Malzone, and I have the honor of talking to entrepreneurs, innovators, and cutting-edge technology experts within the extremely fast-paced industries of fitness, wellness, and health sciences. If you like the show, we'd love it if you took three minutes of your day to leave us a nice supporter review wherever you consume your podcasts. If you're interested in staying up to date with the future of fitness, go to futurofitness.co to subscribe and get weekly summaries dropped into your inbox. Now onto the show. One theme keeps coming up the right technology can make or break your business. That's why I'm thrilled to introduce our new presenting sponsor, Perfect Gym. Perfect Gym isn't just another gym management system. They are part of the Sport Alliance Group, Europe's leading fitness software company that has officially entered the US market. Now, I've seen this movie before, but here's the difference. They've opened up a U.S. headquarters in Boston because they understand that the American market deserves dedicated, localized support. After digging into the platform, one benefit especially stood out. They are simplifying the nightmare that keeps business owners up at night migrations. These guys were able to migrate one mega client with more than 250 locations in six different countries in just 20 days between two payment runs. No disrupting operations, no member loss, one seamless operation that simply works. Now, if you have ever switched platforms, you know how terrifying that process can be and how truly impressive that feat is. At a high level, here's their secret sauce. They give the power back to the operator. Instead of forcing you into their closed ecosystem, their Perfect Gym Marketplace connects with over 120 integration partners. So want to use your own app, your preferred payment processor, class pass for booking? No problem. Whether you're running a single studio or managing a multi-location enterprise, Perfect Gym was built from the ground up for multi-club operations. They have invested a ton into this platform, and now they're bringing that European engineering excellence to America. The migration experts have arrived. Check out perfectgym.com where enterprise level sophistication meets operator freedom. Hey friends, if you are serious about the business of fitness, please block off February 2026 for the Connected Health and Fitness Summit in Los Angeles. This is where operators, founders, and health tech leaders go to get a grip on what's next. AI integration, wearable tech that drives retention, GLP1 market impact, longevity strategies, and so much more. All the stuff that is reshaping our industry right now. Three days of real conversations with people building this space, not just talking about it. You'll leave with partnerships and playbooks you can actually use. My listeners get 10% off with the code FOF10. Link in the show notes. I hope to see you there. All right. Here we go. Verdeen Baker, welcome to the future of fitness. How you doing, man?

Doing great. Thanks for having me, Eric. Appreciate it.

Yeah, I uh, you know, I've heard nothing but great things about you, Verdeen. And you know, we met briefly at an event. I think it was, I don't know, they all blend in a one, dude. Uh I think it was Athletech Innovation. And uh you were talking to Andrew. Yeah, yeah. Andrew Mentor from Fismoto, who he's also a big fan of yours. I know you've done a lot of work with him. And yeah, so you know, I'm excited for our conversation. And, you know, just in our chats now, you know, you have some really keen insights and things you've been tracking as far as like the consumer's mindset and shift towards wellness, which is an undeniable trend. You know, if you don't believe it, just follow the money, right? Of of where people are spending their pocketbook money um right now. It's and it's great for us as an industry. It's it's an excellent, excellent thing. And obviously, you're you're now at iFlex. We're gonna get into that and what that means with SQL brands and what SQL's up to. You know, I think it's it's something that a lot of people are watching within the industry right now. So, yeah, let's let's start with this. A little bit of your background. I know you're a professional athlete, for Dean, and had huge success at Stretch Labs. So tell us a little bit about your journey and then we'll we'll go from there.

