We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Christine Stacey a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Christine, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

Love Your Butt Co. isn’t just a brand; it’s a story of love, resilience, and finding joy in unexpected places. When the pandemic hit and our gym closed its doors, my husband and I found ourselves facing uncertainty and darkness as well as a lot of free time to think. The heart of our brand lies in a simple yet powerful phrase: “love your butt!” It’s something my mother-in-law says with a twinkle in her eye every time she says goodbye—a reminder to laugh, to embrace who we are, and to find beauty in the little things. She’s been saying this for years and I never knew how to respond until one day I thought, “this should be a brand!”

We embarked on a journey to spread love and acceptance in a world that sorely needed it. And so, Love Your Butt Co. was born—a quirky, uplifting brand dedicated to celebrating self-love and embracing every curve life throws our way, moving your body and spreading the message of acceptance.

We were not solving a specific problem in the athleisure space but more so utilizing the space to spread a message and also to have a little fun when everything in our world felt heavy and dark.

In the face of adversity, Love Your Butt Co. emerged as a beacon of hope, reminding us all to find joy, laughter, and acceptance, even in the darkest of times. And as we continue to grow, our mission remains the same: to spread love, one booty at a time.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I’ve been coaching individuals for over 20 years and love to see the power that women especially develop when they realize just how strong they can be. The way fitness and taking control of your health translates over to your self worth and life goals is amazing and profound. I have worked with countless individuals who have experienced major breakthroughs in their life simply by deciding to “work out.”

Love Your Butt was born from that idea of leaning into you at all costs. Loving yourself so much that you realize your are worth the time to break and get a workout in or do some squats or pursue the big scary goal you’ve never started shooting for. It’s about laughing and losing the judgement and just accepting ourselves and others just the way they are.

I’ve always been a peacemaker, very inclusive and just a big believer in others’ potentials. LYB is my belief in humanity. I think we need that right now. I think we need inspiration every where we can and we need to also just laugh a little. And I also like butts, who doesn’t? ;)

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

We are currently in a pivot! LYB is a brand new brand and the first two years have been basically a testing phase. We believed in the message but we also really wanted to make comfy athleisure clothes with fun bright colors in the fitness space where there is a lot of blacks, grays and boring messages. One day when we were gearing up to launch at our first big vendor event I said “maybe we should throw the name on a t-shirt?” But I laughed and maybe even blushed because I thought there is no way anyone would wear a shirt that says “Love Your Butt!”

Well, pretty quickly I learned that is all anyone wants. We went too wide and deep and have learned that the brand is all in the name and to go all in on our trademarked “Love Your Butt!” We are working on different styles of the t-shirts. We are expanding to putting the trademark on sweatshirts and tanks as well. It was a funny but crucial learning lesson!

Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?

Jumping into the clothing retail space is no small task. Manufacturing is a bit of a moving target with no exact playbook. I utilized all the resources I had: other small business owners in the fitness clothing space, YouTube, blogs and really anything I could get my hands on to help me understand the process. It still seeming very confusing and like I didn’t really have specific steps to take. I learn by doing so I just decided to move forward in a number of different ways. I utilized a local screen printer in Portland and asked a lot of questions. I designed by hand and communicated to a manufacturer in China and had items developed overseas. I used a white label company out of LA who helped develop USA made leggings. I tried everything and in the end the process that I loved the most was working locally. Although the price per item may be the highest, there are so many benefits to local. I love supporting another creative as well as the control and ease to communication in the process. There were pros and cons to all the other methods too but for our brand local design and printing has worked the best. And at the end of the day, if you have a quality product customers will pay what you need to charge for the item.

Contact Info:

• Website: loveyourbuttco.com
• Instagram: @loveyourbuttco
• Facebook: Facebook.com/loveyourbuttco
• Other: TikTok @loveyourbuttco

Image Credits
Photographers Michael Tremaine and Sarah Willey