Barre3: Sadie Lincoln (2017)

Hey, it's Guy here. You know, Sadie Lincoln still remembers the name of the very first person who signed up for membership with Bar 3 back in 2008, which is pretty incredible because at the time she was also teaching nineteen classes a week. and cleaning the bathrooms at the studio. Today. There are bar three studios in 33 states. Sadie also joined us for our first ever How I Built This Summit last month, and she shared some helpful tips on how to build a great company culture right from the start. If you want to check out a video of Sadie from the summit, we just posted it at our How I Built This Facebook page.

Go check it out. Anyway, this episode with Sadie first ran about a year ago, and I hope you enjoy it. One evening We put the kids to bed. I'll never forget this. We're in the living room and Chris came up to me. And he pulled a spreadsheet out of his pocket.

And he said, Sadie, I've been holding this in my pocket for Couple weeks. And he opened it up. And it was a spreadsheet. A model.

Of how we could sell our home. All our possessions. and drop out and not work. For a year. For a year. Wow.

And That was the spark. to building. But we don't From MPR, it's how I built this, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.

Guy Roz, and on the show today, how Sadie Lincoln turned a room with mirrors and a ballet bar into a multi-million dollar company. That's now one of the fastest growing fitness programs in the US. So if you were to take a little bit of Pilates and some yoga. And then throw in some ballet into the mix?

You'd get bar. It's actually been around since 1959, when a former ballerina named Lottie Burke invented the whole concept in London. But it didn't really begin to take off in the US until this past decade. And today there are more than seven hundred bar studios around the country. Companies like CoreFusion, Physique fifty seven, and Pure Bar.

Now the people who go to bar classes are overwhelmingly women And most of them aren't just going for the exercises, they're they're actually connected to the culture around the whole bar movement. It's about building confidence and esteem. But it's also big business.

The whole boutique fitness sector, which Bar is definitely a part of. Із науати більон долар індустрі. And one of the best known faces of Bar Sadie Lincoln.

Her company, Bar 3, now has about 130 locations all around the world. And the company is still privately owned by Sadie and her husband Chris, and just one outside investor. Now all of this has of course made them rich, and in Sadie's case, It's made her a celebrity fitness guru. Which as you will hear

has made her very uncomfortable. Because Sadie isn't actually as flashy and slick as her online videos would suggest. In fact, her upbringing? It was pretty unconventional. My mom and her four best friends. dropped out. They're part of the counterculture in the sixties. Like they were living in California and they just dropped out. They were living in California. Yep. They found each other.

They're kind of gypsy like they're traveling around together. They ended up in Tas New Mexico. And uh each of them ended up having a child. The dads all split. And they

basically raised us kids collaboratively. their plan, like to all these women to move to Taos and you know, basically have children and then all all to raise them these children together w because it Yeah, I mean that's how it worked out.

D is that how they thought it was gonna work out? I think it just happened and it was a time of exploration. It was a time for them to Go inward, look inside, Live close to nature. Trust their intellect.

And create and discover a new way of living. And they were five kids all together. Yes, let's see. So Lark is eight years older than me, so she's sort of like an honorary auntie in a way, but Lark, Sophia Yeah. File. Meg out me.

So six. Yeah. And was fitness. Part of your er early childhood? Well, we we used to do what we called boogie parties. Uh we would put on a rad record and boogie. Dance our butts off.

Um, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Chuck Barry. The Beatles, of course. Um we did that as a family often. So that was my first kind of introduction to just Loving moving. And h how did how did your mom, like, make ends meet? Well, first of all, we are often on food stamps. I do have memories of going to the store with food stamps with a note from my mom that I could use them and thinking, Oh, this is I have different money than other people. But they did end up um into when once they got secure and they had some stability, they they created their own business.

Uh they created a newspaper called What's Happening and then changed it in later years to Eugene Weekly, which is still the weekly publication in Eugene. Yeah. And did you sometimes feel like a weird kid, like a different kid. Yes, I felt like a weird kid. And um

Then I tried to play normal. You know, I that I played normal for a long time just I didn't want my friends to know that I had this alternative out of the box family. I was really attracted to k normal kids, normal families. Were you embarrassed? Oh yeah.

Yeah, I was embarrassed. I mean my mom was wearing brick and stocks before they were cool. They were smoking weed before it was legal. They were Just Outrageous in some ways. Now I think it's wonderful, but back then You know, I wanted to be I was like Alex P. Keaton.

