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Speaker 1: What's going on?

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Speaker 2: Guys.

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Speaker 3: Welcome to episode thirty six of Hurdle, a podcast that

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Speaker 3: talks to everyone from top CEOs to entrepreneurs about how

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Speaker 3: they got through tough times hurdles of sorts by leaning

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Speaker 3: into wellness. My name's emileah Body, and today I'm chatting

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Speaker 3: with Ethan Agerwall, the founder and CEO of Active, an

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Speaker 3: audio based workout app which might be best described as the.

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Speaker 1: Netflix of fitness.

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Speaker 3: Today's episode is brought to you by Headspace. I had

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Speaker 3: founder Andy Putcolm on the podcast, so you know I'm

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Speaker 3: a huge fan of the brand. They've got hundreds of

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Speaker 3: meditations on everything from stress and anxiety to focus and sleep,

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Speaker 3: and just ten days of using the app has been

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Speaker 3: proven to reduce stress and increase happiness.

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Speaker 1: You have got to try it. I swear by it.

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Speaker 3: They're offering Hurdle listeners thirty days free of the entire

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Speaker 3: Headspace library. Just head on over to headspace dot com

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Speaker 3: slash Hurdle again. That's headspace dot com slash Hurdle to

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Speaker 3: dive on in. Today's episode is also brought to you

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Speaker 3: by Athletic Green. Guys, I have been so ampt lately.

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Speaker 3: Total understatement, seeing more and more listeners tagging me in

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Speaker 3: their Athletic Greens packages on Instagram and I hope you're

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Speaker 3: loving it as much as I do. Containing twelve servings

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Speaker 3: of fruits and vegetables, the Greens pewder gives me the

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Speaker 3: boost I need to start every single day off right.

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Speaker 3: Athletic Greens is offering a special deal to hurdle listeners.

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Speaker 3: It's twenty free travel packs a ninety nine dollars value

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Speaker 3: for free with your first purchase. Just head on over

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Speaker 3: to Athleticgreens dot com slash hurdle to claim it.

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Speaker 1: No code necessary.

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Speaker 3: Again, that's Athleticgreens dot com slash Hurdle. Now, let's talk

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Speaker 3: about Ethan. In twenty thirteen, the now CEO is working

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Speaker 3: as a consultant, tired, traveling constantly, and forty pounds overweight,

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Speaker 3: and like a lot of people, fitness wasn't a priority

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Speaker 3: for him because, in his words, it was hard to

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Speaker 3: make it a priority. The catch he wanted to be healthier.

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Speaker 3: In his hurdle moment, Ethan dropped forty pounds by building

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Speaker 3: the first version of Aptive, originally called Skyfish, which brings

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Speaker 3: top level digital only audio based training sessions with personal

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Speaker 3: trainers right to your headphones.

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Speaker 1: In today's episode.

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Speaker 3: The founder tells me hilarious stories about the early days

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Speaker 3: of APTIV, posing as a surveyor at the gym, asking

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Speaker 3: strangers for feedback. He offers essential advice for anyone trying

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Speaker 3: to adopt a new fitness routine, and gives the lowdown

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Speaker 3: on his six am habit that makes him more productive

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Speaker 3: throughout his entire day. As always Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, at

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Speaker 3: Hurdle Podcast, whether it's a take away from the episode,

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Speaker 3: or you opening a package of athletic greens or trying

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Speaker 3: headspace for.

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Speaker 1: The first time, I want to see it. I want

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Speaker 1: to hear about it. Make sure to tag me in.

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Speaker 3: Your Instagram stories and I'll definitely repost them from the

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Speaker 3: Hurdle account Over at Hurdle Podcast, Los Angeles. I'm doing

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Speaker 3: a live podcast tomorrow, January fifteenth, at the Tory Sports

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Speaker 3: Store on Rodeo Drive. I'll be sitting down with hurdler

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Speaker 3: Y Simons Studio founder and CEO Sarah Larson Levy, as

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Speaker 3: well as Nachelle Hines from cycle House at seven pm

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Speaker 3: and I'd love to see you there. You can find

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Speaker 3: more details on that over on the top of the

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Speaker 3: Hurdle website over at Curdle dot us. If you're not

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Speaker 3: on the West Coast, don't worry, because I'm gonna be

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Speaker 3: having some fun back in New York at the end

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Speaker 3: of the month with We Work Too. Super Flatter that

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Speaker 3: We Work Labs is showcasing Hurdle in their great Reads

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Speaker 3: and Listeners Club as podcast of the Month, and to celebrate,

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Speaker 3: I'll be hanging out with Hurdler's Adam Callen, Jesse Dover,

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Speaker 3: and the co founders and CEOs of Shine Text Maalaidi

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Speaker 3: and Naomi Hirobayashi on January twenty third at six thirty pm.

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Speaker 3: You can find all the details on that over at

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Speaker 3: Curdle dot us as well. Okay, last thing, I promise,

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Speaker 3: even in the Aptive crew, we're't gonna let you get

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Speaker 3: away without offering you an opportunity to try their workouts yourself.

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Speaker 1: Head on over to aptive dot com.

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Speaker 3: That's aaptiv dot com and use the promo code Hurdle

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Speaker 3: to get a seven day free trial, then thirty percent

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Speaker 3: off in annual Aptive membership. I just gave both my

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Speaker 3: parents after for the holidays and they're hooked again. Use

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Speaker 3: the code at checkout at Active dot Com. And with that,

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Speaker 3: let's get to hurdling. I'm sitting here today with Ethan Agarwall.

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Speaker 3: He's the CEO and founder at Active.

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Speaker 2: Hey, Hey, how are you?

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Speaker 1: I'm good? How are you?

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Speaker 2: Terrific?

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Speaker 1: This is kind of cool.

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Speaker 2: We're in a sound booth. We are.

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Speaker 1: It's funny.

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Speaker 3: I actually feel like this is the dialogue I've been

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Speaker 3: having a lot lately. I'm just traveling the country in

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Speaker 3: different sound moves, connecting with awesome people. It's a pretty

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Speaker 3: cool way. It sounds like it's a kind of great

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Speaker 3: side hustle man. And since the last time I came

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Speaker 3: to Active, you are we're in one world trade Right

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Speaker 3: now we are.

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Speaker 2: We're on the forty ninth floor and we're looking right now.

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Speaker 2: We're looking east at a pretty beautiful sunset over the

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Speaker 2: Brooklyn Bridge.

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Speaker 1: Has the change been because you guys were in Flat

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Speaker 1: Iron before?

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Speaker 2: Right we were? You know, I've lived in Manhattan for

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Speaker 2: twelve years and this is the first time I've ever

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Speaker 2: worked downtown. But it's awesome. I mean, what they've done

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Speaker 2: with Oculus and Brookfield and this building is really cool

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Speaker 2: and like, I mean, you know, this building, but it's

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Speaker 2: not a bunch of sort of stuffy finance people. It's

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Speaker 2: like a lot of young people, a lot of startups.

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Speaker 2: So I'm really happy we moved down here.

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Speaker 3: Well, as someone who used to work in this building,

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Speaker 3: I would agree, I'd co sign it's pretty nice.

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Speaker 1: I'm so amped to be here with you today.

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Speaker 3: I'm amped to share more about Active with the Hurdle

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Speaker 3: audience and hear about your company. So why don't we

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Speaker 3: jump off with you giving me a brief synopsis on

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Speaker 3: what Active is.

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Speaker 2: Sure So Active combines the voice and inspiration and guidance

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Speaker 2: of a trainer with an amazing motivating playlist. So for

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Speaker 2: those of your listeners who have been to a studio class,

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Speaker 2: whether it's you know, soul Cycle or berries or whatever,

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Speaker 2: we capture that experience and we make it mobile, so

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Speaker 2: an easy way to think about it is like a

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Speaker 2: personal trainer on your phone. So we have twenty six

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Speaker 2: different categories of classes, everything from treadmill, outdoor running, spinning, stare, climber, meditation, yoga,

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Speaker 2: and we have about three thousand different classes available in

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Speaker 2: those categories.

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Speaker 1: Wow, that's a lot of classes.

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Speaker 2: It is, you know, we think we really care a

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Speaker 2: lot about driving outcomes and helping people reach their goals,

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Speaker 2: and we discovered pretty early on that what you do

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Speaker 2: between classes and having the variety of classes and content

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Speaker 2: is just as important as the class itself. So one

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Speaker 2: of the challenges I think that people experience when they

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Speaker 2: go to a studio class is there's no relationship between

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Speaker 2: you and the studio from one class to the next class.

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Speaker 2: Right if you get injured, if you skip a class,

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Speaker 2: there's no sort of follow up or progression or anything

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Speaker 2: like that. And we care very deeply about the relationship

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Speaker 2: with our members, both during the class and outside of

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Speaker 2: the class.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I love the term. I love that you call

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Speaker 3: them members absolutely.

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Speaker 2: I mean, this is a community, and a community has

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Speaker 2: members in it. We're not, you know, some big corporate

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Speaker 2: entity that we don't use, like you know, IDs or something.

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Speaker 2: I know people's names. We have over two hundred thousand members' names,

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Speaker 2: and I can probably name a couple of thousand of

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Speaker 2: them just because I read about them and I personally

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Speaker 2: talk to them all the time, and I really you know,

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Speaker 2: one of them is an author and I bought her

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Speaker 2: book and I was reading it this weekend, So you know,

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Speaker 2: like we're really a community. You could you could borderline

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Speaker 2: call it a family. So yes, they're family members.

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Speaker 1: Family members, family members.

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Speaker 3: Okay, so your your family's pretty big now, you guys

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Speaker 3: started in twenty sixteen, that's right. What I would love

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Speaker 3: to know, rewinding a little bit for you life before Active. Sure,

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Speaker 3: it's not like you wake up one day you're like,

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Speaker 3: you know what I'm gonna do tomorrow, I'm going to

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Speaker 3: start this workout app. It's going to be audio. It's

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Speaker 3: gonna be great. So tell me about life before Active.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so where'd you grow up? I grew up in California? Okay, well,

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Speaker 2: I was actually born in Montreal. My dad went to

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Speaker 2: the seventy six Olympics, fell in love with the city

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Speaker 2: and wanted to move there. Not as a competitor, definitely,

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Speaker 2: just as of viewer. That would be amazing though if

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Speaker 2: he was in the Olympics. He is a PhD though,

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Speaker 2: so I don't know that he would be able to

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Speaker 2: do both. So he went to watch the seventy six

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Speaker 2: Olympics in Montreal, and so he moved the family there,

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Speaker 2: and I was born in Montreal and then moved the family.

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Speaker 2: He moved family out to California in the mid nineties,

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Speaker 2: and so I grew up there. And then you know,

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Speaker 2: most of my career before Active was in finance and

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Speaker 2: in various sort of business roles. So you know, I

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Speaker 2: did invest in banking. I went to Wharton for my MBA,

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Speaker 2: I worked at a hedge fund for a bit, and

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Speaker 2: I spent a few years at McKenzie and all that

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Speaker 2: was except for grad school obviously was in New York,

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Speaker 2: and then started Active about three years ago.

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Speaker 3: I only learned recently that bankers at some of the

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Speaker 3: companies that you're talking about work hours that are like

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Speaker 3: nine am to midnight.

