Studio Success in a Small Town with Rachel Eidson

You've been running your studio for years. You survived the startup phase, you survived COVID, and now a competitor just opened down the street. You're still teaching most of the classes. And that teacher training you've been meaning to launch? Still sitting on the back burner.

In this episode, Jackie sits down with Rachel, owner of Elevate Coleman—a barre, yoga, and Buti yoga studio in a small Southern town. Rachel found Jackie during COVID recovery, went through the Studio CEO Program, joined the Grow Mastermind, and now works with Jackie one-on-one. She's nearly a decade into her business and still growing.

Timestamps:

[03:30] From show choir and gymnastics to barre
[07:00] Proof of concept before signing a lease
[11:20] Opening with a 6-month-old
[14:00] The 3 phases of running a studio
[20:00] How Rachel found Jackie and decided to invest
[27:00] The VIP on-site visit experience
[34:00] How Rachel talent-scouts and develops teachers
[43:30] The CEO mindset shift — working on the business, not just in it

Key Takeaways:

✔️ You don't need a perfect manual to launch a teacher training. Version one is the goal.
✔️ Proof of concept can start with a notebook, 50 names, and basic math.
✔️ Every studio goes through three phases: startup, survival, and stable growth in competition.
✔️ Operating in your strengths and hiring for the rest is a CEO-level decision. ✔️ Being around other scaling studio owners shows you what's possible—and what's next.

Pull Quotes:
"If they were playing baseball, I've been in T-ball."
"There's no such thing as a perfect manual. Can you get version one out there now?"
"My job is CEO first. Teaching supports that."
"Steer yourself and your team toward what's going right. Do more of that."

FAQ:
How do I know if my town is big enough for a boutique fitness studio? It's math, not population. Figure out how many members at what price point covers your rent, then work backwards. Rachel opened in a town with zero boutique fitness and built a nine-year business doing exactly that.

Studio CEO Program vs. Grow Mastermind — what's the difference? The Studio CEO Program is where you start—auditing your business and building core systems. The Mastermind is for owners who are already running and ready to focus on leadership, paid ads, and scaling alongside other growth-minded studio owners.

Should I launch a teacher training before it's perfect? Yes. There is no perfect manual. What you know from years of teaching is the curriculum. Get version one out, then refine. Waiting means another year of being short-staffed.

How do I find good teachers for my studio? Watch your students. Look for people who absorb instruction as a teacher would. Rachel identified one of her best teachers just by observing how she moved through class—then asked her to lunch.

What does the CEO mindset shift actually look like for studio owners? It means recognizing that your primary job is to grow the business—and teaching supports that, not the other way around. When teaching starts competing with strategic work, something needs to restructure.

How do studios survive when competition moves in? Get specific about who you're for and what result they get. The studios that th

Work with Jackie Murphy

• Say Hi on Instagram @studioceoofficial
• 3 Marketing Mistakes Yoga & Pilates Business Owners Make:
  https://www.jackiegmurphy.com/3-marketing-mistakes
• Join The Studio CEO Program: https://www.jackiegmurphy.com/studioceo

