Episdoe #505: Navigating the Recovery Tech Landscape with Brynn Scarborough, CEO of JK Products

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1:00 Go get them. This is Pete Moore on HALO Talks NYC. I have the pleasure of bringing the CEO of JK Products, Brynn Scarborough, out of St. Pete to her first HALO Talks. Brynn, welcome to the show. Thank you so much. Happy to be here. I heard a lot about the podcast and privileged to be on it. Thank you. And, we have a ranger fan and a lightning fan, and we are going to bury our rivalry for the sake of the industry. So Brynn, let's talk about, you know, the products that you guys are delivering and the growth of the workout recovery and med spa space and, you know, focusing on, you know, we've got labor shortages, we've got labor price increases, and how your products are kinda positioned to attack the opportunity as well as reduce the cost of entry.

1:48 Absolutely. Yeah. Just to give you a 30 second recap of our history, if you don't know us in the fitness space, we have, a plat a manufacturing platform and service platform in the tanning and sunshine space. So we've been manufacturing equipment, capital investment equipment for more than 40 years. And so 5, 6 years ago, we really started taking a look at how we could build stackable amenities, into recovery and wellness spaces. And, honestly, it was before the conversation was really ready. This was pre COVID. People weren't really talking as much about touchless or labor free modalities at that point. Today, it's a very different conversation. And so we're bringing modalities to the forefront, like dry water massage red light infrared and others that. Really work to help operators and owners not only increase foot traffic, which we know is a problem right now, but also do that without directly impacting or raising labor costs. Which we know is another huge problem for operators at the moment, so we feel like we're really well positioned at the moment to let people kind of take the initial investment to not only upgrade their services, but be able to diversify their service offerings, you know, when the next treadmill or the next piece of cardio isn't gonna make that happen. No offense to my cardio manufacturer friends out there, but we know what moves the needle at the end of the day.

3:09 Sure. You know, as you take a look at when you started, you know, entering the space to where we are today, and we we invested in the company, as I mentioned before, Higher Dose, you know, we were in, like, this education and, like, evangelist movement, and people would be like, oh, what's red light? Or, you know, what is PEMF standpoint? So, you know, from your vantage point, where are we in the education curve, and, you know, how are the conversations now, going for you and your team? I would say we're somewhere in the messy middle. Okay. We we are light years ahead of where the conversation started. You know, we were one of the first companies to come out with Total Body Redlight almost 15 years ago. It was fringe, it was biohacking wasn't even a word, there wasn't a category to put it in, no one even knew what to say about it. Today, it's a very different story. Now the consumer appetite for experimentation, especially in the US, is high, particularly with the with technology integrations for wellness and fitness. Where we're missing you know, there's but there's definitely snake oil out there. You know, along with that conversation comes entrance to the market that are not necessarily high level or well researched as I'm sure you're aware. So the conversation has definitely moved forward. Where we really try to position ourselves is not only the forefront of of quality, but also technology combined. We build equipment that you're going to invest in, you know, over decades, not over, you know, single years or months. And and we really have a reputation for people being able to build their businesses around our brands. And so that's a

4:42 that's a place that we really work hard to not only stay in, but then be at the forefront of education. We're not trying to convince you that biohacking is cool. Right? That's not really our job. Our job is to give business owners equipment that really shows an ROI and a value proposition that can be as complex as you want it to be for that consumer or as straightforward and, you know, almost explanation free on a lot of things, to kinda help them be able to move memberships as well. Got it. So when you take a look at the number of health clubs and and studios, and I'll I'll Talks studio a second because I've got some comments on it in a viewpoint that I wanna get your view on. But but I've been telling health clubs for the last 5 years is to say, look. There are these new concepts coming up that are in the workout recovery space.

