¶ Transforming Studios
Imagine turning your studio's empty wall space into a profit generator that creates buzz and energizes your community . In today's episode , I'm joined by Andrea from Be Half Moon , who's sharing some of the secrets to creating a successful retail space in your boutique fitness studio business .
Stay tuned to discover how this simple shift could really change your business trajectory and your overall client experience . Well , hi there , I'm Saren Glanfield . I'm a business and marketing strategist just for boutique fitness studio owners like you . If you're ready to be inspired and make a bigger impact , you're in the right place .
All you need are a few key strategies , the right mindset and some support along the way . Join me as I share the real-life insights that will help you grow a sustainable and profitable studio . This is the Pilates Business Podcast . Welcome back to the Pilates Business Podcast . Welcome back to the Pilates Business Podcast .
I'm Saren Glanfield , and I'm so glad you're here with me today because I'm joined by a very special guest , andrea , who is the founder of Be Half Moon .
Now , be Half Moon offers elevated and enduring wellness props , ranging from the coveted B-mat to Pilates tools , meditation cushions , essential oils and healing crystals , and I have been looking at their site and personally picking out some of my favorite items over the last week or so and my shopping cart is pretty full .
So I'm excited that Andrea is here with us today , because we're going to be diving into talking all things retail . So welcome Andrea , I'm so glad you're here .
Thank you , saran , I'm so happy to be here .
So Andrea and I actually got connected through one of my amazing and lovely Thrive group coaching amazing and lovely Thrive group coaching member , and when we got connected , there was so many things that I wanted to ask Andrea about her journey in business , about what she offers and how she works with studios , and that I thought this would be the perfect Pilates
business podcast episode . So why don't we start off ? Why don't you share a little bit about yourself , the journey that led you to what you do today ?
I would love to . I just wanted to open by saying as well that the studio channel for Be Half Moon I say this all the time to my team is the heart of our business . It's where we launched and it's just where all the magic happens . So for that reason alone I'm just so thrilled to be chatting with you . But I can take you back to how this started .
I did launch the business 10 years ago when I was pregnant with my now eldest daughter , and truly from a place of deep passion . But the seed for my passion for wellness was planted many years prior . It started truly in 2003 . I was doing my MBA in the beautiful Sydney , australia , and that's where I found yoga . Or , as I say now , yoga found me .
And it was more than yoga . It was the vibrant wellness culture that is just everywhere in Australia , even 21 years ago , which it just blew me away . I was a shy 20 something year old girl . I'm Canadian and I was the only Canadian in this MBA program and I was really unsure of myself .
But I just this wellness practice that surrounded me and that I started indulging in as it felt , really grounded me and gave me strength in that time . So that's when the seed of the intersection of wellness and business was planted , and then it took me many , many years to get to a point of launching what is now Be Half Moon .
So I launched the business in 2014 . We just had our 10 year anniversary , as I mentioned , and we launched with one hero product , which remains our hero today , which is the B-Mat . And , as you said in your intro , like the B-Mat is just a coveted product , it speaks for itself . It's high performance .
When people get on it , when they try it , they just remark wow and it changes their practice . And in launching with that , coupled with a really strong brand with deep integrity and high values , in 2014 , it was just this snowball effect of growth and looking back on that time , like the first three years of the business , I'm just blown away . It was magic .
I didn't realize it at the time and it was my side hustle . I had another full-time job running business , but it was just magical . And then , in 2018 , another moment of true joy , a pinch me moment was the founder of Half Moon , which is another Canadian based business that has been around for over 30 years .
She reached out to me and truly for me , it was like getting a phone call from Jennifer Aniston , I was like , oh my gosh , beth McTavish is calling me .
And long story short , there she offered she wanted to see if I was interested in acquiring her business because she was nearing 60 , looking to retire , and clearly I did end up buying her business after she was nearing 60 , looking to retire , and clearly I did end up buying her business after about eight years of courting and that really rounded out our offering
in 2018 . And was just such a wow moment Because , for me , I had admired that brand for many , many , many years . My mom actually had a studio which , for Christmas , I bought her a whole bunch of bolsters to outfit her studio from Half Moon , so it was a really , really just pinch me moment .
After that , after 2018 , I was on a real journey to integrate two companies , two cultures one East Coast , one West Coast into one , and I certainly underestimated that challenge . I think a lot of entrepreneurs can be very naive in the onset , and that's certainly where I was . It's not always a bad thing , though , right , I agree .
Had I known , I wouldn't have done it Right exactly . So I learned a ton , my skin thickened and now we are one team , one culture , one brand , one company , but that was a huge feat , leading into COVID , which turned us all upside down , especially the studio channel , which my heart broke for the studios .
But today we are one and last year , about a year ago , we rebranded and brought the two brands together as one . So that's why today we're B Half Moon , we're B Corp certified , which was a huge coup really pushed by my incredible team , showcasing that we're in the business of doing good and giving back .
And truly the business has evolved with my wellness practice . So we were originally solely offering yoga goods .
Today , fast forward 10 years , we're really offering , as you alluded to , goods for any movement , so including Pilates , including barre , including HIIT , as well as yoga , as well as meditation , supports , healing , items that are kind of peripheral , like crystals I always have a crystal with me essential oils , so our offering has really expanded with my wellness practice
, which I'm so grateful for .
