Latest / The Strength In Numbers Podcast / EP 34: Connor Abreu | Systems, Staffing, and Building a Profitable, High-Performing Gym

Transcript

EP 34: Connor Abreu | Systems, Staffing, and Building a Profitable, High-Performing Gym · The Strength In Numbers Podcast

0:00
I used to have the mindset of the Joker from The Dark Knight.
0:03
If you're good at something, never do it for free.
0:05
And I've learned over the years that's probably the opposite
0:08
mindset you should have in the beginning.
0:10
You want to be able to show that you could help people 1st and
0:13
provide them with the results they're looking for.
0:15
So you might have to exchange, you know, a little bit of time
0:19
to build that trust with them and.
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Every time my back has gone more against the wall, more positive
0:25
growth has happened. And it's the whole cliche of
0:27
like growth and comfortability are inverted, right?
0:31
So if you want to grow, comfortability is low.
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And if you're not growing, comfortability is high, right?
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What if I went on a Shark Tank? Or what if somebody came to me
0:41
with like licensing or franchising, you know, private
0:44
equity, like what would they want to see?
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And it's, you know, operationally all the I's need
0:49
to be dotted, T's need to cross boxes and be checked off because
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otherwise it's up for interpretation.
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And if you want things done a specific way, you need to be
0:58
clear on it. I want to be able to set myself
1:00
up moving forward so that when we do have a kid, I don't
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necessarily have to be at the gym, you know, at 6-7 AMI can be
1:08
able to weigh down the road, drive them to school or take
1:12
care of them in the mornings. And know that the gym is
1:15
operating without me. So that's kind of like what I'm
1:18
trying to create now and get people in the right places, in
1:21
the right seats and operating at a high level so that I'm almost
1:24
not needed. Welcome to the Strength in
1:33
Numbers podcast. I'm your host, John Bloom, and
1:35
today's guest is Connor. Connor is the owner of Thunder
1:38
and Lightning Performance in New Jersey, and he has done an
1:41
incredible job of leading and growing his gym, driving major
1:45
success and profitability at his one location.
1:48
He was even given the Gem of the Year award in 2024 in the
1:51
business of Strength group that we are both a part of.
1:53
Connor breaks down in our talk his strategy if he had to start
1:56
his business over in a brand new city with no connections and how
2:00
he would build his member base backup.
2:02
It also explains how to find core value fits when hiring
2:05
employees, how to intentionally develop those employees, and how
2:08
to build out standard operating procedures or playbooks for your
2:11
business. Lastly, Connor does an awesome
2:14
job breaking down the balance of writing the best program for
2:17
each client while still fitting everyone into a system that
2:20
makes sense logistically for business.
2:23
Enjoy the episode, Connor, man, It's it's awesome to get it
2:25
connected with you again today. It's been really cool getting
2:30
the getting to meet you through the Business of Strength group
2:32
and just learn from you and kind of see from afar what you're
2:35
doing at TNL and in your gym there.
2:39
And so I know I'm going to learn a lot more just talking with you
2:41
today. For people who don't know who
2:42
you are, Connor, can you just tell who you are and a little
2:45
bit about thunderlining? Performance yeah, absolutely.
2:48
John, thank you again for inviting me to be on the podcast
2:51
with you today. It's good to see you even though
2:53
it's virtually and connect with you again.
2:56
Been a few months, but yeah, I'm Connor Brew.
2:58
I'm the owner and founder of Thunder and Lightning
3:01
Performance, TNL performance for short.
3:03
I was just saying to John before we got on today's actually TN LS
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8th birthday. December 4th, 2017 is when I
3:11
opened everything. And we primarily help out youth
3:14
athletes become the fastest, strongest, most confident
3:17
versions of themselves on and off the field.
3:20
And we also help out busy moms and dads to transform their
3:24
health and fitness and build a healthy relationship with
3:26
training and fitness. Those are our primary 2
3:30
demographics and that we work with, you know, we work with
3:32
college athletes throughout the year as well.
3:36
We've had handful of professional baseball players
3:39
over the years, you know during the offseasons, but those two
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first two groups of people are our primary avatars as you would
3:47
say. And then, you know, I'll give a
3:49
little bit of a chronological background.
3:52
You know, this day eight years ago, I started everything in a
3:55
500 square foot garage space in a baseball facility, rented all
3:59
the equipment about a year and two months or so.
4:03
I bought all the equipment during that time process.
4:05
And then we moved into our current location, what we call
4:09
TNL 2 point O, which was actually right across the street
4:12
from where I started, weirdly enough.
4:15
And we've been there ever since February 2019.
4:18
And during that time we made it through COVID.
4:21
It was just me still working by myself.
4:24
I hired my first employee at the end of 2020, Coach Sean, who is
4:28
my director of training to this day.
4:30
So he actually just hit his five year mark earlier this week, as
4:34
well as a, you know, paid coach too.
4:36
He's been training at TNL since he was an athlete in 2019.
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So he's been, you know, involved with our community for quite
4:43
some time. And then, you know, once he came
4:46
on board, you know, we started hitting, you know, seeing some
4:49
really significant growth. I hired my second coach, Davis,
4:52
in 2023 and then this week just hired my third coach, Coach
4:58
Drew, who just started this past Monday.
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So it's been a very cool process to lead other coaches especially
5:06
have to be able to support them with their lifestyles and
5:09
provide them with a career opportunity as you know, in an
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industry that is very, you know, unforgiving to young coaches and
5:18
it is hard to, you know, keep your foot in the door and in
5:20
regardless of its private or team sports setting.
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So that's been pretty awesome and we've been able to grow from
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I think I opened with eight to 10 athletes, you know, back in
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2017. We are at 110 winter athletes
5:35
right now along with 45 adults in our adult personal training
5:40
program. So that's.
5:41
Incredible. Thank you.
5:43
Yeah, yeah. That's pretty much a crash
5:46
course of TNL. We got some big things coming
5:49
for 2026, you know, within the four walls.
5:52
So I'm excited to, you know, see all that stuff happen in the
5:54
next couple of weeks. We got some new things
5:57
happening. Yeah, man, I've loved hearing
6:00
the story of kind of your growth of your business and kind of how
6:03
you've LED that and then develop that over time.
6:06
And I know before TNL, you kind of started out with some
6:10
internships in the collegiate sector and we're kind of heading
6:14
that direction of maybe being in college coaching.
6:18
But what led to that decision of kind of shifting gears there and
6:21
going and starting your own business versus continuing down,
6:24
you know, being Georgia, being full time college coach and
6:27
continuing down the career ladder of that position?
6:29
Yes, I mean, that's the $1,000,000 question, you know,
6:33
and that was something that I was figuring out during my
6:35
undergrad. So Long story short, you know, I
6:38
was a very undersized athlete back in the day.
6:42
Freshman year, I think I walked in the high school, 5 foot,
6:44
nothing, £100, you know, I was, I was very tiny and I was a late
6:48
bloomer. So my dad enrolled me with the
6:50
same trainer that my brother had worked with.
6:52
And my brother, you know, played Division One baseball at Seton
6:56
Hall University. So he was four years older than
6:58
me. So we went down that path as
7:00
well. And that was a life changing
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experience. Just, you know, getting me ready
7:04
and seeing how much, you know, bigger, faster and stronger I
7:07
could get because that was always something I heard once
7:09
you know, we hit that, you know, puberty age of all these other
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kids are getting bigger. You know, I was very skilled
7:15
player, but I was just behind the 8 ball physically and that's
7:18
what coaches would always tell me.
7:19
So we worked on it and you know, I had got the opportunity to
7:23
play Division One baseball as well and I went to college as a
7:26
pre veterinary major. So within the first semester I
7:31
chose not to do that anymore and I realized I wanted to stay
7:33
around sports and I loved training.
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So when I found out about exercise science, that was the,
7:38
you know, the thing for me to do.
7:40
And I had my sights set on college strength and
7:42
conditioning for the rest of my undergrad.