Yeah, professional athlete is uh maybe an overstatement like for five minutes, but I I played soccer in college and you know, been an athlete all my life, has probably the most injured athlete that you've ever met. I've had six knee surgeries, a shoulder surgery, a foot surgery. So being in the wellness space, right, and recovery, and you know, it's uh it's not new to me. It seems like I spent my whole life in a physical therapy clinic or chiropractic clinic or doing massage or stretching and different modalities around health and wellness. You know, I kind of grew up in the fitness industry. I I started my career at Crunch Fitness, you know, I was selling memberships, that kid at the front desk and greeting everyone. And, you know, I really fell in love with that experience, to be honest with you. It was really gratifying to me to just re watch people's journey as they come into the door and they have a certain goal. And, you know, they go through an experience with you, and then they're on their way to finding their health and wellness within the experiences they're having in your facility or what you offer. And that was like that was a goal to me. I I really love being around that kind of environment. It really invigorated me, gave me a lot of passion. Um, and it also piqued my curiosity around business and operations and kind of like why are we doing things a certain way? Like, what can we improve on people's experiences or the staff's experience and so forth? And I kind of grew from there. I spent 10 years at Croach Fitness. Ton of gratitude for the leaders that I had there, great mentors that really taught me what it really means to be in the industry, right? It's not about anything else other than helping people, and that curiosity into that and and kind of building on that passion kind of led me to wanting more out of it, right? How do I have more impact? And I was fortunate enough to get recruited into Stretch Lab early on, where they had three locations by the executives at Exponential and grew it to um over 600 locations, which was uh a great experience. You know, you learn a lot of really great things on how to do things really well, but you also learn a lot of key things of like, hey man, I we could do this better, or we could have done this better, right? And kind of segueing into this opportunity with iFlex, I think rarely do you get an opportunity in life where you can kind of leverage seven, eight years of experiences that you've had before and say, hey, these are the key defining moments of a brand that you could do well or or improve upon, right? Or have areas of opportunities that you can really tackle and solve different types of problems. And that was really intriguing to me. And uh when that opportunity came available, I jumped on it and really excited to see where we could take this brand and kind of usher the the usher the next evolution of of this wellness modality and stretching, making it more dynamic. And you know, I think of it as more, it's not just stretching, right? It's it's it's performance and recovery. We listen to our consumers and what they're getting out of these experiences. It's that's what they're looking for, right? They're looking uh for ways that they can do other things that they love as much as possible, whether that's to just walk their kids around the block or to play golf or pickleball or soccer or whatever it is. Uh so that really excites me uh to be in the environment where I could really continue to impact people's lives and help them do the things that they love even more. So yeah, that's a little bit about a little bit about my journey in the health and wellness industry. Just a kid trying to help some people out.

I like it. You know, when I when I look at stretch lab, there's a part of me that says, I can't believe it's that successful. And then there's another part of me of like, of course it is, right? Because here's what I'm getting at. Anybody can stretch. I kick it off right now, I could stretch, right? It's it's it's free, right? Like anybody can do it, but nobody does it. So, and then have someone professionally stretch you and then go in, like, I I if there was one near here, um, which there's not, it's your your fault. There's gloves, yeah, there's one in Missoula, right? Were you ever surprised by the success of stretch lab where you're like, holy cow, I can't believe this is taking off like this.