5:30 Okay? If you're an authority on workouts, you better become an authority on workout recovery. Right? Yeah. And then you see these med spas or you see these workout recovery groups, and great that they're providing it, but they're opening up in your shopping center. Okay? And they're basically poaching your 600 people that are traffic in your club, in your parking lot, and they're charging 5 to 10 times the amount of what your membership cost. So if you're not gonna either build that yourself and get a new location that's adjacent to or allocate space inside of your health club, you're basically giving away the most premium component of their disposable dollars. So how is that kind of weaved into your you know, sales pitch or, like, saying, like, this isn't something that you you watch and and and go buy because you're gonna lose them, and they're they're gonna think you're not the authority, and then you're kinda backfilling. And that's not a place you wanna be.

6:22 There's so many layers to this conversation, and I love this conversation because at the end of the day, the the brick and mortar that's building up around wellness and recovery really wasn't there pre COVID, it's brand new. And there are times when the traditional fitness industry is just kind of sitting back and watching that happen when I agree with you, they should be out in front of it and they have the space they've already got the square footage. It's already there, I think in the traditional fitness space recovery used to mean, you know, a massage gun and a foam roller. And that's not what the con what consumers expect. And I really think it comes down to the the base level root issue of up regulation and down regulation, you know, oscillating input and output. And in the fitness space, we've been great at, like, no pain, no gain, go hard or go home for a long time, And a lot of our HVLP actors are are perfect in that space, but they don't know how to offer the opposite or the down regulation, the relaxation, what we are now calling recovery that means something very different, to their same member. And so they're having to educate themselves, But you're absolutely right, they're they're watching someone walk out of their Moore, and if if you're, you know, a participant in the time wallet and there's only so much time in the wallet and you have to choose between where you go during the day, you know, you're making a choice between stops or locations Square fitness, especially HVLP and others, are really well positioned to Talks up a lot more space in, like, the high end recovery amenity

7:53 modality space. And it's it's they're a little behind in the conversation. I'll just tell you. Some have been doing it for years. Others are still wondering how to put the mix together when they really just need to be trying and, you know, taking advice from their members, things like that. This is Pete Moore. I wanna let you in on a little secret. There's this company called Promotion Vault, and what they do is they give out rewards from retailers that allow you to incentivize your members without having to do zero down and 1 month free or giving away shakes or giving away t shirts. What you wanna do is build a rewards program that lasts, that people value, and that doesn't discount your own products and services.

8:37 So here's the deal. There's something called rewards vault. The rewards vault is going to allow a member to set up their own profile. They are going to answer questions. You're gonna get those answers. You're gonna be able to target those members, and you're gonna reward them inside your club, inside your spa, and outside of the club, and outside of the spa to get them to become loyal, to get them to pay their monthly dues, and to be rewarded properly for the actions. A lot of companies are cutting back on rewards. You shouldn't be. Promotion Vault's your answer. Trust me. This is real. Yeah. One thing and I've been in the health club industry for better or for worse since, August 1, 1999. And sometimes I would go to certain groups, and I'd say, look. You need to put this in. I kinda refer refer to, like, a trade show as, like, a a weapons dealership. Like, what weapons do you need to actually optimize or keep your members? And that's what they want. The one thing that I saw that worked really well, and I wanna know if you guys do this or if you're thinking about doing this, but a health club operator, they might not get educated on each one of the actual modalities. Like, what's it in for its sauna? You know, what's a compression technology? Lymphatic drainage, cold plunge. And what I found that worked was basically saying, like, here's a picture of, like here's a here's what you need in 500 Square feet. Here's what you need in 1,000. Here's what you need in 3,000. And just, like, buy this as, like, a bundle, and then organize it like that, like I'm in a IKEA store. You know? I would say. So Yep. So how have you kind

10:08 of fed this and say, look. I'm not gonna educate you on every piece of technology. You're missing the point of what we're delivering to you. I'm gonna actually give you, like, a room. Yeah. Is is that is it evolved to that, or is it going there? Yeah. We we've gone I'd say we're about 60% of the way there, but you are pegging on you know, it's not a complex concept. I say, a, fill up the truck. If the truck's coming, fill up the truck. And b, you know, create a space that makes sense and is stackable in a a sensical way. The SPA world has been doing this for a while, like, this idea of a circuit that, it is now autonomous. It didn't used to be autonomous. Now the circuit is autonomous because technology can support it. But you're absolutely right to be able to move from red light to dry water massage even to tanning if that's a component of what you do in your business model. And all of those three things work together. You don't have to make choices between what you use on each on what day. You know, you really can't do it wrong. You can optimize it. There's no doubt. But as a user, you really can't do it wrong. So you don't have to have the hour webinar of education before you use each piece of equipment.