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Speaker 2: Yes, that's so intense, it's crazy, for sure.

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Speaker 1: Or are you working hours like that?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? I was doing that. And you work on weekends

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Speaker 2: and you work on holidays, and you don't really take

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Speaker 2: much time off.

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Speaker 3: So I can imagine that that probably didn't exactly cultivate

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Speaker 3: the healthiest lifestyle.

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Speaker 2: Definitely not I was. I was very thin or in

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Speaker 2: shape sort of growing up. And then, as you said,

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Speaker 2: because of the hours, and also in grad school, I

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Speaker 2: wouldn't say I was living my healthiest life. I put

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Speaker 2: on like forty pounds. And you know, this is an

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Speaker 2: audio podcast, but I generally you have a pretty small frame,

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Speaker 2: and so forty pounds is a lot of weight for me,

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Speaker 2: and I wanted to lose it, and that's part of

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Speaker 2: the reason that active came to be.

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Speaker 1: Were you frustrated?

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Speaker 3: I remember, for example, when I was in college, I

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Speaker 3: was dramatically overweight as well. I have talked about on

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Speaker 3: the podcast before, but I lost seventy pounds from my

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Speaker 3: freshman year to my senior year.

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Speaker 2: That's incredible.

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Speaker 3: And throughout that process, I remember that the best parts

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Speaker 3: were when I just started to feel like I had

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Speaker 3: more energy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, the thing with weight loss or weight

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Speaker 2: gain for that matter, is yes, you look physically different.

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Speaker 2: But the problem with weight gain is what you said

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Speaker 2: right where you lose energy, you lose confidence, and you

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Speaker 2: lose sort of the motivation that you know wakes us

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Speaker 2: up every day and makes us strive to do something

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Speaker 2: incredible that day.

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Speaker 3: Did you feel like you were lacking motivation at your

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Speaker 3: job because of how you are kind of perceiving your body.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, you know, you lose a sense of confidence, you

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Speaker 2: lose a sense of sort of self worth. You know

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Speaker 2: what's it all for? Kind of thinking ends up entering

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Speaker 2: your brain. You know, why am I working all these

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Speaker 2: crazy hours? I'm not living healthy. I've put on all

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Speaker 2: this weight, none of my clothes fit anymore. I feel

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Speaker 2: guilty every meal, and so you end up that ends

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Speaker 2: up factoring into your sleep, into your relationships, into your friendships,

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Speaker 2: and so it's not just the weight, like the physical weight,

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Speaker 2: it's all the other stuff that goes along with it

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Speaker 2: that makes it really challenging.

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Speaker 3: I always ask this to people who also were at

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Speaker 3: one time heavier than they are now.

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Speaker 1: Well, what was your food?

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Speaker 3: Like?

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Speaker 1: What was the thing?

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Speaker 2: I grew up in California? So Mexican food is definitely

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Speaker 2: my weakness, and for what it's worth, it's still my weakness.

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Speaker 2: Like you could put her refried bean burrito in front

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Speaker 2: of me and I would eat it anytime. Yeah, now

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Speaker 2: I just eat a lot less of them than I

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Speaker 2: used to.

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Speaker 3: I share that sentiment, but it's equally divided between French

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Speaker 3: fries always and like I used to be able to

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Speaker 3: tell you, like which places around where I grew up

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Speaker 3: had the best fries, and it wasn't. I'm not talking

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Speaker 3: like McDonald's. It was like the maritime aquarium.

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Speaker 2: Like French fries, seasoning is very specific.

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Speaker 3: I used to just be a sucker for French fries

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Speaker 3: and also still to this day, just ice cream in general, Okay, huge.

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Speaker 2: I I never had a big sweet tooth, thankfully. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: but Mexican food is a big weakness.

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Speaker 3: Okay, So you are working crazy hours, you're traveling a lot,

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Speaker 3: and as you're traveling, to my understanding, you start to

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Speaker 3: kind of have these thoughts about what your routine is missing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good way to put it. What's my

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Speaker 2: routine missing? And how do I You know, if getting

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Speaker 2: healthy and losing weight is first and foremost a mental decision,

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Speaker 2: it's really a test of mental strength more than physical strength.

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Speaker 2: And so if I've made the mental sort of you know,

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Speaker 2: I'll even call it a mental accomplishment to decide that

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Speaker 2: I want to live healthier, I shouldn't have to then

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Speaker 2: undergo this big, logistical, complicated world of how to lose

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Speaker 2: that weight, because the mental part is the hard part.

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Speaker 2: And so I made a decision. I said, I want

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Speaker 2: to lose weight, I want to live healthier, and I'm

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Speaker 2: ready to make those changes in my life. But the

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Speaker 2: things that I needed to make those changes were too

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Speaker 2: hard or nearly impossible for me to find. And that's

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Speaker 2: where I found an opportunity.

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Speaker 1: Right, And so it's interesting that you say that.

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Speaker 3: I think a great example for this is with running,

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Speaker 3: Like people are like, oh my god, I need all

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Speaker 3: these things. I need sneakers, I need a smart watch.

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Speaker 3: Are the leggings I'm wearing? Are they okay? What about

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Speaker 3: do if you're a woman? Do I need a sports bra?

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Speaker 3: And then they get so rare up in the details

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Speaker 3: that they completely forget that you could literally just put

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Speaker 3: on any pair of sneakers and get out and move.

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Speaker 3: You don't need to see how fast you're going, like,

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Speaker 3: you can just do it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly right. And running is a great example

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Speaker 2: of something like literally all you need are like sneakers

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Speaker 2: in a road. You can do it anywhere anytime. You

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Speaker 2: don't need to spend a bunch of money, you don't

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Speaker 2: need to know how to do anything. You just run.

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Speaker 2: And I think one of the you know, you bring

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Speaker 2: up a really good point. One of the things that

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Speaker 2: I think hinders a lot of people is this fear

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Speaker 2: that other people are going to look at them. And

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Speaker 2: you know, I don't want to look like a fool.

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Speaker 2: I don't want to look like I don't know what

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Speaker 2: I'm doing. And I always tell people two things. One

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Speaker 2: is whether this hurts your ego or not, no one

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Speaker 2: is looking at you. Everyone is focused on their own thing.

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Speaker 2: Everyone's listening to music, everyone's doing something. I promise you,

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Speaker 2: no matter how good or bad you look, no one

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Speaker 2: is looking at you.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: But the second and most important thing, and we can

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Speaker 2: get to this later, is you know, one of the

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Speaker 2: things I's active is that we're audio only, and so

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Speaker 2: when people are listening to our class is they're listening

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Speaker 2: in their earphones and they're listening on their phone in

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Speaker 2: their earbuds, and so no one knows. No one else

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Speaker 2: in the gym knows that you're listening to an active

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Speaker 2: trainer and an active class. So when you walk into

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Speaker 2: a gym with active membership, you walk in like you

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Speaker 2: own the place. You have a sense of confidence that

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Speaker 2: I can walk up to any machine and there's dozens,

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Speaker 2: if not hundreds of classes available led by the world's

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Speaker 2: best trainers to teach me exactly how to use that machine.

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Speaker 2: And I'll be honest, that's not something that I planned

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Speaker 2: for in the beginning as one of the reasons why

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Speaker 2: I started the company, but it is one of the

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Speaker 2: most common reasons that we hear from people as to

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Speaker 2: why they love active.

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Speaker 1: And it's funny now that you say that.

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Speaker 3: I had a girlfriend hit me up a couple of

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Speaker 3: days ago asking if I wanted to go to the

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Speaker 3: gym together next week, and she said, I just feel

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Speaker 3: like I walk in there and I have no.

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Speaker 2: Sense of direction totally.

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Speaker 3: And so what you're saying is like a huge problem

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Speaker 3: solver for someone like that that's just like, I don't

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Speaker 3: know what to do this. I can I get there.

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Speaker 3: I feel like I've chicken with my head cut off.

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Speaker 3: I'm just walking around. I'll like lift something briefly, then

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Speaker 3: I'll like get on the treadmill and I'll be like, oh,

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Speaker 3: I don't really want to be on the treadmill, and

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Speaker 3: then I'll like walk over to the elliptical.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it doesn't have to be like that. It does

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Speaker 2: not have to be like that. The other thing I'll

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Speaker 2: just say really quick is we launched a maternity program recently,

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Speaker 2: and as we were doing research before we built the program,

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Speaker 2: we were talking to a lot of moms, or I

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Speaker 2: should say both pregnant women and re moms, and one

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Speaker 2: of the pieces of feedback that we got almost unanimously

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Speaker 2: is because a woman can't tell anyone in the first

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Speaker 2: trimester that she's pregnant. A lot of women were going

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Speaker 2: to the gym in their first trimester or going to

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Speaker 2: a spin class or whatever it is, and they couldn't

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Speaker 2: tell the trainer or the instructor that they were pregnant.

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Speaker 2: So they had this huge sense of concern inside of

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Speaker 2: is this workout safe for me? Is this workout safe

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Speaker 2: for the baby? But because they couldn't tell anyone, they

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Speaker 2: couldn't answer that question. And that's such an unfair situation

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Speaker 2: for a woman who is pregnant and wants to work

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Speaker 2: out at the gym, that she has this sense of

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Speaker 2: insecurity inside. So when we built our maternity program, now

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Speaker 2: we have it's a full three trimester program and then

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Speaker 2: we have a fourth trimester after you deliver. But each

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Speaker 2: week's classes that we have for all forty weeks is

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Speaker 2: first of all, the program is created by our trainers

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Speaker 2: who are also moms. But more importantly, the classes are

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Speaker 2: safe to be done in any given week. So if

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Speaker 2: you're taking the Aptive Maternity program and you're in week

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Speaker 2: six and you're not telling anyone that you're pregnant, the

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Speaker 2: classes that we have in week six we know are

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Speaker 2: safe for women. To do. So now they're going into

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Speaker 2: the gym, they're taking the Aptive maternity program with a

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Speaker 2: full sense of confidence without having to disclose to anyone

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Speaker 2: else that they're pregnant, because no one knows that you're

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Speaker 2: taking the maternity.

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Speaker 1: Program, right right, Okay, so let's dial it back again.

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Speaker 3: We're going to reel it in and we're going to

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Speaker 3: talk to when you started to really kind of concept

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Speaker 3: the idea for this ad app because at the time,

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Speaker 3: there was really not much like it at all.

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Speaker 1: There wasn't anything like it at.

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Speaker 2: All, that's right, So there was nothing like it.

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Speaker 1: Or what year we in when when you first have

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Speaker 1: this kind of aha moment?

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Speaker 2: Twenty fifteen.

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Speaker 1: So and you're still you're still at your old.

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Speaker 2: Gig, and yeah, this is right now, this is just

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Speaker 2: an idea in my head. There's there's no one working

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Speaker 2: on it, there's no money, there's no members. This is

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Speaker 2: just like an idea that I have.

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Speaker 1: And you're still forty pounds overweight.

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Speaker 2: No, so it started because I lost the weight. I

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Speaker 2: lost the weight by creating, you know, the very very

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Speaker 2: very early version of active, which is like music and

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Speaker 2: a workout designed to the pace of the music, and

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Speaker 2: some coaching and you know programs and stuff like that,

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Speaker 2: and I lost all the weight and I went from

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Speaker 2: uh one seventy five to one thirty five, and one

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Speaker 2: thirty five is a little skinny for me, so I

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Speaker 2: put some weight back on, but I lost the weight.