Man, I'll tell you a story. When um Anthony and the exponential team came to me, um, I was at Crunch Fed Nasburg, San Francisco. My wife and I had just had our our daughter, she's nine now, so this is like you know almost 10 years ago, right? Uh, we were happy, our friends, family were there. I had no intention of leaving Crunch, right? So he came to me and said, and it was the um I had a call with uh Ryan Junk, who's now the the president or CEO of Beam. And I didn't know Ryan from previously, but through, you know, if you're in the industry, you know, you know, people love people, right? Um so I learned about his career and what he's done, and I took the call and he's like, hey, we're we're we're we're thinking about doing this thing, right? Which is the form exponential, buy a bunch of brands and then launch them. But um, and we're thinking about you to be uh one of the leaders of the brands, and but I can't tell you what it is and and when is gonna happen. And I was like, okay, this is kind of strange, but sure. And I'm curious. And months go by, uh, and a few months later he calls me back and says, Hey, you know this thing I was telling you about? Well, we we we bought these brands um and we formed Exponential, and Stretch Lab is one of them, and you know, we'd love for you to be part of it. And I said, Okay, well, that sounds great. And I as a college athlete, like I've been stretched by athletic trainings my whole entire life, right? So I knew what it was, but for the life of me, I was like, why would anybody else want to do this and pay for it? My my wife and I we we we went down to Los Angeles at the time, stretched life at three locations, right? Venice, Santa Monica, and Beverly. Uh, Venice is the first one, Santa Monica the second one. And uh so I walked into the studio down in Los Angeles, and man, it hit me like a ton of brakes. Like it was like this, like I mean, everybody has these like aha moments, epiphanies, whatever you want to call it, but it was just like instantly, I like connected with it like you would not believe. I saw like an eight-year-old dancer who was getting stretched by a flexologist. She's an Irish dancer, you know, talk to her after and kind of learned a little bit about her. And it was I also saw like a 90-plus-year-old gentleman that was getting stretched, and everyone in between. And the conversations that were happening between the therapists and their clients, the conversations that were happening after the stretch, how like people felt when they got off the bench, like it just was like this like, oh my God, like this is like the next evolution in health and wellness. This is going to be the thing that becomes the necessity, right? Because if my eight-year-old athlete sees the value in it, or the parent sees the value in her being able to do this, and the nine-year-old guy sees the value in doing this, and then everybody in between, man, like this is truly something that could complement everything that everyone's doing around movement. And as I continue to learn more, it's not just about that, right? It's uh whether it's longevity or stress relief or mental health, there are so many benefits that come along with being consistent with taking care of your body, right? And so the question of like, am I surprised? I guess you could say yes, right. I was more curious to see like, why would anybody want to do this? But once I got myself kind of connected to it, like it just made so much sense, right? That that stretch lab has taken off the way it has, because it's kind of filled a need that our industry has needed and have tried to do and execute at a high level in the past, but just haven't been able to do it. And you know, stretch lab kind of came at the perfect time. And going through going through COVID with Stretch Lab was also a really interesting experience that gave us even more confidence that, like, hey man, this is like something that's there, right? When we went through 2020, March 15, 2020, I remember this like it was like yesterday. We shut down all 72 studios that we had, froze every single membership, um, all our members, and we had no idea, like, hey, are people going to come back? Are we going to be able to do this? Like, there's all these things that's going through your mind. You know, by the end of October, we had reopened every studio. And some municipalities we had to kind of open, shut down, open, shut down, and do all those things. And then open another 35 studios in 2020. And then over 80, 90 of our members came back and said, Hey, I want to do this. I want to pay for it. I want to experience it because I need this. And that just blew my mind and gave me even more confidence that, like, yeah, this modality, this vertical is here to stay. And there's a lot of opinion that we have in the industry to continue to kind of you know usher this movement into the next uh evolution of health and wellness with with stretching right performance and recovery.

Well, it's it's it's complementary to everything else. Like, you know, you could open a Pilates studio and you're gonna compete with all the other Pilates studios. You can open a CrossFit gym, you're gonna compete with all the other CrossFit gyms. But if you open a stretch lab or an IFLEX, it's like who's doing stretching? Nobody. But it complements everything that that you do. It reminds me um you know Kelly Starrett, the kind of guru of mobility, right? The goat of mobility. He when he started the whole thing and kind of started really terming that or coining that term of mobility, it was like, well, of course, it goes along with everything. There is no other he would there was no competition for him to be a thought leader in the space because you know, if you're doing functional training, great, you need mobility, right? If you're doing Olympic weightlifting, you need mobility. If you're uh an endurance runner, you need mobility. So it was like complementary to everything that you do. And I think that's what what's very unique about this modality is like it there's no reason not to stretch, right? Like there's really no reason not to stretch, no matter what your age at. You mentioned an eight-year-old and an 80-year-old, right? Like that's that's the beauty of the modality. One of the questions I have about this, maybe you've probably been asked, is flexologists, was that a thing before stretch lab, or did you guys kind of coin that?