And family ties. Kind of. I was like You know, I became a cheerleader, you know, which is very you know of course they all supported me because that's what they do, unconditional love, no matter what your choice is. Um I was really social. Um I just want to be normal. Were you a uh a pretty good student? In in high school.

Horrible student. Really? Really bad. I went to alternative school called Magnet Arts. I developed a great deal of confidence there. You know, we did pottery and dance and music and

but I didn't learn the basics. And then middle school, I entered middle school and I didn't have the foundation. nor the interest. And so I just kinda survived on having fun. So after high school, Sadie took off for LA. She thought she'd become an actor. And in the meantime, she started to take classes at Santa Monica City College, and she discovered that she actually liked it. So a couple of years in, she transferred to UCLA. And it was during that time she got really into fitness classes.

So after college? Sadie decided to look for work? Yeah I landed a job with a company called Twenty Four Hour Fitness. And the reason I took that job really was I wanted to move to San Francisco to live with my girlfriend. I lived in on her dining room floor, literally. And

Uh they were based out of the Bay Area and fitness. I was like perfect. Yeah. And what's what was the job that you were hired to do? I was hired to run Um all of the group exercise for I think twenty five gems. Wow. It was a big job. We were acquiring gems. At a rapid pace. So I started I think we had around fifty gems and

I ended up staying there for eleven years and when I left we had four hundred and thirty locations. Wow. So this was just massive explosive growth. Explosive growth. I thought I was going to work there maybe two one to two years and I ended up reporting direct to the founder and CEO. Mark Mastrov. And he just kept igniting interest in me because he'd give me all these incredible projects along the way. So everything from sales to um brand strategy, which was my favorite. I mean it was the ultimate learning experience for me. I traveled all over the world, all through Scandinavia and Asia and Spain and Italy. Um Mark had other businesses besides Twenty Four Hour Fitness that I got to be a part of gyms in Russia. Well, um

So he's like a major Like fitness mogul. There's no one greater. I mean in the fitness industry he's known. Even to this day. Yeah. Oh yeah. Hm. Okay, so so you are at twenty four hour fitness. It's exploding in growth.

And is that by the way, is that where you met your your husband, Chris? Yeah. I met Chris in San Francisco outside of twenty four hour fitness. He was working for a startup software company. I met him at a Superbowl party. Oh and We connected instantly. His last name's Lincoln and I mur he introduced himself as Lincoln. Everybody called him Lincoln and I remember in that moment thinking, Oh

My name's gonna be Mercedes Lincoln. Uh, my real name's Mercedes. I knew that instant. Wow. Yeah, I knew. I knew that. He was yeah, he's the one. And He After a couple of lunches with Mark Masdroff.

Mark pulled Chris into the loop as well. So he ended up working direct for Mark as well. And so Mark now had me and Chris and he would put us on projects together. So it was a wonderful testing ground for us as business partners to see how we work together. Chris is really analytical, really grounded. I'm more of the new shiny thing dreamer. Um we bought a house which is like climbing Mount Everest in the Bay Area Which was really exciting defining moment for us. For me especially I I rented almost my entire life growing up. So ha actually owning a home was incredible. Uh we had two children back to back, eighteen months apart. So I mean You're living in the Bay Area and you've got this gig with Mark and both you and Chris are kinda doing projects for him. Mm-hmm. And

What what happens? Do you have s is there some sort of crisis that kind of propels you to make a big life change? Well the first crisis for me I think happened before I was pregnant with my first child. I Even though I was part of this booming business and my career was booming.

And I was making a great salary and you know, we're buying a house and all that good stuff. My own health was declining. And I didn't feel Good.

You know, I've just been immersed in the fitness industry, but it wasn't working in my own body. I was what do you mean? I was really uncomfortable in my own skin. I I didn't feel alive inside, if that makes sense. I was working out really hard. Every day. Every day.

running on the treadmill, counting how many calories I was eating and how many calories I was expending because that's scientific, you know, calories in, calories out. You know, doing all the right things that I had learned were was the formula for success. And this is multi-billion dollar industry I was in was working. I mean it was selling like hotcakes. And This attachment to an ideal. I was sort of drinking that Kool Aid. And

I was shameful that I wasn't looking that ideal or feeling that ideal. So What changed? When I got pregnant with Audrey. I think being pregnant is the ultimate.