7:45
Not that I didn't like it. I did an internship at Seton
7:48
Hall University, weirdly enough, with one of your former guests,
7:52
Angela Ginger Elias, my guy officiated my wedding a few
7:55
months ago. That's.
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Awesome. I love the.
7:57
Experience. The guys who I worked with
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alongside with Angela were great.
8:00
They're great mentors. I just learned a lot about
8:03
college strength and conditioning, and it just kind
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of opened my perspective to like, oh, this is what it's
8:08
really about. So I started seeing what other
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avenues there were to be a successful coach.
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I continued as a GA strength coach.
8:16
I'm at a Division Three school in New Jersey, a Montclair
8:18
State, where I actually did my undergrad as well.
8:21
And then during that time, before I finished my degree, my
8:24
graduate degree, I interned at Cressy Sports performance up in
8:28
Massachusetts in the summer of 2016, doing primarily the
8:32
baseball strength and conditioning at Montclair.
8:34
It made me realize like, well, I love baseball, you know, I
8:36
played it my whole life and why don't I just do that in the team
8:40
sports setting of just be a baseball strength coach and get
8:42
into professional baseball as that Ave.
8:46
So at the end of my internship, I had already spoken to Pete
8:49
Dupuy, Erics business partner and the owner of, you know, the
8:52
Massachusetts location about like, a potential business plan
8:56
of starting something up if I went, you know, and did my own
8:58
thing down the road. And then I spoke.
9:00
To Eric about the. Professional baseball route.
9:05
And he kind of opened my eyes to some things just like Pete did
9:08
on the private sector. And Eric asked me that that's
9:10
the $1,000,000 question. He goes, what do you actually
9:12
want to do? And I said I would love to start
9:15
my own facility one day. And he told me, you know, pretty
9:18
much like lose sight of all the other stuff and get into the
9:21
private sector and get good at the private sector was his
9:24
advice. So once he said that and kind of
9:26
changed my motive and I had one more semester of grad school, I
9:31
started pursuing some private sector jobs, jobs in my area,
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I'm in New Jersey, got hired as the director or Co director of a
9:39
facility of a sports performance gym.
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We were actually inside of a baseball softball facility and I
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did that for about 11 months. That whole building kind of fell
9:49
apart, not physically. All the businesses that were
9:53
inside of it all went to different places and we got kind
9:56
of left out on the streets. And that's when I decided to
9:59
start TNL. So I figured it was too good of
10:03
an opportunity to at least try it out to do my own thing.
10:07
And if it didn't work, you know, it really wasn't any skin in the
10:11
game at that point. It was a, you know, super
10:14
favorable investment to go right into it.
10:17
And and you know, I was still living at home at the time with
10:20
my parents. So it was like a safety blanket
10:22
and I didn't have to invest a lot of things right away.
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It was just my time for the most part and building something.
10:28
So here we are today. Yeah.
10:30
One thing I think about sometimes for myself is like
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where would I be if instead of spending however many years like
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coaching in college, like I just started a business back then and
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then continue to grow now. And obviously there's different
10:44
benefits of coaching in college for me of of when I was there.
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But if, if someone's in their undergrad and I remember when I
10:53
was in my undergrad, I like, I would think about wanting to
10:55
have my business sometime down the line, even when I was in
10:58
college at different points thinking about that, but still
11:01
kind of delayed for different reasons.
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If I am in my undergrad, I know I want to at some point run my
11:06
own business, but I'm debating, OK, maybe go in coaching college
11:10
for a bit and get experience and grow my coaching skill.
11:13
Maybe save some money before going and making that leap
11:17
versus just go start into it. Kind of you're talking about you
11:20
were advised just go get good at the private sector.
11:22
What advice would you give someone that's kind of debating
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that path right now? Yeah, that's a good question cuz
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I was an adjunct professor for about seven years and I tried to
11:34
instill some of those qualities into my students even though I
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taught just like a strength and conditioning class, like
11:39
coaching and and weightlifting for me.
11:42
You have somebody like has, you know, Eric Coleman, shout out,
11:45
Eric Pullman, Breakthrough Performance, Long Island.
11:47
He kind of just started it up doing his own thing while he was
11:50
in undergrad, you know, just kind of building his little
11:54
brand. It was a personal brand at the
11:56
time. You have like that route.
11:58
And then you'd have a route that like, I kind of gravitate
12:01
towards of like what you said, like go getting experience, you
12:04
know, in these other areas or just different settings and kind
12:08
of hone in on your skill set and then, you know, kind of build up
12:12
some resources as well. That's what Pete Dupree had told
12:16
me was, you know, save up X amount of money, you know, build
12:20
a little bit of a personal brand so people could recognize you in
12:23
the area. Because he used an example of
12:25
Tony General Core, who was a very big name in the industry
12:29
and former, you know, CSP part owner.
12:31
He was like, you know, he's got X amount of followers, people on
12:34
his newsletter, he's got all these clients and he opened up
12:37
his little personal training studio and it was, you know, it
12:39
was less than 1000 square feet, I think.
12:41
And I had this opportunity come up, you know, while I was there
12:44
for when I came back and he was like, you have him doing that
12:48
and you're going to move into like a 4000 square foot place
12:50
with no clients or anything, right?
12:52
So, you know, I was big on just getting experiences and figuring
12:57
out where I wanted to go to. Like, I'm just getting an idea
13:00
of a vibe of like, what is this setting like, right.
13:04
Like I said, I didn't hate Seton Hall or the college setting.
13:07
I'd love the time there. And I just learned, OK, this is
13:09
what it's going to be like long term.
13:11
I don't know if I want to do that specifically.
13:14
And even like Joe Reggio, I interviewed him for a grad
13:17
school class and like, he kind of laid out, like, what are you
13:20
doing in your summers and your winter breaks while you're
13:22
undergrad? Are you going to different
13:24
facilities? That's kind of like where my
13:25
head has always been a, you know, go try this out or, you
13:29
know, network in this location because you never know.
13:32
Like the CSP network for me is is invaluable.
13:36
You know, the connections that we were able to build up and all
13:39
the other intern alumni and all that stuff that we have in this
13:42
group, you know, be able to just ask somebody like, hey, you
13:45
know, can I send a client there? Or if I have a client somewhere,
13:48
right? Like just getting involved in
13:50
that network, you know, you can't put a price tag on it.
13:53
So you just never know if you work for somebody, what the
13:57
connections they have or if you can intentionally set yourself
14:00
up, do something, you know, along the lines of X maybe Mike
14:04
Boyle's the best person to go get experience with.
14:07
Let me go do that. So I know how he runs his
14:09
business and his training model and everything.
14:12
And then I can take all that, you know, skill set that I've
14:14
developed and then incorporate it and blend it into my own
14:18
with, you know, all the stuff that you've built up to that
14:20
point. So I think that's where I
14:22
typically would lean towards of, you know, if you have an
14:25
interest in something, go dabble with it, learn about it, try to
14:30
become really good at it. And then if you want to add to
14:33
it, go do something along the lines of, you know, something
14:36
else where it's like, OK, maybe, you know, I want to work with
14:39
more baseball performance or whatever.
14:42
Maybe I should go to Driveline for a little bit, learn about
14:45
how they operate and then take it and then kind of blend
14:47
everything into my own approach. Yeah.
14:50
And and I feel like to like, like you're saying, like I know
14:54
especially when you started, you're heavily focused in
14:56
baseball. I know it's kind of expanded
14:58
more, more past that. But like you're really niche
15:01
into baseball a little bit. And part of that probably comes
15:03
obviously your background then obviously going with Cressy and
15:06
obviously there's specialization in baseball.
15:08
And I feel like sometimes when you have maybe that background,
15:11
like for me working a lot in college basketball, I feel like
15:14
that helped me then establish A reputation when I came to the
15:18
business of working with basketball players.
15:20
And obviously doesn't have to stay just in that realm or that
15:23
niche, but then they can kind of help you get your foot in the
15:26
door to get people in and then expand from there.
15:29
Yeah, for sure. And that was something that we
15:32
had learned at CSP of just, you know, when you become the expert
15:36
at the niche, you know, you could work with everybody.