11:15 It really is, you know, almost explanation free from that perspective, and you get a great outcome. It's also one of those things, you know, this this phenomenon of flat January that we had this year. Instead of dry January, which some of us suffer through, we have flat January. Obviously, what is in the gym space isn't enough to get people in their cars and drive across town, and so we really focus on bringing you amenities that people will drive to, that they will say, okay. I wasn't gonna go in today, but if I can go in and have really good red light and a great massage, that's worth it even if even if I'm not gonna work out. Because something's gotta be added to the value of the workout right now to get people through the doors. So so 2 follow on comments and, you know, we can just keep going back and forth here for hours, but, you know, we gotta cut the show at some point. But the one thing that drives me crazy that and being, you know, being a Swifty, in addition, my other cult that I belong to I'm gonna be I'll admit it here.

12:13 I'm like, I'm cold. No no judgment here. Thank you. The other the other cult that I'm a part of is Soul Cycle. Okay? And the one thing that drives me crazy about Soul Cycle, and I'm sorry to Melody and the team at Soul Cycle for saying this on a podcast, and I'll try and get in touch with them beforehand, is that, Brim, they have 500 square feet that they have in their studio that is devoted to towels, and they're cleaning towels, okay, which generates 0 revenue. If you took those industrial towels machines out and put in lounge chairs at NormaTec. You would have at least 30% of the people that went to a class to go straight to the NormaTec and do compression right afterwards for an extra $20. I know I would do it, and I'm I'm not the minority. So have those conversations happen? Do you, like, look at certain studios and say, like, like, what are you do you use your square footage for, like, selling, you know, like, you know, T shirts? Like, I can put I'll put anything where you're not making money. I'll find something to put in there. That's on my list of products. I agree. And, you know, we have a few similarities and that we're both Swifties. I used to be a spin instructor because I love the fact that, you know, you get that energy in the room, everybody moving at one time. It's great. It's a great way to tune in and check out. And I think the conversation around boutique fitness has been for a while, like, there's no, oh, we don't do amenities, we don't do, you know, this, we have our merch, and I love great merch, don't get me wrong. Yeah. But for the spaces that aren't

13:45 making you money, I completely agree with you that, you know, whether it's a massage, whether it's red light, whether it's recovery, there's multiple things you could do that don't add staff and don't take up extra extra square footage that you don't already have, that get that extra click out of every person that comes through or even a few percentage that moves the needle. And boutique fitness has kind of sat out on this conversation and I don't think that's gonna be an option in the future. Yep. One of the things that drives me crazy, I we do these HALO Academy, so we go through, like, here's what it takes to run your unit economics for it to be successful. And please don't sell a franchise unless the unit economics actually work for you as a franchisor. But one of the things that that we look at is if you're a spin studio and you're open, you know, you have 6 classes, right, at 45 minutes, right, The hair salon's open 14 hours. The Dunkin' Donuts open 24 hours. You know? The, you know, the the GNC store, they still probably make a little bit of money. You know, they're open up from, like, 7 to, you know, 10 PM. Moore basically paying the same exact rent, and you basically have, like, 5 hours of revenue.

