Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Alicia Galvin . We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alicia, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you come up with the idea for your business?
I have always wanted to work with people, using diet and nutrition as a way to help their symptoms and health struggles. I just didn’t know anything about integrative and functional nutrition (IFN) when I was going through my conventional dietetics trainings and it wasn’t a topic we were exposed to when I was in school. So after working as a dietitian in a conventional setting for 5 yrs, I had the opportunity to open my own practice and decided it was a good time to make the jump to entrepreneurship! As I was trying to figure out my niche, I came across a colleague who introduced me to the IFN concepts and from there I was hooked. This was my tribe and like-minded colleagues who were really working on the root cause of health issues and trying to use nutrition as a way to redirect the client’s trajectory. I completed hours of formal trainings to achieve the IFNCP credential while I was starting my practice in 2014 and have never looked back.
In addition to my solo practice, I have co-founded a virtual education platform called SIBO Academy. This idea came from my observations of clinicians and RDs needing much more expansive and integrative training in the realm of GI health and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) which is now recognized as an underlying cause for up to 60-70% of IBS cases. But as RDs, we do not get this training in our coursework. So in establishing this educational platform, we have now grown to have 7 evergreen webinars on SIBO watched by over 300 RDs, an extremely successful 10 week GI course that has now had over 200 RDs go through, and a membership model consisting of monthly meetings with our alumni- all with the laser focused goal of elevating the profession and enhancing the clinical skills of dietitians in the GI space.
Alicia, 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 always knew I wanted to be a dietitian from the time I was 13 yrs old. I was an athlete in high school and I experienced first hand how nutrition affected health and performance. So I knew this is what I wanted to do as my career. I also love solving puzzles, piecing information together to come up with the bigger picture- and the process of practicing integrative and functional nutrition (IFN) is exactly that. Every client that comes to me brings a set of puzzle pieces (symptoms or concerns) and in looking at their life history, timeline of events and onset, and asking them all sorts of questions bout environment, lifestyle, diet and medical history, the puzzle pieces start to piece together to form a picture of the direction we need to go to get them feeling better. Or at least that is how my brain works :) But the key to IFN is to look at the person as a whole- how is their digestive health affecting their brain health and hormonal health, how does their immune health affect their energy levels and cardiovascular health. It is all about looking at how all systems of the body are interconnected and where to identify the dysfunction, so you can work on the root cause of their symptoms, not just treat the symptoms. And then we utilize natural products, nutraceuticals, vitamins, minerals, herbs and therapeutic diets to try to work on those root causes as much as we are able
With SIBO Academy, this is the only Comprehensive GI training program with an IFN lens and the only one that is approved for 25 CEUs with the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.
When I had the idea for SIBO Academy, I knew I wanted to partner with someone who had a similar vision and background. And Erin Skinner RD (business partner) fit that description when she established the SIBO Dietitians Facebook group. In looking at her posts and her comments, I knew she would be a great fit, and truly she has been a mirror image of myself in all things. So we think the same, have the same vision and work ethic, and so it has been really easy to build this amazing platform with her. And what is funny is we have been doing this since 2019, but only met in person once!
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
Honestly, in my private practice, word of mouth is the number 1 source of clients. I try to take each client as an individual- I answer their questions personally, I remember their personal lives and get to know them at a deeper level. I want each client to feel like they are important and that I truly care about their well being- because I do. I think people feel that and so they tell others. Plus, when you work in IFN, it is a very different approach from what most people experience, and my clientele appreciates that holistic and individualized approach. This has been my philosophy and strategy since Day 1. I have not done alot of official marketing- just connecting with like-minded professionals and trying to do a good job at my work.
Image Credits
Professional photo by Debra Shore- for my use Meal and veggie photos are by me- these are veggies I grow in our home garden (because I love growing my own food to supplement what we get from the store)