15:40
You know, when you're in and you're known as like, oh, that's
15:42
the baseball guy. Like they used to give us
15:44
examples of, you know, they had a, you know, buddy down in
15:47
Louisiana who was a big football guy.
15:49
But if he had a baseball player in the area, he might send them
15:52
up to CSP, you know, for like a weekend just so that he can get
15:56
into eval and, you know, programming and all that.
15:59
You know, it's a humility approach of like, you know, if I
16:02
know somebody is better at that or they're the expert at that,
16:05
maybe I should help my person out to go there for a little bit
16:09
and then, you know, they can come back and work with me.
16:12
You know, kind of goes back to that.
16:13
If it's like the Jack of all trades, master of none, where if
16:17
he becomes, you know, very keen on, you know, being the expert
16:20
in that specific niche, it's just going to separate you that
16:23
much from. The rest of the pack.
16:25
Sure, for sure. So if you had right now, you
16:28
still had all, all the skills, all the knowledge, all the
16:32
experience that you've grown over the past, you know, eight
16:35
years with, with TNL. But but I took all that away and
16:39
you had no facility, no clients. You just have your experience
16:43
and knowledge. What are you going to do to
16:44
start over and build your business up without having any
16:48
established business going on? It's funny you asked that
16:50
because I've thought about where if I was like, you know, I want
16:54
to just move to South Carolina, you know, move down like Hilton
16:58
Head, SC, what would I do if I did that?
17:00
And like, you know, maybe I still had ties to TNL right now
17:03
or I sold it to somebody, whatever.
17:05
And I just started there. You know, how would I go about
17:08
that if I just moved to another area?
17:11
And I think knowing what I know now would be identifying if I
17:16
don't have anybody because that was an advantage of me starting
17:20
TNL was the facility I worked at was 1520 minutes away from where
17:25
I started TNL. And when all that stuff
17:28
happened, I was all out of my control with the, you know, even
17:31
like the business I worked and it was out of our control and we
17:34
couldn't do anything about it. You know, a lot of our clients
17:38
and parents had come up to like our coaches and said, you know,
17:41
if you guys wind up somewhere in the area, we'd love to maybe
17:44
continue training with you if it makes sense for everybody.
17:47
And one of my college team mates, him and a business
17:50
partner, they had a baseball facility in the Shore area, New
17:53
Jersey, so about 50 minutes away or so, and they created a
17:57
satellite location. He was a strength coach, You
18:00
know, we connected on that. And I kept in touch with him
18:02
after our playing years. And that's when I was like, OK,
18:05
this could be a real opportunity.
18:07
So I kind of had this advantage over somebody started from
18:10
scratch of I had some people following me and, and I had a
18:14
spot that I could just kind of walk into and just have all this
18:17
equipment and have this, you know, minimal overhead.
18:20
Knowing what I know now too, it's it's all about location.
18:24
I'm not going to set up a location in the middle of
18:26
nowhere and expect to, you know, charge 500 bucks a month when
18:30
people don't even really know like, Oh yeah, fitness is a big
18:33
thing. So it'd have to be somewhere
18:36
geographically that makes sense, you know, within the
18:40
demographics of that area as well.
18:43
Saturation would be another thing for me of not getting into
18:47
an area that's super saturated. Like you just look at, you know,
18:51
New Jersey's a very dense area to begin with.
18:53
North Jersey even more so. And you know, I know like the
18:56
Varsias guys have talked about all the gyms that open up in
18:59
their area and everything along those lines.
19:01
It's like, well, I'm not going to open up over there.
19:03
But some of these businesses, like there's this one successful
19:08
small group personal training gym that's opening up.
19:10
You know, I think they have a dozen locations in New Jersey
19:12
now and they, they run a pretty good operation and they're
19:15
opening up in all these areas that are very competitive too.
19:17
So, you know, it's definitely strategic on their end.
19:20
I don't know anything really about it.
19:23
So like it would just be identifying an area that I, you
19:26
know, would want to, you know, live in if I was starting over
19:29
from scratch and then find the demographic population within
19:33
that area that I want to gravitate towards.
19:35
And then it, you know, the biggest thing would be trying to
19:38
establish myself by offering, you know, because I used to have
19:43
the mindset of the Joker from The Dark Knight.
19:45
If you're good at something, never do it for free.
19:47
And I've learned over the years that's probably the opposite
19:51
mindset you should have in the beginning where it's just, you
19:55
know, you're trading, you know your time to be able to
19:58
eventually get money right? You want to be able to show that
20:01
you could help people 1st and provide them with the results
20:04
they're looking for. So you might have to exchange,
20:07
you know, a little bit of time to build that trust with them.
20:10
And, and you know, when you have that trust, you know the
20:12
influence lever, there would be authority, you know, you're
20:15
showing them that you know what you're doing.
20:17
And then eventually the social proof comes after that as well.
20:21
So going to specific if I want to continue working.
20:24
With athletes going to, you know, training facilities, you
20:27
know, if it's a baseball facility or a soccer facility or
20:30
you know, a basketball facility or even schools and trying to,
20:34
you know, get involved with them so that you know, the parents
20:37
and athletes can see what I can do.
20:39
And then along those lines, maybe find.
20:42
Either. You know, if I'm building up a
20:44
home gym, that's probably what I would do in the beginning as
20:47
well. You know, if I'm to say I have
20:48
some stuff now, try to build that up a little bit so that I
20:52
can control my overhead and then, you know, people can come
20:55
to me in that area as well. I can have a home base and try
20:59
to branch out into multiple different avenues or locations
21:03
and, and kind of plant the seeds in those and just build the
21:06
brand up as much as I can. And a lot of hustle and bustle
21:10
is kind of how I would look at doing that if I were to, you
21:13
know, move down the Hilton Head, SC and just kind of be a
21:16
transplant in the area and just get people to know who I am.
21:21
Yeah, that's really great, Connor.
21:23
And as you talk about, you know, trying to go maybe if they're
21:25
trying to get athletes going to those facilities and you know,
21:28
giving yourself for free for some information there to
21:30
establish yourself. I've been thinking about trying
21:33
to do more of that myself too. Like right now we've got a lot
21:36
of basketball, but a bit of volleyball and trying to get
21:38
more and more into volleyball, especially as kind of their
21:40
school seasons finishing right now and kind of get with the
21:42
clubs. And I've been thinking about,
21:44
you know, as we try and reach out to these different clubs or
21:47
organizations and maybe get in front and give some type of
21:50
presentation and, and hopefully connected, like what is the
21:53
everything? Like?
21:53
What is the information I could give that one is valuable to
21:57
them, but also maybe like shows them that they need some help in
22:03
those areas to actually get the most results from it.
22:06
And that I'm actually the one that would be best to help them.
22:10
As you kind of think about that mindset and trying to provide
22:12
value, but then also get them to like want to be work with you
22:15
from that value. Like how do you go into that
22:18
trying to execute that? Yes, I mean.
22:20
Lately I've I've gone down like the, I guess more you say more
22:25
of like the sales rabbit hole. You know, I've been training up
22:27
my team on, on that stuff over the past three months.
22:31
It was a quarterly rock for us this year, you know, for Q4 this
22:34
year. There's really two things of why
22:36
people won't want to do something with you.
22:38
Like if you can kind of just use these as your basis of is it the
22:43
desire objection? Like what is the objection of
22:45
why somebody wouldn't want to train with you?
22:48
Desire means they're, they just don't want to do it yet, right?
22:51
They have the interest and everything.
22:52
The, you know, they maybe it's a time factor or it's, you know,
22:56
commitment level, They're just not ready to do it yet.
22:59
And then the big one, the more challenging one from what we've
23:01
seen is a value for unique solution where, you know, as
23:05
like Alex from Moses say, fitness is a commodity, right?
23:08
Anybody can do it anywhere. It's not like you're going to an
23:10
auto Body Shop where not everybody thinks they could fix
23:13
their own car, right? So if you can overcome those two
23:18
objections and be able to see, you know, where they're coming
23:21
from, now you can directly try to combat them in specific ways.
