Chad Walding - Co-Founder and CCO at NativePath

got laid off. I was one of the first people to get hired. I got laid off, and to be honest with you, I hated that finance job. I remember being in that job behind a cupicle and asking myself, like, if I do really good at this job, I'm going to get my manager's job. And I don't like that job either, Like it doesn't look like a good path. So when nine to eleven happened, I had a nice, nice severance package, and that allowed me space and time

to think about what I really wanted to do. I love movement, I love exercise, I love studying the human body nutrition, and a friend suggested to me physical therapy. So I applied to one school in Texas that had a doctor program and that was Hardened Simmons, and I luckily got in to Harden Simmons. I did my physical therapy program for three years there and met my wife, and really what got me started on what would become native path was my first internship as a physical therapist.

It was back in Houston, Texas, at a hospital and this hospital was world renowned force treatment and heart disease right. And I walked into this hospital and on the first floor that first day, I saw a McDonald's right, and I was like what. I didn't know much about nutrition at the time, but it really got me asking like, what if this is a place for health, why is

the McDonald's there. I didn't know much about nutrition, again, but I knew McDonald's wasn't healthy, and it was to the point where I would I would work with heart patients. They would get out of surgery and it would ask me to wheel them down to McDonald's and we would go down there, they would order a big mac, and I would see other doctors and nurses also eating McDonald's and it got me question. It got me questioning a

whole lot of things like why is this happening? And I started to see a pattern in my experience as a physical therapist, you know. After working in the internships, I moved to Austin, Texas with my wife, who's also a physical therapist, and I started working with chiroprackers, and I got to see a whole other side of health outside of sort of the conventional realm. They're a little

more alternative, right, and getting other solutions. And I started to see a trend here in the conventional medical world where we're going after symptoms but not really getting to the root of the problem, right. And we have in the past, We've had this food industry that knows very little about health, and a health industry that there was very little about food. And in the middle of all that, we have consumers who are just getting some bad advice

or eating core foods. They are getting sick, and then they're being there taking a pill to deal with the issue. But that the issue they're dealing with wouldn't have been an issue if they would just stuck to like a natural diet, right. So I was when I was doing physical therapy as a chiropract I started learning a whole

lot about ancestral health. I got really into CrossFit, you know, the palaeo diet research by guys like Western Price, who studied indigenous people and compared their health and what it was like when they were eating their native diets to people with the same genetics who had adopted a modern diet, and really clearly seeing that over the past one hundred years there have been drastic changes so the ways we eat, the ways we move, the ways we lived, and over

that time, all the things that we're dealing with, especially metabolic health, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, these things have all gone up despite our advances in medicine. And it's because we've moved away from the things we were designed for. Right our food has been industrialized and commercialized at sugar,

industrial seed oils. Anyway, I became obsessed with this and started doing research and going to conferences and learning as much as I could, and really practicing this on myself too. I was dealing with my own health issues, you know, I had skin issues for a long time. I took steroids and topical creams. I tried eating a different way, and within thirty days everything cleared up. I got off medications.

This was an AHA for me because I was looking at my patients who were taking all kinds of medications. You know, a big part of what I did that really changed my view was doing home health physical therapy. And that's when we go into people's homes, you know, to see exactly what they're eating. And you know, these are people who aren't well enough or strong enough to

leave their home to go to an outpatient clinic. So I got to see the situations that people are in just being fed pills, never addressed with nutrition, and if I tried to talk to them about nutrition, I would get in trouble from a nurse or a doctor who said, just just do physical therapy. So I got frustrated, and in the CrossFit world, I started giving nutrition lectures around Austin, Texas, to local gyms, to local businesses, and that was my

avenue to share what I was learning. Right and you know, the Crossfed Gym, I was working at it and started doing really well. Everybody started getting really fit, and I got to see the power of nutrition from a fitness standpoint, like a perform a standpoint, but also a health standpoint. So I began yapping about this all the time right, and the origins of the partnership of Native Path really beginning two thousand and nine when I met my now

