We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Hope Zvara. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Hope below.
Alright, Hope thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard
Everyone else in the industry is trying to keep drivers in the industry longer with more money and bonuses, I’m telling you, that doesn’t work.
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
My former life was lived as a yoga teacher and yoga studio owner. But in 2017, that all changed when a random meeting at a local business mixer changed everything. After chatting up a stranger, I was trying to pitch him yoga, and he looked at me and said “do you have anything for truckers, like in the cab of their truck”. I looked back at him, and with the delay, I threw up my arms and said “Mother Trucker Yoga”. That night business was born. Mother Trucker Yoga® is a company for over-the-road wellness targeting truck drivers, trucking companies, shippers, and logistic companies. We teach drivers how to move more in the driver’s seat, sleeper, and right outside the truck’s cab. There is wellness for everyone else but nothing truly for truck drivers. We are a membership site rich with driver-specific exercises and strategies. As an entrepreneur for my entire adult life running a business wasn’t anything new, and I know yoga and movement like no other. A year after starting the business, I bought out my former business partner, and today, we are a leader in the industry-shaping the health and wellness of the trucking industry.
I help truck drivers, and trucking companies whose drivers are living a sedentary lifestyle, have back pain, mid-drive brain fog, and mental burnout, and struggle sleeping at night with small simple changes they can make all from the cab of the truck in just minutes a day. While everyone else is telling them to work out, go to the gym and just eat healthier, I’m saying they don’t need to do that if they start with small micro changes sprinkled in throughout the day: from the driver’s seat, the sleeper and right outside the rig. Anyone can tell a driver to workout or slap a workout video up on youtube in front of a truck and call it trucker fitness, but to understand the human body, to piece out practical, functional fitness and deliver it in a way that meets the needs of the professional driver, that’s where I come in.
In 2022 I released Trucking Yoga Simple Fitness for the Long-Haul, a playbook for truck drivers, fleets, and CDL schools to understand how they can live a healthy life as a driver. Drivers should never have to choose between their career and their health, and up until now, that was the choice they had to make.
I believe it’s the small, simple changes that lead to the big results in life so that you can feel good again.
In the last five years, I have inspired and reached more than 200,000 drivers across multiple platforms, and have been featured in Forbes, Yahoo News, PBS, and was recently noted as #10 of the TOP 11 Female Entrepreneurs to Watch Out For in 2023 by LA Weekly.
I have single-handly brought yoga to the trucking world and furthermore brought a more practical approach to fitness, wellness, and health that was not present before Mother Trucker Yoga®.
I have always had a vision that I would make a significant impact somewhere, but before Mother Trucker Yoga, I wasn’t sure where that would be. I love my drivers; they are my people, and I am honored that they entrust me to help them improve their everyday lives. I am hyper-creative, and in the last two years, I have created an entire product line to help drivers more easily incorporate health and fitness into their lives including a pain cream and soon-to-be-released mini luxury travel massage gun, trucker camo™ tees, and several other items on the docket this year.
What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?
Adding value. I give and give and give to the point that a few years ago, I had to learn how to also ask. I believe life is about balance, and business is no exception. I have built an entrusted reputation with my peers, clientele, and market because I am who I say I am. I’m not a weekend fitness warrior that memorized a bunch of moves; I understand the human body; I understand lifestyle fitness and have not only taught it for 17 years to thousands of real live humans but have also trained others to teach and when people work with me on any level what they get is exceptional quality, originality, and creativity customized to them with the motivation and personality to go with it.
When it comes to the business side of Mother Trucker Yoga®, I took the time to get super clear on the problem I solve and how I want to solve it. Too many people start a business because they think they are good at something, never really taking the time to build the business itself. And I no matter what business you want to start, take the time to learn about your audience, what they like and don’t like, and most importantly, take the time to figure out you, what you like, what you don’t like, and flush out what you want. Mother Trucker Yoga® was not my first go at owning a business and that in part is why things have gone the way they have, I’ve learned from my previous mistakes.
Building relationships is essential in any business. Building JV relationships are critical in today’s business world, and because I also have a love and gift to write and with words, it helps get my message out there that much faster.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
My entire entrepreneurial journey has been nothing but resilience. I have learned that the higher you climb, the more resilient you must be. The bigger you grow, the more significant problems come your way, and you have to have the mindset, focus, and clarity to follow through and level up no matter what. This is why so many entrepreneurs quit or never make it past five figures in business.
Running a legit business is hard. And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you. I have a BIG vision, and that means BIG moves. And what I have realized is customers often buy based on mass approval. And it takes constant resilience to keep going in your business when you feel like you are moving at a snail’s pace. I was doing all the right things, trademarking my business, patenting my designs, branding properly, SEO-optimized website, and great partnerships and relationships, but I struggled to get customers to invest in themselves on this level. I realized I had taken on a HUGE mission that wasn’t just about teaching yoga, health, and fitness to drivers; it was re-educating the industry on self-care and investing in themselves on that level. I believe the trucking industry can weave health throughout it, and I’m up for the challenge; all I ask is drivers meet me halfway and be willing to try Mother Trucker Yoga’s® approach to a simpler driver fitness and see what happens.
When it comes to trucking company fitness and wellness, owners may say they care about drivers’ health (and some genuinely do), but many have a program and don’t care to optimize it. They still believe drivers will stick with them simply by offering them a higher bonus and have normalized the constant turnover as “normal.” The drivers entering this industry want more; they want to be respected, seen and supported- and health is a significant factor. I have spoken and consulted with dozens of trucking companies, and just because you hear the word “no” doesn’t mean what you are doing is not working. I had to pivot and keep pushing if I wanted to make an impact and recognize just because someone doesn’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there. No just means “not right now.” Again, another reason business owners stay small or give up is that they can’t handle rejection. I look at no as “not right now”, and furthermore, I won’t waste my time with a company that isn’t interested in retaining their drivers and offering them quality health and fitness programming or isn’t open to improving what they offer even more.
When it comes to customers, I have to keep putting myself out there; it’s a full-time job just doing that! If no one knows about you, how can they do business with you? With all that bombards people today, you have to be louder than the rest, not just to be noisy. I know my solutions work, and I have clients as proof, but being in business today MEANS you must be resilient, dedicated, and willing to never give up.
I’m a small female-owned business, I don’t have an endless budget and have been 100% entirely self-funded, so you learn to be scrappy, crafty and savvy. And when you have a smaller budget than the big guys, you have to get creative to be seen and not stop, not even for one second, or you lose one of your most valuable assets- momentum. To those small businesses out there, money is only one part of growing a successful business, the other part is…you.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.mothertruckeryoga.com www.hopezvara.com
- Instagram: Instagram Hope Zvara: https://www.instagram.com/hopezvara/ Instagram Mother Trucker Yoga: https://www.instagram.com/mothertruckeryoga/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MotherTruckerYoga/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hope-zvara-77572935
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/trucker_yoga
- Youtube: YouTube HopeZvara: https://www.youtube.com/@HopeZvara YouTube MotherTruckerYoga: https://www.youtube.com/@MotherTruckerYoga
Image Credits
https://www.whimsicalroots.com/ https://www.facebook.com/whimsicalroots Whimsical Roots Photography – Andrea Hall