Opportunity to realize Intuition. Because if you think about it inside your body I I was creating a baby without thinking about it. And I never felt more alive and connected and happy. For me becoming pregnant reminded me At my roots. Hm.

My aunties. The power of intuition, what healthy really was, was living close to nature, being intuitive, versus following someone else's formula. And I had the s ah, I started to do yoga at home. And I had this this moment of clarity, I'll never forget it, where I literally said to myself

Maybe I'm not feeling fitness. Maybe fitness is failing me. Hm. And I'm probably not alone. Even though the fitness industry is booming, the vast majority of us, it's not working. I mean that's the news story on the news every day.

It's like obesity's on the rise, people are more stressed out than they ever have been. There's all these magic pills, magic answers, formulas that we're also desperately seeking. And w were you having this conversation with your husband with Chris at the same time? I would say the conversation Chris and I were having more at that point versus fitness is failing or not. Was we were lonely. Mm. Really lonely as a couple.

We were having a hard time finding belonging. We didn't have a strong community and we we're kinda like, Is this it? Like is it just you and me? You know? What's going on? He was having a hard time relating to Business as he was

managing the the studios he was managing with Twenty Four Hour Fitness and You know, I just I remember this one moment walking into the room and he was on speakerphone and the manager that was working with coaching him. They were on a a conference call. The guy and he was did it with such great intention, but he was You know, nobody could see each other, so he was saying, Okay, everybody, raise your right hand. Now put it on your back. Now lift it up.

Now put it back down. Now lift it up. So he was having everyone on the conference call pat their own back. And Chris instead of doing that was flipping off the speaker. Right. I was like something needs to change. This is not working for us.

So we felt empty. There wasn't a sense of purpose. So what did you do? So we started I mean over the years, over like maybe a two year, we w he was coming up with all kinds of different business plans from plant watering business to pizza to nail studio channels. Chris was. Yeah. And um

So that was sort of in the backdrop, but also it was like I had this good gig. I was working from home, I had two babies. Um, he had a good job. I mean, we had bought our house. So I felt like things were kind of moving along pretty Pretty well. And one evening We put the kids to bed. I'll never forget this. We're in the living room and Chris came up to me.

And he pulled a spreadsheet out of his pocket. Mm. And he said, Sadie, I've been holding this in my pocket. Pr couple of weeks and I I just need to share it with you. And he opened it up.

And it was a spreadsheet. A model. Of how we could sell our home. All our possessions. And move to Bendor again.

and drop out and not work. For a year. For a year. Wow. And you know, I'm the one that's usually thinking of these outrageous ideas. He's more conservative and super analytical for s him to Bring me this outrageous idea was honestly one of the hottest things he's ever done. Because I was just like, You see me, you you see adventure. And if it's also a reflection of how I was raised. Yeah.

It gave us permission and Think outside of Any kind of Boundary. If we cannot work for a year.

What can we really do? So that idea morphed into Let's sell the house. And let's put every single penny. Into

A dream job. That might fail, but we don't care. Let's just try to build a life for ourselves. That will feel like dropping out. That will feel Free. And

That was the spark to building. What we built with bar three. Wow. So y and and so with the money you move to We ended up deciding on Portland because

Uh I wasn't as excited about Ben you know, I wanted to be in a more thriving Urban market. How much cash did you guys have to live up? I I don't remember the exact number, but I can tell you this. We went down to one car, we packed all of our belongings into the car, a moving van, we moved our two kids, our cat, to Portland, Oregon, we rented a small little house.

We just went down to the bare minimum. And how much did you have to This business idea. So our only investor to this day is Mark Mastrov. So he he said hey, I'll I'll work with you guys. Yeah. So he gave us a small investment.

I wanna say like under two hundred thousand. And then our house, which Um, so we probably had maybe three or four hundred thousand. And that was with a cushion. Your life saving life savings. And you poured much of that into this business idea. Yeah.

So what what was the concept that you guys started to work on when you got to Oregon? Well I became enamored with studio culture. And going to yoga studios, going to bar studios in the late nineties, early two thousands, bar was really igniting in New York and in San Francisco.

Yeah. Well, Barr back then was based off of the Lottie Burke method. which she was a dancer who rehabbed herself basically at a ballet bar and her first instructors started the first bar studios, Core Fusion, Physique Fifty Seven, Bar Method, there's a bunch of them out there. And s they sort of had a renaissance in the early two thousands. And I started to take those classes and I was I was intrigued by them. How come? Um, for one thing they reminded me of sort of a contemporary

Jazer size, to be honest. And then using the ballet bar. as a prop just has this instant grace and art and heritage. That was really attractive. To me.