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Speaker 2: And people started asking me, Ethan, how did you lose

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Speaker 2: forty pounds, because it's a lot of weight to lose.

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Speaker 2: And I started telling them about, you know, these programs

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Speaker 2: and these classes that I had sort of built myself

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Speaker 2: and I was taking. But where I got really interested

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Speaker 2: in it is I realized that all the content that

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Speaker 2: was created before Active was video based. And a big

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Speaker 2: problem with video is, like, you know, I'm a runner.

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Speaker 2: I think you run too. You know, you can't run

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Speaker 2: down the street staring at a video on your phone

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Speaker 2: or on an iPad, right, that doesn't make any sense.

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Speaker 2: Any instruction, guidance, motivation that comes to us has to

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Speaker 2: come through audio, and running is, by the way, the

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Speaker 2: most popular workout in the world because of all the

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Speaker 2: stuff we just talked about. And then I realized audio

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Speaker 2: actually works even better for almost every kind of exercise,

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Speaker 2: Like we're not meant to work out while staring at

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Speaker 2: a foreign screen for forty five minutes. That's a terrible

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Speaker 2: way to work out your body. You can't move your head,

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Speaker 2: your eyes are anchored to one place. You know, you

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Speaker 2: can't do any body weight kind of workout. You can't

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Speaker 2: do push ups, you can't do squads, you can't do

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Speaker 2: anything that doesn't require you staring straight ahead. And so

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Speaker 2: if you get the best trainers who can articulate the

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Speaker 2: right posture and who can motivate you through words, which

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Speaker 2: is exactly what we have today, audio is actually a

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Speaker 2: much better way to deliver content and instruction than video,

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Speaker 2: and no one had done that. So that's why I

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Speaker 2: started Ouptive.

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's so interesting, I think especially I mean

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Speaker 3: I had Ruth Zagribbin on the podcast they have fly

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Speaker 3: Anywhere at Flywheel. I had Robin Arizono the podcast. She's

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Speaker 3: a part of the huge team at Peloton. And it's

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Speaker 3: like there's more and more options coming out, some of

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Speaker 3: which do have screens like you're talking about. And then

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Speaker 3: obviously now there's more competition in your market, but it

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Speaker 3: seems that the bigger goal here is to provide people

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Speaker 3: with things that they can do on their own.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, I think flexibility and personalization are going to

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Speaker 2: win in the end. You know, people are tired of

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Speaker 2: being treated like an um. I mean we were talking

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Speaker 2: about this earlier, like our members are members. They're not

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Speaker 2: just a number, and they're not put into like buckets

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Speaker 2: of demographic like, oh, you're a woman who's twenty five

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Speaker 2: to forty four, so here is five classes that we

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Speaker 2: think you alike. That makes no sense. Forget the fact

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Speaker 2: that there is a nineteen year age range between those people.

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Speaker 2: Even two people who are twenty five are going to

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Speaker 2: have very different goals, very different bodies, very different capabilities.

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Speaker 2: So we really care about specificity and individuality and personalization,

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Speaker 2: and we don't try to box people into buckets. We

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Speaker 2: don't try to tell people, hey, the only way for

438
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442
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443
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444
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459
00:22:51,960 --> 00:23:02,800
Speaker 3: com slash hurdle. You have this idea, you lose the weight,

460
00:23:02,920 --> 00:23:05,240
Speaker 3: people are asking you about it, and you're like, maybe

461
00:23:05,280 --> 00:23:08,240
Speaker 3: I should really start thinking a little bit more about

462
00:23:08,600 --> 00:23:09,320
Speaker 3: all this stuff.

463
00:23:09,760 --> 00:23:12,159
Speaker 2: Yeah, So what I did is I created like a

464
00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:19,840
Speaker 2: very like really really rudimentary, really pretty subpar app It

465
00:23:19,880 --> 00:23:22,200
Speaker 2: was like super ugly, and I think, there, how.

466
00:23:22,080 --> 00:23:23,919
Speaker 1: Do you even like do that when you've never created

467
00:23:23,920 --> 00:23:25,000
Speaker 1: an app before.

468
00:23:26,160 --> 00:23:33,320
Speaker 2: Badly, so you know, you beg people who are engineering.

469
00:23:33,320 --> 00:23:35,119
Speaker 2: I'm not an engineer, So I had to find people

470
00:23:35,720 --> 00:23:38,720
Speaker 2: who are engineers and pay them like obscene amounts of

471
00:23:38,760 --> 00:23:41,359
Speaker 2: money to design something that I designed, and I'm not

472
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:44,800
Speaker 2: a designer. Yeah. I just studied a lot of different

473
00:23:44,800 --> 00:23:47,119
Speaker 2: products that I liked and found common themes and then

474
00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:49,560
Speaker 2: created a design based on that and I got someone

475
00:23:49,600 --> 00:23:50,960
Speaker 2: to build it. And then what I would do is

476
00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:53,280
Speaker 2: I would either go to people in the gym in

477
00:23:53,280 --> 00:23:55,160
Speaker 2: my building, or go to people outside in the street,

478
00:23:55,240 --> 00:23:58,399
Speaker 2: or go to people at gyms and say, hey, like,

479
00:23:58,760 --> 00:24:01,439
Speaker 2: I see you're about to get on this, mil I

480
00:24:01,480 --> 00:24:03,760
Speaker 2: have this class. It's like going to make you work

481
00:24:03,800 --> 00:24:05,280
Speaker 2: out better. Do you mind trying it?

482
00:24:05,280 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 1: It's gonna make you work out better?

483
00:24:06,680 --> 00:24:08,879
Speaker 2: And nine times out of ten they tell you to

484
00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:11,359
Speaker 2: screw off, right, Yeah, like, leave me alone, dude, I

485
00:24:11,440 --> 00:24:13,840
Speaker 2: want to work out. But every once in a while

486
00:24:13,920 --> 00:24:15,840
Speaker 2: someone would say yes and they would try the class,

487
00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:19,080
Speaker 2: and unanimously, the feedback I got from people was like,

488
00:24:19,160 --> 00:24:20,920
Speaker 2: oh my god, how do I get more of that?

489
00:24:21,119 --> 00:24:23,719
Speaker 2: And it didn't matter to them that the app looked like,

490
00:24:23,920 --> 00:24:25,199
Speaker 2: you know, it was terrible, and I was just some

491
00:24:25,280 --> 00:24:28,040
Speaker 2: random dude and a gym bothering them. The class was

492
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:31,880
Speaker 2: really really good, and so they kept and I did this,

493
00:24:32,680 --> 00:24:35,480
Speaker 2: you know, dozens and hundreds of times, and then I

494
00:24:35,520 --> 00:24:38,160
Speaker 2: got a bunch of feedback from people telling me these

495
00:24:38,160 --> 00:24:41,200
Speaker 2: classes are amazing. I've never had anything like this before.

496
00:24:41,560 --> 00:24:45,800
Speaker 2: Like that gave me the drive to keep going with this.

497
00:24:45,880 --> 00:24:46,920
Speaker 2: I realized there was something.

498
00:24:46,920 --> 00:24:48,720
Speaker 3: Then you probably also got like a lot of really

499
00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:50,040
Speaker 3: good critical feedback.

500
00:24:50,320 --> 00:24:52,840
Speaker 2: Oh definitely, so great point. One of the things I

501
00:24:52,840 --> 00:24:55,159
Speaker 2: did is when I started, I would tell people that

502
00:24:55,240 --> 00:24:57,320
Speaker 2: this is my thing and I built this, and so

503
00:24:57,359 --> 00:24:59,560
Speaker 2: they were like a little too nice. And then I

504
00:24:59,760 --> 00:25:03,119
Speaker 2: changed my approach and I said, hey, I work for

505
00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:06,520
Speaker 2: this like surveying company, and I've been hired to gauge

506
00:25:06,560 --> 00:25:10,320
Speaker 2: interest in this. So they're much more honest because they

507
00:25:10,320 --> 00:25:14,680
Speaker 2: have no problem, you know, criticizing something if it's not mine.

508
00:25:14,720 --> 00:25:16,480
Speaker 2: And that's what I want. I want the criticism.

509
00:25:16,600 --> 00:25:19,680
Speaker 3: And are you still at this point at your other

510
00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:22,320
Speaker 3: job while doing this on the side and paying people

511
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:24,560
Speaker 3: a ton of money to help you execute this.

512
00:25:25,119 --> 00:25:27,520
Speaker 2: I'm sort of this is right when I was leaving

513
00:25:27,520 --> 00:25:30,600
Speaker 2: my old job and before I started app to full time.

514
00:25:30,720 --> 00:25:34,960
Speaker 3: Okay, and I just I as an entrepreneur myself, I

515
00:25:35,000 --> 00:25:38,520
Speaker 3: find it fascinating to think about people that are either

516
00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:41,160
Speaker 3: keeping a full time job while building something else, or

517
00:25:41,720 --> 00:25:44,040
Speaker 3: they start building something else and then like they finally

518
00:25:44,040 --> 00:25:45,680
Speaker 3: get to a point where they're like, maybe I should

519
00:25:45,680 --> 00:25:47,840
Speaker 3: reach out to some other people for money. Like it

520
00:25:47,960 --> 00:25:49,879
Speaker 3: just blows my mind. And it goes back to that

521
00:25:49,960 --> 00:25:51,760
Speaker 3: question of like, so how did you make the app?

522
00:25:51,840 --> 00:25:55,800
Speaker 3: Like there's simple questions that people are like that someone

523
00:25:55,840 --> 00:25:57,600
Speaker 3: will say to you and then I just did this

524
00:25:57,680 --> 00:25:59,760
Speaker 3: thing and I'm sitting here and I'm like.

525
00:25:59,760 --> 00:26:01,920
Speaker 1: How how'd you do the thing? Like how did it happen?

526
00:26:02,000 --> 00:26:03,520
Speaker 1: I want to know all the secrets. I want to

527
00:26:03,520 --> 00:26:04,240
Speaker 1: know the details.

528
00:26:04,520 --> 00:26:08,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you know, I think part of the

529
00:26:08,040 --> 00:26:10,640
Speaker 2: reason that we don't that I don't share too many

530
00:26:10,640 --> 00:26:14,159
Speaker 2: details is because it's not at all a glamorous process.

531
00:26:14,800 --> 00:26:19,040
Speaker 2: It's actually horrible. Like, yeah, I was. I was doing

532
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:22,200
Speaker 2: an interview earlier last week, and you know, we went

533
00:26:22,280 --> 00:26:25,320
Speaker 2: pretty far in depth about like how I had you know,

534
00:26:25,320 --> 00:26:27,720
Speaker 2: I was pretty deep into student Dead and I like

535
00:26:27,760 --> 00:26:30,040
Speaker 2: didn't have a bunch of money, and I racked up

536
00:26:30,040 --> 00:26:31,920
Speaker 2: a bunch of crazy bills on my credit cards to

537
00:26:31,960 --> 00:26:34,560
Speaker 2: get into this thing, and I was recently married, and like,

538
00:26:34,880 --> 00:26:37,840
Speaker 2: you know, it's a big personal commitment and a big

539
00:26:37,880 --> 00:26:42,479
Speaker 2: personal investment and there's very very slim chance of it

540
00:26:42,560 --> 00:26:46,280
Speaker 2: turning into something, and it's a lot of frustrating work

541
00:26:46,480 --> 00:26:49,720
Speaker 2: and a lot of failure before it becomes anything. And

542
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:51,840
Speaker 2: then even so, you know, we raised a little bit

543
00:26:51,880 --> 00:26:55,880
Speaker 2: of money in twenty sixteen, and so I started hiring

544
00:26:55,880 --> 00:26:57,520
Speaker 2: some people, but like, I didn't take a salary for

545
00:26:57,560 --> 00:27:00,359
Speaker 2: six months, and then when I did, it was like far,

546
00:27:00,720 --> 00:27:03,359
Speaker 2: it was like twenty percent of what I was making before.

