Episode #589: From Backpacking to Beer Baths-The Journey Behind Oakwell Beer Spa

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This is Pete Moore on Halo Talks NYC. I have the pleasure of

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bringing a new invention to the modern

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spa experience straight out of Denver, Colorado.

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Husband and wife team Damian and Jessica, we're going to talk about Oakwell

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Beer Spa. That's right, you heard it right, Oakwell Beer Spa.

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Words that have never been put together before this podcast and before they started

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this company. Welcome to your first Halo Talks. Thanks, we're excited to

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be here. Awesome. So you guys started this about

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5 years ago, and from the research that I was

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doing on your new business, that you guys visited,

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I think, 25 different countries and kind of came home

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and decided that this is what your play was going to be. So kind of

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talk us through that journey and how we got to this, and

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then, you know, why you thought that there was a fit with what the market

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was looking for. Yeah. So our story starts in New

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York City. We were both working corporate jobs at the time. Damien's background

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is in sales and marketing. My background is in

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operations and HR. So New York is where we

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met. We fell in love. We got married. And although we were

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living the, the life in New York, enjoying everything that the city has to

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offer, we really felt professionally unfulfilled. We've both been

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entrepreneurs at heart.. So we find ourselves when we

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got home from work, we would have a pint of beer or a glass of

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wine and talk about different business ideas. And we knew that we

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didn't want to reinvent the wheel, but we also didn't want to do a restaurant

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or a coffee shop or something that's been done a million times

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before. So, you know, at the time we were still young in our twenties, and

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if we were going to do something crazy, we figured now is the time to

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make a big move before we have a mortgage, kids, all of

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that stuff. So we made a decision to both quit our jobs

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at the same time, sell everything we own, pack two backpacks

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and travel the world indefinitely looking for interesting

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business ideas that we could bring back to the United States and

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scale. So although we had a lot of fun on the trip, the purpose was

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to find a unique business idea that didn't exist in the United

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States. So we ended up backpacking for 14 months. We went to 25

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countries. We saw a lot of really interesting things, a lot of

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them not so scalable, like Mario Kart racing in

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the streets of Tokyo, hedgehog cafes, a

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lot of interesting animal cafes, cooking classes.

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But really what we love is hospitality and wellness. And so when we

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found ourselves in Zakopane, Poland, which is in the Polish

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Alps, at a beer spa, we thought, okay, this is

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interesting. Americans love beer, we love wellness, we love

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hospitality. This really merges everything that we're passionate about into

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one. Um, you know, in Eastern Europe there are a few beer spas that exist,

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but they're very different than what we ended up doing. So

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in Eastern Europe, the, the vibe is very rustic. You're

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always in kind of a log cabin type of environment.

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Um, you have a free-flowing tap next to your tub, so it's

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like all-you-can-drink beer, which is illegal and likely dangerous

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in the United States. In Eastern Europe, you have a bed

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of hay that you lay in after your beer bath, which we didn't find

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particularly enjoyable, so we decided not to do that. But we thought it was really

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cool, the idea of mixing, using beer for wellness, creating

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a social wellness experience. So

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we continued exploring spas around the world. We went to jimjibangs in

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South Korea, onsens in Japan, wine spas in

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Spain, and realized that all around the world you have these social

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wellness experiences where people go with their friends, with their families.

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They're big facilities with saunas, with different tubs, with

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different amenities. And then there's also a cantina where you can drink beer, you

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can have a bowl of ramen or noodles. And it's

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something that everyday people go to. It's not just for the healthy and wealthy like

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in the US. The spa industry is really catered towards a

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certain demographic and is really catered towards women more than

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everything. So we realized that this is something interesting that we could do and something

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that the US was missing. So we put together our business

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plan and financial models as we continue traveling. Although we

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love New York City, we knew that, you know, New York is oversaturated when it

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comes to tourism activities. It's a bit expensive. We didn't want to have

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any investors up front. So we were searching for what

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city to put this in. We were looking for a

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beer-centric city, wellness-centric city. And all of our research pointed

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to Denver being the best location. So we moved here with still our,

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our backpacks on and just our business plan in hand. We'd never been to

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Denver before, but started pitching banks and looking for

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commercial spaces and ended up opening the first location in

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February of 2021. So we're just celebrating 5 years in