When you got into when you decided to open up our studio. There were competitors out there, right? So did you think w how how how are you able to say, Well, we're gonna be different this way or attract customers by doing this. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so we moved to Portland a conscious decision where there was no bar.

Um around us. And I loved using the ballet bar. I love the isometric work of Lottie Burke and the small movements and the music. But I wanted to create a studio.

That instead of Being something, being the answer, being a methodology. I didn't want to be the Sadie Lincoln method or the Barthree method. I just wanted it to be an exercise experience. From the very beginning in our instructor manual, the very first sentence is, The one thing that never changes at R3 is we're always changing. At the very beginning of class, almost every instructor will start by saying, welcome to bar three. I give you full permission to do something different than I say.

Your only job is to listen. Not to me, but yourself. I'm your guide. We're gonna turn the music on. I'm gonna show you how to align your body and then I want you to make it. Your

Oh. But just as an idea to introduce people. I mean obviously you you introduce it to people when they show up and when they start taking the classes, right? But Like

when you passed by the studio and you saw this thing, bar three, B A R R E three, like a lot of people maybe I'm speaking for men, I guess. I don't know. I'm probably betraying my stupidity would say, what is this bar? Like what is this thing, right? And so I can't be the only person who thought that when I first saw it. Nobody knew how to pronounce it. Nobody knew what it was. I had a tagline at the beginning where ballet bar meets yoga and plotties. Which you okay, that makes sense. Right. How did you come up with a routine? Did you spend like Weeks and months kind of

Writing it down or Yeah. Well, I had taught for about twenty years all different concepts and so I started to piece together The concepts that balanced the body. So

I really focused on working opposing muscle groups in every exercise. So if I work the bicep, I was gonna equally work the tricep. So I had this whole system. when you open your doors and this is August two thousand eight. Uhhuh. Um Was it right away, was it like a hit? Did people were people like lining up to come in? Was it a curiosity? Yeah, before I even opened our studio, I taught free classes

Upstairs of what is now Whole Foods, but at the time it was wild oats. And I'll never forget the day we finally got our permit to open the doors. I sent out an email to the community that was coming to my free classes and I said, Hey, I got my certificate of occupancy. I'm gonna teach a class tonight. And I thought maybe a couple of people would show up, you know, my friends, my good friends that I'd made. Um, twelve people showed up and paid that night.

And I sent out the email at two and I think I taught at 545. And I will never forget that moment. The sun was coming in, I played my opening song was Seal Amazing. And To this day, when I hear that song, it's such a visceral memory of This is gonna work.

Sadie Lincoln. In just a moment, how she took bar three from a studio above Wild Oats. to locations across the country. And in the process Almost became someone She didn't want to be.

I'm Guy Raz, stay with us, you're listening to How I Built This from NPR. Hey welcome back to How I Built This from NPR. I'm Guy Roz. So it's two thousand eight and at this point Sadie and Chris are Pretty busy running their studio in Portland.

And they spend so much time there that they actually have to hire a babysitter To be at the studio. So that their kids and then their clients kids can also come to the studio. I was a busy mom with two kids, and I think the most important thing to both Chris and I is we wanted to have a community. We wanted a place where we could attract people that were inspirational, um, thoughtful, connected.

exciting to be around. And it was just the two of you at the beginning, right? It was just the two of us at the beginning. And then one of my girlfriends who had moved from the Bay Area, um, she taught one or two classes in the evening. But I checked everybody in Um, opened the doors, checked everybody in's, cleaned the bathrooms, I mean the whole thing, taught all nineteen classes, six AM to eight PM I was there. I I knew every single client, um, Mary Ellen. I remember she was the first person to sign a membership. She's still one of my clients. And if you were a drop in at that time, how much did you have to pay to take a class? Twenty dollars. So it wasn't cheap. It wasn't it was probably it was around five dollars more than yoga. How much runway did you have?

before this had to actually start making a profit. I think Our return was maybe in Sixteen months or so. Was a pretty quick return.

You know, starting with nineteen classes a week and having those classes have at least ten to twelve people was our goal, and that's exactly what we did. I mean you must have been stressed out. Oh yeah. Even though you were doing nineteen classes a week and you probably got a lot of your Stress out that way you still must have been stressed out. It is not balanced. Yeah, right. It is not the short of the story is my body broke.