Yeah, that that's that that's a stretch lab uh um kind of phrasing a word and have it, yeah, definitely trademarked by stretch lab. You know, us at iFlex, we call our therapy, we call our service providers therapists, like stretch therapists, right? Kind of a more broader term. And you know, I think it was it was unique, it was um something that, you know, as you're entering a vertical, it's like something that kind of pops at the time. Like, what is a flexologist, right? The founders of Stretch Lab coined that term flexologist. And when we bought the brand Exponential, we're like, okay, like let's just stick with that and and really make it pop in the industry. And and it's really cool now that I get to hear, you know, therapists call themselves a flexologist, right? But the circle, yeah, you know, now yeah, but now that the verticals has, you know, there's obviously some brand recognition around it and you know, people know what stretching is, or or for the most part, stretching in a uh um a boutique fitness environment or anywhere else, it's time that we kind of take that next step into a broader term of a stretch therapist, right? And it's been really cool to see how the industry service providers have been kind of gravitating towards stretching, right? When we started, I would try to recruit people, they'd be like, What, okay, like stretch studio? Like, what is that? Like, how do I do that? Right. And now you see the trend, right? Like, since we started stretch lab and and this whole stretching movement, you see other whether it's personal training certifications, they're adding their, you know, their stretch therapist certifications and so forth. And that's great, right? Like, that's just, you know, we're we're very much in a time where the concept of a rising tide raises all boats, right? Like just that getting the movement, getting the industry to really kind of look at stretching as something that's a necessity for a service provider's tool belt. That's really cool, you know, to have NASM that have a stretching certification or some of the the the other big personal training certificate certification that that that's out there. That's really exciting. And uh, you know, it all started with a couple studios and kind of grew from there.

Yeah, awesome, man. So you close that chapter and you're you're moving on to a new one with iFlex. Tell me what was the initial conversation? Anthony called you, who called you?

Yeah, you know, it's uh you know, one of those things that, you know, the stretch lab was in a man, just I'm so grateful for the experiences that I had there. Uh the team we built, but but mostly the franchisees that we interacted with and got to support through the whole entire process. You know, that was my whole thing. It's it's when you're doing this, that passion is for them because they've spent their whole entire lives to amass the wealth, the resources, to be able to do something on their own, right? So you hold that kind of responsibility to support them in the best way that you can. And you know, as a publicly traded company going through some transition, sometimes it becomes a lot harder for you to make decisions that support your franchisees entirely. But that shift for me kind of made me look up and say, all right, well, if the decisions that I'm making are not entirely supporting my franchisees uh a hundred percent, then and that's what I'm there for, right? That's what they rely on me for. And it became really hard, it became harder and harder for me to do those things, right? So once the opportunity came, you know, I kind of was looking around. You want to do things with the people that you you you you enjoy being around, that you care about, and that really think about the way that I think, which is we have to make decisions that supports the people that put food on our tables. And um, I made that call just to be curious. Like, hey, if there's anything that's around, let's let let's let let let's see if we can make something happen, right? And um, when I talked to AG's, he he said, Hey, I'm thinking about buying this brand. And I remember the conversation because he said, Hey, uh, I'm only gonna buy it if you come running. I said, All right, well, let's see who else is on the team. And uh, you know, the opportunity to be able to do something that you're really passionate about, but the people that you really enjoy being around for the right purpose, right? For the right purpose. That really piqued my interest, and he made it for is a hard decision because you know, you've been doing something for eight years when and and you're in the trenches with people that you know you've been around for a long time, you've built the team, you you you you you enjoy the successes and challenges that come along with building a brand with amazing people, man, across the country, around the world, really. So it's a really hard decision to kind of leave what we've all built from previous. But like I said before, the opportunity to do it the right way and make decisions that solely support franchisees and doesn't necessarily have implications around, hey, we got to hit this KPI, we got to satisfy, you know, the broader scope of being a publicly traded company. That part was easy, right? But the human aspect of it is you know, it's always difficult to leave something that you love and the people that you love doing it with. So yeah, that's kind of how it materialized, man. But I'm excited to be here. You know, like I said earlier, it's very rarely do you have an opportunity to have a second bite at the Apple and truly take the learnings that you've had in the first bite, right? So we're here.