547
00:27:04,080 --> 00:27:06,400
Speaker 2: And you know, even today I'm the lowest paid guy

548
00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:08,960
Speaker 2: on my executive team. And so you know, this is

549
00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:12,399
Speaker 2: this is just part of It's like you, right, you

550
00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:15,760
Speaker 2: sort of have an itch and you look back in

551
00:27:15,800 --> 00:27:17,359
Speaker 2: hindsight and you say, man, I can't believe I did

552
00:27:17,359 --> 00:27:18,960
Speaker 2: all these crazy things. But it was an itch. And

553
00:27:19,000 --> 00:27:21,320
Speaker 2: if you didn't scratch that itch, that was much more

554
00:27:21,359 --> 00:27:24,600
Speaker 2: painful than the risk that you had to take or

555
00:27:24,640 --> 00:27:25,840
Speaker 2: the financial commitment.

556
00:27:25,520 --> 00:27:28,480
Speaker 1: That you had to put in totally, and.

557
00:27:28,280 --> 00:27:30,040
Speaker 2: That's how these things work out. Sometimes.

558
00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:33,679
Speaker 3: I can only imagine, as someone that was recently married,

559
00:27:33,760 --> 00:27:36,399
Speaker 3: that this must have been so stressful for the two

560
00:27:36,480 --> 00:27:39,359
Speaker 3: of you. She's she's like, what did I get into? Like,

561
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:41,280
Speaker 3: what are we doing there? When I met you, you

562
00:27:41,400 --> 00:27:43,000
Speaker 3: were this guy, Now you're this.

563
00:27:43,200 --> 00:27:46,800
Speaker 2: Yeah. I'm fortunate in the sense that my wife's always

564
00:27:46,840 --> 00:27:49,639
Speaker 2: been very, very supportive. So we were together for quite

565
00:27:49,640 --> 00:27:51,720
Speaker 2: like a couple of years before he got engaged. Yeah,

566
00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:53,960
Speaker 2: and then we got married, and you know, she knew

567
00:27:54,040 --> 00:27:58,480
Speaker 2: that this is this kind of lifestyle and work level

568
00:27:58,560 --> 00:28:02,440
Speaker 2: and sort of I guess ambition is something that has

569
00:28:02,640 --> 00:28:05,639
Speaker 2: always been part of me. So yeah, I'm super lucky

570
00:28:05,680 --> 00:28:07,680
Speaker 2: that she's been so supportive from there.

571
00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:12,639
Speaker 3: Oh man, Okay, so you start working with these app developers,

572
00:28:12,680 --> 00:28:15,720
Speaker 3: you're going in posing as a survey guy at a gym.

573
00:28:15,800 --> 00:28:17,840
Speaker 3: Did anyone at any of these gyms ever tell you

574
00:28:17,880 --> 00:28:19,200
Speaker 3: that you needed to like buzz off?

575
00:28:19,320 --> 00:28:19,760
Speaker 2: Oh?

576
00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:22,520
Speaker 1: Like what about like the staff at the gym?

577
00:28:22,640 --> 00:28:26,720
Speaker 2: Yeah? So one time. Yeah, Actually, one time, I was

578
00:28:26,800 --> 00:28:30,159
Speaker 2: like trying to record something on a treadmill as I

579
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:32,760
Speaker 2: was running, But I brought my laptop with me and

580
00:28:32,800 --> 00:28:34,760
Speaker 2: I put it up and I had an external mic

581
00:28:34,800 --> 00:28:37,000
Speaker 2: that I plugged into the mic thing because I wanted

582
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:39,960
Speaker 2: to see if it works if you're recording while you're running,

583
00:28:40,440 --> 00:28:43,280
Speaker 2: and so I'm like recording a class or like an

584
00:28:43,320 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 2: audio clip while on a treadmill with a laptop sitting there,

585
00:28:48,600 --> 00:28:50,760
Speaker 2: and within like you know, two minutes, the guy comes

586
00:28:50,760 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 2: to me and he's like, sir, what are you doing? Like,

587
00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:55,400
Speaker 2: you can't be doing this here. You gotta cut this out,

588
00:28:55,400 --> 00:28:57,720
Speaker 2: you gotta go. So I like closed it and I left.

589
00:28:57,720 --> 00:28:59,320
Speaker 2: But it was the building. It was the gym in

590
00:28:59,320 --> 00:29:01,320
Speaker 2: my building. Oh my godness. It was like, you're not

591
00:29:01,320 --> 00:29:02,560
Speaker 2: going to kick me out of the apartment. So I

592
00:29:02,560 --> 00:29:04,600
Speaker 2: just went back upstairs and that was the end of that.

593
00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:06,920
Speaker 2: But yes, I got kicked out of gym's all the time.

594
00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:08,240
Speaker 1: All the time.

595
00:29:08,240 --> 00:29:08,840
Speaker 2: It happens.

596
00:29:09,280 --> 00:29:11,360
Speaker 1: Do you have any sort of like personal training background

597
00:29:11,360 --> 00:29:11,640
Speaker 1: at all.

598
00:29:12,200 --> 00:29:16,600
Speaker 2: No, So this was all me just understanding sort of

599
00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:20,120
Speaker 2: the technology of totally. And then as soon as I

600
00:29:20,200 --> 00:29:22,800
Speaker 2: before I put anything out there for anyone else to consume,

601
00:29:24,000 --> 00:29:26,880
Speaker 2: all that's been done by you know, professional license trainers,

602
00:29:27,160 --> 00:29:28,400
Speaker 2: I would never do that myself.

603
00:29:29,440 --> 00:29:33,200
Speaker 3: Okay, so you are doing all that testing, This seems

604
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:34,680
Speaker 3: to be something that people could be into.

605
00:29:35,040 --> 00:29:38,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the feedback I was getting from people was

606
00:29:38,040 --> 00:29:43,560
Speaker 2: really strong. And then in January of twenty sixteen, I

607
00:29:43,600 --> 00:29:46,480
Speaker 2: started act to full time. It was me with two

608
00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:48,880
Speaker 2: monitors under my arm, and I walked into the We

609
00:29:49,040 --> 00:29:52,120
Speaker 2: work on twenty ninth in Park in a three person office.

610
00:29:52,400 --> 00:29:54,160
Speaker 2: I didn't need a three person off It's just me,

611
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:57,400
Speaker 2: but it was. I remember it was January seventeenth, and

612
00:29:57,440 --> 00:30:01,160
Speaker 2: I walked in and started working on the thing full time.

613
00:30:01,440 --> 00:30:05,680
Speaker 2: And the first guy I hired joined in March, and

614
00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:08,360
Speaker 2: then Clara, who I think we both know, joined also

615
00:30:08,400 --> 00:30:12,360
Speaker 2: in March or maybe in April. And you know, we

616
00:30:12,520 --> 00:30:15,720
Speaker 2: ended that year with ten people. We ended twenty sixteen

617
00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:19,040
Speaker 2: with ten people. We ended twenty seventeen with seventy people,

618
00:30:19,800 --> 00:30:22,760
Speaker 2: and today, you know, we're sitting at just over one

619
00:30:22,800 --> 00:30:25,800
Speaker 2: hundred people. And so, yeah, the last couple of years

620
00:30:25,840 --> 00:30:27,840
Speaker 2: have been pretty crazy.

621
00:30:27,600 --> 00:30:31,840
Speaker 1: Pretty crazy. An Active didn't start as Active, that's right.

622
00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:35,720
Speaker 2: We started with the name originally was Skyfit. That was it.

623
00:30:35,800 --> 00:30:38,000
Speaker 3: I was trying to remember what the originally was because

624
00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:39,600
Speaker 3: I tried it when it was Skyfit.

625
00:30:39,840 --> 00:30:40,560
Speaker 2: Oh, I didn't know that.

626
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:42,720
Speaker 1: Oh, I was an early doctor.

627
00:30:43,080 --> 00:30:44,560
Speaker 2: I love to hear that.

628
00:30:44,600 --> 00:30:47,880
Speaker 3: I mean, I would say props to Clara forgetting me

629
00:30:47,960 --> 00:30:49,720
Speaker 3: to try it when it was called Skyfit.

630
00:30:50,200 --> 00:30:52,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, guys, back in the day, I was.

631
00:30:52,720 --> 00:30:55,560
Speaker 3: Definitely pitched it as an editor, probably sitting in this

632
00:30:55,680 --> 00:30:59,800
Speaker 3: very building. I think Skyfit that app was featured in

633
00:31:00,040 --> 00:31:04,240
Speaker 3: ELF when I was itself. That sounds right, Yeah, yeah, well,

634
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:07,800
Speaker 3: thank you, You're welcome, no problem. I'm sure that that

635
00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:09,520
Speaker 3: press really did you a lot of good.

636
00:31:09,920 --> 00:31:11,520
Speaker 2: I think it did a lot of good.

637
00:31:11,640 --> 00:31:14,600
Speaker 1: Well, you know, the name changed, So where's apptiv come from.

638
00:31:14,680 --> 00:31:18,360
Speaker 2: So one of the things that we wanted to veer

639
00:31:18,400 --> 00:31:21,640
Speaker 2: away from was being known as like a fitness company

640
00:31:21,760 --> 00:31:26,840
Speaker 2: or a fitness app because we you know, today, we

641
00:31:27,040 --> 00:31:31,440
Speaker 2: think of our vision and our mission as physical and

642
00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:34,920
Speaker 2: mental strength. That's what's much more important to me. So

643
00:31:34,960 --> 00:31:39,520
Speaker 2: we have categories like meditation, We have yoga, obviously, we

644
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:42,280
Speaker 2: have walking. We have a lot of things that wouldn't

645
00:31:42,320 --> 00:31:46,040
Speaker 2: traditionally be considered fitness. Like our goal is not to

646
00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:49,040
Speaker 2: always make you sweat. Sometimes our goal is just to

647
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:52,040
Speaker 2: have you sit in a chair and you know, meditate

648
00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:55,880
Speaker 2: for six minutes, just to reset your mind mentally. And

649
00:31:55,960 --> 00:31:58,600
Speaker 2: so we wanted to take the word fit out of

650
00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 2: our name, and we kept using the word active physically

651
00:32:02,720 --> 00:32:05,680
Speaker 2: and mentally active, and so we started playing with the

652
00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:08,000
Speaker 2: word active and that's how we came up with active.

