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

Scott , appreciate you joining us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

A couple of years ago I would have simply said our mission at FitTogether is to build a platform that connects the gym industry in a much more effective and logical way than what is available to us today through the big tech platforms. What I realized over the past two years during the pandemic is that while the industry does very much need its own purpose driven platform for our community, the world desperately needs more education about health and fitness and how changes in your lifestyle can not only lengthen your life, but prepare you and strengthen you against viruses and illnesses that can really cause a lot of damage to unhealthy people. Health and fitness are the key to preparing for the next pandemic and the one after that… Our mission is now a mission of health and one of making humans everywhere healthier, stronger and more resilient every day.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’ve been addicted to the gym and to fitness for as long as I can remember, it’s just who I am at heart. I have an old memory of my dad taking me to the Coast Guard base in Norfolk because he had a basketball game. I went and played around in the gym during his game. It was definitely a ‘love at first lift” thing for me. The idea for FitTogether actually came to me while I was in a meeting for my “day job” which is selling software and IT services to large corporations. The gentlemen I was meeting with were executives for one of the largest gym chains in the country and the spent the vast majority of the time walking me through all the business challenges they face as gym operators. There was nothing that my current company could build or sell to them to solve the issues, but I realized there was an opportunity to build something for them that could actually help solve their problems and also bring a lot of value to their millions of members across the US. If I had to compare FitTogether to something out there I would say it is probably a mixture of Facebook meets LinkedIN, but built very specifically for gyms and for the 184M people around the world that have gym memberships. It is the only app of its kind that puts trainers, gyms and social users all in one place to connect, share and exchange services on together. While it has been a long(very long) journey to get to this point, it has also been an amazing experience to create something that didn’t exist before and see people from all over the planet using it.

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

Starting your own business is without a doubt the hardest thing I have every done. I have failed thousands of times just to get to this point now where people are using my product and we are positioned to raise capital to really see what this thing can do with the right people and financing behind it. I have gone broke several times, foreclosed on a home in Charlotte so I could keep building FitTogether, had coders run off with code, had coders not do the work they were paid to do, had to sue multiple companies for trademark infringement, you name it, I have lived and worked through it. I now have a few advisory board folks that are pretty amazing humans and have been very successful in the SaaS and fitness space. At this point I feel like it’s just a matter of time before we get the right people on board to turn FitTogether into a household name.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

Everyone has a different story on how they built their business. Some get lucky and get funding right away, some come from wealthy families and have access to unlimited to cash and capital. I had none of those things. I have bootstrapped this entire endeavor leveraging paychecks and commission checks for years from my software job. Every dollar that I could afford to put into FitTogether, I did. This method probably caused me some time as far as deploying code and services, but it also allowed me to get to this point now where I don’t owe anyone anything and I can make very strategic decisions on who I bring on board next for investment and management roles. It might not be a popular opinion, but I recommend doing as much as you humanly can before asking for money from anyone. That’s my .02 anyway!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://onelink.to/fittogether
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fittogether/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FitTogether/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/_FitTogether

Image Credits
Michelle Bowen Photography