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business. Amazing. So a couple of questions. One, those 25

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countries is clearly a business expense according to tax purposes. If

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you're looking to to start a business, I hope. So I

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would encourage all entrepreneurs to expense your travel if you're

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looking at new ideas while you're on the road. Let me ask you a

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question. When you were in Poland and when you were in some of these

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other cities and going to these experiential places, did

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you spend a lot of time kind of talking to the staff, talking to the

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business owners, like get access to, you know, hey,

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who's running this place? Like, what's the unit economics? How

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deep did you go there? Were you really just looking for what's the

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experiments? Do we like the experience? And then we'll figure out what the business model

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is based on your background. But, but actually we're

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very analytical by nature. So

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there's the experience part where it's all about the hospitality and

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we actually would take the time to really enjoy the experience when we

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were experiencing all of those new concepts. And then

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we'll just sit down around a beer or a glass of wine after

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the fact, have a debrief with all of our notes, putting

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notes on paper and really take the time to

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analyze a business model. We are very familiar

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with the hospitality industry. We've

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worked within that industry for a long time. So that was very natural

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for us to just sit down and look and

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really split every single

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step in that process, in that concept, and being able to analyze

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it. The size of the tub, the size of the room, is it a private

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room? Are we running this as a hotel, more as

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a restaurant because you need tables turnover? So

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we would ask ourselves all of these questions. Of course, for

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any fellow entrepreneurs that are listening to us, be a little

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bit like, you know, go above and beyond

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and maybe Maybe give a call to that business 2 or 3 days later and

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ask them specific questions. Maybe you have some allergies and

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you need to know a bit more about the ingredients. Maybe you

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are about to create the best anniversary ever for your

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wife. Do you offer this type of package? Do you have

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anything, you know, in your, in your bag for— we would

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always try to question

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and find out questions and answers that we didn't

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have. From her experience. But overall, um, it's— it

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was just you and I.

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Yeah. This is Pete Moore. I want to let you in on a little secret.

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There's this company called Promotion Vault, and what they do is they give out

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rewards from retailers that allow you to incentivize

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your members without having to do zero down and one month

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free, or giving away shakes, or giving away t-shirts, What you want

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to do is build a rewards program that lasts, that

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people value, and that doesn't discount your own products and

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services. So here's the deal. There's something called Rewards Vault. The

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Rewards Vault is going to allow a member to set up their own

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profile. They are going to answer questions. You are going to get those answers. You're

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going to be able to target those members and you're going to reward them inside

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your club, inside your spa, and outside of the club and

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outside of the spa. To get them to become loyal, to get them to

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pay their monthly dues, and to be rewarded

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properly for the actions. A lot of companies are cutting back on rewards. You

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shouldn't be. Promotion Vault's your answer. Trust me, this is

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real. You know, one of the things, and I might be wrong, but I'm just

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going to make a statement. When, when I traveled around Europe and it's been

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a while, I didn't see like the density of

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people when I went to a restaurant or when I went to a spa

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or like a health club that, I mean, I'm a little bit dated from when

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I went on tour, but I was kind of sometimes amazed

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by like, how's this restaurant stay open? There's only like 3 or 4 tables of

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people that are eating here. You know, like I was in like Milan or like,

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you know, somewhere in Italy or in like Switzerland. I was like,

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what is there like, do they have a marketing problem? And I felt like sometimes

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like maybe that business just kind of gets by. So did you

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kind of get a sense for like what the volume, what the demand

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is, or did you not really think that that was

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necessary? Because if I put this in a high-density city in the

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US, kind of like I know what the behavior, you know,

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typically would be of people that would enjoy this type of, you

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know, place to go. Yeah, we didn't look too much at

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the occupancy of the spa experiences that we were at around the

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world because we know that the market in the US is really different, right? There's

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more disposable income here. Salaries are higher. This is a type

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of concept that we were going to put in mid to large size cities,

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typically in the downtown area where you have a lot of tourism

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traffic. So it wouldn't be an apples to apples comparison looking at, you know,

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oh, this spa is kind of dead here. We're really just looking for, you

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know, what type of experience, what type of services, the hospitality we wanted

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to provide, really more around the operations side than we were looking

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at the occupancy side. We would look at the

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number of reviews. If you have a space with 3,000,

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4,000 reviews over the last 4 or 5 years, that was actually

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a good indication that they had enough traffic to

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show us that that specific business model, a part of it

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was viable. Gotcha. Yeah, we're invested in a company

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called HigherDOSE, which does infrared saunas. And they do, you

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know, yeah, we did actually a lot of research into HigherDOSE when we were first

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opening because HigherDOSE was one of the first saunas,

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infrared sauna spas. So, we're familiar.