Transcript

Welcome To Studio CEO

SPEAKER_00 0:12

Welcome to the Studio CEO, the only podcast that empowers yoga and Pilates teachers and studio owners to step confidently into their role as CEO. If you are ready to show up with passion, take your business seriously, and scale to new heights without burning out, you are in the right place. I'm your host, Jackie Murphy, an award-winning certified business coach with over 12 years of experience inside the yoga industry. I have seen firsthand what it takes to build a profitable and scalable business. Join me as we dive into strategies, insights, and real-world advice that will help you grow your revenue, build a thriving team, and create a business that serves you as much as you serve your students. It's time to embrace your inner CEO and make more money without working more. This is just the beginning. All right, my friends. Welcome back to the Studio CEO podcast. I have another guest for you today, a client interview. My client Rachel is here to share her story and her experience in her business. Rachel, welcome to the podcast. Thanks, Jackie. I'm so excited to be here. Yeah, I'm happy that you are here today. Why don't we start with? I always like to go back to the beginning. Like, how did you find bar, yoga, Pilates? What did you find first? Have you always been a person who's into movement? Tell us like your origin story. Okay, I was thinking about this this morning and uh kind of like origin story and movement. Growing up, um, I did two things in in high school that kind of in hindsight led me in this direction. Um, the first one was like growing up doing gymnastics and cheerleading stuff. And then this is gonna sound funny for anybody familiar with the Southern Baptist Church, but we had this amazing show choir. Oh, it was called Chi Alpha, and we went on these awesome tours. Like every year for spring break, we would go to different cities all over the U.S. We would like sing and dance, and like cool. Do you remember the show Glee? Yeah, okay, we we were that like before Glee was a thing, and um like several members of the choir went on to like make music their career in Nashville and LA, and um that was like where I figured out like oh, you can put together this choreography and like lead this large group of people. Yeah, and so I think it was like the athleticism of like the gymnastics and cheer competition and then like the group and this like glee style show choir. Um, that like I can kind of see the connections now, like all the way through um that when I was first introduced to bar through a friend and moved to a new city. They were opening a Pure Bar. It would have, it was the first studio of any kind uh in Huntsville, Alabama. And um, I actually had not taken a bar class before. I just like went to this interview because I needed a job. And uh it was an like instant hit. Um accepted the job, went to Denver, Colorado for training. Um, and the first day that I took class, I was like, oh my gosh, I've made a mistake. That was way too hard. Um, and I was like in great shape at the time. I had been running a lot. I had finished this like goal for the year to run a hundred miles every month. I mean, like I was I was ready, but I was also very humbled, which I think is a common thing for people in the world of bar. It's like a very humbling uh discipline to take on. Um, but I I did go back and finish training and finish working there um and worked with that franchise for five years, and then we moved to a small town with again no boutique fitness of any kind. Um so you can kind of like see the pattern there. Um and I just joined the local YMCA and thought that would be pretty good, and it was fine, um, but really missed the work that uh that Bar did for me. Um again, staying in shape, I was like swimming and doing all these other classes, and it just did not produce the same result. So my friend who owned a dance studio um offered like a space to host class once a week. Um, we kind of started there, proof of concept, right? Yeah. Um and it it was nothing about it was like takeoff, uh, but it was like week after week, different people would come in and try this. They seemed to like it, they were willing to pay for it. Um, you know, like all of these things that you're trying to set up, like would this business work? Um and so that went on for at least a year. Before I was ready to sign a lease and open elevator. Yeah, yeah. Okay. I have so many questions from that. It also makes so much sense with the show choir, with your like being able to count to music and teach to the beat really well. I'm like, yes, that line connects perfectly. Because not everyone has that skill or the ability, as you know, and you are very talented at doing that. Let's go back to, I'm thinking of a client right now who really wants to open a studio and doesn't necessarily have proof of concept in the sense that like there's another studio in that town already doing the same thing. She would be the first, she would be out there. And often what we're talking about with her is like, well, what if it fails? What if I don't succeed? What if people don't come? How did you get to the point where you were like, I believe in bar in this town enough to sign a lease? Was it the pop-up classes or the classes that ran for the year? Or just like your bravery? So a couple things happened there. One, as much as I love the discipline of bar, the practice there. Um, another thing was happening during this time in the small town with no studio. I had my first child who is now nine, and like I can almost track the studio with him. Yeah. Um when he when he turns 10, we'll be nine and a half, like all of that. But wait, you opened when he was six months old?

unknown 7:45

Yeah.