14:50 So if you put on the workout recovery, you know, you don't have the risk of somebody being injured, and you're not you know, and you're liable for that. But you can actually have an open to say, whatever you're doing, like, come in. Reserve a an infrared sauna. You know? Come in here whenever you want and have one person working in there just making sure that everything's monitored. And I don't know why people don't get that and that you and I have to have a podcast about it to get it out there. I'm with you you know? And I can't I love boutique fitness, but I'm not loyal to any of them. And I think loyalty in boutique fitness is a huge issue right now, where it is, you know, certain apps and platforms have made it so easy to move around, they don't have that stickiness that they really need to keep you coming back to the same location, and that's part of it. Right? It's part of it is, what else can I do? How can I be more efficient with my time?

15:41 And the amenities are a big piece of it, to be honest with you. You know? If you could you got the same person at the front desk, whether they're scheduling classes or putting people in a paid service, the same person's working the front desk. It's really not you know, adding an amenity like, you know, WellSystem or Revive is a force multiplier because it does not add to your overhead, but it adds to your to your revenue. You know, one thing I think that's missing in workout recovery, and I wanna get your take on this or maybe, you know, your team's already doing it or or thinking about it. I play this game with my nest my with my niece, Candyland. You know, Candyland? And it's just basically, you know, you're moving through the colors. Nobody's given someone, like, a a prescription yet to say, like, you know, hey. I just sold cycle 3 days a week. You know? I do, you know, that's pretty much what I do. Sorry. I do soul cycle 3 days a week. I go right, you know, take a Talks, and I I run outside.

16:34 I do some TRX. Let me tell you what I do. Now the overlay, like, a candy land okay. You should do compression 3 days a week. Yeah. You should do an infrared sauna. And don't do the infrared sauna before the cold plunge because it it eradicates the effect. Or do it in reverse order. Or don't do them on the same day. I feel like there's, like, this black hole of there's all these these great technologies, but, like, what order do I do them in? When do I should I do it before? Should I do it after? Like, I feel like that's, like, the final frontier that, like, nails it, and nobody's doing it yet. I'm busy. Integrated recovery protocols, based on your preferences would be amazing. I would follow them too because I'm an I'm an experimenter at the end of the day. Right? I've tried everything, and I can give you my advice.

17:18 But I'm with you. No one's really telling you, like, okay. If you're doing HIIT 4 days a week, you really need to be focused on cold plunge and infrared. Or if you are, you know, looking for muscle gains, you need to be focused on x, y, and z. No no one has taken it to that level yet. And, honestly, the technology is getting there. I mean, we have enough good modalities at this point. Now accessibility, right, is gonna be highly varied, but we've got enough, like, good modalities to be able to really put together protocols that Talks sense. This is Pete Moore. Here's the last tip for you of the podcast. We are partnered up with a company called Higher Dose.higherdose.com.

18:01 They are the leader in workout recovery products, infrared technology, LED light masks, neck enhancers, and other products such as Pete mats and sauna blankets. If you have not gotten on the workout recovery train yet, your time and your stop is now. You gotta get these products in there before these workout recovery and spas end up saturating your Moore. Having your members walk out of the club and going into one of their locations for $200 per month where they're paying 39 to you. Let's become an expert in workout recovery if we are already the authority in workouts. Higher dose, check it out. There's a wholesale code, and we look forward to helping you augment your products and services to meet the demands of your members. And, hey, let's get people happy, healthy, and sweating, and the recovery should be just as good as the workout.

19:03 So from a standpoint, you know, we got about 5 minutes left here. When when you walk into a a new client, you know, obviously, some of them come and say, like, I know I need to do this. You know? Like Yeah. Tell me what to do. What are the things that you know, if you if I said, look. I wanna take baby steps, and I don't wanna, like, overhaul what I'm doing. So what is your advice and your team's advice to say, look. Let me get you into my ecosystem, and here's, like, the products we're gonna start with, and then we're gonna walk our way up. So maybe, like, explain how you think about that. Yeah. Absolutely. So, you know, we we focus on a few things just because our equipment is not it needs a space to be. Right? And so we the first conversation is, are you remodeling, or or what is your existing footprint, and how much ability do you have? Are you willing to remodel? A lot of people don't wanna remodel, and at the end of the day, you're repurposing a good bit of your space or at least some of your space from, you know, open treadmill spaces to something different. So the first thing is opening up your mind to remodeling. And I I think, honestly, consumers are looking for that. But if you can't even remodel and you're just ready to put in the first item, it's definitely the well system wave because it can sit in an open space. It doesn't need a dedicated room.