23:26
But like, the laws of influence are definitely drivers of how
23:30
you combat those objections or overcome them.
23:32
So, you know, for you bigger in the basketball realm, you've had
23:36
X amount of years of coaching. Like that's authority right
23:39
there. Like you've got Damian Lillard's
23:40
jersey in the background, right? You know, it's like I've worked
23:44
with him, you know, or whatever the capacity of it is.
23:47
Or you know. I'm just throwing an example.
23:49
It's like if you can establish that authority now you're,
23:52
you're already somebody like, OK, I should probably listen to
23:54
you, right? If you go to these clinics,
23:57
it's, you know, you're very well versed on the, you know,
24:00
education side of things as well.
24:02
And you've worked with multiple sports in college.
24:05
So it's just like, OK, if there's a specific population of
24:07
people, can I learn a little bit more about that, you know, sport
24:11
specifically and find out what the pain points are.
24:15
Maybe it's like injury rates and knowing how to overcome those
24:18
injury rates and be more resilient.
24:20
You know, what are things that are going to factor into a
24:23
better performance as well? You know, if it is volleyball,
24:26
it's like, OK, like let's try to work on lower body, you know,
24:30
resiliency and try not to get, you know, or lower the risk of,
24:34
you know, ACL injuries or whatever it may be.
24:36
And also showing like volleyball, typically people
24:38
think, you know, jumping a lot. Well, volleyball is an overhead
24:42
sport too. So if you can work on that stuff
24:44
as well from like the shoulder perspective, now you're doing
24:48
things that aren't from my perspective.
24:50
I don't think that population of people is really focusing on
24:53
those things. They do so much overhead hitting
24:56
and all that. And when we give volleyball
24:58
players in, I go right to the overhead athlete thing, you
25:00
know, on top of like obviously jumping right and being able to
25:04
move around multidirectionally. It's like, well, your your son
25:08
or daughter's an overhead athlete.
25:10
So we got to train the shoulder as if like were a baseball
25:13
pitcher for the most part because of all the reps that
25:16
they're doing and just, you know, knowing every in and out
25:20
so that you can focus on a couple of things that that
25:23
population can get benefit out of, right?
25:25
Like what can you walk into that facility with that's going to
25:29
benefit them versus the, you know, place B, you know, gym B
25:33
that thinks they're the, you know, whatever.
25:35
Like how can you differentiate yourself from them and provide
25:39
them with resources as well? Like obviously you can maybe put
25:43
on a vertical jump clinic or you could do like a volleyball
25:46
clinic that has vertical jump training and you know, some
25:50
shoulder care or whatever. And then you give them a
25:53
resource as well. Maybe it's a down like QR code
25:56
to like an ebook or you print out the ebook some more, add
26:00
value that you can give in the beginning of insights to things
26:05
that they should be doing. You know, that's just going to
26:08
establish yourself and it's a planting the seed, right?
26:11
We all want to get that instant benefit.
26:13
Maybe get a sign up on the spot. But six months later or next
26:17
school year, you might get 8 sign ups from that same exact
26:21
group of people. It's just, you know, from what
26:23
I've noticed in my experiences, we get people, they all that
26:26
they came in once or we they met US1 time somewhere and then all
26:29
of a sudden the year later it's like, OK, I remember you now.
26:32
Yeah. Yeah.
26:33
No, no, I think that that's really great information there.
26:36
You know, you talked about it before of when we're talking
26:39
about going college versus private sector and business and
26:43
kind of thinking about, you know, basically what path and
26:45
what vision you had for for life and for your career.
26:49
And how has the vision of which you basically want your life to
26:53
look like led to the principles of how you've operated and the
26:57
decisions you've made of how you've grown and LED TNL and,
27:01
and, and intentionally built that to also set up the life
27:05
that you want down the line? Yeah, I chuckled when you said
27:08
that because I had this thought come to my head of, you know,
27:11
there is a specific point in time.
27:13
And it's when I met my wife was when I was like, oh, maybe I
27:16
should, you know, be a little more in.
27:19
Tune with things. I haven't been much of A long
27:22
term thinker in my life. I guess it's like my ADHD brain
27:26
like I just like need to do things like, you know, right on
27:29
the spot. Like I in school, I never was
27:32
somebody who planned work out in advance.
27:34
It was always like do it when my back was against the wall so I
27:36
could just like not focus on anything else.
27:39
I've kind of operated the business like that.
27:41
You know, it sounds bad, but it's not really a bad thing.
27:44
Once I hired Sean, I was like, OK, I got a mouth to feed.
27:46
And I just went over this in our team meeting just talking about
27:50
TN, LS birthday and Sean's anniversary.
27:52
And like, you know, hiring Drew as well.
27:54
Like all these things are happening.
27:56
It's like, all right, I got a mouth to feed.
27:57
You know, I got some kid who's, he's quite literally it not
28:01
monetarily investing into my business, but he's investing a
28:05
chunk of his life into it. And it might have only been a
28:09
year or whatever, but he rolled the dice on TNL and he rolled
28:12
the dice on me as a business owner, right?
28:14
So I was like, shit, I got all this going on.
28:18
I got to keep him, you know, fed and, and, you know, wanting more
28:22
out of what we could do. And he's always been, you know,
28:25
I know if I grow, the business is going to grow too.
28:27
And that's kind of what drives Sean from what he's always told
28:30
me. And then when Davis came on
28:32
boards, like, okay, now I got two people.
28:34
Now I got to provide a lifestyle for them as well and myself.
28:38
And that's around the time when I started getting a little more
28:40
serious with my wife. I think we had just moved in
28:43
together a few months before that, and we started talking
28:45
about future plans. And then, you know, like last
28:48
year we got engaged and we were, you know, starting to look at
28:51
the housing front. And it was like, OK, I got to
28:54
make sure. So it's not like I reverse
28:55
engineered it. It was like a stimulus got
28:58
presented and I had to adapt to that stimulus, right?
29:02
So I've done a little bit more longer term, like foreshadowing
29:06
moving forward ever since like we went down like the engagement
29:09
slash, like wanting to buy a house.
29:11
I was like, OK, I got to set these things up for us to be
29:13
ready for that as well. And then now it's like, you
29:16
know, we're going to start trying to, you know, plan for
29:19
kid in the next year or so. And it's like that's on the
29:22
docket. We've been working towards that
29:24
versus, you know, you talk to me 2021-2022 ago.
29:28
Yeah. Like, you know, it's great.
29:29
You know, like, you know, I'm figuring it out as we go.
29:33
And that was the mindset. You know, I think that's the
29:38
differences of like my growth as, you know, a business owner
29:41
operator versus it just being like a gym owner.
29:45
That's how it was back then where like I was on the trading
29:48
floor 40 plus hours a week back then.
29:50
I was still coaching six days a week, you know, doing all that
29:53
stuff with Sean and I just like couldn't get out of my own way.
29:57
I guess I didn't know any better and I didn't have like, I should
30:00
probably change my perspective and my mindset because now I
30:04
want to create this lifestyle of where I want to be, what I want
30:09
to do personally, because like, you know, I didn't think of it
30:11
like that. Like that's why you get into
30:13
business, you know, at the at the end of the day is, you know,
30:16
you want to be able to create freedom for yourself.
30:20
You know, you don't want to be living in the business 24/7.
30:24
It was fun in the beginning. I loved doing that.
30:27
And now it's like my responsibilities have changed as
30:30
well. You know, I can't stay at the
30:32
gym till 8/8/30 at night and you'll get home after 9 and work
30:36
on programs as soon as I get home.
30:38
I have to be able to, you know, other duties that I'm
30:42
responsible for being a husband and all that.
30:45
And I want to be able to set myself up moving forward so that
30:48
when we do have a kid or kids, I don't necessarily have to be at
30:53
the gym, You know, at 6-7 AMI can be able to weigh down the
30:57
road, drive them to school or take care of them in the
31:00
mornings and know that the gym is operating without me.