Opening With A New Baby

Three Business Phases Over Nine Years

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Holy moly. So, so okay, this this follows pretty closely too. Um so I knew that um like going through labor and delivery and recovery, that um yoga was a huge part of recovery for me. That like, even though I was super familiar with how to modify your classic bar exercises, there was still a lot to just focusing on breath work and regaining that like recovery feel of like bringing everything in. So I knew that I wanted to have uh like a step down in intensity, but still like uh what's the word? Not intensity, but um, something that people could really connect with. And then I wanted something that was more like cardio focused as well. So kind of having these like tiered, I guess if you're thinking of how sweaty would your class be, like having three tiers available. Um so I'm like looking at can we do this studio? Do people like this kind of core offering? And to the person who's like, will this work or not? I like had this little infant child sitting here, he's snoozing, and a notebook. And I like start writing down these people that I know who have like come to class over the last amount of time. And I was like looking at him, and I thought, like, he's he's like a little plant. He sits right here, he's happy and he's growing, and that is gonna last not long. Yeah, he is going to take off, and like if I'm ever gonna open something like this in my town, I actually need to move on it. And so I made this list of people because I didn't have a software program, we weren't working off of anything, but it was like, who have I met? Who do I know that would I think be interested in this? Um, and you want to talk about working backwards? I was like, okay, if I if these like 50 people, if I can come up with 50 people and they would be willing to pay X for a membership, you know, just guessing, truly. There was no chat GPT to help me do this. Great. Um like and then from there I was like, so what would my budget for rent be? It was that basic, that fundamental. But it put me in a place of like I I found a spot I thought I liked. It was more than I could afford, and like I was very candid with the landlord at the time of like, here's what I think we'll be doing. Found other places nearby that were offering rent at the rate that I needed that I was asking for. And so like that was a key um negotiation at the very beginning, yeah. Um, and it still felt scary. Yeah, yeah. So like signally that I don't think there's a way to do that without having a little bit of doubt or a little bit of fear. Like, I'm doing this, I'm fully committing. So when you opened for the six-month-old, talk to us about that. Was it like immediate, like those people who you thought were going to buy did end up coming in, or was there building in the first few years? Um, some of them did. Of course, not all, right? There were surprises that came in I didn't expect. Um, just like as a fun story to moms that are looking at this. Um, they do these uh, they call it second Friday nights in the summer, and I was hell bent on having an open house for this second Friday. Like it was so hot, we're like sweating. I look back at it now and it was so basic. Like, I think we had tiny little water bottles, they weren't even branded or anything, but like the doors were open, right? Yeah. And we're hanging out, people are coming by, and and William started toddling. Oh that night. Oh my gosh, like my little potted plants moving now. Like so he sat still while we painted and and did things, but then like that night he was like, No, I'm gonna move, mom, and it was you know, real, real sweet. That's scary. Um, but another thing, like with people coming in, um when when my husband was like, Oh, this might work, because like God love him, he didn't say this is a terrible idea, but he the the moment that he was like, I think this might work for you was when people he did not know were signing up and coming to the studio because he grew up here, like he knows this town better than I do, or certainly at the time. Um we've been here for a while now. So, like for him, he was like, I don't know who would come to this. Yeah, so for him to see like this is catching on was um kind of a switch of like this is a working business, okay. Yeah, yeah. And I just it's so common to hear like it's a small town. I don't know if I can be successful, or it's a small town. Will this work for me? And I I think I even talked to you about this. I think I did like a business plan calculator for you where I'm like, listen, here's the population, here's how many people you can hold, like, here's what you could be doing in the studio, and just boiling it down to like, yes, you might be in a small town, but that doesn't mean the business can't really thrive in in its own way in whatever that means for each business. So talk us through, I mean, you said almost nine and a half years, like highs and lows of nine and a half years. What has been the hardest part of keeping the business open? And then we'll maybe go to the highs after that.

unknown 13:52

The best.