20:13 It's dry water massage, but it it has a relaxation hood on it that allows you to really drop in even in a public space, which is nice. So if you don't have a relaxation space, if all you have is open floor plan, that's a place you can start. Though if we can really get involved in the conversation, then we're gonna conversation, then we're gonna say, okay. Like, what's your first stack of amenities, which is, you know, well system and red light or even could be sunshine, red light, and well system. Depends on what your business model is. We're gonna look for that really simple stack where you could use 1 or 2 services together without staff intervention. Gotcha. And and from a standpoint of providing people with the marketing for this and basically saying like, okay. Look. You put an infrared sauna.

20:59 And by the way, just as an aside, when we work with higher dose Pete COVID, we used to have infrared saunas that we had with pop ups in in some locations. And I was doing the math, and I thought I was doing the math wrong, but we actually paid back for the infrared sauna in literally, like, 23 days. Yeah. And I was, like, shocked because the amount per hour plus there's no overhead, and somebody's gotta wipe it down. So from a standpoint of, you know, returning the investment, do you guys come also with, like, here's some financing packages that we've got with partners that would that'll finance this for you just like they would fitness equipment? And then my my question that I lost train of thought of, now it's back.

21:39 So I'm gonna say it because I just remember what I wanted to say to you. Was do you provide them with marketing materials to say, look. This is how you position it, or here's, like, put this out as, like, a new amenity? Yeah. We absolutely do. So lots of brands obviously want their own marketing. They want their own messaging out there. So we we focus on providing as much education as we can and then allowing, you know, people to put their own spin or their own messaging on it. I'm with you on the ROI, though, because when when you start looking at ROI on some of these amenities, it doesn't seem believable at first. And, honestly, I I think that's part of the conversation is helping people understand why a 3 month ROI is is really attainable, when you're talking about either I always say, you know, casting a wider net or fishing deeper in the same pond, and you really only have to move, you know, a few percentage points to affect have a strong effect on revenue from that perspective and so. Yeah, the well systems are great example there's no. Procession cost There's no operational overhead. It doesn't cost you anything to run it other than to clean it every now and then. So everybody who pays you $20, that's $18.92 in your pocket, you know, just off the you know, there's just it's the ROI is really good.

22:51 But from an education perspective, we really focus on education and support, and also then make sure that brands have what they need as well, whether that's a mom and pop or if that's a national brand that we support as well. Awesome. Well, look. It's great to have you on the show. Get back to us on some Swifty pictures from Portugal. Absolutely. We're down in Tampa frequently, so I'll reach out to you and and we'll grab some, grab some lunch at a spin class. And, you know, if you wanna use the term halo, we'd be appreciative of that, and, you know, feel free to use it, you know, to describe the ecosystem. But this is great, and I love what you guys are doing, and it's only positive things ahead for everyone. Awesome. Yeah. Maybe we can catch a Taylor Swift spin class if we're lucky. It's even better. I might I might prioritize that already. Exactly.

23:38 Alright. I gotta go teach it. I'm gonna teach a class at 4, to the Crunch guys. But, hey, it was great meeting you. Great talking to you. And let's collaborate with you. It's, We got a lot a lot of clients. Hired dose if, you know, they've got their own set of products, but I want everyone to have all this in there because I'm so sick of somebody saying, like, oh, the the restored's got 400 members there right now. I'm like, dude, those are your members, man. How'd you miss that? It's $80 a month. You know? I totally agree with you. Well, I think there's tons of synergies and happy to open up the conversation, however we can be a resource. Oh, thank Trent and Co for setting this up. It's good to meet you. I appreciate what you're doing. Absolutely. Thank you so much. Take care.