Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Natalie Joseph. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Natalie, thanks for joining us today. Talk to us about building your team? What was it like? What were some of the key challenges and what was your process like?
Well I have to start answering these questions by going back to a moment in time. I opened my first location in 2015. I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to open a second location for a long time. Fast forward to the year 2024 and an acquaintance demanded that I meet an acquaintance of his. This person was amped up to open up his own fitness studio. So, I asked him if he was open to having a business partner and his response was “yes, but that person would need to be exceptional.” I’m paraphrasing, but the point was that when it comes to building a business and building a team, we need to begin with ourselves. If I want exceptional employees then I need to exhibit the qualities I seek. Suffice to say, that man and I became business partners and we opened the second location of BUF at the end of 2024!
I may want to build a team who demonstrates high quality work and fantastic work ethic as well as stellar communication; however, my business partner and I are a great example of how two people who are experts in our field can also bring to the table very different ideas and approaches to everything. But, I see that as an essential part of building a capable and killer team. We make each other better– push each other to grow in ways we never considered previously.
So, when it comes to hiring, what is most important is that the candidate has the passion to learn and a genuine care for the work we do. This isn’t just a job. In order to succeed in our business an employee must embrace fitness and wellness wholly. Having said that, when we first started recruiting team members we saw that some people had plenty of passion, but their work ethic proved to be severely lacking. Part of hiring people is taking a chance on them because words only go so far. We need to see firsthand the employee’s behavior. How do they deal with responsibility, time management, organizing client programming, and the like? I have seen how especially young people seem to want an “easy” job. They don’t necessarily put the effort in that it takes to be great at something. So, this is the difficulty in conducting a basic interview– there are questions that remain unanswered until time passes.
In the beginning, we went through a few younger employees who showed so much excitement in the beginning and then showed zero work ethic over time and zero motivation to learn. So, those behaviors made it easy for us to move on and find better candidates to build our team. The thing is that I cannot possibly expect others to have the same motivation, skill, and know-how that I have. But, I can reasonably expect certain things. And, diversity is essential. I might be in my 40’s, but I still learn new things daily, and when it comes to hiring, I want to see a healthy combination of a candidate who is able to display their passion, communicate effectively, and back it all up with their actions. Skill level can always go up. Bottom line– show me what you are about.
If I was starting my business today, I would have been more discerning on who I chose to be part of my team. I would pay a little more attention to action and bit less attention to words. People are very skilled at making themselves sound great and showing excitement. That’s great, but it holds much less value as a quality when you are trying to build a solid team.
Natalie, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am the owner of BUF (Body Unlimited Fitness) in Sherman Oaks, California and am General Partner for BUF in Spokane Valley, Washington (with Travis Marsh). I have a very colorful ethnic background as well as grew up with extremely unique parents. My father was a nuclear physicist and my mother is a hypnotherapist. So, right off the bat, I was introduced to the world of the extreme internal and unseen energetic (spirit) body and simultaneously the ridiculously complicated and fantastical world of possibilities in calculations. And, to top that off, both my parents suffered from extreme ailments. I witnessed both of them suffer physically and both approached helping their ailments very differently. I was brutally aware of how important it is to take care of yourself, to educate yourself, and to KNOW yourself. Doctors do not know everything and the medical industry is NOT a wellness and health industry.
I started skiing at 5, did gymnastics, swimming, track. Fast forward to when I was 18 years old and I fell in love with fitness training. But, my fitness trainer was not so careful with teaching form. I ended up getting injured and to make a long story short, I had to figure out how to help myself on my own. Then my father passed away, and I had a light bulb moment to just dive into the world of fitness and become a fitness professional. Almost just after the moment I decided to do that is the moment I became successful at it. I discovered that I had an innate understanding of fitness and wellness (to put it simply) and I had an freakish memory for numbers when it came to training clients.
My goal has always been to help others seize their life so that they can feel like themselves– not trapped within their physical body. The body is powerful and is intelligent. With the right support your body can feel strong, healthy and even powerful. You can can wake up each day knowing that joy is not only possible, but likely, because you have an amazing mindset and your body is healthy to support everything that you seek to do. This is the best wealth.
In the world today we are bombarded by noise. It’s hard to decipher what information to take seriously and what to throw out. BUF trainers do the research and are passionate about this exactly. We help you find your way to wellness and strength for your specific desires and needs. We carve the path for you and are your support system in a world where real support like this is rare to find. We do offer other wellness services in addition to fitness training at the Spokane Valley location. Body Unlimited Fitness is about freeing your self from limitations to seize your fitness and seize your life.
Can you open up about how you funded your business?
When my business partner and I began putting plans together to open BUF #2, I began looking into some state programs for funding. I went down a long road of filling out paperwork, business plans, meetings and so forth to come out the other end with enough capital to open shop. However, we hit a wall as nothing went through. We didn’t have enough history is the state of Washington to be considered for any of those programs. So, then my business partner and I started reaching out to people we knew– friends, family and clients. And, the beautiful thing is that a few of them wanted to help us right away. Past clients and family stepped in to forward us large sums of money to be able to pay for what we needed, which was the most amazing feeling. They not only made it possible for us to open this location, but also it was such a real show of support for what we do and what we are passionate about. It was a vote of confidence in our expertise and what we want to offer our community here.
What’s worked well for you in terms of a source for new clients?
The best source of new clients for us is, hands down, current clients. Current clients speak volumes of their experience with us and spread the word like a blaze of fire. It’s better than a written review. Clients referring their friends, family and co-workers to us means that they love it here and are confident in our expertise. It also tells us that we are consistently providing exactly what we set out to do with BUF. We are reliable. For no one wants to refer someone to a place that is unpredictable. The other most important way we get new clients is due to our great location. Thousands of cars pass by our location daily and our building is extremely visible. That visibility translates into people checking out our website and then contacting us. So, I have to mention that it’s really a combination of having amazing visibility and a great functional website that truly support our ongoing source of clientele.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.BUFstudio.com
- Instagram: @bufstudio and @bufspokane
- Facebook: body unlimited fitness / body unlimited fitness spokane