Finding Coaching During COVID Recovery

SPEAKER_00 13:53

You know, I could it's just ironic that it's divisible by three, but there's been like three distinct phases. Like the first three years um are hard because it's new. Yep. Um, and in that first three years, I had my my children were very little. Um, I had William, and then my daughter came about two years later. And so like that was hard and fun, and like all the ways that you know, the first three years of business, everything is new. Um and then um, so if we're tracking timeline, we opened 2017, and then everyone knows 2020 was a dumpster fire, right? Like when I look at how like in January of 2020, I did the whole pick a word thing, and um the word was consistency, and we do this big challenge that like ended on St. Patrick's Day. We had a party, it was so fun, and then two days later we were closed, yeah. So there's like this second phase that is the like COVID survival and recovery phase, right? Um because maybe more people experience this. I I think that the bar and yoga, like Pilates specifically, was impacted differently because a lot of our customers like want to know the rules. We want they want to like be courteous and conscientious, whereas like big box gems, people are just gonna show up when they're ready. Um, and and so our recovery phase of like finding a new normal, I would say that was at least three years. Yeah. Um and then in the last two and a half years, um, we are no longer the only boot deep studio in town. So now it's the phase of like competition in a small town because it the town has grown, but it has not like doubled or tripled in size. Yeah. Um and so that feels like a new phase too. Um, there are days when I'm like, I don't have to be everything to everybody. That's great. Um, and also all of the hard things that come with differentiating and establishing yourself. Um, so I'd say the three phases of the business have been like the um startup, COVID, and and now in in a phase of like stable growth in the midst of competition. Yeah. We're having, I can't tell you how many people come to the studio CEO program and be like, I've been open for 11, 20 years, and now I am seeing a dip or a drop because of competition. Like it is a very common problem right now because our industry is growing so fast and new things are popping up. And I guarantee, like, the messaging that you use in the first three years is has to be different than what you're saying now in the town to stand out. Let me ask you this. And this is gonna sound kind of pessimistic, but I don't mean it like that. I love that you're like, here is here was the hard part of the first three years, here was the hard part of the second three years, here's the hard part now. In business, like problems are kind of forever. There is always something that you could be solving, restructuring, optimizing. How have you maintained like attitude-wise, mindset-wise, through all of those different phases and and decided to stay in it and stay consistent? Uh I mean, having a good coach helps. Uh sometimes having that sanity check is like, whoo, okay. Yeah, you're not like completely off base here, Rach. Um and I think all entrepreneurs suffer from that seizure of like, okay, if I just do this one thing, it's all gonna get one thing. Um I was, you know, and another like entrepreneurial fit. I watch Shark Tank, not all the time. I love it. I love it. Um, and I can't remember which of the sharks said this, but it's one of those pieces of wisdom that has actually been really helpful for me. That if you are gonna stay in business and you are like across the board every single day is gonna have highs and lows. And like the bigger your business, the more of those you will have. And so I think the like challenge in leadership is to steer towards the highs. Like, you don't ignore the lows, you have to fix it. But I think the like biggest challenge to me on leadership has been steering like myself and my team towards like, here's what's going right. Do more of this. Yeah. Um, yeah. Keeping yourself focused on that and then keeping your team focused on that. Yeah. And that can be tricky. Like, I mean, what studio does it have like some post-class like trash talk time here and there? Like, I know that's so normal. And and yet, like, even in that, to kind of catch like here's your chance to move it in another direction. Um acknowledging that, like, if if you're gonna experience those positive things, like the the hard parts are unavoidable. Like, yeah, yeah. It's almost even across the board if I go for it. Right? It's like, well, these three great things happened, and I gotta fix these two problems over here. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I love that quote because I do agree, like, as you grow your business, your problems get bigger and your successes get bigger and both go grow with you. So tell me uh when did you find did you find me via the podcast? When did you find me in your studio journey? Yes, uh, let's see. It would have been in the COVID era or like recovery space. I am a I listen to a lot of podcasts, audiobooks. Um, I actually just did this recently, um, like types of learners, and I I learned by listening. Interesting. Um so I was like searching something in my podcast, and hello, there you were. I I think I went back and maybe even started from the beginning. Oh man, of your podcasts, which if someone is like on the fence about whether or not to hire Jackie, I mean you can do really well listening to your podcast. Yeah, I probably did that for a while. Yeah. Um joined some workshops. Uh-huh. Um, and then I don't know, have we been working together two years now? I feel like so. I think so. You came in through the studio CEO program and then decided to join the mastermind. Let's talk about, and I don't remember how long you've been the studio CEO before, but let's talk about that transition. Like, what made you say, like, I want next level support? I'm like willing to put in more, invest more in order to grow. Um, I think it was just where I was at in my business. Like the studio CEO was very helpful to um kind of like you're looking at a map and and you want to like figure out you are here, right? And then where you're going. Yes. So it was kind of like the you are here part permanent. And and a lot of it was like, yes, we're doing these things well. And yes, we're doing these things well. And like, oh, I kind of want to tweak that. And so that was really great. And like as an ongoing business and like managing a team, the the mastermind made a lot of sense for the stage my business was at, is at. Yeah. It is really for people who don't know, they might be listening. Like the mastermind is really focused on leadership, leading yourself, your team, and your business, and then also diving into paid advertising and funnels and like more in-depth marketing and sales setup. But it also just gives you an opportunity to be around other business owners who are scaling at the same time as you. So kind of, I don't know if you've had that experience before, but let's talk about like what was it like to be in a room with other studio owners who were growing, scaling, learning the same things, leading teams. I mean, honestly, there was something you gave us to work on, and I was like, oh wow, this is what it looks like. Because I I thought, okay, I need to dial back and fix some like things that I kind of thought I had going well, but realized as quickly as some of the people in that room could churn out ads that somebody had put together for them or tweak this over on their website or whatever. I was like, this is another level. Like if I was if they were playing baseball, I'd been in T ball. But doing good in T ball. I was really good at T-ball. Yeah. They they were playing coach pitch or like something else.