653
00:32:08,160 --> 00:32:11,240
Speaker 3: I remember I was working at a company called Cafe

654
00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 3: Mom when I started in the city, and they were

655
00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:17,760
Speaker 3: launching like new digital properties at one time or another,

656
00:32:18,040 --> 00:32:20,080
Speaker 3: and you'd walk through the lobby and it would just

657
00:32:20,200 --> 00:32:25,120
Speaker 3: be like three thousand different words on a wall, and

658
00:32:25,120 --> 00:32:27,080
Speaker 3: people would either like put a check next to one

659
00:32:27,080 --> 00:32:28,080
Speaker 3: that they liked, and it was just.

660
00:32:28,040 --> 00:32:29,160
Speaker 1: A huge drawing board.

661
00:32:29,520 --> 00:32:31,720
Speaker 2: Totally start up. Wow, that's awesome.

662
00:32:32,320 --> 00:32:35,120
Speaker 1: Totally yeah. I don't remember.

663
00:32:35,200 --> 00:32:37,440
Speaker 3: I forget what we were naming at the time, but

664
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:40,400
Speaker 3: I do remember that the naming process was such a nightmare.

665
00:32:40,400 --> 00:32:41,720
Speaker 3: I mean, I feel like for me, I got so

666
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:44,000
Speaker 3: lucky with Hurdle that it just clicked one day.

667
00:32:44,120 --> 00:32:46,120
Speaker 2: It's a great name. Thank you, it's a great name.

668
00:32:46,160 --> 00:32:46,960
Speaker 1: I appreciate that.

669
00:32:47,040 --> 00:32:49,400
Speaker 2: It's very understandable. I know immediately what you're saying.

670
00:32:49,760 --> 00:32:52,560
Speaker 3: More than eighteen million classes have been taken on the app,

671
00:32:53,040 --> 00:32:56,280
Speaker 3: which is a lot of classes which must take a

672
00:32:56,320 --> 00:32:59,640
Speaker 3: lot of hours on your part to be here and

673
00:32:59,800 --> 00:33:03,080
Speaker 3: or straight this team of more than one hundred team

674
00:33:03,160 --> 00:33:07,040
Speaker 3: members and so members my class. My question for you

675
00:33:07,400 --> 00:33:11,600
Speaker 3: is how do you make the time yourself to have

676
00:33:11,800 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 3: a work life balance. Because we're talking about how it's

677
00:33:15,000 --> 00:33:18,480
Speaker 3: so important to have that balance and to be both

678
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:20,720
Speaker 3: mentally and physically fit.

679
00:33:20,920 --> 00:33:22,320
Speaker 1: So what do you do for you to kind of

680
00:33:22,360 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 1: keep that all in check?

681
00:33:23,400 --> 00:33:27,680
Speaker 2: A couple of things. Number one is because I love

682
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 2: this job. I dance to work every day. It's like,

683
00:33:31,280 --> 00:33:36,600
Speaker 2: I'm so lucky and excited to work with these people.

684
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:41,560
Speaker 2: It's incredible how fortunate I am. I don't go home

685
00:33:41,920 --> 00:33:44,000
Speaker 2: and say, like, oh man, I need a drink, like

686
00:33:44,040 --> 00:33:46,200
Speaker 2: I'm exhausted. I go home and I have ideas and

687
00:33:46,240 --> 00:33:49,400
Speaker 2: I'm reflecting on what happened that day and what I

688
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:52,320
Speaker 2: can do the next day and preparing, and so my

689
00:33:52,440 --> 00:33:56,840
Speaker 2: mind is running and excited with things that can be

690
00:33:56,920 --> 00:33:59,800
Speaker 2: done or things that we have done. And so I

691
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:02,800
Speaker 2: don't really see it as like now I'm home and

692
00:34:02,920 --> 00:34:05,400
Speaker 2: so I'm like done with frustrating work. I just I

693
00:34:05,440 --> 00:34:08,040
Speaker 2: love what I do. So it's always part of It's

694
00:34:08,080 --> 00:34:11,000
Speaker 2: like your your hobbies or your family or something that's

695
00:34:11,000 --> 00:34:12,680
Speaker 2: sort of always in the back of your mind. So

696
00:34:13,440 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 2: A I don't, I'm because I'm so lucky that I

697
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:17,000
Speaker 2: love my job so much. I don't feel like I

698
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:21,200
Speaker 2: need that complete separation. But one thing I do definitely

699
00:34:21,400 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 2: is that I run every morning for an hour, and

700
00:34:24,200 --> 00:34:27,719
Speaker 2: that's new I started in the last about year and

701
00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:31,120
Speaker 2: a half. Now. Number one is it's the only time

702
00:34:31,160 --> 00:34:33,560
Speaker 2: of day that I'm completely alone. And so I live

703
00:34:33,600 --> 00:34:35,960
Speaker 2: in Chelsea. I run down the West sid Highway and

704
00:34:36,280 --> 00:34:39,680
Speaker 2: I'm it's just me and my class in my ears,

705
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:42,680
Speaker 2: and that's it. And usually I wake up pretty early,

706
00:34:42,719 --> 00:34:44,319
Speaker 2: so like the sun's not even out yet, so I'm

707
00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:47,360
Speaker 2: just running and like it's dark and it's just me

708
00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:50,600
Speaker 2: and my notifications are off on my phone and so

709
00:34:50,640 --> 00:34:54,920
Speaker 2: I'm just running and sort of zoning out, listening to

710
00:34:54,960 --> 00:34:57,920
Speaker 2: the trainer in my ear. And that's That's an amazing experience.

711
00:34:58,120 --> 00:35:01,520
Speaker 2: And I hold myself to that to do that every day.

712
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:04,040
Speaker 2: And sometimes it's harder because I have a late night

713
00:35:04,160 --> 00:35:07,640
Speaker 2: or whatever it is, but that's time that is important

714
00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:10,160
Speaker 2: for me because what it does is it allows me

715
00:35:10,200 --> 00:35:13,960
Speaker 2: to focus better at work. I feel it sounds kind

716
00:35:13,960 --> 00:35:17,160
Speaker 2: of silly, but I feel smarter at work, you know.

717
00:35:17,200 --> 00:35:20,399
Speaker 2: I obviously feel more energized. I feel like I'm more

718
00:35:20,440 --> 00:35:22,400
Speaker 2: productive if I get that in the morning, and if

719
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:25,520
Speaker 2: I don't, then it's the opposite, and that's not fair

720
00:35:25,680 --> 00:35:27,799
Speaker 2: to everyone that I work with. It's important that I'm

721
00:35:27,840 --> 00:35:31,640
Speaker 2: operating really well, so that workout gives me that and

722
00:35:31,680 --> 00:35:35,759
Speaker 2: then you know, once a week, ideally, I try to

723
00:35:35,800 --> 00:35:40,160
Speaker 2: find like one dinner with my wife so that we

724
00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:42,720
Speaker 2: can both you know, just sit down and talk about whatever.

725
00:35:42,719 --> 00:35:44,920
Speaker 2: Because she also has a crazy schedule. I have a

726
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:47,160
Speaker 2: crazy schedule. We don't see each other that much on weekdays,

727
00:35:47,360 --> 00:35:51,160
Speaker 2: but we try to find like one week night, excuse me,

728
00:35:51,200 --> 00:35:53,640
Speaker 2: one night every week to have dinner together.

729
00:35:53,800 --> 00:35:55,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting.

730
00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 3: I feel like listening to you talk about running, it

731
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:01,600
Speaker 3: reminds me about how I feel about running.

732
00:36:01,920 --> 00:36:04,480
Speaker 1: Sometimes. It almost feels like a spiritual practice.

733
00:36:04,760 --> 00:36:08,400
Speaker 2: Oh, totally. It's it's it's completely like it's going back

734
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:10,680
Speaker 2: to what I'm saying earlier. Running I really think is

735
00:36:10,760 --> 00:36:14,480
Speaker 2: more about mental than physical. Yeah, everyone can run, it's

736
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,120
Speaker 2: the question of do you have the I guess mental

737
00:36:17,200 --> 00:36:20,840
Speaker 2: sort of desire to get out there or something. You know,

738
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:22,720
Speaker 2: we're in New York City. It's cold in the mornings,

739
00:36:22,760 --> 00:36:25,280
Speaker 2: and it's dark and all that stuff, and you're tired.

740
00:36:25,400 --> 00:36:28,680
Speaker 2: Like if you can make that mental step, the physical

741
00:36:28,680 --> 00:36:32,520
Speaker 2: ones are very very easy relative to the mental ones.

742
00:36:32,719 --> 00:36:34,879
Speaker 2: And that it goes back to the weight loss thing too, right, Like, yeah,

743
00:36:34,880 --> 00:36:37,000
Speaker 2: I'm happy that I lost the weight, but what it

744
00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:40,239
Speaker 2: really lets me do is be much more energized and

745
00:36:40,280 --> 00:36:43,560
Speaker 2: focused and sharp at everything else I do. We had

746
00:36:43,600 --> 00:36:50,560
Speaker 2: a guy, a member Bill, who lost two hundred pounds

747
00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:53,239
Speaker 2: with active He was four hundred pounds and he's now

748
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:55,960
Speaker 2: down to two hundred, and he shares these pictures and

749
00:36:56,000 --> 00:36:58,880
Speaker 2: obviously he looks incredible and what he's done is amazing.

750
00:36:59,239 --> 00:37:02,080
Speaker 2: But what's cool so we did this testimonial. On this testimonial,

751
00:37:02,239 --> 00:37:04,000
Speaker 2: at the end, what he says is, you know, I

752
00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:06,160
Speaker 2: lost all this weight and I felt great physically. But

753
00:37:06,680 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 2: what that did is he wants his own business. He said,

754
00:37:09,280 --> 00:37:12,800
Speaker 2: it allowed me to expand my business into other areas

755
00:37:13,160 --> 00:37:16,440
Speaker 2: because I now had the confidence to do that. Because

756
00:37:16,480 --> 00:37:19,640
Speaker 2: I had achieved this physical goal, I now had the

757
00:37:19,680 --> 00:37:22,800
Speaker 2: ability to take a risk in my business that I

758
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:26,959
Speaker 2: wouldn't have done before. That's what's awesome about having these

759
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:30,760
Speaker 2: sort of physical successes is the mental benefit that comes

760
00:37:30,800 --> 00:37:32,720
Speaker 2: from that. That's what gets us really excited.

761
00:37:33,239 --> 00:37:34,040
Speaker 1: You get the grit.

762
00:37:34,440 --> 00:37:36,800
Speaker 2: The grit I swear.

763
00:37:36,880 --> 00:37:40,160
Speaker 3: I mean, I think that if I hadn't undergone a

764
00:37:40,360 --> 00:37:44,680
Speaker 3: major body transformation, I wouldn't truly believe that I am

765
00:37:44,719 --> 00:37:46,360
Speaker 3: capable of anything I set my mind to.

766
00:37:46,920 --> 00:37:50,880
Speaker 2: It's amazing what confidence you get when you were able

767
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:52,120
Speaker 2: to achieve something like that.