31:04
So that's kind of like what I'm trying to create now and get
31:08
people in the right places, in the right seats and operating at
31:10
a high level so that I'm almost not needed.
31:14
Yeah, yeah. And you've mentioned a couple of
31:17
times they're like hiring those employees I just mentioned right
31:19
there like that's having, having good employees you can trust is
31:23
going to be essential to get into that spot in business and
31:26
life for you. How have you found like what?
31:29
What have you done to be able to find and then also evaluate who
31:32
are going to be the best fits for you from from an employee
31:36
standpoint for TNL? It's another good one, John.
31:39
So we just had an internship interview yesterday.
31:42
We have a really good connection with the local school, the
31:44
College of New Jersey, TCNGA, the very good exercise science
31:47
program. We typically will get one to two
31:50
interns from them every year. The guy runs the internship
31:53
program. Real good dude.
31:54
You know, very methodical with how he even sends people our way
31:58
or just other facilities too. Like they don't just send you
32:00
somebody to send you somebody. Like they want a good fit before
32:04
they even interview with you. They want to know that.
32:06
Like if you say, hey, I want to do physical therapy down the
32:09
road, they're not going to send you to us unless you said, like,
32:12
I would like to do this to be able to be a better PT.
32:15
Then they might say, OK, you should probably go there along
32:17
with getting, you know, some PT hours or whatever it may be.
32:19
Right. So we've been lucky.
32:22
You know, I don't say lucky. I, I planted that seed.
32:24
And, you know, grateful, I should say, to be able to have
32:27
that many students coming in over the years.
32:29
We've had over 20 interns since 20. 20/19/2019 was my first
32:34
official summer intern, Sean was number 2 and 2020 and then since
32:39
then we've had 18/20/21 and beyond where we've had two to
32:44
five interns a year since then. So yesterday an interview, he
32:48
asked us some good questions and you know, in Sean's response, he
32:52
went, you know, to the core values, right?
32:54
And that was awesome to see him do that of, you know, for a good
32:58
intern to be a good fit for us or just do a good job, even if
33:01
we don't hire them, you got to be a good core value person.
33:03
And the more and more the deeper into business and just being
33:06
around all the other business owners within the business of
33:09
strength and, you know, consuming information from our
33:12
industry and other industries, it core values is a huge thing.
33:16
And like Dan had just talked about, like they're trying to
33:19
quantify core values that you can be able to check a box off.
33:23
This person is doing this Corvette because it's a very
33:25
qualitative approach. When you have like John, are you
33:28
putting in effort, right? Like our core vows or
33:30
commitment, consistency, effort, self-awareness of patients.
33:33
It's like, well, how do we know your patient?
33:35
So being able to quantify that, but leaning into those core
33:38
values. So in the beginning, I guess it
33:40
was more of an intuitive approach of, OK, John's dog,
33:45
right? He wanted to come train with me
33:47
when he had he's coming off a labrum surgery and to get ready
33:50
for a senior year of college. So like right there invested
33:54
into, you know what we were doing our summer savage first
33:57
one ever. So I just knew he was a good
34:00
dude right deep down. We connected well and then that
34:04
winter, you know, he was APE major in college, so he didn't
34:07
have to go down this route that winter.
34:09
He approached me, said, Hey, I want to do the internship next
34:12
summer. Like what do I need to do?
34:14
And I you know, I was like, cool, like I'll get you all
34:16
ready for it as we get closer to it.
34:18
And obviously it's a win win for him.
34:19
You know, he gets a, you know, he would have got training for
34:21
free that summer too. That's a perk of, you know,
34:24
being an intern. But he was already paying.
34:26
So he knew the deal. So, you know, smart on his end.
34:29
But it was the COVID summer, so he did virtual sessions with me
34:34
leading into like when we got back to in person outside and we
34:37
were putting up canopies outside of the back, you know, our
34:40
garage, moving equipment in and out every day.
34:42
So it's like he did everything and it was like, who else is
34:45
going to do this with me, right? He's a, you know, a TNL.
34:49
He's a culture guy vibes with our clients.
34:51
Like the right there was it wasn't like I had specific
34:55
intangibles I was looking for. It was just like a feel thing,
34:58
right? Which might not be the best
34:59
advice for somebody. And then as we got more and more
35:03
interns over the years, we did have one who I called the intern
35:07
of God away. He was an awesome guy, spring of
35:10
2022. And I just didn't know how to
35:13
approach it from a business perspective.
35:15
So I knew he would have been a good fit for us, but I was like,
35:18
do I have the money? Do I not have the money?
35:19
If we get this many athletes or this many members, like I'll
35:22
hire them then versus using it as a investment.
35:25
Because when you think about like the total payroll, it's
35:28
like big number. But when you break it down to
35:30
like the payroll cycle, it's like, oh, I probably could have
35:32
paid for them back then and we probably would have got more out
35:34
of them then. And I could have did a little
35:36
bit more on the business side, you know, back then a little bit
35:40
quicker as time got on. It's like the core values, core
35:45
values, you know, do they mesh with us and like our community?
35:50
And what we're looking to do is, you know, how I'm going about
35:54
our approach. And I just got done with the
35:56
hiring process as well. So like prior to that, it was, I
35:59
was like, I'm going to hire from the internship program
36:01
exclusively. It was like a badge of honor.
36:04
I had for whatever reason, maybe this fear of having to hire
36:07
somebody and coach him up without, you know, doing it for
36:10
free for, you know, three months.
36:13
So like on the internship side of things, you know, developing
36:16
them and we have a curriculum and they have, you know, it's I
36:20
would say it's self-paced, but it's like we have topics every
36:23
week that we review and that they should be up to speed with
36:25
by the next one, right? And if they're not, they should
36:28
be asking questions like we look for those things, you know,
36:31
earns wise. If we were going to hire
36:33
somebody, we want to make sure they live close enough to the
36:35
facility where it's not like a burnout thing.
36:37
You figure like 45 to an hour cap like at most because we did
36:42
have some interns who are commuting an hour ish plus.
36:44
And it's just like good for you for doing it and committing to
36:47
it, but it's like you, we're not going to be able to hire you
36:49
because we're not going to be able to pay you enough to move
36:51
to this area, especially in New Jersey.
36:53
So that was one thing we would look for in like developing, you
36:57
know, for future coaching talent was do they live close enough?
37:00
You know, are they connecting with clients?
37:02
That was a lesson I learned from Joe early on with Sean, I was
37:05
like, results, He's got to be doing this many programs.
37:07
He's got to be making sure we get this much progress.
37:10
He's like, dude, you're going to teach him how to write programs,
37:13
You know, like the back of his hand.
37:14
He's got to be good with everybody, right?
37:16
From a people perspective, like he's got to be swift.
37:18
He's got a deal. He's got to do all that stuff.
37:21
And I was like, OK, so that's a huge thing, what we look for in
37:24
our intern pro internship program specifically.
37:28
And like, just do you want it? Like do you want to be a
37:30
strength coach? Do you want to be a personal
37:32
trainer? Do you have an interest for
37:34
training? Are you actively seeking out
37:37
information? And it was refreshing for this
37:39
intern interview yesterday. The guy was like, I know this
37:42
person and I followed this person and I hurt my back.
37:45
So I looked up some stuff and I found these couple of guys who
37:48
like I followed their methodology and I got my back
37:50
better where I just went through a, you know, three-week long,
37:54
long hiring process, you know, externally.
37:57
And there were, we had like 5-6 finalists and a good, a good
38:02
chunk of them didn't know they weren't reading books, they
38:05
weren't like consuming like training podcasts or whatever it
38:09
is and this. And that's like, do you really
38:10
want to like be a coach now? Like the guy Drew who we hired,
38:15
you know, he was, he's come across as a dog and, you know,
38:19
it seems to be really into training.
38:21
Knew some big names in the industry was following their
38:23
protocols. He trains along that lines.
38:26
He's college football player too.
38:27
Worked at a couple colleges, you know, strength and conditioning.