Yeah, awesome. Well, you know, I could poke at that a little bit, but we're gonna we're gonna let it rest and then we're gonna get on to iFlex. I think what's piquing my interest for you is that you mentioned that there's things that you would improve upon now that you got a second chance, right? So maybe give us some insights as like what are some of the things that you've identified now with iFlex that uh well, I guess we could go both. Like, what are some of the things that you know fundamentally are gonna be critical to the growth of of iFlex, things that you've already proven out in your experience? And then what are some of the things that you feel that you want to change and improve upon now that you have this opportunity?

Yeah, I think the first thing is the franchisee experience, right? And and how we build them, right? And when we're starting stretch lab, we didn't know what we didn't know. So it's kind of a lot of it is kind of trial by error. You learn as you go. And you know, one of the key things coming over to IFlex that I really focused on is you know, how do we improve the experiences of the franchisee? And and it kind of boils down to some simple things for me, right? Can we make it more cost effective for them to build them? Can we make it faster uh for them to get to market? And um, you know, can we cut down on the square footage, you know, the footprint of the studio, right? Going from 10 benches to six benches, going from 1,500 to 1800 square foot to 800 to a thousand square foot. And those make fundamental, significant differences in the unit economics of the model, right? Uh from what you're paying in the rent to your equipment package and all those different things. And you know, can we make it simpler to build? Can we have an elegant premium experience in our studio? But you know, it doesn't have to be overbuilt, right? So those of those were some of my focuses like on the franchisee experience, right? And and also taking the learnings and like, how do we how do we teach the model? How do we how do we express the The franchise or franchise a relationship, right? And then, you know, I think some of the things that I always thought about is I had, you know, we know what to do as a franchise or and sometimes you have the expectations that, you know, you may teach it one way or one time, and the other person hadn't been a high-level executive or they've been successful doing something else that they can adopt to what we do and do it instantly, right? And that's not always the case. And, you know, I learned that you have a spectrum of learners as franchisees, and you have to meet them where they are. And you have to adapt your teaching to their learning. So it's not about kind of revamping, but more like refining the models of support that we have or the systems of support that we have and take no assumptions that they know how to do it. And that's the next level of support, right? When you can walk alongside them and not just hold their hand, but walk alongside them. Um and that's what we've done in iFlex is really take that next step into support and really understand where our franchisees are and meet them there, right? And have the systems and the processes around teaching to meet them there. So that's one side of it, right? And I think the other side of it for me was like, okay, what's the next step in this like stretching like evolution, right? And I think what I thought about was, you know, how do we expedite the results that we get for our members? How do we make it stickier? How do we how do we get them to be more engaged? And, you know, some of the trends that I started to see back, I like to use the term back at the farm, right? Like what we used to do. Okay. You know, some of the things that trends that we started to see was that the consumer kept on getting younger. When we started then, it was the obvious, right? The disposable income and disposable time. So that tends to be your 50 plus nearly retirees, and they already understand that they need to stretch, right? Because they've gone through a lifetime of deconditioning of not moving the proper way. So that was interesting to me to see the trends start to, you know, the average age kept on dropping. The consumer profiles that were fastest growing were the you know, athletes under 18 and your millennial executives between 30 and 50. And, you know, when you think about what's happening with those demos, they are keenly acute to, you know, this, right? They are cell phone. Yeah, they they they they're they're living their lives through technology, you know, whether that's to find ways to gamify the experience or find ways to be able to track improvements or you know, find different technologies that'll help aid in their performance and recovery, like that's where the industry is going. So I really took a hard look at like, we don't want to get away from the DNA of who we are as a stretching modality, but how can we find ways to incorporate technology into the experience that allows us to really enhance the benefits that that our members get from stretching, right? And and make them even stickier members than they already have been. So we started looking at different tools, whether that's heat vibration to help prime the body, to be able to get a stretch or compressive therapy to help kind of seal in some of the results that you get from getting a stretch, topical cream, all those different things that like they were kind of add-ons and maybe kind of ancillary to the actual stretch. But how do we kind of incorporate them into the service ecosystem themselves, but not exactly ask our members to be in our studio any more time, right? Because we all have stuff to do. So instead of asking my member to be in my studio for an hour and a half or two hours, I could do all of those things within an hour and create an experience that yields them better results when they walk out of the studio. So we're really kind of thought about every way we could improve that. And that's that that doesn't stop, right? We're always looking at different technologies or different ways that we can improve on the experiences that our members are having. And, you know, with the end result of getting the very best results for performance and recovery, because that's what our members are coming into the studio for. They're looking for something that truly helps them do other things that they love to do. So that's been our focus. And you know, I'm excited to see the next step into the stretching journey. It's not just stretch, right? It's it's it's you know, how can we we improve on that performance and recovery aspect of health and wellness?