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If you need any of our products wholesale, happy to hook you up there

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because that's a big $50 million revenue business now, all

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e-commerce and products. The reason why I was bringing that up is because when I

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first got involved, there was an education process

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that needed to be put forward

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to consumers related to what is infrared and what is red

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light and different frequencies. How does this

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differentiate from what you know and how does the

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science proliferate? And now, it's kind of like I don't have to explain to somebody

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what infrared sauna is, but 8 years ago, I did.

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So, what's the background and the history of

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this whole beer spa concept that was out there?

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And, how did you kind of check off your own boxes

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since you both seem to be very educated and like

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aware of like, hey, there's like shticks and there's like

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science. So how did you kind of go back and, and do that and get

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comfortable with it? This is such a good question. Yeah. So when we first decided

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we wanted to do a beer spa, our biggest thing is we don't want to

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be a gimmick. We don't want to be something that's hot and it's trendy and

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it's cool and then all of a sudden fizzles out a few years

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later. We wanted there to be real wellness benefits behind it, right?

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So we had to look into what are the benefits of hops? What are the

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benefits of barley? And just for everyone that's listening, you

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don't actually bathe in beer. That is the number one question that we get. So

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we're not pouring a PBR Coors into a tub,

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right? So the water, it's hydrotherapy that's infused with hops, malt, and

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then we have different herbal blends. So hops is a

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natural sedative. It's a cousin of marijuana, and the aromatherapy

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from hops is really relaxing. So if you've ever drinking

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a really hoppy beer before and gotten tired afterwards, that's

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from the aroma from the hops. And then barley is

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a grain. It's really similar to oatmeal. So we've all heard of taking an oatmeal

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bath before, how it's really hydrating and nourishing for the skin.

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So that's the same thing that malted barley does. So those are the two main

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ingredients of beer, and that's what we use in our hydrotherapy tubs. So

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we did quite a lot of research into making sure that there's real

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therapeutic holistic benefits in bathing in these ingredients. And then

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we also worked with herbalists to come up with the other herbal additions for

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the bath as well. We have 3 different

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herbal infusions that you can infuse into your bath. So we have an

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energizing IPA. So that's in addition to the hops and malt, we also

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have lemongrass, lemon verbena. So those again have a lot

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of energizing properties. We have a calming amber bath that uses

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sage and peppermint, and then we have a muscle-relaxing lager

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that has arnica in it. So hiking, snowboarding, skiing is really popular

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here. So you can come take a beer bath with the hops and malt and

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then arnica in it as well. So we took a lot

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of time curating those blends. And then we also

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have infrared sauna, to your point. So basically, we have

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private spa suites. Inside your spa suite, there's an infrared sauna,

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a rain shower, and a hydrotherapy tub.

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So you're very familiar with HigherDOSE, with the benefits of infrared sauna. So we don't

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need to go through all of that. But that's something at the time we were

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building this business model, it was relatively new. So we did a lot of research

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making sure that, okay, there are actually scientific benefits behind

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this.. And then we use zero gravity massage chairs

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as well. So instead of using

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massage therapists, we have high-tech robotics-enabled massage

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chairs. And again, did a lot of research into the benefits of

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those. And then as well, from a business perspective, you know,

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having a spa that doesn't rely on licensed professionals is a

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big game changer. We talk to a lot of people in the spa

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industry and hiring and retaining massage therapists and

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estheticians and then also dealing when one of them calls out sick, then you have

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to cancel all of their appointments for the day. So we wanted to be able

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to create a spa that had all of the wellness benefits, but

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also address a lot of the pain points that you see in the spa

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industry. And adding to that, yes, the culture

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of educating a market, an audience that is not

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aware of practices abroad

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from our takeaways from travel around the world.

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Japan, South Korea, Eastern Europe, or even France, people

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bath in those herbal baths

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since centuries. From France originally, we have wine spas, you know, south of

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France and north of Spain, and Eastern Europe has all of those

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beer spas. So we didn't reinvent the wheel.