38:30
So it's just like he did a lot of things, checked a lot of
38:33
boxes for what we were looking for.
38:34
We had some good candidates as well.
38:36
We had like kind of Sean and I talked about like a specific
38:39
type of person that we were looking for that would have come
38:42
in and complimented our personalities, right.
38:46
I'm not much of A type A personality in TNLI am That's
38:51
like, you know, my my Zen place. So like I'm just myself there.
38:55
Like who It's kind of like pro wrestling, like the characters
38:58
in the WWE or pro wrestling, like they're just a personify or
39:01
magnified version of who they really are.
39:03
That's me at TNL for sure. Same thing with Sean and Davis
39:07
as well, like we're kind of more introverted people by nature, so
39:10
we wanted somebody to come in and have this personality and,
39:13
you know, not be afraid to like just throw themselves into the
39:16
fire. And those are some of the
39:18
qualities that Drew had as well. So very interesting process
39:21
doing it externally, very different because it's like a
39:24
crash course. You got to be able to identify
39:26
those things. And I went through a pretty
39:29
rigorous interview process of phone interview for, you know, a
39:32
little bit of time, then a in person or virtual like hour long
39:36
interview with Sean and, and then in person shadow day.
39:40
And the in person shadow day is what separated everybody.
39:42
And we had two finalists and they were the ones who
39:44
definitely did way better than the other ones.
39:46
You know, compared to the other shadow days weren't very good.
39:49
They just kind of held up the wall, you know, So we weren't
39:52
looking for that. We wanted somebody, even though
39:54
it was their first time being in there to go up to people, talk
39:56
to them, you know, outside of just like the training knowledge
39:59
and you know, be afraid to make mistakes or ask us questions as
40:03
well. So.
40:04
I know that might have been a little long winded, but overall
40:07
it kind of ties back to the core values, right for us.
40:11
Are they committed to wanting to get better?
40:13
And you know, going through this whole process, are they going to
40:16
put 100% effort in day in and day out?
40:19
Are they going to stay consistent not just with their
40:21
effort and their work ethic, but their energy levels?
40:25
Are they going to stay consistent with that as well?
40:28
Self-awareness is the oddball of the group, but you know, am I
40:31
sharpening my blade is the way we always kind of go back to it?
40:35
Am I asking questions? Am I seeking out information,
40:38
right? Am I trying to help provide more
40:41
value for what TNL is trying to accomplish?
40:44
And the last thing is patience, right?
40:46
If I'm a young coach, I'm not going to be making 75100K right
40:49
off the bat, but I could do that eventually, right?
40:52
Especially in this industry. And for me, that's what I'm, you
40:55
know, looking to do is provide more opportunities like that
40:58
down the road as well, you know, for an industry as we talked
41:02
about earlier, that just gets battered with burnout.
41:04
Yeah, Well, man, there's a there's a ton of gems in that.
41:07
That was great. As you talk about now you've
41:09
just hired Drew and now he's starting up.
41:12
What are what are the intentional habits or or
41:15
routines that you're going to have in terms of developing him?
41:19
And obviously he sounds like he's a great coach, but
41:21
developing him into your system and into your business.
41:25
And maybe touch on, you know, at the weight room mouth when you
41:28
present, you talked a lot about how you kind of been investing
41:31
into building out these standard operating procedures for TNL and
41:35
maybe just about like that investment for you and what
41:37
that's helped just with your business and your employees.
41:42
And and also kind of building to that vision of where you're not
41:45
having to be there and manage everything, but you can still
41:48
have that system running without you there.
41:50
For sure. Yeah, this goes back to one of
41:54
my best friends who's my college roommate and teammate, trained
41:58
at TNL for years. He played, you know, I think
42:00
like 6 or seven seasons of independent pro baseball.
42:03
And he has a contracting business now and he, I think it
42:07
just started it, but we've always been bouncing business
42:10
ideas of each other. He's always, you know, kind of
42:12
like when he was training at TNL, like talk to me about
42:14
business stuff. And he's got a very business
42:16
centric mind. We got dinner one night and he
42:18
was like, I was talking to him about hiring Davis.
42:21
I was about to do it and he and some of the, I guess, I don't
42:24
know, pain points, but just like maybe some things I was like,
42:26
oh, I got to make sure I do this, this and that, blah, blah,
42:29
blah. And he's like, you need to
42:30
create playbooks. And I was like, what the heck
42:32
are you talking about? And he was like, you got to
42:34
write everything down and blah, blah, blah, like, you know, you
42:37
want to even just something as simple as opening the facility.
42:41
What are what is every detail that you're going to have to do?
42:44
And I remember Joe used to do a drill like that with us and the
42:47
BOS of like, what's the peanut butter Jelly?
42:49
And, you know, drill of how do you make a peanut butter and
42:51
Jelly as precise and concise and get to the point as quickly as
42:55
you can that like a third grader can understand it of how to make
42:58
a good PB and J, right. And I put all these pieces
43:00
together. I was like, OK, maybe I was a
43:02
little bit behind the 8 ball at that point in business of not
43:05
having as many SO PS or playbooks.
43:07
But that's when I started doing all that.
43:09
And that's where I'm at now as well of like, you know, year end
43:14
stuff. I'm like, I got to get way more
43:16
of these things done. Mike Lisey and the Ignite crew,
43:19
they used Loom for us. So I'm big on Loom now.
43:21
I'm starting to record more videos for the staff.
43:24
And I've learned that in Dan Martell's book of buy Back your
43:26
time of the the camcorder method, where if you want
43:30
somebody to learn something from you, you record it, you give it
43:33
to them and you ask them to re record it.
43:36
And then now the second version, the one that they did is the
43:39
actual version that you're going to keep with your team moving
43:42
forward. So I'm not a team builder
43:44
expert, but Seans going to put together that and he's going to
43:47
have some responsibility of like getting a video together for
43:50
Drew and and just future coaches of like this is what team
43:53
builder is, is how we use it, all that type of stuff.
43:56
And we've got some other, you know, online softwares that
43:58
we'll use that I'm putting together now.
44:01
Just more clarity, better communication and a better
44:04
expectation of what I want done. Like I've, you know, my wife,
44:09
she kind of hates it. Sometimes we go to restaurants
44:11
and I'll just observe like how their service is, you know, how
44:14
the managers walk around or what the servers are doing, you know,
44:17
the whole staff. I've gone into places and I've
44:19
seen in the bathrooms, they have checklists for cleaning in the
44:22
bathroom. Like, OK, there's an idea for me
44:24
right there to take back to you now.
44:25
Now we have a huge spreadsheet that's on a piece of paper.
44:29
And every two times a week we go through the facility and we
44:32
check all the equipment, make sure everything is operating and
44:35
there's nothing that could go wrong if a client was going to
44:38
use it. So just little things like that.
44:40
But it, you know, this whole time it's made me realize like
44:42
there's still so much information, information that if
44:45
I want to continue scaling it the way I want to be able to get
44:48
to 1 day and even like just having that what if I went on a
44:51
Shark Tank or what if somebody came to me with like licensing
44:55
or franchising, you know, private equity, like what would
44:58
they want to see? That's you know, operationally
45:01
all the IS need to be dotted. T's need to cross boxes need to
45:04
be checked off because otherwise it's up for interpretation, and
45:08
if you want things done a specific way, you need to be
45:11
clear on it. Yeah, Yeah.
45:12
No, no, I love that. I know that that's something for
45:16
myself as I'm in a lot earlier stages of my business and the
45:20
first year or so kind of doing my own and figuring it out and,
45:23
you know, maybe operating more off feel or, you know, adjusting
45:27
things that I go. But now, once I started hiring,
45:29
you know, my first employee, it's like, OK, now I've got to
45:32
like, I can't just I can't just operate on on my own intuition
45:35
feeling now like I've got to create more systems and
45:37
playbooks like you're talking about.
45:39
So it can, you know, I can help him out and not leave him
45:42
guessing of what am I going to do.
45:43
You know, how are things going to go that we can have a plan?