Yeah, Larry. So you mentioned technology, which always piques my interest here. Any kinds, any specific types of technology that you're looking at right now that you're considering? Yeah, what's what's interesting to you at this point?

Yeah, there's a couple of things, man. Like within the within the service itself, right? I think, you know, I mentioned a couple of things like heat compressive therapy, compressive therapy. We work with um, you know, everybody knows hyper ice, right? You turn on an NBA game, NFL game, and you see everybody's got the you know, hyper ice heat pack or ice pack on their knee or their shoulder. So we've been partnering with them for a long time and kind of incorporated that into the service itself, right? So when somebody walks into the studio, you know, if you're in Nebraska and it's uh or whitefish, Montana and it's freezing outside and it's 20 degrees, you know, getting you on a bench and getting you a stretch is fantastic. But getting you on the bench and getting you a stretch when your body's primed for it with a little bit of that heat vibration makes a huge difference in the results that you get walking out of the studio. So instead of asking my number to come in half hour early, we just incorporate that into that 50-minute stretch altogether, right? And where we're going through our assessment, they're able to leverage that heat vibration to get their body into a great space for them to receive the stretch. Um, and it also ushers that kind of calming effect to get their nervous system to calm down with topical cream. We work with a company called Pros with their nerve cream that really helps the body get into the prime state to be able to get stretched. So if there are target areas that our members really need to focus on, we we apply some of those tools to those target areas, and that really gets us the better results that we'd like. Um, and then at the end of the stretch, we focus on kind of sealing in the results that you get. And what I mean by that is there's kind of an expiration date on getting a stretch and how good you feel after, right? So it takes time for us to kind of feel good all the time, right? Because we spent years of deconditioning ourselves. So, you know, some people may come out of the studio and get a stretch and say, Man, I felt great for two days or three days or one day, whatever it might be. But we're asking our members to come see us once a week for 50 minutes. So can we get the stretch to feel good for as long as possible, right? I'd love for them to come in twice a week. That's amazing, right? For my business at least. But of course. And when I really think about like, hey, we want to make sure we're lifting the community in something that makes sense, right? And I think it makes sense for you to be in a studio once a week to do something good for yourself. I mean, if I can extend that time and how well they feel, I think that's a good thing. So that compressive therapy is a way that we do that, right? Towards the end of your stretch, uh, instead of asking my member to stay in after their hour for 30 minutes, we incorporate that compressive therapy that really sees it, seals in the results. And what our members are telling us is that they're feeling better. If they were feeling better a day after, they're feeling better for two days after. If they're feeling better for two days, they're feeling better for three days after. And that's really exciting for us to kind of see those types of results and see those smiles on the faces of our members. Um, and then the other piece of technology that we're really excited about is the movement piece. You know, you mentioned Andrew, and I've I've I worked with Andrew for a long time, and kind of the next step in in movement assessment is like what happens next after you get the assessment and you know the score, and it's like now what, right? And everybody has all the rage about AI and whatever your opinion is about it, it's here and it's here to stay, right? And how do we leverage it for our industry and find ways for us to find better results for our members? And we leverage that movement technology to look into the future. Now, instead of relying on a specific therapist to be able to program for a client or if you're a personal trainer to program for a client, the text that we're using will look at the different tools that you might have access to. And for us, it's a simple, right? Like whether it's a stretch strap or elastic bands, things like that. And it creates the program for you, uh, which is which is really exciting, right? So it's just really extending the engagement that we have with our members outside of the studio, outside of the therapist, and to keep us and the stretching modality at the forefront on what they do. So that's kind of the next evolution, the next step, right? And you're able to kind of gamify and socialize those things, and that kind of feeds right in line with the movement that we see in the consumer profiles that's being attracted to wellness and and and uh movement. You know, they want to see it, right? They wanna, they wanna they wanna track it, they want to socialize it, they want to celebrate it, and we want to be at the forefront of that. So those are some of the things that we've been working on and and excited about bringing it to the market and and exposing people to it. And I think uh they'll also be really excited about it because they'll be able to see what they're doing.