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And actually, Jessica, you have a good point

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on investing, creating something is not gimmicky for the longevity of the

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business model. And the really the most amazing thing

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in your concept is offering that

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private spa suite that is very similar to

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a luxurious small hotel room. And within

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that room, the main, the cherry on the top is actually that big

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giant tub. And the culture of bathing in the US has been here

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for a long time, actually hot tub. Is

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something extremely popular in the US. We've tried to— we—

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you can educate about the infrared sauna, but it didn't

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matter. What really people loved about our concept at the very beginning that we

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didn't have to explain is you're soaking in a

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bath. Everything else is pure bonus with your favorite drink in hand,

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with your favorite drink in your hand. And combining the

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best of both worlds has actually created a

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lot of Oh my gosh, is that what I hear? Is that what I read?

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A beer spa? Can you tell me more? So that

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was another advantage. Yes, then you're right. How do we break

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the stigma that day spa is meant to be only for specific audience?

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In the US, often women are going to

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day spas. So Jessica and I has actually worked a

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lot on sensory marketing. The music,

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the smell, the way everything is designed,

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the way we greet you, the way whenever you step

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in, in the spa, you're not intimidated

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by, you know, specific colors. Can be pink, it can be light blue.

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We've really done a lot of research on making sure that

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both men, women together

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are feeling not intimidated. So now

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the beer aspect took a long time and still as

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of today is it takes a lot of education. It's like, no, you're not

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bathing in beer. You're not sure it's not real

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beer. Yeah. Okay. I've got a write down like a list of questions. So

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this might be a longer podcast than I anticipated to all of our listeners here,

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but this is intriguing to me. First question, in

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no particular order, is there anyone that ever gets allergic or like has

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an out, you know, like any kind of

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reaction to, to hops and barley? Yeah. So in the

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history of 5 years being open, we've only had one person that told us they

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were allergic to hops. Some people are more sensitive to the

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smell of hops, like they'll sneeze. But in terms of having

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like an actual topical reaction, the

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hops is relatively limited. Barley, on the other hand, has

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gluten, right? So people that have celiac disease or

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have topical sensitivities to gluten, we have worked with a

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gluten-free brewery that provides milled millet instead of the barley. So we use

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the same ingredients that you would find in a gluten-free beer. It provides all

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the same benefits for your skin, but without the gluten.

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Wow. Okay, next question. Okay. When

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you have a hot tub full of hops and

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barley, do you need in between sessions to actually have kind of some

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kind of filtration system? Yeah. So we completely drain,

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clean, and refill the tubs after each use. It's very similar to

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a bathtub more than a hot tub. Like, we're not putting— there's no chemicals, right?

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We wanted this to be a very clean experience for

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your skin. So the tubs are, you know, big enough to fit 3 people

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in them. So we're not wasting too much water, but

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we do completely fill them, infuse whatever hops,

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barley, and herbs that you've selected for your experience, and then at the end of

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your session, drain, clean, and then refill. Okay,

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third question. Okay, how many people have said afterwards,

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hey, can I get a, like, a gallon of this for my house and I

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can use it for my own tub? And we have Oakwell Cosmetics, which

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is our sister company. So we do beer— there we go—

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body products. Um, so we do have, uh, smaller sizes of our

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bath infusions that you can bring home so you can have a beer bath at

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home. So it's like a concentrate that, like, you You put it in

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the water, a bit of powder. Yeah. So they come in essentially giant

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bath tea bags, right? And so if you could picture a tea bag, but it's

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more like— Okay. And then it has all the hops, the barley, and the herbs

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infusion inside. And then we have miniature versions that you can hang from your tub

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spout to do it at home. Gotcha. Okay, my last

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question is, you come back from your trip, you decide you're on backpacks,

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you move into Denver, you walk into like your first bank and say, hey,

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I'm opening up a beer spa. How did those conversations go?

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You seem very, you know, like people that, you know,

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are passionate, educated, thorough, want to finance. But I got to assume there's a couple

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of banks that like, you know, this couple's like out of their mind. Like, there's

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no way they're getting approval. It's an investment committee, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's

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funny. We pitched over 40 banks, so

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we went through all of them. The Chase, the Bank of America, the Wells Fargo,

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like all big, small, regional. It doesn't matter. They love it.