unknown 23:50

Yeah.

Sustainable Growth For Studio Owners

SPEAKER_00 23:52

Yeah. Yeah. And I don't think you can know that until you see it, right? Like, kind of like you were saying, you're like, I thought I was like checking all these boxes and doing well. And then you had the opportunity to see, oh, it could look like that. Yeah. That's kind of the eye-opening experience of, oh, there's there's a place for me to grow that I wasn't even imagining before. I will say though, it was like, okay, this is what it would take to switch that. Whereas like I had participated with a coaching program like right maybe a year after we'd open, like very early on. And it was geared towards um like franchise models, uh, a lot of any-time fitness groups, which is very rarely a single person team with with you know helpers, right? So what they were focused on was like wildly out of what I could do, whereas this was more of like, okay, this is what stepping up a level looks like, but it's still um, you know, one and two location studios. This is still people who um like might be picking up their children after school. And because there that's a thing too, right? Like you're building this business, you want it to be successful, but um also like if that takes away from the lifestyle I'm trying to build, then I haven't quite done what I meant to do. Totally, totally, yeah. And that's really I would say like that is the client I attract. I think partly because I am a mom and I talk about being a mom and I talk about at 3 p.m. Like I'm done for the day and I go see my kids. So part of the way that I teach growth is to make it sustainable. Like, what do you only want to work while your kids are in school hours, but you have a certain revenue goal? Like, let's hit that together versus let's do whatever it takes and work all the time and scale as many studios as we possibly can, which is just a different game. It's just a different way to approach it. We have now then gone from working in the mastermind to working one-on-one, which it's been about six months, which I can't believe it. I'm like, that flew by. And we just did our VIP on-site visit. So I'd love to hear your thoughts. Like thinking about the people who are listening who they were like, ooh, I actually had so many Instagram messages. I want you to come to my studio. I'd love to have you here. Like, what was your biggest takeaway, or just it doesn't have to be a takeaway? Just what was the experience of having me in person in the studio compared to on Zoom?

unknown 26:49

Yeah.