Yeah, yeah, that's uh it's a great mindset into how you're approaching this too. And maybe this is a dovetail into our next topic, but recently, right before this recording, a couple days prior, ChatG or Open AI, OpenAI announced their Chat GPT health, right? Which it's game over in my mind. Well, it won't. It won't. Because here's the thing like it's it's not gonna do, you know, it's not gonna give you a colonoscopy, right? Uh it's not gonna give you a knee replacement, it's not gonna give you enough if you have a heart attack, it's not gonna put in a stint yet. Uh but it is gonna make a more um educated consumer. And the thing that when their announcement that stood out to me was that 230 million people per week ask health and wellness questions to Chat GPT. 230 million people per week. So what does that tell you about the mindset of the consumer nowadays when it comes to wellness, health, vitality, longevity, whatever you want to call it? What are you what are you noticing? Because I know this is something that you're following very closely.

Slowly, man. I mean, very early on at Stretch Lab, you figured it out. Like when you look at the markets that's that studios were opening in, and there's there's it's the obvious and then the stuff that you know kind of comes after it, right? You you're targeting a consumer profile that cares about their health or wellness. They obviously have the means for it, the resources to be able to uh to do it, right? But if you follow it, it's also a very highly educated consumer, right? Because those consumers, whether whatever happens in the economy, they're not like, hey, I'm gonna cut out health and wellness. They're gravitating towards health and wellness and cutting out other things. So that's really exciting to me in my modality because we do well in markets that have a highly educated consumer. If they're continuing to ask those questions, that means that we're we're we're growing that market, right? We're getting more educated consumers around health and wellness and the benefits of different modalities that really supports their health and wellness. And I think that bodes well for stretching what we're doing at iFlux.

Yeah, yeah, it is. What are the biggest noticings you've had when you're kind of tracking consumer wellness education and interest and the mindset of the consumer? Like, you know, maybe over the last few years, where do you think they've gained the most knowledge as far as their own journey in health?

Yeah, you know, it's you start to see this trend, right? And I've been talking about this for I guess 10 years now that, you know, consumer, you've got to follow the dollars and where they're spending, right? And I think when you think about health and wellness, the movement modalities kind of dominate the conversation, right? Uh whether it's, you know, different types of movement-based workouts or whatever it is, it kind of dominates that space. But, you know, I think the wellness part has kind of been chipping away at it over the last few years. And it's interesting, not to talk too much about COVID, but it it I I feel like it kind of accelerated it in a sense. It has stepped it up because through science we learned that hey, if you were in better health, if you were physically more able, if you had better cardiovascular capacities, if you had all those different things that we all know in the health and wellness industry are good for you, right? It gave you a better chance, right? And I think that really just woke up the industry or our consumers to really think differently about health and wellness, right? And not just think about, hey, I gotta go work out, but I gotta look at this in a more holistic way, right? What are some ways that I could engage in health and wellness without it's not just going to, you know, nautilus and lifting weights? And we started to see that trend happen and and really going through the pandemic really kind of accelerated it for us, right? And I mentioned it before, being able to see our members come back in droves, 90 plus percent of them came back um and and said, Hey, I want to do this, whether I'm wearing a mask or you're wearing, it doesn't matter. That's I want to do it because I need it, right? I need to do it. And you're starting to see this evolution where it's not like a niche modality, it's becoming the necessity, right? And where we're where the the industry's going is that the stretching movement will be as synonymous as and as widely accepted as physical therapy or massage therapy or chiropractic care and so forth. You know, I mean, think about this. You know, 30 plus years ago, chiropractic care wasn't even part of insurance coverage, right? Like it just wasn't a thing. It was like kind of this thing on the side, right? And now, you know, just about all the major insurance carriers like you know offer and accept chiropractic care as a modality that will support the health and wellness of their clients, right? Or their members. So that's where the industry is going. And you start to kind of see it happening more and more, and our consumers are telling us, right? You know, our market has been growing no pun exponentially year over year, especially post-COVID. And, you know, I think that tells us something. They're telling us something. There are needs that they need to be met, and you know, we need to be here for.