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They would love it. They want that you buy a gift card. They loved it

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as a consumer, just

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not as a client. I'm not going to loan you

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any money. So yes, we learned a lot through pitching all of

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those banks. You know, by repetition, we got to understand what the

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questions they were asking. I mean, we had a really detailed business plan and

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financial model, but still, it's like unproven concept. We didn't have 2 years

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worth of P&L. And so they're like, come back to us later

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on when you're ready to open your second location. But we ended up getting funding

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from the city of Denver. Has a

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small business loan program for people that cannot get

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traditional funding. It's like excellent interest rates, like we're

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talking 1.5% interest, 10 years. And

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so they ended up funding it because we were able to prove that, hey, we

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went to 40 banks, they all said no, but we have this great idea. We're

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willing to go into a neighborhood in Denver that's in need of economic development. So

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they have different target areas within Denver. And so

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they ended up lending us the money, but it was only because all of these

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other banks said no. Just a question, if

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you're comfortable answering this question. If you're not, then go ahead, go take a beer,

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beer, beer, so on the tub and, you know, come back. Do you have

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to personally guarantee something like that when it comes to

355
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like a government-related loan? Yeah. Yeah. So it was

356
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a personal guarantee. And actually there was— we got the funding from two

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different places. The city of Denver did half and then the other half came from

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a local nonprofit lender. Similar thing, SBA. Backed

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loan, but to businesses that are, you know, we're a woman-owned business, right?

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So that gave us an advantage. We're able to qualify for certain loans

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that other businesses couldn't. But yes, they all

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were personal guarantees. And then same with the commercial spaces

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as well. You know, it was funny, we thought that we'd be able to find

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a commercial space pretty easily but had a hard time finding the money. It was

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quite the opposite at the time in Denver. This was in 2019

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when we moved here. The vacancy rate for commercial spaces was

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only 2%. There was a lot of landlords that didn't even want to talk to

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us because again, they thought like, what the heck is a beer spa? Who are

369
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these kids like pitching this weird idea? We'd prefer to go with a 7-Eleven

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or something that's proven. So we ended up getting the

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funding relatively quickly but had a really hard time finding

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a commercial space and of course had to put a personal guarantee on those on

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the lease. Yeah, gotcha. So as you were going through

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this, for the average entrepreneur listening here, what was

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the chirping from friends, family, parents,

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grandparents, so on and so forth of like, hey, we know they're in love, that's

377
00:23:25,470 --> 00:23:29,070
awesome, they want to work together, but like, you know, this sounds like

378
00:23:29,070 --> 00:23:31,830
a crazy idea. Because my parents say that to me all the time about several

379
00:23:31,830 --> 00:23:34,710
things I've done in the past. So I just wanted to see if there's any,

380
00:23:34,790 --> 00:23:38,430
you know, I love that type of company, if I can get some. You

381
00:23:38,430 --> 00:23:42,230
know, I think we don't really ask people for input, right? Like we are

382
00:23:42,630 --> 00:23:46,200
each other's— That's even better. It's like we also don't

383
00:23:46,200 --> 00:23:49,520
believe in taking money or hiring friends

384
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or family. So they were kind of like, here's what we're doing. This is the

385
00:23:52,840 --> 00:23:56,560
plan. You know, I feel like they're all pretty supportive. Like they

386
00:23:56,800 --> 00:24:00,120
know that we're, we're fairly capable people. We'll figure it out. Of course, I'm sure

387
00:24:00,120 --> 00:24:03,440
in the back of their mind they're like, all right, well, good luck. This sounds

388
00:24:03,440 --> 00:24:06,320
a little strange, but at the end of the day, we just didn't really ask

389
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for anyone's opinion. We just

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00:24:11,690 --> 00:24:15,290
charged forward. This is Pete Moore. Here's the last tip for you of

391
00:24:15,610 --> 00:24:18,490
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392
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393
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394
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399
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400
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407
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408
00:25:17,200 --> 00:25:18,440
should be just as good as

409
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:25,960
the workout. How important was working at a

410
00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:29,920
corporate job, understanding processes, understanding financials, understanding

411
00:25:29,920 --> 00:25:33,750
sales and marketing, You know, how important was that for

412
00:25:33,910 --> 00:25:37,510
you to run a business successfully the way you're doing now?