partner Chris Clark. He's a co founder with me, and when I met him, I met him through a mutual friend. We went to a CrossFit workout and we went to a post workout lunch, and he got his butt handed to him in this workout, and we always joke. At

that time Chris was overweight. He had, you know, that midsection tire around his belly, he had a double chin, and he was asking me about what I was what I was doing, and I was basically telling him what is now we call the principles of being on the path right, things about movement and nutrition and sunshine and sleep and hydration right. And I said, hey, just try this for thirty days and just see what happens to your health, you know, just just give yourself a good

honest shot and see what happens. And I didn't talk to him for another two years. And two years later he came to Austin, Texas and he was living at Denver and he had lunch with myself and my wife, and when he showed up, he looked like a completely different person, right. You know this, he was very lean, very vibrant, his skin had cleared up. He was telling me he was super bought into what I told him that day at lunch, and now he was telling all

his friends. And he knows a whole lot. He knew a whole lot about creating online businesses, and I knew a lot about content educating people. And he invited me to start something with him, to do online blogging and just put out articles telling people the same thing that

I told him, and that's what we did. We agreed to do that because I knew I can only impact so many people as a physical therapist or as a coach, and I had a big desire to reach a lot of people to really that was my calling, and that's what we did. Within three years, we created an audience of over three million people, built up a lot of trust with people, kept growing and eventually these people were asking us what supplements we recommend, And in twenty eighteen

we came out with rebranded as Native Path. Our very first product was collagen and the whole idea behind Native

Path products is to really fill in the gaps. You know, what are the things that are missing in our modern diet and how can we supplement that and at the same time educate people to as we say, our mission to guide people on the paths of eating, moving, and living in harmony with our biology and in alignment with nature, you know, So that there's a way we there's an intension behind what we do, and it's it's amazing to see where we came from as a co founder, from

nothing to where it is now. We have over one hundred and twenty people that work for us. It's one hundred million dollar business. It is incredible where we've gotten to today, and it's through a lot of key things. So anyway, that's the origin of how we got It's a long, long winded thing, but you know, it something I enjoy sharing, so no chat.

And there are so many different things that you talked about that I do want to address, but I want to back up and give context everybody, because that conversation happened about sixteen years ago with your partner, and now the company has been around for fourteen and I imagine sure there have been a lot of ebbs and flows, and also the industry and people have changed too over that decade and a half. With that said, when it comes to Native Path, what's your mission statement?

the path. Right, So we're trying to get people on the path to really, like you said, buy into what we're saying. And Native Path is really helping supplement that lifestyle with supplements. But the key is the lifestyle, what the root of what we're going for.

our bodies. We've developed stagnant lifestyles where we're living under artificial lights and staying up late. Right, So what we're doing is first educating our customers on what's going on with their health and then guiding them and supplementing them, supporting them with the most pure, high quality something that we can find to really with their body back in the state of homeostasis where it's healthy.

what you offer. So if you can maybe highlight some of the different products that you offer, why you offer them, and then we can start to get in also to the education if you could first.

each of those areas there's gaps. Right, there's an ideal thing the body wants to have, but there's also reality in the modern world of what it's getting right, So with our as, we're trying to fill in those gaps. So let's take for example, collagen. Collagen is our number one cellar here at Native path It was our first product that we came out with. Collagen is something our native ancestors would get plenty of in their natural diet

because they would need nose to tail right. They would take an animal, they would take the bones of that animal. They would put in a pot and make soup and they would go all the gelatin, all the collagen from the tendons and ligaments and the hides and break it down and they would consume that on a consistent basis

and give their body collagen. Now, collagen is extremely important because it makes up like all your body, Like as we're looking at each other, we're literally looking at collage, and it makes up your hair, your scan, your nails, but also things like your brain, your nervous system, your gut lining, and even even your bones, which most people don't know. So people are lacking in collagen and they're experiencing all these health issues, joint pain, digestive distress, you know,