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. There's signals that can't be ignored, right? So as we move forward into this second half of the decade, what does success look like here for you? So let me give you a little more context. Let's say 2030, you and I are having another recording here, if I'm still podcasting by then. You know, what what if you were saying like uh you're like, Eric, man, this has been a smashing success, right? Everything has gone the way I've hoped, what would that look like?

Man, well, besides having a few thousand locations around the world, what it would mean to me, right, if if we're able to see all demographics, all socioeconomic demos that are applying the principles of health and wellness into their lives and and and and making generational change into how they live, right? I mean you think about where we're at right now. I think a report just came out that over 75% of us are are obese. And you know, somebody that's a lifelong fitness industry person that have been an athlete, that's like that's like hurts my heart just to think about it, right? Yeah, so success to me is the impact that we have on our communities, right? So and how we do that is is obviously by opening our doors to everyone, being accessible to everyone on different levels. If I can look back 30 years from now and see that our modality has made an impact on people and they're being able they're able to apply the principles of what we do into their daily lives, and that that that that would be success. That'd be really cool to see. Awesome, man.

Um Bradeen, if if uh last question I always ask is what what challenges are you facing? What do you need help with? And I mean in the context that people are listening and you want to hear from them. What would you like to hear from people about?

Yeah, I think uh that's a great question. I think, you know, I love solving problems. So I I I I always think of kind of challenges that and obstacles as an opportunity to to solve solve something else, right? I think, you know, one of the challenges that you have in the in in in health and wellness is is to make sure that your your your message is is is clear and you know you're not getting outside of your DNA of who you are, right? Because there's so many things out there, right? It's easy, I think, for you to become a disciple in many things, but a master of none. So I think I'm always kind of wrestling with that, right? Like there's always this, oh yeah, that's that's really cool. That's like something that we could think about, right? But I have a great team that keeps me grounded. I have great people around us that are great, brilliant health and wellness minds that challenges how we think. Um, and um, yeah, that's always a challenge, is to stay true to your DNA of who you are, but also evolve, right? And innovate. Um so it's a it's a balance that you have to strike to be able to deliver the very, very best to the consumer, to your members. So I'm always curious by nature. So I'm always looking, but it's it's great to have a great team that kind of gives you perspective and give you experience that you may not always have. So I'm grateful for that. Awesome, man.

Okay. Well, if people want to reach out to you or get in touch, what's uh what's the best way, man?

Man, you can uh LinkedIn is also a great way. I'm not a social media person, so that's probably the only one I have and you can get a hold of me. I'm probably the only Verdeen Baker that's out there. So reach to me out on LinkedIn, I'd love to connect with you or or check out SQL Brands, you'll be able to find us. I'd love to connect.

Verdeen, thank you so much for joining me. It's been an absolute pleasure. Ladies and gentlemen, Verdeen Baker.

Thanks, Eric. Thanks for having me. It's been a pleasure.

Hey, wait, don't leave yet. This is your host, Eric Malzone, and I hope you enjoyed this episode of Future of Minute. If you did, I'm gonna ask you to do three simple things. It takes under five minutes and it goes such a long way. We really appreciate it. Number one, please subscribe to our show wherever you listen to it, iTunes, Spotify, Castbox, whatever it may be. Number two, please leave us a favorable review. Number three, share. Put it on social media, talk about it to your friends, send it in a text message, whatever it may be. Please share this episode because we put a lot of work into it. We want to make sure that as many people 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 futureoffitness.co. You can subscribe to our newsletter there, or you can simply get in touch with me as I love 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.