45:46
And as it grows to more and more employees like it's, you know,
45:49
it's not just all over the place in a different experience if
45:52
it's different people doing different things.
45:53
For sure. And that's like, you know, just
45:55
like strength and conditioning, like, you know, programming is
45:58
an art, but it's a science at the same time.
46:00
And that's the hard part of with those things specifically
46:03
because you and I might write kick ass programs, but if we
46:06
bring somebody in, you know, or you're getting hired by me or
46:10
I'm getting hired by you, you know, you, we have a way that we
46:13
want to train people and it can't be all convoluted.
46:16
So that was something like early on that I had to do it, you
46:19
know, on the programming side of things, it, you know, it's
46:22
become more systemized, specifically where in the
46:25
beginning I, I had AI held my hat on customized training, you
46:29
know, from like the my CSP days. And even when I trained to the
46:32
guy, you know, he was big on like writing individualized
46:34
training programs and everything.
46:36
And obviously I had college weight room experience and I was
46:38
like, I'd rather be doing my own thing, you know, as an athlete.
46:41
But we had to do the team stuff. And then as the years went on,
46:44
it was like, all right, well, you got to water it down somehow
46:46
because each person's not going to think exactly how you think
46:50
on that front specifically. Like operationally, same thing
46:53
with sales. As long as you have a system in
46:55
place, you might do it differently than I do, but we
46:58
still might get to the same result as long as we're
47:00
following a process. Like our personalities are
47:02
different. So like programming was the 1st
47:05
Drew playbook that I came up with where it was like Sean and
47:08
me sat down one day for like 3 hours to just whiteboard it out.
47:11
Like, OK, here's what we want to do for a programming and this,
47:14
this and that. And then over time, it's gotten
47:16
a little bit more systemized to the point where we keep it
47:19
individualized. But we have the amount of volume
47:22
that we're seeing these days has to be scaled back, you know, and
47:26
the avatar that we're working with is more along the lines of
47:30
like a 13 to 16 year old who really doesn't have much
47:34
training experience. Where in the beginning it was
47:37
more like sophomore to senior level baseball players who were
47:41
like, I want to play D1 or I definitely want to play high
47:44
level college ball and whatever, you know, capacity where I was
47:47
like, OK, like I had like, I guess it was just like the said
47:50
principle that was the stimulus, you know, and I had to adapt to
47:54
that and that's what I was creating or I was attracting.
47:56
And now it's like we have such a niche with just developing young
48:00
athletes and building that foundation with them that we
48:03
don't need to get super specific as much these days, you know,
48:06
and when we see kids, we'll make the individual adjustments with
48:10
their programming as needed based off of any injuries or
48:13
specific goals. So yeah, I would say like
48:16
training was the first playbook that we ever like put together.
48:20
Yeah, yeah. And that's definitely an area
48:23
that I'm I'm kind of, I feel like going maybe a similar path
48:27
to you where like I started, you know, and I kind of still have
48:31
it all where like each person has their own kind of folder and
48:34
it's their visual program. It's within the system.
48:37
But I feel kind of you right now.
48:37
I've got a lot of those, maybe sophomore to senior or college
48:40
athletes that are, I want to do the high level if I, you know, I
48:43
want to give them the best product.
48:44
But now is that, you know, I've got more clients like, OK, how
48:47
can I make sure it's not like chaotic and can still fit
48:51
logistically into what we're doing and while still trying to
48:54
find the balance of giving them the best product?
48:56
So that's definitely an area where I'm trying to find more of
48:59
that system while still trying to give each person what they
49:01
need. It's definitely a balance.
49:03
But yeah, when everybody's doing different things, it can
49:06
definitely get pretty chaotic if it's not scaled into a system
49:09
there. You know how how it can all flow
49:12
together within a session? 100% and you're in the advantage
49:16
or advantageous position these days with, you know, you're
49:19
learning from all the other gyms in our network and everything.
49:22
So you're getting, you know, the most like fine-tuned approach.
49:26
So, you know, I envy you because of how much good information
49:30
you're getting from all these other, you know, really
49:32
successful gym owners that you're connected with.
49:35
Yeah. You know, kind of what's
49:37
something that maybe used to really believe in and about in
49:41
business, but now you don't believe.
49:43
Business specifically. Could be training or you can go
49:46
anything business, training or life.
49:48
I mean, business specifically, like, I think the one thing was
49:52
something I mentioned earlier of the Joker quote where I guess I,
49:55
you know, thought that was the right philosophy.
49:57
But if you look at the, you know, the character that is, you
50:00
know, portraying that, it's probably not the best character.
50:03
Maybe he's like Superman and what he said.
50:04
But yeah, I learned, you know, that the hard way, I guess, of
50:08
just like, maybe turning things away because it was supposed to
50:11
be done for free. And it's just better to give
50:13
information away for free because the end of the day,
50:16
like, nobody's going to be able to do what you do.
50:18
And I could tie that back to like, Cressy sports performance.
50:21
Like Eric gives away so much information and they gave us so
50:24
much information during our internship and everything too.
50:27
It's like they know we're not gonna be able to replicate
50:29
exactly what they do there. You know, as much as people
50:32
wanted to create like their own little Cressy models and
50:34
everything, and I tried to do that and it worked for a little
50:38
bit and I came to terms with like, oh, maybe I need to change
50:41
my programming. So it's more of like a training
50:43
philosophy versus like business. But like I'd say the business
50:46
was, you know, just give more for give more out right.
50:49
Eventually it'll come back to you.
50:51
But on the training front, that's where I kind of had the
50:53
biggest mindset shift of, you know, I remember the first
50:56
summer I was in business, you know, I had like 10 high school
51:00
kids middle school and I had like 10 to 12 college athletes
51:03
that summer as well. And all, you know, same thing
51:06
with like you just said, higher level athletes trying to get the
51:09
1% out of them, you know, get a little bit more change.
51:13
So I was doing manual arm care in every session, like in their
51:15
programs, you know, their C's and D's like accessory work for
51:18
like lower by days. Either core arm care and a lot
51:21
of those manual arm care, which is what I took from CSP and even
51:24
the previous place I worked at, but we had multiple coaches.
51:27
CSP gets 11:50 coaches every, you know, 3-4 months just due to
51:30
the amount of interns they get. I was doing arm care for like 4
51:34
hours straight every day, you know, because like each session
51:37
had, you know, 2 to 4, you know, of the kids who were doing those
51:41
manual arm care. So like at a certain point in
51:43
the session, it was just like I was going from one person to the
51:45
next just doing, you know, 9090 ER holds or like manual
51:49
resistances and all that stuff. And I was like, I'm not even
51:52
enjoying this right now. Like not necessarily enjoy as
51:56
like I can't be as present because I'm just like bouncing
51:58
to arm care, arm care, arm care. So like that's where
52:01
philosophical changes needed to happen early on.
52:03
Knowing as like, OK, I'm by myself.
52:05
What can I do to substitute that and get the same kind of
52:09
benefit? Maybe not, as you know, the same
52:12
thing, but close to it. And then over time it was like,
52:16
all right, well, the CSP model and like how they train their
52:20
baseball players, that's heavily influenced.
52:22
That's like the roots of how we go about our programming.
52:25
But then became like, well, our baseball players, they train
52:28
like animals, you know, but maybe they don't go to the right
52:31
hitting instructor or the right pitching coach now that now
52:34
they're not as good of a player as they could be.
52:37
And baseball, softball, such as skill driven sport with hitting
52:41
and throwing that if you stink at those things, you're going to
52:44
stink right, regardless of how fast or strong you are or
52:48
whatever, doesn't really matter versus like maybe in soccer,
52:52
lacrosse, you know, you don't, you can be a little bit more raw
52:55
athletic or like football, something like that.
52:57
Still need to be pretty skillful to be really, you know,
53:00
competitive and successful. Don't get me wrong, Like
53:02
baseball, we are seeing kids who are just investing so much, you
53:06
know, time, effort and making so much progress in the training
53:09
floor and then like they go on to the field and minimal
53:12
increments, you know, and they're throwing velocity just
53:14
because they're throwing mechanics were absolute, you
53:17
know, crap, you know, so that's where I was like, OK, we can't
53:21
rely on that anymore because we don't have control over that
53:24
variable of baseball development.
