We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Shasmine Thomas a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Shasmine , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?
I hope that my legacy will be that I touched the lives of many young girls and impacted them in such a way that they would continue that cycle within their own lives one day. I want to leave a legacy for my children, my two little girls, that they’ll have for a lifetime, and then maybe someday pass it down to their children and their children’s children.
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?
My name is Shasmine Thomas and I am the founder and head coach of Cheer Leads Elite, an all star competitive cheer program located in southeast Georgia. CLE began as a developmental cheer program with the specific goal of better preparing young cheerleaders to be best prepared for cheerleading tryouts with any institution. The program grew exponentially and now services 60+ cheerleaders through our all star program.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
One story that illustrates my resilience is being told that I couldn’t practice in the space that I was renting out month to month. I didn’t have anywhere else for my girls to practice and I began to become so discouraged as if this wasn’t what I was supposed to be doing. I would cry, and pray. I knew I couldn’t let my girls down, so we practiced outside of my apartment building. Mind you it was the middle of winter, and they were still willing to practice. I knew then I had to go harder and try and find something quick. I began calling around to different people that I knew in my community, reaching out to family members, and using social media to try and find something that was available and big enough for us. Nothing seemed to be happening, and then my grandmother told me about the old vacant church that I grew up in might be available. Long story short we ended up there for 4 months , and shortly after that on April 1st we moved into our very own gym, and we aren’t stopping here. My hopes, dreams, and prayers is that we build our very own gym that we OWN! I could’ve given up, but I knew what God had called me to do, and I knew that Faith wasn’t what I seen but what I believed!
What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?
The most effective strategy for growing my clientele is simply being genuine and caring about your clients. In my case it would be loving on my athletes, letting them know that I truly care about them. Making the parents feel comfortable and building that trust that screams we are FAMILY. People will always spend their money where they feel they are valued and loved. That then creates the marketing of word of mouth. We went from 16 to 60 girls within a year. Our goal is to triple that within the next few years, we plan to do that by sticking to the strategy!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.cheerleadselite.com
- Instagram: @cheerleadselite
- Facebook: www.Facebook.com/cheerleadselite
- Youtube: www.YouTube.com/cheerleadselite