768
00:37:59,120 --> 00:38:01,400
Speaker 3: Taking a break from two episode to give a shout

769
00:38:01,400 --> 00:38:04,960
Speaker 3: out to my sponsor, Headspace, I'll admit, just like with

770
00:38:05,239 --> 00:38:08,560
Speaker 3: any habit, meditation takes time to get used to, but

771
00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:10,880
Speaker 3: there's no easier way to make it a part of

772
00:38:10,920 --> 00:38:14,279
Speaker 3: your daily routine than with Headspace. Trust me, I've been

773
00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:16,319
Speaker 3: using it for just over a year now and I

774
00:38:16,360 --> 00:38:19,520
Speaker 3: am absolutely hooked. When I use the app, I feel

775
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:22,360
Speaker 3: one hundred percent more calm and capable of handling whatever

776
00:38:22,440 --> 00:38:25,560
Speaker 3: comes my way during the day. And trust me, it's

777
00:38:25,600 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 3: a lot. Don't just take my word for it, though.

778
00:38:28,200 --> 00:38:30,880
Speaker 3: The science is there. Four weeks of Headspace has been

779
00:38:30,920 --> 00:38:35,160
Speaker 3: shown to both improve focus and reduce stress by fourteen percent,

780
00:38:35,520 --> 00:38:39,080
Speaker 3: as well as increased happiness by five percent. With hundreds

781
00:38:39,080 --> 00:38:43,000
Speaker 3: of meditations on everything from stress to sleep, there's even

782
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:45,719
Speaker 3: guided exercises to help you add a touch of mindfulness

783
00:38:45,719 --> 00:38:48,680
Speaker 3: to things you do every day, like cooking or commuting,

784
00:38:48,880 --> 00:38:52,360
Speaker 3: or eating or so much more. Headspace is giving Hurdle

785
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:56,759
Speaker 3: listeners thirty days free of the entire Headspace library. Just

786
00:38:56,800 --> 00:38:59,560
Speaker 3: head on over to headspace dot com. Slash hurdle Again,

787
00:38:59,560 --> 00:39:02,839
Speaker 3: that's head space dot com slash hurdle to dive on in.

788
00:39:08,800 --> 00:39:11,719
Speaker 3: I'm back here sitting down with Evan Agarwall. He is

789
00:39:11,800 --> 00:39:15,120
Speaker 3: the CEO and founder at Aptive. What I want to

790
00:39:15,160 --> 00:39:18,080
Speaker 3: know and I find I asked Hayden Slater, the founder

791
00:39:18,120 --> 00:39:20,880
Speaker 3: of Press Juicery, this question and I loved his response.

792
00:39:20,960 --> 00:39:25,239
Speaker 3: So my question to you now is we're so immersed

793
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:29,359
Speaker 3: in this wellness culture and everyone's trying wacky things all

794
00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:32,920
Speaker 3: the time. What would you say has been the craziest

795
00:39:32,960 --> 00:39:34,879
Speaker 3: thing that you've dabbled in?

796
00:39:36,120 --> 00:39:38,160
Speaker 2: Well, if you asked me three years ago, or if

797
00:39:38,160 --> 00:39:40,640
Speaker 2: you asked a lot of people, they would say audio fitness, Like,

798
00:39:40,680 --> 00:39:42,680
Speaker 2: what the hell are you talking about? This is going

799
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 2: to work out to that. So you know, I'm not

800
00:39:45,040 --> 00:39:47,880
Speaker 2: going to knock anything because clearly something that might be

801
00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:50,960
Speaker 2: seeming wacky can evolve into something much harder. You know,

802
00:39:51,040 --> 00:39:53,400
Speaker 2: I'm more of like a traditionalist like Iron and I

803
00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:56,279
Speaker 2: do strength trading and stuff. I don't know that I've

804
00:39:56,320 --> 00:39:59,640
Speaker 2: tried anything particularly crazy, but seriously, I'm I'm all for

805
00:40:01,080 --> 00:40:04,840
Speaker 2: different ideas. Whatever gets whatever it is that gets people moving,

806
00:40:05,160 --> 00:40:05,960
Speaker 2: I'm all for it.

807
00:40:06,239 --> 00:40:10,239
Speaker 3: See, if you built this company in California instead of

808
00:40:10,280 --> 00:40:13,080
Speaker 3: New York. You probably would have answers similar to Hayden's,

809
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:14,520
Speaker 3: which were like leech therapy.

810
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:17,960
Speaker 2: Lech therapy, I've heard of that one. It's supposed to

811
00:40:17,960 --> 00:40:18,359
Speaker 2: be good.

812
00:40:18,680 --> 00:40:22,400
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, everyone's different, everyone's dife, everyone's different. Okay,

813
00:40:22,880 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 3: you are building active, well it becomes aptive. When does

814
00:40:26,560 --> 00:40:28,920
Speaker 3: it make the switch from skyfit to Active?

815
00:40:29,080 --> 00:40:31,960
Speaker 2: It was November of twenty sixteen.

816
00:40:31,680 --> 00:40:34,400
Speaker 3: Okay, and when you started. Because now you have a

817
00:40:34,440 --> 00:40:37,880
Speaker 3: pretty robust network of trainers that you guys work with, right,

818
00:40:37,960 --> 00:40:41,799
Speaker 3: so talk to me about building those relationships and how

819
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:44,040
Speaker 3: that has kind of evolved for you and your team.

820
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:48,360
Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, I mean the trainers are the most important

821
00:40:48,400 --> 00:40:51,319
Speaker 2: part of what we do, right, Most people don't. Most

822
00:40:51,320 --> 00:40:53,320
Speaker 2: of our members do interact with me, They interact with

823
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:58,839
Speaker 2: the trainers. And we have a serious responsibility to our

824
00:40:58,840 --> 00:41:03,719
Speaker 2: members to provide the world's best training, the world's best classes.

825
00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:06,879
Speaker 2: We are rigorous about the people that we work with,

826
00:41:06,880 --> 00:41:09,680
Speaker 2: with the trainers that we work with. So we've had

827
00:41:10,920 --> 00:41:14,160
Speaker 2: I think four thousand applications or something now from trainers

828
00:41:14,239 --> 00:41:18,440
Speaker 2: and we've hired five full time trainers out of those.

829
00:41:18,480 --> 00:41:21,200
Speaker 2: And so you know, it's what is that, it's like

830
00:41:21,239 --> 00:41:23,480
Speaker 2: a less than a point one percent acceptance rate. It's

831
00:41:23,480 --> 00:41:25,319
Speaker 2: like getting into Yale Law school or something.

832
00:41:25,360 --> 00:41:26,800
Speaker 1: Right, And I'm friendly with Rachel.

833
00:41:27,320 --> 00:41:29,400
Speaker 2: Oh okay, So Rachel is a great example. I mean,

834
00:41:29,440 --> 00:41:35,120
Speaker 2: she's phenomenal at what she does. And what's really I

835
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:38,440
Speaker 2: guess you could call it fortunate about us is you know,

836
00:41:38,440 --> 00:41:41,799
Speaker 2: when you open a studio location, as the studios tend

837
00:41:41,880 --> 00:41:44,920
Speaker 2: to expand, they have to hire more trainers, and so

838
00:41:45,719 --> 00:41:48,040
Speaker 2: eventually they end up having to sort of expand to

839
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:50,160
Speaker 2: a point where maybe some of the trainers aren't as

840
00:41:50,200 --> 00:41:53,719
Speaker 2: amazing as the very first ones were. But because our

841
00:41:53,760 --> 00:41:57,560
Speaker 2: classes are digital and available on demand, like Megan Tacis

842
00:41:57,680 --> 00:42:01,399
Speaker 2: are our master trainer for RIN. Her classes have been

843
00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:04,680
Speaker 2: listened to literally millions of times, and I don't need

844
00:42:04,760 --> 00:42:07,600
Speaker 2: to keep finding more Megans as we expand. There's only

845
00:42:07,600 --> 00:42:09,520
Speaker 2: one Megan in the world, and she works for Active

846
00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:12,279
Speaker 2: and her classes are only available and Active, and so

847
00:42:12,920 --> 00:42:15,319
Speaker 2: we're very excited to be able to bring Megan too

848
00:42:15,360 --> 00:42:19,680
Speaker 2: the world as we expand. And so similarly, you know

849
00:42:19,760 --> 00:42:23,440
Speaker 2: someone like Kenta, who's a phenomenal strength trainer. He does

850
00:42:23,480 --> 00:42:27,759
Speaker 2: a variety of different workouts, his training style is so

851
00:42:27,920 --> 00:42:30,880
Speaker 2: powerful and so unique. Bringing that to the world is

852
00:42:30,960 --> 00:42:36,200
Speaker 2: really exciting to us. So we're really careful about the

853
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:39,440
Speaker 2: trainers that we work with, and then when we partner

854
00:42:39,440 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 2: with them, you know, it's full throttle. I mean, these

855
00:42:42,239 --> 00:42:45,560
Speaker 2: people are like my family, so we love working with them, right.

856
00:42:45,640 --> 00:42:48,799
Speaker 3: And so from the user experience side, someone downloads the

857
00:42:48,880 --> 00:42:52,360
Speaker 3: app and when they get on there, they, I'm assuming

858
00:42:52,480 --> 00:42:54,920
Speaker 3: complete a profile. It's been a while since I created

859
00:42:54,920 --> 00:42:57,120
Speaker 3: my own profile, so I'm just recapping this for everyone

860
00:42:57,120 --> 00:42:59,520
Speaker 3: at home. So you create a profile, and you probably

861
00:42:59,680 --> 00:43:02,080
Speaker 3: talk a little bit about your goals, what you're looking

862
00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:03,240
Speaker 3: for exactly.

863
00:43:03,280 --> 00:43:05,160
Speaker 2: You tell us your goals, You tell us your current

864
00:43:05,200 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 2: fitness level, You tell us where you work out, you

865
00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:10,759
Speaker 2: know what times of day, what days of week, how

866
00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:15,520
Speaker 2: many times, et cetera. And we will recommend programs for

867
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:18,359
Speaker 2: you that will help you achieve that goal, will send

868
00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:21,960
Speaker 2: you reminders the night before and thirty minutes before you

869
00:43:22,040 --> 00:43:28,480
Speaker 2: work out. We have like an incredible community of tens

870
00:43:28,520 --> 00:43:31,040
Speaker 2: of thousands of people in it, of active members who

871
00:43:31,080 --> 00:43:35,359
Speaker 2: are sharing stories and sweaty selfies and videos of how

872
00:43:35,400 --> 00:43:38,080
Speaker 2: aptive Is helped them on a daily basis and it's

873
00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:42,560
Speaker 2: super encouraging and super motivating, and so you know you're

874
00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:47,840
Speaker 2: getting you're really joining a community, as I said earlier,

875
00:43:48,200 --> 00:43:51,439
Speaker 2: when you join Active, and that's really important to help

876
00:43:51,480 --> 00:43:52,480
Speaker 2: you achieve your goals.

877
00:43:52,760 --> 00:43:52,960
Speaker 1: Yeah.

878
00:43:53,000 --> 00:43:55,319
Speaker 3: I think I read the stat that you guys have

879
00:43:55,520 --> 00:43:58,239
Speaker 3: over two hundred thousand paying members right now.

880
00:43:58,360 --> 00:43:58,879
Speaker 2: That's right.

881
00:43:59,080 --> 00:44:02,399
Speaker 3: Wow, it's a lot of people working out, it is,

882
00:44:03,120 --> 00:44:03,759
Speaker 3: and it's a lot of.