53:26
And the next move for me was always early on was I want to
53:30
open up a one stop shop facility and that's kind of shifted and
53:33
I've kind of put that one on the back burner.
53:36
I don't really want to do that one as much anymore these days
53:39
or at all. Just so many different things to
53:41
account for. But that's where I was early on.
53:43
Like I got to create a one stop shop and have hitting instructor
53:46
and pitching coach that like we can all get on the same page and
53:49
control those variables. So then it was like, OK, what's
53:51
the next thing that we can control within training that's
53:54
going to transfer to on field performance.
53:56
And I've always had a passion for speed.
54:00
I was always a fast runner and so I was like speed development.
54:03
So I went down that rabbit hole and we get kids fast these days.
54:07
So that's like kind of what we hold our hat on.
54:09
We are still known as like baseball and softball.
54:12
Like, Oh yeah, you guys train a lot of baseball softball
54:13
players, right? Like do you work with soccer
54:15
players? It's like, yes, like almost 40%
54:18
of our athletes these days are because our soccer players like
54:20
3040% whatever it is. So I just know that speed is the
54:25
one thing. The only skill that we really do
54:28
in the weight room are in training that will transfer to
54:30
the field because otherwise you're not trapped bar dead
54:33
lifting on the mounder and the batter's box.
54:35
You know, you're not bench press like those are all abilities
54:37
that we're working on within physical preparation and
54:40
physical development. But sprinting, whether it's
54:43
linear laterally, whatever it is, but the skill of sprinting
54:46
or moving like that is what we do on the field, right?
54:50
You know, jumping is another one for most sports, but the sports
54:52
that we were primarily with don't aren't as like jump heavy
54:56
compared like, you know, basketball, volleyball, stuff
54:58
like that. But you know, sprinting is the
55:01
one skill that will transfer to the field of if if you're
55:04
faster, you're going to be a lot better on the field.
55:06
We can guarantee that. So regardless of your other
55:09
skill set. So that's what we kind of like
55:11
hold our hat on. Yeah, and I love it.
55:14
Now the last thing I got for you is, you know, we've talked a lot
55:17
about, you know, there's a lot of benefits to renting a
55:20
business, but there's also a lot of sacrifices and and just
55:22
stresses. Like you're saying, you've got
55:24
you got mouths to feed with your employees.
55:26
You've got, you know, you've got a lot of things right on your
55:29
back and there's no one above you telling you to do anything
55:32
right. It's, it's, it's on you to make
55:34
these decisions or not. It's like what what drives you
55:37
and keeps you going to make those decisions that you have to
55:40
make each day to to keep TNL running and profitable and
55:44
growing. For sure.
55:45
It's ironic because I've always been somebody who I don't know
55:49
if it's probably a double edged sword because I've always
55:52
thrived off of structure, right? Like if you tell me what to do,
55:55
I'm going to do it to the full stability, right?
55:59
So it's ironic that I don't have somebody telling me that
56:02
anymore. And it's like, oh, no, I got to
56:04
do it myself. So good thing I, you know, I
56:06
signed up with the business of strength early on.
56:08
So I've, I've had that mentorship and that
56:10
accountability to check me when I need to be checked and just
56:14
kind of pat me in the ass along the way of like, yeah, like make
56:17
sure you're doing this, make sure you're doing that, that
56:19
type of stuff and get that mentorship.
56:21
But we actually just talked about it yesterday in our staff
56:24
meeting and Sean and I had an our leadership meeting on Monday
56:28
and it was a quote from Adam of just creating deprivation for
56:32
yourself. So like for those that, you
56:36
know, maybe don't know that we're listening.
56:37
Deprivation is just like, you know, Adam, use example, LeBron
56:40
James, like he doesn't have enough money.
56:42
Like any pro athlete, like Derek Jeter, like I don't have enough
56:44
championships. I need more, you know, Yankees
56:46
Aaron Judge mindset of like, well, we lost in the playoffs
56:49
again, I won the MVP, but that's not good enough, right?
56:52
Like they need that that one more thing.
56:54
So for me, it's always kind of like in intrinsic motivator,
56:58
driver of my backs against the wall, What do I need to do to
57:02
get out of there, right? If I make a big investment money
57:06
wise, like, you know, BOS back then that was a huge investment
57:09
when I wasn't really making any money.
57:11
It was like, all right, well, how many more people do I need
57:13
to make that money back and more right of like, and then just
57:16
going to the next thing. Now it's like everything's a
57:19
numbers game for me and I'm very number centric and driven.
57:22
So it's like, if I need this much in payroll, like we have to
57:25
make at least this much money and revenue for that percentage
57:28
to be there. And then it's just like every
57:30
time my back has gone more against the wall, more positive
57:34
growth has happened. And it's the whole cliche of
57:37
like growth and comfortability are inverted, right?
57:40
So if you want to grow, comfortability is low.
57:43
And if you're not growing, comfortability is high, right?
57:47
So hired Sean, made a big, big jump in, in, you know, growth in
57:51
revenue and all that stuff when he came on board closer to the
57:54
gym as well. And, you know, had personal
57:57
finances go through the roof compared to what I was doing at
58:00
the time. So another, you know, back
58:02
against the wall, then hired Davis.
58:04
So it's just like all those types of things.
58:06
And it was like buying a house, you know, preparing for a
58:08
wedding and then, you know, coach #3 all those things that
58:11
to me is like where it knocks you down a little bit and it's
58:15
like, OK, how do I get back up? And beyond that, it's like, you
58:18
know, not necessarily one step back, 2 steps forward, but it's
58:20
a similar kind of mindset of, you know, I just had to, you
58:24
know, it's a challenge. How do we overcome the
58:26
challenge? So that's, you know, how I've
58:28
been this whole time of, well, I don't have anybody above me
58:31
telling me what to do, but this is the plan, this is the mission
58:35
and this is the vision. All right, well, how are we
58:37
going to stay on track with all of that and more, right?
58:41
So just going back to what do I want to get out of all this and
58:47
how can I get there as maybe scary as it may be, but it's
58:52
worth getting through it and not backing down from it.
58:56
Yeah, No, man, that that. That's awesome.
58:59
I love that. And like you said, I think, you
59:01
know, if people are listening, they're thinking about running a
59:05
gym or they are running a gym, I think they definitely need to
59:08
check out the business strength and the the resources and help
59:11
of being part of that group is just incredible.
59:13
But man, there's been an awesome conversation.
59:15
There's been so many insights that apply to a ton of what I'm
59:19
thinking about for myself and my gym, but I know so many other
59:22
people get so much from it. Also, if people wanted to, you
59:26
know, connect with you or learn more about TNL, like where
59:28
should they look to to find more So standard stuff, you know,
59:33
Instagram. Is probably where we're most
59:35
active in terms of like communicating with people.
59:37
So at T as in Thunder N as in negative L as in lightning
59:42
performance on Instagram, that's where you can see everything
59:45
that we do from, you know, just outside looking in.
59:50
You can go to our website, tnl-performance.com.
59:54
More information there. And if you wanted to connect
59:57
personally with me, Instagram is at Movement Ninja Instagram and
1:00:02
then my e-mail is connor@tnl-performance.com.
1:00:07
You know, if you have any other questions or anything, you know,
1:00:10
feel free to shoot me Adm or send me an e-mail or something.
1:00:13
I'll be happy to chat with you. I'm very open to.
1:00:16
You know, communicating and trying to, you know, just share
1:00:19
thoughts and talk shop with people.
1:00:23
Awesome man. Thanks Connor for sharing all
1:00:24
that. Hey man, keep killing it.
1:00:27
You're doing amazing things with TNL.
1:00:29
Thanks John, much appreciated and you as well.
1:00:32
I'm excited to see your growth for next year again, you know
1:00:35
from what you're already doing this year.
1:00:36
Thanks for having me.