energy trouble, losing weight. Collagen, in my opinion, is one of the least things we can do that makes the most different to our overall health because we're supplying the body with these very important amino acids that it needs to make up the structure. Right, it's the most important thing. So that's an example of the philosophy behind our products with collagen. But you'll find the same thing across the board. Right. So,

for example, I mentioned hydration. You know, hydration is extremely important, but most people in our modern world are extremely dehydrated. Not only are they not drinking enough water. We tend to drink liquids that are diuretics where we give off a lot of water, you know, like coffee and energy drinks.

And then also our food. A lot of the food we're eating is refined in processed, and it's made for a long shelf life where it doesn't have water in it like natural food would say, like a broccoli or tomato or even even grass at beef. Right, there's water in those real whole food nutrition. So in the modern world, as we've moved away, we're getting more and more dehydrated. And our second best product, our second most selling product,

is something called hydrate. Right. It has these important minerals that you need, potassium, magnesium, and salt, as well as these very helpful assets that further help you absorb the electrolytes, but it helps solve one of the major problems that

most people are having, which is hydration. Right, So you can see with our products we're trying to fill in the gaps with these areas of health that if humans can can get these things down, if we can fulfill the needs of what a human body really wants, we

can drastically feel better. Right. And when we feel better, we move better, we engage with the world around us better, and hopefully there's a world where there's less need for pharmaceuticals, there's a world where you have more of appreciation for national.

the things. And I didn't want you to address that because you've kind of talked about it's not just supplements folks, right, and the collagen the supplements or even health focus, Uh, you you also address recipes on here about eating and then you also have a blog in community, so you're also educating people on all the facets of taking care of yourself. It's not just kind of a one I guess it is a one stop shop, but there are also different factors that you're talking about to get on

the path of being healthy. So if you could address that, because your beautiful website really addresses and offers everything, I love you.

we were founded on education. The supplements came second, you know. So, for instance, one of the big problems that we solve with a lot of our customers is bone health, you know. And and what makes us different is is we want to educate a customer on one of the foods that are actually harmful to our bones. Right, And here's how collagen can help you, right, because we have to if we're going to take step forwards, we have to stop doing the things that are harmful and do the things

that are good for us. We don't want to just try to supplement our way out of it, right. So it's a big part of kind of how we would view more of a holistic view of the human body and what it needs from lots of different areas with these lifestyle principles of eating, moving, and also living right. Right.

But when you started this business with native path to where you are today and when it comes to educating people and just the industry as a whole, can you talk about some challenges but also things that you're combating, whether if there's a were closing in one area, it's opening another, Especially when you're working with your clients and all the people that are checking things out.

they use right. So one of the things that makes us different is we have an outstanding customer experience team who's always getting that information for us and we're relaying that back. But there was a time when we didn't know who our customer was, and we we didn't speak to them with their problems, and we didn't add enough value, and we charged too little for our products, and our margins were too thin, and the quality wasn't there because

we weren't getting enough scale. So like we were way off on our values right, which leads to another thing. I think some areas where we had challenges is early on in the culture, we did not have a clear set of values. We did not have a group or a team clearly all bought in on what we were believing and about needing, moving and thinking and that those are those are big things. I think that pulled a lever to to get us where we are now. We

started understanding the customer better. We started speaking to them with their problems and their words and creating products that helped solve their problems. And then we started buying into a culture that was more rooted in values. We created a Monday culture call where we just educate our internal team. And what that did is it empowered the team to be to be like more of me right to where they can talk to the customers on the phone or through their content that they write or the emails that

they put out did they help me put out? Right? It's more in line with the true roots of what we're doing, and those those things move the needle for our business. We started speaking to our customers a different way. We started empowering our team, and it was like a flywheel, right, It was a flywheel that like, this made that better, This made that better, this made that better, and now now we know what the process looks like. And that led to a lot of growth for us.

and co founding this company. Are maybe a special story that stands out to you that was just really impressive. And this is why we get up every day.