883
00:44:03,719 --> 00:44:04,720
Speaker 1: People with an opinion.

884
00:44:04,840 --> 00:44:06,799
Speaker 3: See, like, this is what I keep well, this is

885
00:44:06,800 --> 00:44:09,560
Speaker 3: what I keep coming back to because I love how

886
00:44:09,600 --> 00:44:12,200
Speaker 3: passionately you talk about the people that use your app,

887
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:16,239
Speaker 3: and I'm just so curious as to how often you're

888
00:44:16,239 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 3: incorporating that user feedback into the product that you're offering.

889
00:44:19,400 --> 00:44:22,920
Speaker 2: All every day, every day. And it's there's sort of

890
00:44:22,920 --> 00:44:25,000
Speaker 2: official channels for it, which is that we do a

891
00:44:25,040 --> 00:44:27,279
Speaker 2: lot of user feedback. We have a team here that

892
00:44:27,360 --> 00:44:30,200
Speaker 2: does just user feedback and they do interviews both of

893
00:44:30,280 --> 00:44:33,680
Speaker 2: existing members but people who have churned, people who have

894
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:36,200
Speaker 2: never paid us. You know, we do a lot of

895
00:44:36,239 --> 00:44:38,200
Speaker 2: research to understand what we're doing well, what we can

896
00:44:38,280 --> 00:44:41,080
Speaker 2: do well. And then there's unofficial things where people ping

897
00:44:41,160 --> 00:44:45,840
Speaker 2: me on Instagram messages all day long saying Ethan, I

898
00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:48,080
Speaker 2: would love it if Aptive had X, Y and Z,

899
00:44:48,400 --> 00:44:50,439
Speaker 2: or they send me messages on Facebook saying, hey, Ethan,

900
00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:51,920
Speaker 2: I love it, but I wish you had X, Y

901
00:44:51,920 --> 00:44:54,120
Speaker 2: and Z, and so I look at all that and

902
00:44:54,120 --> 00:44:57,080
Speaker 2: then we put it into our product development process and

903
00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:01,880
Speaker 2: incorporating member feedback is so oh critical, it's so critical.

904
00:45:01,920 --> 00:45:04,960
Speaker 2: I mean, they're the ones that we're building the product for. Ultimately,

905
00:45:05,920 --> 00:45:08,200
Speaker 2: if you don't know what your members are asking for,

906
00:45:08,239 --> 00:45:10,600
Speaker 2: if you don't know what they want, how can you

907
00:45:10,600 --> 00:45:11,400
Speaker 2: build a product?

908
00:45:11,760 --> 00:45:13,200
Speaker 1: Do you ever unplug?

909
00:45:16,320 --> 00:45:21,160
Speaker 2: That hour a morning is good unplugged. But but you know,

910
00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:25,960
Speaker 2: I was talking about this with actually Lauren recently. I've

911
00:45:26,000 --> 00:45:28,799
Speaker 2: gone on vacation. You know, I think whatever at some

912
00:45:28,880 --> 00:45:33,840
Speaker 2: point and when I go unplused, Like to me, not

913
00:45:34,280 --> 00:45:39,839
Speaker 2: being up to speed is more stressful than you know,

914
00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:43,000
Speaker 2: knowing what's going on. So I would much rather just

915
00:45:43,080 --> 00:45:45,400
Speaker 2: like check my emails, see what's going on, look at

916
00:45:45,400 --> 00:45:47,160
Speaker 2: some of the numbers, the product stuff, and then if

917
00:45:47,160 --> 00:45:49,440
Speaker 2: everything's good, yeah, like I can go to the beach

918
00:45:49,560 --> 00:45:51,839
Speaker 2: or whatever and said for a couple hours. But I'm

919
00:45:51,880 --> 00:45:53,960
Speaker 2: not one of those people that's like I want to

920
00:45:53,960 --> 00:45:56,120
Speaker 2: turn off my phone for two weeks and go to

921
00:45:56,480 --> 00:45:59,319
Speaker 2: go on a cruise. You know that that doesn't work

922
00:45:59,360 --> 00:46:01,360
Speaker 2: for me at all.

923
00:46:01,760 --> 00:46:02,759
Speaker 1: It's not your jam.

924
00:46:02,960 --> 00:46:05,239
Speaker 2: But you know that doesn't mean it doesn't work for

925
00:46:05,280 --> 00:46:06,440
Speaker 2: other people. It's just not for me.

926
00:46:06,600 --> 00:46:09,160
Speaker 1: What about those aptive meditation classes though.

927
00:46:09,080 --> 00:46:12,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, I use those. I use those in traffic all

928
00:46:12,880 --> 00:46:13,200
Speaker 2: the time.

929
00:46:13,280 --> 00:46:15,840
Speaker 3: That's actually when I love to lean into meditation, or

930
00:46:16,000 --> 00:46:18,200
Speaker 3: like I feel like my watch knows when I'm in

931
00:46:18,239 --> 00:46:21,400
Speaker 3: a cab because I'll get the ping from the Apple

932
00:46:21,520 --> 00:46:25,040
Speaker 3: Health app that says for me to breathe. It's always

933
00:46:25,080 --> 00:46:27,200
Speaker 3: when I'm in the back of a cat and I'm

934
00:46:27,320 --> 00:46:31,000
Speaker 3: in my head, I'm like, you knew that I can

935
00:46:31,000 --> 00:46:33,160
Speaker 3: tell by the speed I'm going and the stopping and

936
00:46:33,200 --> 00:46:35,279
Speaker 3: starting that I'm in a car and I should chill

937
00:46:35,320 --> 00:46:36,719
Speaker 3: out exactly.

938
00:46:37,440 --> 00:46:39,120
Speaker 1: And I should chill out. Okay.

939
00:46:39,200 --> 00:46:43,800
Speaker 3: So, now thinking back onto what you're building here with Aptive,

940
00:46:44,200 --> 00:46:47,240
Speaker 3: what would you say has been something from the past

941
00:46:47,320 --> 00:46:50,600
Speaker 3: year here? Uh, that's changed in the brand and made

942
00:46:50,600 --> 00:46:52,440
Speaker 3: it for the better. So what are some things that

943
00:46:52,480 --> 00:46:54,520
Speaker 3: are changing that are that are tweaking for you guys,

944
00:46:54,520 --> 00:46:57,279
Speaker 3: that are really working in your favor? Uh?

945
00:46:57,320 --> 00:47:00,759
Speaker 2: You know, I think the biggest thing is the diversity

946
00:47:00,960 --> 00:47:04,279
Speaker 2: of the members. So when we started it was you know,

947
00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:06,680
Speaker 2: we were less less members honestly, so it was a

948
00:47:06,719 --> 00:47:11,400
Speaker 2: pretty narrow call it audience that was using it. But today,

949
00:47:12,239 --> 00:47:15,560
Speaker 2: you know, we have people who are eighteen and people

950
00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:19,759
Speaker 2: who are eighty. We have people who are working out

951
00:47:19,800 --> 00:47:21,480
Speaker 2: for the first time in their life, and we have

952
00:47:21,600 --> 00:47:27,480
Speaker 2: people who are doing iron Man. It's really the full

953
00:47:27,560 --> 00:47:30,320
Speaker 2: gamut of folks. You know. We have people in Chelsea

954
00:47:30,440 --> 00:47:32,360
Speaker 2: and we have people in India because we're now in

955
00:47:32,400 --> 00:47:36,080
Speaker 2: twenty different countries. We have people that do our six

956
00:47:36,120 --> 00:47:38,480
Speaker 2: minute classes and people that do our two hour classes,

957
00:47:38,600 --> 00:47:42,279
Speaker 2: and so I think it provides a richness to the

958
00:47:42,320 --> 00:47:48,600
Speaker 2: community to have a more diverse set of folks in

959
00:47:48,719 --> 00:47:52,720
Speaker 2: the using the product. And that's something that's only happened

960
00:47:52,719 --> 00:47:55,839
Speaker 2: in the last I don't know year or so. Two

961
00:47:55,880 --> 00:47:59,960
Speaker 2: hour class it's one of the marathon training classes.

962
00:48:00,680 --> 00:48:02,600
Speaker 1: Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, And like, what are we

963
00:48:02,600 --> 00:48:03,360
Speaker 1: doing for two hours?

964
00:48:03,400 --> 00:48:05,240
Speaker 2: You want to go do it? Maybe we'll do it together.

965
00:48:05,320 --> 00:48:07,600
Speaker 1: We'll do it one morning on the West Side Highway.

966
00:48:07,320 --> 00:48:08,439
Speaker 2: And we'll both be late to work.

967
00:48:09,440 --> 00:48:10,560
Speaker 1: What time are you out there running?

968
00:48:10,600 --> 00:48:12,200
Speaker 2: Usually like six?

969
00:48:12,400 --> 00:48:14,000
Speaker 1: Oh that's my jam.

970
00:48:14,080 --> 00:48:15,399
Speaker 2: Okay, great, I'll see what.

971
00:48:16,600 --> 00:48:20,080
Speaker 3: How well we like kind of jumped the hurdle as

972
00:48:20,120 --> 00:48:23,640
Speaker 3: to like how much mileage you're typically doing during that hour.

973
00:48:23,719 --> 00:48:26,600
Speaker 3: I guess because a marathon training class over two hours

974
00:48:26,719 --> 00:48:28,960
Speaker 3: is like a solid thirteen miles. Uh.

975
00:48:29,520 --> 00:48:33,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, I usually do like seven and a half.

976
00:48:33,400 --> 00:48:35,280
Speaker 1: In the hour. Yeah, it's pretty impressive.

977
00:48:35,760 --> 00:48:38,439
Speaker 2: It's okay. We have some pretty fast people on my team.

978
00:48:39,480 --> 00:48:43,439
Speaker 2: Our CTO Chris Fisher, just ran Chicago and New York

979
00:48:43,480 --> 00:48:46,120
Speaker 2: in under three hours. Wow, within like two weeks of

980
00:48:46,120 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 2: each other. He's filthy fast.

981
00:48:47,760 --> 00:48:49,799
Speaker 3: What's one of the best lessons that someone in this

982
00:48:49,960 --> 00:48:53,120
Speaker 3: office has taught you about, maybe like your lifestyle habits

983
00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:56,000
Speaker 3: or something that you should be incorporating into your regular routine,

984
00:48:56,000 --> 00:48:59,560
Speaker 3: because again, you're surrounded by people that live and breathe

985
00:49:00,080 --> 00:49:01,480
Speaker 3: health and wellness all the time.

986
00:49:01,719 --> 00:49:07,320
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, actually, him, Chris, he joined us in January

987
00:49:07,520 --> 00:49:11,480
Speaker 2: of twenty seventeen, so we're coming up on two years

988
00:49:11,680 --> 00:49:16,279
Speaker 2: and he's the CTO and VP product And what he

989
00:49:16,360 --> 00:49:21,719
Speaker 2: taught me is this term that the running community uses,

990
00:49:21,719 --> 00:49:26,080
Speaker 2: which is EDD, which is every damn day, and it

991
00:49:26,520 --> 00:49:32,000
Speaker 2: basically says that no matter what's going on, find some

992
00:49:32,320 --> 00:49:37,799
Speaker 2: time during the day to do something physical. You know,

993
00:49:37,840 --> 00:49:40,319
Speaker 2: you could be working late one night, you could be

994
00:49:40,400 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 2: at a wedding, you could be out of town traveling,

995
00:49:43,160 --> 00:49:46,680
Speaker 2: you could be hungover. Whatever the thing is, every damn day.