Literally my back went out. Mm. And I remember my mom saying to me, honey, you're embodying Your business. because I was like walking around like a ninety year old woman, you know, with my back slimped over, like whining and hurting. Yeah. Um, and it was like, oh

Yeah. Shoot. You know this isn't good. So that was um

A moment. I was training instructors at the time, so I did have some relief. Uh but I learned that To be healthy. It really is okay to pause, to not move, to not achieve, and to not have an outward expression of what exercise means. But I mean you you must have like

you know, pulled out of this because you I mean you still manage to open up a a second location pretty fast, right? Pretty much right away, I mean the first year we were open, we put up a tab on our website that said Grow with Us and we got Instant. interests. W what did that mean? You like like start your own bar three? Yeah, we knew we had you know, w we grew up in An industry where we knew how to run multi unit operations. So going into bar three, we thought, you know, let's open maybe twenty of these in the Pacific Northwest. So from the get go, you thought

Our model should be franchising. Yeah. we have this unique knowledge and wisdom in the industry, so Instead of raising money to open our own Let's look into this franchise model, which is really ultimately about empowering someone else. to invest in this idea that we have in our wisdom and open up their own business.

Venture capitalists and banks or whatever. Yeah. We didn't want to be beholden to institutional money. Yeah. Instead I was really excited about I still am excited about the idea of being beholden into other people just like me who had a dream and wanted to open their own business and have their own skin in the game. And um be able to make it their own. So where was the the second location? Our first

Two partners to sign. Were The Philippines and Manila. Hm. And Ben Dorigan. Wow. So so so you franchised immediately to

Manila. Yeah. Yeah. This woman came in, her name's Tanya Tan, and she was in the States and discovered us and her family is very entrepreneurial. Uh, they have a family business and then their children each have different business models, and she's the youngest of all the children and she chose bar three. Wow. And because you and Chris had this experience at Twenty Four Hour Fitness franchising, you kinda understood how to structure it. I did. I was we were we were bullish that way and I mean it was exciting, it was an adventure, but we knew we could do it. We knew we could do it internationally. with the right partner. And then Darcy and Bend was close enough and she was coming to class and really a part of our tribe. Shortly after that was Carrie who opened in Vancouver, Washington, which is just twenty minutes away. So most of our franchise partners were

or our clients. So they came to Bar three Loved bar three. new bar three were owner operated. So Um, unlike some franchises, our franchise is owner operated. So if you're gonna franchise with us, you're really gonna live and breathe the product. You're gonna teach and manage and, you know, be the face of it. Yeah, it's interesting'cause we had Jerry Morrell on the show, the founder of Five Guys.

And um which is like One of fastest growing very different uh business from yours, burgers and fries. Although I bet more similar than different in some ways. But you never know. And uh He was opposed to it. Like all of his sons, part of the you know, of the five guys, they were like Dad, let's do this And he really didn't want to do it because to him, like the burger that they were serving and the fries that they were serving was

it was great, he could control the quality. He just he was completely opposed to the idea. Obviously he feels differently today. So weren't you nervous about handing over your concept to somebody who could Right. Screw it up? No.

I I think that's one thing about I have unbridled optimism in people. sometimes to a fault, to be honest, but I really do believe in people. And here's the thing, we don't Our product isn't a burger. It's a person. It's someone teaching

A class. And I cannot pretend to be able to control that. Because I can't control other people nor do I want to. But how did you

I mean, there's no way I mean, as a creative person and a creator of this concept that you spent you know, years on d honing, there's no way that you just handed it over and said, Go run with it like you had to get there mentally, I have to assume. Yeah. Well, it's person by person, you know, we would meet with these people and see if there was a deep connection I believed in our training program. I believed in my ability. My master's is in education. I love training and developing people. And that's what I wanted to bring to fitness is this idea of teaching and a true teacher the teachers that I love the most going back to Santa Monica City College and the teachers who really

brought something out of me, it wasn't that they were all knowing. And that they had the answers. They sparked something inside of me. that made me realize I have the answers. And

I love doing that with body. I love doing that with movement. I love showing people that You can First of all, run your own studio. And you can do it your own way. Here's our blueprint.

But you now get to go and put your own fingerprint on it. Yeah because I do not want you to copy this is not the Sadie Lincoln method. I am not a guru. We're the anti guru company. Um And Your true power. All of my owners is is in collective wisdom, just like I was raised.