On Site Visit And Studio Experience

Building Teacher Training As Revenue

SPEAKER_00 26:52

Um, you know, the day of the visit, I woke up and I was like, I'm so nervous. She's scary. I'm like like eyes closed, like still thinking, like, but like, why? Like, this is really good. I've been like looking forward to this. It was probably like when I was deciding on whether or not to step up into private coaching, I was like, oh no, I I need Jackie to come see our space. Like, that was one of the reasons that I decided to do that. Um, and uh, so it's like, okay, this is all like working for me for the studio. Um, and then like, you know, as soon as you came in, I was like, oh yay, she's here. Okay. And I also had this thought of um, like, if I go all the way back to my roots in just like boutique fitness in 2010 with a large franchise, I don't know, maybe the largest franchise now, the exponential has combined in so many ways. And I don't know if I can say that, uh, but um they do that all the time, right? Like they have people coming in to review, and and so if it's like just me out here swimming on my own, like yeah, and I get this brilliant idea that I want to share with the team, um they trust me, they like me, they they'll probably um take to it, but like having that support from somebody else that says, like, hey, um, we are working with other studios in places just like yours, and here's how they handle this. Yeah um, it helps a lot. Yeah. It it is something that like when I was going around opening studios, on-site visits were it was like a quarterly thing. Like it was so embedded in a part of what we were doing because there is something unique from my perspective. I know the studio, I know you, I kind of like know what we've been working on, but at the same time, I I'm not attached to it at all. Like, I don't own the business, it's not my business. I don't know your teachers, I don't know your members. So going in, I I really get to see like, what does it feel like? What does the experience from start to finish being a new student look like? Are there gaps here that we can fill? Like, what does the team feel like? A lot of times, team members, we do an anonymous feedback survey ahead of time, they'll tell us stuff that they don't necessarily comfortable telling the teacher. And I get to relay that to the owner. So it's a very unique, like, I always feel like a secret shopper at first. I'm like, I'm gonna go in and like sense how the studio is operating. And it gives me like such a better, I think I said this to you a million times, but it gives me a such better understanding of like everything you've been telling me. I'm like, oh yeah, now I can like feel it and really see it and understand it. And it also can be as simple as like, I do this every time I walk into a studio and I'm like, signage for membership. You could put it there, you could put it there, you could put it there. And like that, like very basic in-studio marketing piece, I don't think is it's really hard to, I can tell you over Zoom, put up marketing in your studio, but it's so different to say, like, no, right here, this is where it should go and this is what it should say. It's so fun, it's such a like cool experience for me on the back end to do it. One of the things that I saw while we were there on site, I took a booty yoga class. Melanie, is that her name? Yeah. Melanie taught, and I hadn't done boody yoga since college. So I'm like, I'm all in, let's do some Buddha yoga. But it was the most like fluid. Oh, it was like just such a great Buddha yoga class. Her sequencing was really fluid, her music was really fluid. At the end of it, I was like, How long have you been teaching? Like, you clearly are a seasoned teacher. And she's like, No, I just started. And come to find out, you essentially like talent scouted her, told her to go get trained in Buddha yoga and then put her in teaching. There, that is a skill of being able to say that teacher could grow in this way, or I see their talent in this area. Let me pull it out and expand on it even more. How are you doing that for people listening? Like, how are you seeing? Oh, look, she would be great at this, and I'm gonna send her to get trained. Well, because I went to the mastermind, I know my strengths finder is arranging people. Yeah. And I there's this book they turned into a movie called Molly's Game. Um, I love that movie. Uh-huh. Okay. So for anybody who doesn't know it, this girl put together a perfectly legitimate business of hosting card games. Um, and she got in trouble later on for some type of SEC filing. I don't know what it was, but it it all turned out well for Molly. But Molly's gift was figuring out who would want to play together. Yeah. Um and I like I can so clearly remember uh this girl taking class. She's one of the teachers you didn't get to take from. And I was like, she's a teacher. Uh-huh. And I like asked her to lunch. It was it have it was like asking her out on a date. It was