996
00:49:46,760 --> 00:49:49,760
Speaker 2: Find a little bit of time every day to do something,

997
00:49:50,000 --> 00:49:53,759
Speaker 2: and that habit formation is what drives the outcome. And

998
00:49:53,800 --> 00:49:56,520
Speaker 2: I've you know, I've always been pretty sort of motivated,

999
00:49:56,600 --> 00:50:00,800
Speaker 2: and I've never really had trouble getting myself to do something.

1000
00:50:00,880 --> 00:50:04,520
Speaker 2: But I've definitely skipped days before. But this notion of

1001
00:50:04,680 --> 00:50:08,480
Speaker 2: just find some time in the day is unique and

1002
00:50:08,520 --> 00:50:09,960
Speaker 2: something that I'm really glad he taught me.

1003
00:50:10,160 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 3: I think it's also really important in this no days

1004
00:50:12,719 --> 00:50:16,360
Speaker 3: off culture to like respect the days when one happens

1005
00:50:16,400 --> 00:50:18,760
Speaker 3: and maybe it's not planned, or maybe it is planned,

1006
00:50:18,800 --> 00:50:21,160
Speaker 3: and on that day, maybe find another way to give

1007
00:50:21,200 --> 00:50:22,000
Speaker 3: back to yourself.

1008
00:50:22,239 --> 00:50:23,240
Speaker 2: That's a great point.

1009
00:50:23,400 --> 00:50:27,280
Speaker 3: I think that I'm I'm someone who really am also

1010
00:50:27,520 --> 00:50:31,160
Speaker 3: of the ed D. Coul right, And on the days

1011
00:50:31,160 --> 00:50:33,920
Speaker 3: where I'm not really moving a lot, I'm finding some

1012
00:50:34,000 --> 00:50:34,600
Speaker 3: other way to.

1013
00:50:34,640 --> 00:50:36,160
Speaker 1: Like move around.

1014
00:50:36,400 --> 00:50:39,840
Speaker 3: Yeah that Like I'm walking around Soho and doing some shopping,

1015
00:50:39,960 --> 00:50:41,960
Speaker 3: or I'm going to see a friend and maybe she

1016
00:50:42,040 --> 00:50:44,719
Speaker 3: lives across town, and maybe on that night in particular,

1017
00:50:44,760 --> 00:50:46,560
Speaker 3: and like hopping a city bike to go do it

1018
00:50:47,000 --> 00:50:50,759
Speaker 3: something great. But I think I think, uh, there's you know,

1019
00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:53,439
Speaker 3: there's we're just I think in general we're really hard

1020
00:50:53,440 --> 00:50:56,719
Speaker 3: on ourselves about making sure it always gets done. I

1021
00:50:56,760 --> 00:50:59,440
Speaker 3: am really hard on myself in that regard. But on

1022
00:50:59,480 --> 00:51:01,319
Speaker 3: the days off, I just try to like move in

1023
00:51:01,360 --> 00:51:02,520
Speaker 3: some way that feels good.

1024
00:51:02,719 --> 00:51:05,160
Speaker 2: I think that's what's important. If it's in your mind,

1025
00:51:05,560 --> 00:51:07,680
Speaker 2: that's good. Like if you just have a desire even

1026
00:51:07,719 --> 00:51:10,640
Speaker 2: going for a walk, Great, you did something that's awesome.

1027
00:51:10,719 --> 00:51:13,840
Speaker 3: Totally, totally okay. So we're winding down here. What's on

1028
00:51:13,840 --> 00:51:15,920
Speaker 3: the horizon for Aptin. You've got a hell of a

1029
00:51:16,000 --> 00:51:21,719
Speaker 3: lot of members, You've got this amazing office, you have

1030
00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:23,000
Speaker 3: no vacation time.

1031
00:51:24,320 --> 00:51:31,960
Speaker 2: Actually we have unlimited PTOs, so you know what's next.

1032
00:51:32,520 --> 00:51:37,920
Speaker 2: We're focusing a lot of our work in twenty nineteen

1033
00:51:38,239 --> 00:51:46,239
Speaker 2: on personalization. We're really focused on helping our members achieve outcomes.

1034
00:51:46,800 --> 00:51:48,799
Speaker 2: They give us a goal. They tell us they want

1035
00:51:48,840 --> 00:51:53,560
Speaker 2: to lose weight, run faster, be stronger, sleep better, have

1036
00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:55,520
Speaker 2: more energy to play with their kids, go on a

1037
00:51:55,600 --> 00:51:58,879
Speaker 2: hike with their parents. Whatever the thing is. We want

1038
00:51:58,920 --> 00:52:02,239
Speaker 2: to help you achieve that goal, and we're gonna be

1039
00:52:02,440 --> 00:52:07,520
Speaker 2: much more successful together as a partnership. If the experience

1040
00:52:07,520 --> 00:52:09,359
Speaker 2: that you have is personal to you, it goes back

1041
00:52:09,360 --> 00:52:10,840
Speaker 2: to what I was saying earlier. I don't like this

1042
00:52:10,920 --> 00:52:15,280
Speaker 2: idea of bucketing people. That's not exciting, that's not fair, honestly,

1043
00:52:15,880 --> 00:52:18,560
Speaker 2: and so what you're going to find in twenty nineteen

1044
00:52:18,680 --> 00:52:24,480
Speaker 2: is a much more personal, sort of honest experience with

1045
00:52:24,560 --> 00:52:27,839
Speaker 2: active which feels like it's built for you, because it is,

1046
00:52:28,480 --> 00:52:32,440
Speaker 2: and it'll help you achieve your goal, whatever that is,

1047
00:52:32,760 --> 00:52:35,080
Speaker 2: in a much more successful way. I like it.

1048
00:52:35,360 --> 00:52:37,919
Speaker 3: Okay, twenty nineteen the year for achieving all the things

1049
00:52:37,960 --> 00:52:42,319
Speaker 3: we ever dreamed of exactly the closer. Right now, you

1050
00:52:42,400 --> 00:52:47,239
Speaker 3: have the opportunity to offer the Ethan who is overweight

1051
00:52:47,360 --> 00:52:52,120
Speaker 3: and maybe not so happy and coaching himself through this

1052
00:52:52,320 --> 00:52:55,520
Speaker 3: hurtle moment of sorts, what kind of advice would you

1053
00:52:55,560 --> 00:52:56,080
Speaker 3: give that guy?

1054
00:52:56,120 --> 00:52:57,480
Speaker 1: Looking back on it now.

1055
00:52:57,560 --> 00:53:00,279
Speaker 2: The thing that I think used to the question that

1056
00:53:00,400 --> 00:53:02,279
Speaker 2: used to be in my mind the most back then

1057
00:53:02,520 --> 00:53:07,120
Speaker 2: was how to have an impact on someone that wasn't me?

1058
00:53:07,480 --> 00:53:10,239
Speaker 2: How do I have an impact on the world? And

1059
00:53:10,600 --> 00:53:12,799
Speaker 2: I didn't know the answer at the time because I

1060
00:53:12,840 --> 00:53:16,120
Speaker 2: was still trying to fix my own challenges and so

1061
00:53:16,360 --> 00:53:18,560
Speaker 2: sort of two problems at the same time. And I

1062
00:53:18,600 --> 00:53:21,840
Speaker 2: look back now and I realized that by solving my

1063
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:26,680
Speaker 2: own challenge, I discovered something that would help other people.

1064
00:53:27,160 --> 00:53:29,920
Speaker 2: And that's a great you know, I'm so happy and

1065
00:53:29,920 --> 00:53:32,480
Speaker 2: so fortunate to be in this place now where this

1066
00:53:32,560 --> 00:53:36,640
Speaker 2: thing is affecting and helping hundreds of thousands of people

1067
00:53:36,800 --> 00:53:40,480
Speaker 2: around the world, and soon hopefully it's helping millions of

1068
00:53:40,520 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 2: people around the world. And so, you know, I think

1069
00:53:43,040 --> 00:53:46,680
Speaker 2: the advice is something simply like, solve the thing that

1070
00:53:47,160 --> 00:53:49,839
Speaker 2: is troubling you and then see how you can use

1071
00:53:49,880 --> 00:53:53,480
Speaker 2: that to help other people. And that's what ended up happening.

1072
00:53:53,520 --> 00:53:56,200
Speaker 1: And so far, so good, I mean, and that's what

1073
00:53:56,239 --> 00:53:59,719
Speaker 1: I hope that I'm doing too well on the same path.

1074
00:54:00,120 --> 00:54:01,680
Speaker 1: Even Thanks so much for sitting down with me.

1075
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:02,239
Speaker 2: Thank you.

1076
00:54:02,440 --> 00:54:03,240
Speaker 1: This is awesome.

1077
00:54:03,680 --> 00:54:06,200
Speaker 3: Please take a moment to leave a quick review by

1078
00:54:06,200 --> 00:54:09,440
Speaker 3: clicking the link with the description to this episode. We

1079
00:54:09,520 --> 00:54:12,279
Speaker 3: all face multiple hurdles in life. I want to hear

1080
00:54:12,320 --> 00:54:15,160
Speaker 3: about yours. Reach out to me at Emily at hurdle

1081
00:54:15,280 --> 00:54:18,640
Speaker 3: dot us. Connect with the podcast on Instagram and Twitter

1082
00:54:19,040 --> 00:54:20,120
Speaker 3: at Hurdle Podcasts.

1083
00:54:20,560 --> 00:54:23,720
Speaker 1: Ethan, Where do they find you? Where do they find active?

1084
00:54:24,120 --> 00:54:24,920
Speaker 1: Give me the load down?

1085
00:54:25,160 --> 00:54:28,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, so easiest to find me is just on Twitter.

1086
00:54:28,880 --> 00:54:32,279
Speaker 2: I'm just at Ethan agarwol. That's a G A R

1087
00:54:32,560 --> 00:54:35,640
Speaker 2: W A L and Aptive. Easiest place to find us

1088
00:54:35,719 --> 00:54:38,920
Speaker 2: is just aptive dot com. That's double a P T

1089
00:54:39,080 --> 00:54:40,400
Speaker 2: I V dot com.

1090
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:42,480
Speaker 3: I have to be honest with the world as we

1091
00:54:42,520 --> 00:54:45,279
Speaker 3: close this out. I'm here because I tweeted at him.

1092
00:54:45,840 --> 00:54:48,319
Speaker 2: Oh well, so clearly I am all over it.

1093
00:54:48,880 --> 00:54:53,360
Speaker 3: Amazing thing, so responsive. Yeah, I don't think a lot

1094
00:54:53,400 --> 00:54:54,480
Speaker 3: of people say that sentence.

1095
00:54:54,520 --> 00:54:58,359
Speaker 2: You can tweet at me anytime that.

1096
00:54:58,480 --> 00:54:59,120
Speaker 1: You're the best.

1097
00:54:59,280 --> 00:55:02,400
Speaker 3: You guys can find me at Emily a body. Another

1098
00:55:02,480 --> 00:55:05,160
Speaker 3: hurdle conquered. Catch you guys next time.