We didn't even use The word chain, we still don't, we're a family of owners. I mean w were all of the partners just like everything was was it just a perfect fit at all It all worked out great.'Cause that's what it sounds like. You didn't really run into any problems. Well We did I mean, I think the biggest problem was it's emotional.

It's scary and it's emotional. And those first partners took a big risk in us and we took a big, you know, jump and leap of faith, trustful with them as well. Every owner to this day is a trustfall. Yeah. And when you franchise You can't fire someone when you franchise. Right. There you're you're

In a partnership. And it's for the long term. And me and Chris, our job is to always keep that value up so they see that importance of being connected to something bigger. And you know, that's really what drives me. I'm beholden.

To all of these Partners. You're the CEO of the company. I am. How many of you know? Locations do you guys own? We own six locations.

And then we have a hundred and twenty four franchise. As you guys were just expanding and exploding in growth. I mean, at what point did you just Did you and Chris just say?

This is crazy. I mean it must have been like a hamster wheel that just never stopped. Going. Yeah, I mean right in the middle there, I kinda lost myself in it. We were booming, we were being acknowledged as like we're getting great press. Um, you know, we really

hit mainstream. Um And it went from this really insular like Word of mouth, tribal Kind of secret. to boom national stage.

And world stage really. And I was at the center of that. So that was kinda crazy. I got lost in that a little bit, just being a public figure. You became kind of a a fitness celebrity. In a way. Yeah. And I started to fall into This

Marketing machine. Which I had left when we moved to Portland, we just citedly shut out all traditional marketing and a a way to like express ourselves. We didn't even like using the word fitness. Um, and then all of a sudden I kinda got back into that machine. And I was in publications, I was working with this producer in LA and everybody was telling me

this way of speaking about fitness. This is the way you speak about what you're doing. Sadie, we can turn you into the next Jane Fonda. That's right. You and and if you go to the website, I mean you still are the face of it and there are videos about of you and and But you don't want to embrace that? Well, I did want it because the idea of growing and serving the company that way was really exciting to me and to be able to get that kind of attention and to fuel our business was super exciting. I mean it really helps. Soulfully though, it went against my Intuition about not being a guru.

And I don't wanna feed the messages that are already so loud. We've got the message, it's loud and clear everywhere. Yes, if you work out and you do these things, you're gonna look like this. And I was getting trained by producers and stuff to say things. So while you're working out, you're always supposed to say you're working out this muscle so you can have a thinner waist for bikini season. You're doing this so that you can have this. You know it sells like hot cakes. This is the way you're supposed to do it. And I tried it on for size. They also said get hair and makeup. you know, get a stylist. So I did all that, so we have online workouts. And there's this little era of online workouts. Where you can see where I did this change. We've pulled some of them, but

I I hired a makeup person. I started to m be more self-conscious about what I wore on camera, and then I started to speak in a different language that was more like quote unquote results oriented. And under the videos, the people who were commenting they were checking me. My clients, the people who are part of my movement, were checking me out the door. They were saying they were saying Honey, you don't need to wear all that bronzer. You're beautiful as you are. And you know what, you don't need to tell me to get teeny tiny arms like I'm doing this'cause I wanna be strong.

I I'm sure there are people who were saying to you, look Do you wanna be a you know, X million dollar company or do you want to be an XXXX million dollar company? And and you can do that. I mean you can become like Jillian Michaels or like another, you know Jane found a

And by the way, I respect all those people, mad respect. for all these incre most people in my space who are booming right now are are incredible women. And I think We are want the same thing. In terms of growing bigger

I'm actually not focused on growing bigger anymore with the company. We've paused. franchising. For now, we're just holding. We're being still and we're being uncomfortable and still. Being still is uncomfortable. It's very analogous to in class. When we're still in class or when you try to meditate, I don't know if you ever have. It's uncomfortable to be still. I do every day and I'm still crazy. It's hard. Yeah. It's hard to be still because it's a real like inner mirror thing. You ch you have to check in and see things. Yeah. So if you look at a company as a person

We've decidedly decided to meditate for a moment. Just Peace out. What was the reason? I mean d did something happened or did you and Chris just sit sit down and say, let's just put this on pause. Why? I mean in any other business people would say, We're growing, let's grow, let's grow, and grow, grow not.