413
00:25:37,510 --> 00:25:41,110
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you say, I mean, you know, we were younger and

414
00:25:41,110 --> 00:25:44,710
I think we've taken is like learn, make

415
00:25:44,870 --> 00:25:47,750
mistakes with the P&L of someone else. And

416
00:25:49,190 --> 00:25:53,030
this is helpful for us to take risks without

417
00:25:53,590 --> 00:25:56,950
seeing the, you know, without

418
00:25:56,950 --> 00:26:00,390
any, any specific issues that could happen to our job or

419
00:26:00,550 --> 00:26:04,090
the business itself. But it was for us. All about training. I

420
00:26:04,090 --> 00:26:07,250
mean, I remember it was like, oh, worst

421
00:26:07,730 --> 00:26:11,170
case scenario, we lose a bit of money or market

422
00:26:11,250 --> 00:26:14,970
share, but it's okay, I'm learning. And I think

423
00:26:14,970 --> 00:26:18,450
creating this business for us is the results of all of

424
00:26:18,529 --> 00:26:22,330
our learning and big takeaways of our corporate jobs. Yeah, yeah. And

425
00:26:22,330 --> 00:26:26,130
in my job before, in my corporate job, you know, I worked in sales

426
00:26:26,130 --> 00:26:29,850
for some time, and, you know, our clients were mainly Fortune 500

427
00:26:29,850 --> 00:26:32,490
companies. And so I'd be meeting with, you know, I was in my 20s, and

428
00:26:32,490 --> 00:26:36,030
I'd be meeting with VPs and directors of

429
00:26:36,430 --> 00:26:39,950
different departments, you know, Fortune 500 companies in New York City, and just

430
00:26:40,190 --> 00:26:43,590
gaining that confidence and also the verbiage and how you interact and

431
00:26:43,590 --> 00:26:47,430
how the hierarchy works. It really made us more confident

432
00:26:47,430 --> 00:26:50,749
then when we were in our late 20s going and pitching these

433
00:26:51,230 --> 00:26:54,590
banks and different people. Like, we knew what to say, we knew what they were

434
00:26:54,590 --> 00:26:58,350
looking for. If they asked, you know, use some acronym or, or said

435
00:26:58,350 --> 00:27:02,140
something, you know, our experience in the corporate world definitely gave us a big

436
00:27:02,140 --> 00:27:05,980
leg up. Yeah. And then, you know, as you look forward,

437
00:27:05,980 --> 00:27:09,660
is this something that you see as, hey, we want to add these locations,

438
00:27:09,740 --> 00:27:13,500
you know, as we feel it's right to grow

439
00:27:13,500 --> 00:27:17,100
corporately, or is there some kind of franchise model here? Do you kind of like

440
00:27:17,100 --> 00:27:20,820
what you're doing? Sometimes people define success too broadly

441
00:27:20,820 --> 00:27:24,380
in my mind of what they think they want to accomplish, and then they realize,

442
00:27:24,380 --> 00:27:27,260
hey, I kind of like my life the way it is, and I'm going to

443
00:27:27,260 --> 00:27:31,060
grow at my own pace that I don't need outside private equity or venture capital

444
00:27:31,060 --> 00:27:34,260
or friends and family or somebody, you know, that's gonna put pressure on me. 'Cause

445
00:27:34,260 --> 00:27:37,940
I'm doing something, I love it and it's working. Yeah.

446
00:27:38,020 --> 00:27:41,500
When we were traveling the world looking for business ideas, we wanted to find something

447
00:27:41,500 --> 00:27:45,260
that we could scale. We never wanted to be mom and pop business owners that

448
00:27:45,260 --> 00:27:48,220
just kind of run one or two stores for the rest of our lives. That's

449
00:27:48,220 --> 00:27:51,460
fine for some people, but we're just a little bit more ambitious than that,

450
00:27:52,580 --> 00:27:56,310
I think. So we, You know, really early on after

451
00:27:56,310 --> 00:27:59,390
opening our first location, we had to decide, do we want to go the franchise

452
00:27:59,390 --> 00:28:03,190
route or do we want to go the corporate-owned route? Because we are the

453
00:28:03,190 --> 00:28:06,990
first in the market and because someone that has deeper pockets can come in

454
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and quickly open more than these, more of these than

455
00:28:10,950 --> 00:28:14,750
we have, we knew that franchising was the route to go because there's only so

456
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many that we can, you know, construct and open by ourselves at the

457
00:28:18,710 --> 00:28:22,510
same time. So we just opened our second corporate-owned location in the

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South Denver suburbs called Highlands Ranch. You know, we opened

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that one and are operating it as a franchise.