awkward. Like, so would you ever do this? Because I just like it, it's it's like you can just see the way they're like processing what they're hearing and seeing and how they're putting it together, like for Melanie to go from teaching bar to Bhuti Yoga, which, if you're not familiar with Bhuti Yoga, um, it's B-U-T-I, uh, the Sanskrit word for um the hidden cure. So it's yoga, but um think like big and dance inspired. You're always moving. The moments of stillness are few. You're finding your like center in the middle of chaos, which I'm like, that is my life. Yeah, yeah. That is perfect. Um, and and the way that uh Melanie tended to connect the pieces of her bar class, I could see that working in that discipline specifically. Um, and we're gonna host a training. Bhuti is the the brand, so we'll host theirs at our place in the fall. Um and that uh the founder recently stepped back into Buddha yoga, and um I'm excited to to host it again. It's been a while, and um it's fun and sometimes it's like the it kind of unlocks things for people. Like I think in that training they talk about how common it is for somebody to get to Savasana and that and and like kind of cry a little bit. Like good cry. Yeah, yeah. It's very somatic, like release, like doing it makes a lot of sense. So here's what I hear from that. Number one, I love that you're like, because I did the strengths finder. There is an element of truth to that. In the mastermind, we use a tool called the strengths finders to identify your top five strengths. The the idea of that being in your business, you should be operating in your strengths and then higher to support your other needs of the business for people in their strengths. So if anyone's like listening, that is something that she's referencing there. But I do think it's just if you're operating in your strengths in your business, you're going to do well. Like that's very, to me, very logical. So you're operating in your strength as leader, teacher, developer. We would never in your business like delegate that out to someone else because that's your natural strength. We might instead delegate, I don't know, marketing or that's not your strength either, but like something that's not your, I love this and I can do it really well. So that's the first thing I hear. The second thing that I hear is like more of like the basics of how you do it. It sounded like you really observed people, like you watch and you notice, and you're like watching how they're learning, watching how they're moving, watching how they're teaching already. And then you're connecting what you're observing with what could be their potential growth. And so let's say someone listening, you're you haven't done the strengths finders, you don't know if this is your strength. This is where you would start. Just like really take the time to be present, watch your people and think what's possible for them. How can I connect them to growth in their area? That's very cool. Sounds just like you're teaching a yoga class. Be present, observe. Right growth. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so let's talk about like now growing the business. We've just added a training in as an element to your business. One to create teachers, but also two, because you have this skill set of developing people, like we might as well really lean into it. What has it been like creating that what I would call a premium value offer or higher ticket offer for people to train? Uh, you know, that was something that I didn't realize I was already doing, but had been putting it together. Um, like, oh my gosh, we need this. And then it was always behind, right? So um when when it came up, I like suggested it offhand and kept moving. And you were like, whoa, whoa, whoa, stop, stop right there. Come back. Yeah, you need to do that. And I was like, okay, that's fine. I'm sure we could. And and it's funny how many things I'm like, well, like that doesn't require a ton of coaching. I already know how to do that. Um, but I do need the like, no, that's what you need to go do. Yeah, right. Um because if you're running the studio, that's like there's always something to take your energy. You have to pick where it's going. And so you encouraged me to direct that energy towards um a teacher training. And I was like, yeah, but like, will people pay for that? I've just been training people because I desperately need teachers. Um, and you know, we we know that a lot of teacher training attendees, um, people who complete it, don't teach. Um, and actually with this first group, I think most of them will, or at least interested in it. They desire to. Um, but it was like maybe a week of like really focusing on updating um the teacher training materials that I've been using. Um, but wasn't like new work, not really. Um there was email sequences, which I'll be honest, I probably did half of what you told me to do. The truth comes out. I'm just kidding. But like that's still a lot more than I would have done.

