Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Kevin Kist. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Kevin, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Risk taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.

When I was 19 I dropped out of the University of Cincinnati to pursue the journey of an entrepreneur. That same week I moved out of my parents house and into an apartment with my friend Clif. I had zero dollars and zero plan other than the self belief that I was capable of building this vision in my head which was to build the best strength and conditioning facility possible!

I went to work as an electrician with my dad and spent every moment thinking and working towards the dream to build RTS Barbell, at one point working 3-4 jobs trying to save enough to move forward.

The very name, Risk To Succeed Barbell , was born from this time period. I remember sitting in my apartment, no money, nothing other than the daily grind going on, writing ideas in a notebook. On one such day I was pondering names and very naturally I fed off of my current emotion towards how I was living and wrote Risk To Succeed. This became my life mantra.

It would be a few years before I had the ability to start bringing the vision to life in the most bare bones way but I was always focused on progressing forward at all costs. I committed to the belief that if I outworked myself everyday, didn’t take no for an answer, never cut corners, and never shy’d away from the money required to build something amazing then the dream was possible.

Since then, year after year, we push ourselves into the uncomfortable place of sacrificing a greater sense of personal security and embracing delayed gratification in the name of continued progress to level up and create excellence for our community.

Kevin, 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?

Growing up I was overweight and quite unhealthy. I battled with that and the bullying that came with it for many years. When I got to high school I became enamored by the school weight room and felt so drawn to feeling what it was like to lift weights and be healthier.

In my sophomore year of high school I dove head first into learning to train and being healthier. I was so inspired by the school strength coaches and knew I wanted my life to revolve around strength and conditioning.

After high school I attended the University of Cincinnati to pursue what I thought I wanted at the time, a strength and conditioning degree. After a year and a half I came to the realization that my path needed to break away from the structures of school and I needed to set out on my own path. With the support of my then, very new girlfriend and now wife, Madison, I set out to create what would become RTS Barbell!

Now, my personal journey has carried me over a decade and enabled me to commit my life to the understanding that everything great in my life is because I started lifting weights.

RTS Barbell and its six year journey so far is my personal expression of gratitude for what lifting weights has given to me and my desire to support others in their own journey to discover the beauty lifting has shown me.

As for what RTS Barbell offers, we have a very simply, straightforward mission.

We are obsessed with creating a kind, welcoming, clean strength and conditioning facility that has the best equipment in the world to serve those that love strength and conditioning, powerlifting, strongman, olympic lifting, bodybuilding and athletic training of all kinds and doing what we can to foster an amazing, kind community!

We provide 24/7 access with very simple membership structures and no extra fees and no games. I want every interaction to make people feel at home and respected. At RTS Barbell you are a part of our community, not another number.

We are currently building a new facility that will be an incredible canvas for us to overdeliver for our community and visitors and raise the bar on what’s possible. It will be 10,150 sqft with a private parking lot, secure entrance, amazing bathrooms and showers, a coworking room and more! Some things to look forward to in addition to a new, beautiful facility is in-house coaches and a couple specialized practitioners that will be joining the community to help enhance the experience for all! We expect this to be finished in early 2023!

If I had to choose one thing to feel most proud of it would be the non-negotiable demand that we operate as a “No Hate Space”. I take the responsibility to support and love everyone that makes RTS Barbell what it is so seriously and its top priority that everyone feels that and knows that.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

My personal journey and the journey of RTS Barbell has been ripe with adversity and has forced me constantly to dig in and keep fighting, even against really brutal odds.

The most recent and at scale, the largest example has been the last year and a half as we have pursued building the new RTS Barbell.

It started with the experience of trying to buy the property to build. The property was owned by a gentleman that had had it since the 60’s and had a deeply inflated idea of what its value was. It took many months of back and forth to iron out what we could offer and what they would accept. In that time, the owner ended up in the hospital and we thought everything was going to fall through. It was a deeply stressful time. We knew the property was perfect for our vision and it was not an option to let it go. We ended up making the closing happen, but this is honestly when the real challenges started.

Once we took ownership of the property we set out to build a team of contractors, architect, and engineers needed to bring this project to reality. With that, we had to secure financing.

Along the process we learned one major fact, most banks don’t want to work with small, local businesses. We were told by many banks that if we weren’t a major corporate gym they wouldn’t work with us. We even had one bank commit to working with us and then pull out on us. It was a gut wrenching and honestly excruciating experience.

Eventually, we were connected with a local bank that was excited by our story and what we stood for and got on board with the support of our construction loan to help us bring this building to reality. I should also add, that all of this was occurring coming out of covid and as interest rates were threatening to sky rocket. Fortunately, the bank helped us get things locked in prior to the chaos, but we experienced months of impossible to explain stress.

Following all of this, the journey as been full of increased construction costs, unexpected hiccups, hard to obtain materials and a shortage of skilled man power to craft the different facets of this project. Through all this the team we have has pushed through and traversed all the different elements required to make this a reality.

As I write this the team erecting the steel for the building started today. Through all of the struggles, adversity and days we felt like there was no way forward our “there is always a way” mentality carried us forward!

I’m so proud that we fought through the dreary odds and made our own odds. We refuse to take no for an answer and we aren’t afraid to fight for every inch.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

RTS Barbell has been built one dollar at a time. Until this most recent construction loan for the new building, we never used a loan, only money made by the gym or money from my day job as an electrician to fund our growth. Even with the loan there is a heavy requirement for additional capital to navigate the crazy process of lining up thats needed.

For almost the entire journey of RTS Barbell, I worked full time as an electrician. For the first year or two, I used money from my electric paychecks to pay gym rent until we had built a community that helped cover it, at which point I pivoted the paycheck resources towards investing into new equipment so we could grow.

Every year of RTS Barbell’s journey has been built on investing in more amazing equipment or saving towards a bigger space at the expense of my wife and I’s personal security. I’ve been steadfast on delaying personal gratification in the name of moving RTS Barbell forward to the place I want it to be.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.rtsbarbell.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rtsbarbell/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RTSBarbell/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdtwO4HX2oFSaRMfGg5eo2w
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/rts-barbell-cincinnati-2?osq=RTS+Barbell