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So we designed, you know, construction blueprints and

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00:28:33,210 --> 00:28:36,930
prototypes and interior design package. We implemented a

462
00:28:36,930 --> 00:28:40,449
new appointment management software and POS where we're now paying royalties and

463
00:28:40,449 --> 00:28:43,170
a brand fund to the mother

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00:28:44,050 --> 00:28:47,730
corporate company. We hired an entirely new team and trained

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00:28:47,730 --> 00:28:51,050
them from scratch because we could have used people, you know, our employees that have

466
00:28:51,050 --> 00:28:54,530
been with us for 3, 4 years from our existing

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00:28:54,530 --> 00:28:57,230
location. But franchisees aren't going to have the luxury of doing that. So we wanted

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00:28:57,230 --> 00:29:00,910
to see what the, the hiring and training process was like with a totally

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00:29:00,910 --> 00:29:04,710
new batch of employees. So, um, that location's been open

470
00:29:04,710 --> 00:29:08,350
for almost a year now, um, and then we just launched

471
00:29:08,350 --> 00:29:12,030
our franchise sales cycle last month. Um, so we've also

472
00:29:12,030 --> 00:29:15,870
spent the last 2 years putting together our ops manual,

473
00:29:15,870 --> 00:29:19,710
FDD, franchise support system, um, and we've been collecting

474
00:29:19,710 --> 00:29:23,350
leads of, you know, our guests that have been interested in franchising over

475
00:29:23,350 --> 00:29:27,120
the past few years. And so we're working them through the

476
00:29:27,120 --> 00:29:30,760
sales cycle now. That's awesome. I'm glad to hear it. Well, that's

477
00:29:30,760 --> 00:29:34,520
a great story. Sounds like an awesome experience. I'll try to

478
00:29:34,520 --> 00:29:38,200
come to Denver. Thanks for coming on Healog Talks. And this

479
00:29:38,200 --> 00:29:41,120
is to the, to the new experiences hitting

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00:29:42,000 --> 00:29:45,800
the market, 25 countries, back to Denver and getting

481
00:29:46,000 --> 00:29:49,680
loans to put this together. It's an awesome story. So congrats on what you built.

482
00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:52,450
Thanks so much. We're excited for the future. Thanks. That

483
00:30:01,090 --> 00:30:04,810
was fun. This is Pete Moore on Halo Talks, your captain speaking.

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00:30:04,810 --> 00:30:08,410
I am the founder and managing partner at Integrity Square. We've

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00:30:08,410 --> 00:30:12,210
been around now for 15 and one half years. We have

486
00:30:12,210 --> 00:30:15,690
been helping people like yourselves get capital, do

487
00:30:15,690 --> 00:30:19,290
mergers and acquisitions, consult helping strategic advice in

488
00:30:19,290 --> 00:30:23,050
the health, active lifestyle, and outdoor halo sector,

489
00:30:23,050 --> 00:30:26,330
trying to help as many entrepreneurs as possible get to the

490
00:30:26,970 --> 00:30:30,330
next level, take that inflection point, and be the force behind

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00:30:30,890 --> 00:30:34,530
your growth. We are helping companies that have at least $3

492
00:30:34,530 --> 00:30:38,010
million of EBITDA, around $10 million of

493
00:30:38,090 --> 00:30:41,450
revenue, and we are positioned to help get institutional

494
00:30:42,170 --> 00:30:45,930
growth capital or to negotiate deals with strategic

495
00:30:45,930 --> 00:30:48,210
partners. If you go

496
00:30:49,730 --> 00:30:53,330
to IntegritySQ.com/ISQ, you can see our capabilities deck. Happy to set up a consultation

497
00:30:53,330 --> 00:30:56,730
at any time. That is free of charge, and we look

498
00:30:56,930 --> 00:31:00,610
forward to helping solve obesity, loneliness,

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00:31:00,770 --> 00:31:01,670
and diabetes. Go Halo!