Which is exciting. Well, we started to be courted by a lot of institutional bankers. Pure Bar was sold for one hundred and twenty one million dollars. There are a A bar. Yes, and and and bigger, they have a lot of things. And like the story we kept hearing is who's gonna be number two, who's gonna be number two, and you could be valued at gazillion dollars and

So we started to entertain a bunch of conversations. You could have just cashed out. Like majorly. Yeah. There's lots of choice out there, right? And I kinda feel like

I wanna be a bit of a rebel. So I am seeking right now. Other CEOs, other founders, other people in this world who are going a at it alone. So I just wanna protect But I have.

First is Make it giant. And I want to show Kinda the business community that you can do it that way. Yeah.

There's not that many people seeing that in the business community. You know the value of not Growing. The value of not selling. You know, it's interesting because there's this kind of drive in in in certain segments of the business world to to do that. But there are plenty of companies including

you know, episodes on the show we did with we we did with with with Angie's list. Uh companies that are not Profitable but they're sustainable. they are more or less breaking even every year. But that has enabled them to hire you know, more than a thousand people. And and and there are lots of companies that aren't as focused on profit, but are focused on sustainability and just creating jobs and creating careers for for people. I mean, so it doesn't have to be about growth and expansion and growth and expansion, right?

That's right. That's really what I love about my product is that we literally embody ideas in bar three. So we're teaching exercise, but we're embodying ideas. So stay with me for a second. I know this is strange to hear. But I think what you just said is so analogous to fitness. You can do a thirty day extreme program with your body.

You know Exercise. Every single day. Eat nothing white. You know, drink tons of water.

Get ten hours of sleep every single day. You know, lift lots of weights. and get tremendous results. That's like Exciting.

Right, it's tremendous like change in your body. Is that sustainable? To exercise every single day and to to be that regimented and disciplined, not for most people. It's a short term outcome. And that is the story we're sold over and over again with fitness.

The story, which is less intoxicating to a lot of people, but over time I think they really get it, is the sustainability model in the body. Exercising 10 minutes a day. being in touch with the food you're eating. You know that it's okay to drink a glass of wine, that relationships are just as healthy as exercise. And that developing a long term relationship with exercise that's sustainable is actually

going to benefit your posture. You'll live longer. You'll Um feel better in your skin. Yeah, you won't shed weight in thirty days necessarily, but in the long term you will. You know There's something I I've been meaning to ask you about, which is um

uh w you know, we've had like Melissa and Doug on the show, who who came up with Melissa and Doug toys for kids and And they have these incredible partnerships. I mean they're they're they're married and they are you know, they they built these incredible businesses together. But then, you know, I've talked to other entrepreneurs who say there's no way I could work with my partner. There's just no way I mean my my my the the person who I have a family with, like that we would just kill each other. You and Chris have built a business together

Um has it is it just your personalities mesh and you naturally find your way, or is there ever any tension or Yeah. I mean

There's no way. I'm sure there's a way, but I can't imagine a way of not working with Chris. Yes, there's tension. So I'll start there. Um we're we're different in that he's really analytical and his skills are different. he's very thoughtful. He doesn't talk very much. He thinks about things for a long, long, long time. Whereas I just go

Got instinct. Yet we're both starters. We're both entrepreneurial. We both are really into our children. And our dogs I have my best friend.

By my side, my rock, he's the one that gives me courage to be bold and to make crazy decisions. And so it just works for us. Are are you always talking about the business? We talk about it a lot. Like we talk about the business more than we do our kids. Uh

We were joking, we were talking about how many business decisions have been made in bed, but then we are laughing about how funny that sounds because it nothing about that sexy. It's like Carol and Mike Brady. Like that's who we are in bed. We lie in bed with our laptops and we're like What color should it be? Orange. Okay. What should our name be? Bar three. Sounds great. Um But it's kinda beautiful too, you know. H how much of

I ask. pretty much everybody's been on the show about uh this question which is how how much of what happened It has to do with luck and how much of it has to do with your skill and and ability.

Oh gosh. I think Timing was great for us. this boutique movement started and people wanted connection and community. Um I would I'm a teacher and group exercise became hot again. Um moving to Portland in just the right moment.

being shut out from all the noise, so we d weren't competing with anyone. We we can just do what exactly what we needed to do, scratch our own edge. So that's luck in a way, that this movement, you know. At the right time. But a lot of hard work and inner work and Paying our due is out there in the business world. certainly was a part of this.