So we have these conversations that we're having. I have them every Monday, and we educate, and we have these internal Slack channels where the team members are sharing their stories. You know, we just had someone today who who stated at the beginning of the year she was one hundred and ninety pounds, so she's already down ten pounds and we're six weeks in and she was asking me what

do I do next? Right, we have a customer experience director who came in not completely understanding what we were doing. He has since lost forty pounds, he's avoided knee surgery. You know. Those things are great. Honestly. One of the best ones though, is my mom. My mom. My mom had falls, she had hip fractures, you know, she took she had lots of surgeries. And one of the things I got my mom doing was was Collegen. I said, hey, Mom, just take take I wanted her to take a lot.

I said, take forty grams a day and start doing these exercises, drink water, do these things, you know. And it was a great thing for me, like a mother and a son, like working together to feel better, to help my mom stay more mobile, you know, and in her late eighties, in her goldens, you know. So it's a beautiful story, and we've we've filmed my mom and got her story and it's really helped connect to a lot of older women and inspire them to take collegen.

So as far as like what touches me and the most, that's probably the one that I appreciate the most.

seventies kid. But now as I'm getting older and wanting to really take care of my body and having a twenty two year old in my family who takes wonderful care and is also a former athlete too, you know this speaks to people that are from my age bracket of really paying attention to what I eat, what I drink, the collagen, working out, because you know, one of the things you know as a physical therapist is that ligaments in your bones start to get brittle after you term sixty,

and yeah, it starts to put you in harm's way. That's where I think. You know, while your project is for absolutely everybody, for the older generation, it's just imperative that you do stuff like this to take care of yourself. Would you agree?

to see what you were saying. The body as it ages, how the ligaments get a little looser, we get a little more immobile, We maybe have some trouble with getting up and down, you know, things things that are happening, And it's a it's a thing I noticed with with functional mobility. Right, So as we get older, there's a potential to lose our balance and have a fall, right, And and what happens a lot, And I would see this. People would have a fall and they would fracture a

hip or a femur and they would be stacked. They would have surgery to fix that and then they would be stagnant for a while. But the health outcomes, what life look like after that fall and after that surgery starts to really the quality of life starts to go down.

And there's a stat I think it's like the early early mortality after fall, like goes up like one hundred percent or something once once you have that fall, and on paper it'll look like, oh, this person passed away from diabetes or a heart issue or something like that. What really happened is that fall set off another host of events with someone's health. They weren't eating as much, they weren't going out as much, they weren't getting as

much sun. The body is stagnant, they start eating different fruits, and then disease sets in. Right, it's an environment where the disease sets in. So mobility, feeling good in your joints and your ligaments, being able to do these things is so important, right, And that's why I like collagen so much, because it is the number one thing that helps us with the structure of our body that impacts our mobility. It is what makes up the tendons and the ligaments and the otator cuff and the sheath and

your and your bones. You know, the stronger your bones are, which is bones are made up of collegen, the less likely you're going to have a fracture. So it's part of our why we do what we do. I think.

a gorgeous website. But Chad, if you could maybe just recap what we've talked about in some final thoughts from you, the floor is your, sir.

But what we're here to do, what Native Path is here to do, what I'm personally encouraging you to do, is keep taking those steps right, keep doing those things, because that is the thing that makes life truly worth living.

on Facebook. As you mentioned, we have a wonderful community of I think over seventy thousand people now wow, who are all doing what we're doing. And it's a great place for inspiration, engagement and supporting people. So those are really the main areas of that I would encourage people to look for.

It just must be so cool for you and your team that you are changing lives out there for not only wellness when it comes to the physical part, but your mind as well too, because folks, if you feel good in your body, your mind's going to feel a lot better too. And we're all going through everything in twenty twenty five, so I imagine that's just such a big thing about why you get up every day.