unknown 38:32

Yes.

Perfectionism And Version One Launch

CEO Mindset And Where To Find Rachel

SPEAKER_00 38:33

Like I feel like you know that. You're like, if I told her to do 10, she'll do five. Yeah, right. Um but I I am like decent at targeting who I thought would respond to them. Um and uh we have a really good group. It's a first-time teacher training group. You know, if we had ended up with 10 or 12, whatever the like high reach number is, that would have been a stretch, especially for um like number of classes available for them to take. Because we've we've got a really excited group of five that like want to do this. I think it's perfect. Yeah, that like there's a place for them in the like first meeting, yeah. Which I set it up as a 40-hour training spanning over six weeks. And um, this is like not the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders, there is space for everybody on this team. You don't have to kick somebody out. Um they're not gonna get cut halfway through, yeah. Well, and and trying to share um the the range also of what we offer, right? So, like if we have this middle ground of bar training that is very Pilates based, very like yoga flow. Um, and it's strength training, right? Like at the heart of it, like bar is strength training. You're just using your body weight for most of it. Um, and and then helping them kind of see for somebody who might approach it with a major focus on the yoga side, like they might spend more time there and trying to help them develop their strength. Yeah. Like, are you the yoga style teacher or are you the um more like loud, fast, maybe this is your sculpt style class, um, help helping them go through that. And um we're almost halfway through the training now. Yeah, and like every session, I'm like, this is so great. Yeah, good. I'm thinking of a client who she's short staffed right now and needing teachers. And so one of the things that I told her is like, hey, you might consider a 50-hour training and and creating your own teachers, which I think is as the industry grows, it's almost gonna become necessary that you have some sort of way to train your own people and bring them in to teach. But her response back, and I love her so much, she's actually gonna be on the podcast in a few weeks. She was like, Oh, I'll do that winter of 2027. And I was like, wait, why are we pushing it off a year and a half to do training? What would you say to that client who's like, I would love to do training. I know I want training, but I think I'll need to do it in a year and a half now that you're in it, now that you're delivering and you've like started doing trainings. I don't know that client, but it sounds like they think they will have a like perfect uh manual and program uh about a year from now and be like ready to do it six months from now. Yeah. I mean, maybe I'm overly confident in that I was like, we've been doing this for years, like from the day the doors opened, um, like we've been preparing our teachers. Um and like I I always had some like follow-up like um trainings that I I send them to to learn from someone that's not just me, right? Yeah. Um but then you then there was so much of like, well, here's how we do this stuff here, yeah, right. That it's like tailored towards our studio and how we do things. Um so I think to the person who wants to do it, you know, a year and a half from now, um, that might be a little bit of the like perfectionist um procrastinator. Uh-huh. And you'll be pretty miserable in the meantime if you like continue to need those teachers the whole time and you're trying to work on this. Yes. Um, there's a really go ahead. There, well, there's just no such thing as like a perfect manual, right? Like even if you were to like get this thing done like you were like you were doing, you're like, I just updated it again. I'm sure in another year you'll want to update it again. Like it'll always be developing. So it's really like, can you get it out there? Version one. Can you get version one out there now? Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, and you're you say this a lot that um like thinking as your CEO versus like thinking as a teacher. And um I I don't know like what the breakdown for people you work with is, but like I really enjoy teaching. It is not my goal to stop teaching ever. Um but I do see where um Like the importance of like me being in the room teaching dials back more and more over time. Um to the extent that like very recently I had to go teach for something. I was like, I really need to be doing this thing on this ad or something else. Which uh like, you know, that's a strategic decision too. Like, do I hire out more of that work if I want to keep teaching her like how to move those pieces? Um, because it's almost like if you don't recognize that that work needs to be done, you think like, well, of course I can teach and do all these other things. Yes. And then you don't get the opportunity to work on the things that help you move forward. Yeah. Like those things teach your training. Yeah, to grow the business, really. And it's so interesting. I was just talking to my coach about this. Like, I still feel most comfortable in the teacher role. Like, I still go back to that. Like, I taught for so many years, my degrees in education, but sometimes I'm like, wait, oh, I I'm a coach now. I don't need to teach. Like it's it's muscle memory, I think, in our brains, where if teaching feels comfortable, we will automatically shift to that. But it's retraining the brain to say, wait a second, I'm working on the business. My job is to grow the revenue this year. My job is to expand new student reach with ads or like whatever. And then teaching supports that. But main job is CEO first. So good. Okay, tell everyone where they can find you. We'll link it in the show notes. Um, if they're ever local, they can come take a class, but also just they want to just connect and send you a message. For sure. Um, yeah, elevatecoleman.com or elevate coleman on Instagram and Facebook and all the things. Uh, we are on TikTok as well. Um, and I'm the Bama Bar Babe on Instagram. I I loved your post. The one I saw today was like one of us is working for this booty and one of us was born with it with her dog. Like that's I have an Australian shepherd with a really fluffy booty. It was just like perfectly in the camera. And that's I I had uh set up the camera for a really short flow, and he just like stood there, booty to the screen the whole time. If yoga with Adrien ever sees that, I wish she would let me know how she gets her dog to sit pretty to face forward, yeah. Yeah, yeah, because um Donut will chill while I do yoga, which is such a big step for him. Um but yeah, he did not show the camera his best side. It's so funny. Go look it up, you guys. We'll link her her personal account in the show notes, too. All right, thank you so much, Rachel. I really appreciate you being here today. Thank you, Jackie. Yeah, we'll we'll talk to y'all in the next episode.