On Wednesday, Laurie and I were honored to be panelists at the 18th Annual Women Business Owners Conference at Mount Holyoke College. First of all, it was so exciting to get the call from our business advisor Lyne Kendall who asked that we participate. She wanted the other entrepreneurs to “hear our story.” To be quite frank, when you are in the midst of it you often don’t realize that your story might be of interest, or even very different from the rest of the world. But we did as told, put together the talk and told our story. Now I realize that maybe the followers of this blog might want to hear our story too.
I started the talk with, “Did I ever think that I, with a B.F.A in dance and an overzealous interest in anatomy, would be surfing the internet to research business valuation techniques as well as creating a proforma balance sheet…Well no, but in May and June that’s what I found myself doing. The even more surprising thing was that I was enjoying every minute of it, and even better I was doing this with my very best friend…
Then I talked about the history of our friendship. We met at the studio 10 years ago. Our friendship developed so much so that the original owners of the studio changed our schedules so that we were working in different locations (apparently we were a little "too chatty") However, when ownership of the studio changed, we conveniently changed our schedules so that we would be working together all of the time again. As time passed a collaborative process developed between the two of us. We learned how to accentuate each of our very different strengths into a synergistic division of labor…(that might not make sense but it does if you really think about it)
At the Talk we also went on to tell the story of our tagline…Laurie and I are very passionate about our tagline because it succinctly accentuates the reason we love our business so much.
The Pilates Studio: Strengthening Community One Core at a Time.
To me that’s enough said but Laurie and I were supposed to fill 35 minutes at this conference so we had to explain a little bit.
When we decided to buy the business last spring we set out to write a business plan. We spent hours talking about how great the studio was and trying to find what, besides the fact that Pilates is an excellent exercise method for creating strength and flexibility, was it about the studio that we loved so much!
As we were writing this business plan, we of course would go on tangents. Do you remember when Mary had her whole family come to the studio to take a mat class for her 60th Birthday? Isn’t it great that Nel, Allie, and Sara go to lunch at Esselon after their session? Do you remember when Debbie and Laurel were planning a surprise party for Alice, and you had to remember not to spill the beans when Alice came to Mat Class? I love that our clients love each other! Do you remember the party we had last year? Who knew that a party at a Pilates Studio could be so much fun? We need to have more of those? Interspersed between all of this reminiscing we were doing the "tedious work" of analyzing the market, making spreadsheets, and creating a marketing plan…
At some point during this process Laurie and I were both at work. I was teaching a session and when it was finished I went to the desk and her eyes were huge when she said, “I’ve got it. The Pilates Studio building community one core at a time”
I said, “That’s perfect” and then I taught the next session,.
When I came back to the desk Laurie said, “The Pilates Studio: Strengthening Community One Core at a Time.”
"Well that's even better!"
We were definitely going to have to have another party.
From here several ideas came to mind. We wanted to continue strengthening the community at the Pilates Studio so we decided to:
1. Have snacks after some mat classes…Community is strengthened when there are snacks. This idea actually came to mind one day when I left my lunch on the counter and went to talk to a client. When I came back to the desk the students from Laurie’s mat class were standing around the counter chatting and eating my lunch.
2. We implemented Open Studio – This happens on Fridays from 1-2. Anybody can come to the studio and for just $5, they can get an extra workout that week or any week for that matter.
3. Our lecture series now known as MAT CHATS. This concept was born when Laurie came to me and said you know how everybody keeps asking you questions about anatomy…What if we have a lecture series…We can ask our clients to participate too!
4. We decided to have a community page on the website. We would link to anything our clients were passionate about. We have authors, passionate philanthropists, volunteers, who come to the studio, and they are passionate about many things in the community. We want to share their passion with the rest of the community.
5. We also support local businesses.
WE bank locally. The same mat class that ate my lunch surrounded our loan officer one day when he came to the studio. Their sole purpose was to tell him how important the studio was to them. They are a feisty group of ladies.
Our graphic designer is local
Our printer is local
Our accountant is local, and we were given the advice that of all the people you work with you need to love your accountant!!! It was the best advice and we also LOVE our accountant!
Our lawyer is local. He is the person that pointed us to the small business development center in the first place
We joined Pioneer Valley Local First!
At the Pilates Studio in Hadley
We really are Strengthening the Community One Core at a Time.
At this point in the speech I handed the microphone to Laurie, and she spoke of the details of our social media strategy...In a sense it is how we connect with the community around the Pilates Studio on the web....
She talked about our blog, she talked about facebook, she talked about constant contact, she talked about search engine optimization. She did this all with the sense of humor that makes the students in her mat classes get core work from laughter as well as Pilates. This is a prime example synergistic division of labor I was writing about earlier...Laurie was the person that went with me to buy my first cell phone. She sent me my first text (when I was still resisting) She signed me up to friendster and then myspace, and finally to facebook...I am lucky to have such a brilliant business partner that is on the cutting edge of technology. Wahoo I say!!!!
Katrina Hawley C.M.A, R.S.M.E
Co-owner The Pilates Studio
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