Um so it's yeah, I think probably like most businesses a combination of all those factors. Sadie Lincoln. founder of Bar 3. By the way, if her childhood story sounded somewhat familiar,

It's probably because you heard her brother Miguel's version on a previous episode of this show. He's Miguel McKelvey, founder of the multi-billion dollar company WeWork. Miguel also grew up in that all women's collective, and like his sister Sadie, He also rebelled against it by going into business. Was it better than the galls? So much better. So much better than Gills. But I will say I was really excited because my high school

chose me over him for the Hall of Fame. Oh, that's good. Sorry, Miguel. Us hippy kids, you know? And please do stick around because in just a moment we're gonna hear from you about the things you're building. Hey, thanks for sticking around because it's time now for how you built that. And today we're gonna update a story about Alexander Harik that we first ran last year. Alexander grew up in New York City, and when he and his sisters would sit down for meals, there was always one thing, one condiment, that they pretty much slathered.

On everything. We would put it on baked potatoes all the time. Uh we would have it in yogurts. We'd have it on chicken, on bagels and cream cheese, on eggs, uh on burgers. And which magical condiment could actually taste good on all of these different things? Yeah, there's there's sriracha, but but besides sriracha. It's Zatar. Zatar is this tangy, earthy Middle Eastern spice made with different types of thyme, maybe some oregano. And then other spices like a cumin, sage, some sesame seeds, even chickpeas. I mean it is a cultural food staple. You know, ask a Middle Eastern person, do you know what Zatar is? It's like asking an American, do you know what apple pie is. Anyway, a few years ago, Alexander, who happens to be of Lebanese descent, started to notice that Zatar was showing up in all of these unexpected places. Like In corner hipster restaurants. Food blogs on Instagram, on social media.

And I was like, no way. Is Zatar becoming a thing? Yes, in some parts of the country, Zatar was becoming a thing. But Alexander wondered why nobody made it the way his mom did, mixing the spices with olive oil into a spread. It brings out the flavor. of the herbs, you know the essence of the herbs out more. And you know, condiments are cool. Everybody loves condiments, right? So Alexander was thinking about all this last year, and at the same time he was working at a research firm on Wall Street. It was a job he wasn't really crazy about.

And so one night He was having dinner at his parents' place. The Atar was, of course, on the table. And I'm looking down, my head's between my arms, telling him what's going on, and boom. It just hit me. I'm staring at. And I said, Mom, Dad, I got it. It's his light bulb moment. Alexander says,

We have got to make Zatar the way you make it, Mom, and we should sell it, like as a spread. We've been eating these foods our whole life. We always joke about it. We should have started hummus or we should have started Greek yogurt. So let's do it for Zatar. We can do this. So a few months later, Alexander walked away from his job. He moved back in with his parents, he found an industrial kitchen, he googled where to find the spices, the olive oil, the little glass jars, he made his first batch of spreadable Zatar, And he started going door to door to sell it to specialty stores in New York. I had these little gift bags. I had a jars STZ, pita chips, recipe cards, and our sales sheet, and I'd walk in and I'd say, Hey, I think I've got a great product your customers would like, and I'll follow up in a week with you. And when he did follow up in a week, A lot of people said No. No, we don't like this. We don't think this will sell. We don't like the taste. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

So dealing with that You know, people who say that It's business, it's not personal. Whoever came up with that quote or says that Never started a business because I would disagree with that for sure. But a few months after he got all those no's. I get an email.

saying thank you so much for the thoughtful package. We absolutely love this we'll take two cases. And uh when I got that email Start to cry. That email was from one specialty store in Brooklyn, and from there, Alexander started to get a bit more traction. He even got his atta spread into a few whole foods in New York City.

And now, a year after we first ran this story, The Satar Spread is in 450 Whole Foods markets across the country, and Alex is planning to roll out four new products next year. And his mom, well she's still at the center of things. She's the head of research and development. I want to share what I ate growing up with everybody else. And that's what I want to do with my life. Alex's company is called Zesty Z. To learn more about it or hear previous episodes of our show, head to our podcast page, how IbuiltThis.npr.org. And of course, if you want to tell us your story, go to build.npr.org. and thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can also write to us at hibt at npr.org.

And if you want to send a tweet, it's at How I Built This. Our show was produced this week by Runda Abdelfata, with music composed by Ramteen Arablui. Thanks also to JC Howard, Nor Kutsi, Neva Grant, San Azmehanpur, Jeff Rogers. Our intern is Mia Venkat. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This from NPR.

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