Yeah , I know I was picking out some of my favorite items for our top holiday picks and I couldn't stop adding things to the list . It was very challenging to curate a shorter list because there are so many different . You have such a few different kind of areas that you kind of focus on .
Why don't you tell us a little bit about how you kind of put the pieces together ?
For sure , for sure , it's really been an evolution and truly it's . It's evolved with my practice and , I think , greater societies practice . You know , like 10 years ago everything was really compartmentalized there was Pilates , there was yoga , whereas today it's such a hybrid of practices out there and it's really interesting and fun and creative .
And I love that our offerings have evolved with what we see out there in studios and in just greater wellness practices . We started with our BMAT lineup , which is today still our hero product , and that's really due to the extreme performance , the grip , the durability and the sustainability of that product and we're just so proud of that .
But from there , five years ago , we really started getting into functional movement . So during COVID we designed the Helix weights which are I'm so proud of .
They're so beautiful . I was actually sharing that with a friend of mine and I was sharing with some of the things I picked out and you know it was like whoa , it goes so pretty the way that they kind of sit together .
They're stunning , truly yeah as I said , we are so proud of a lot of the products we've expanded into over the past five , six years and really rounding out our offering with deep intention . It's really interesting .
Our functional movement line has expanded a lot in the past two years but in May we launched the Pilates ring and I was excited but I didn't realize the impact it would have because it just for some reason it rounded out our functional movement offering to the point where adding that one SKU to our product line just built that category for us , which was a
beautiful , unexpected outcome of this single SKU that we launched . So some of our key products there include the Helix weights . We've chatted about the Grip weights , the Grip socks and we really do have a beautiful kind of full service offering in functional movement but as well as meditation and recovery .
Yeah , I know , I saw the circle , the Pilates circle , the ring as well . It's stunning . By the way , everyone should go take a look at it . It is beautiful and get one because it's very pretty .
You know it's so funny because a lot of you know I've been , you know you've been doing this a long time and so you're very familiar with the quality and the types of products that were available or have only been available .
You know , up until a certain point and you know now it's it's so nice to be able to see so many such beautiful pieces , such beautiful props versus the .
You know , for years we were using these awful ugly balls and rings and all you know they , they were not pretty at all and it's just changes the whole vibe of the studio when you can have really nice , pretty , aesthetically beautiful .
I couldn't agree more . I am inspired by my surroundings and one of my favorite elements of my job is to help studios outfit their space and to make it as inspired and really aligned with their vision as possible . And that also comes down to function and quality , but also the aesthetic , to me , is super important . So you see that in our lineup ?
Yeah , absolutely For sure .
So let's talk a little bit about a studio owner who might want to , or has perhaps , dabbled in some retail offerings . Some of the key factors that a studio owner should consider when they're sort of deciding where to get started and what products to sell , how much to buy , what are your recommendations and best practices ?
Yeah , for sure , a couple things . It's obviously really important to understand your community and to know your demographics and what they're asking for , what they're looking for , what are their favorite movement modalities which inherently you would know that . But just really listening to your community and you can pull your studio .
And one thing you can do is I really am a big proponent of starting small , and small can mean starting with pre-order , where you say to your community you can order any of these products , but you as the studio owner or manager , you don't have to commit to anything until you have your community's order and then you would place an order .
But also , our minimum order quantity is super approachable by design . We want to make this as accessible as we can for studios , large and small . So it's $300 is our minimum order , minimum opening quantity , so you can really start small and grow and build and learn from there . We really do advise that you start with a very tight , niche , curated offering .
So focus on two or three SKUs . We offer 400 SKUs , so don't start there and that can be really overwhelming , but start with just a few that you really think or , even better , you know your community will rally around . The other thing is teachers . Like I think you probably know , students really look to their teachers .
So if you can get your teacher community to really believe in something that you're offering at retail whether it's through sampling to your teachers or getting some sort of endorsement from your teacher community that really , really helps build with the broader community , because they're just the ultimate word of mouth and trusted source . We lean on that .
When I see studios who really embrace retail and kind of infuse it into their whole studio and it's really powerful , not just , I think , for sales but also to sort of it really does energize the community and people get excited about being able to check out your new offerings and what there is , and so it really is kind of powerful when you kind of really
infuse it throughout your studio .
I fully agree and some studios do that so well really like also demoing and creating an experience around products . So every teacher practices on a B-mat and says to us or sometimes they'll offer , hey , would you like to use my mat for this practice ? And that's supportive essential oil blend in her space . That is so invigorating and then you sell the oils .
So demoing is hugely effective for you know those key products that you pick and really infusing it into your studio experience , as you said .
Yeah , it's , it's really powerful and and so fun too .
I think you know it that the energy that it kind of creates is so , is so , is so fun too , and so I think some of the things that we , when we talk it that the energy that it kind of creates is so , is so , is so fun too , and so I think some of the things that we , when we talk about , when I talk about retail with the studio owners that that I
get to work with , you know some of the things that they are concerned about , and maybe some of the listeners listening in are also kind of thinking this too , which is okay how do I make sure that I sell this , the inventory , or how do I make sure that I don't buy too much , or how do I make sure that I don't end up having to discount it to sell it
? What are your best practices around how often to buy new merchandise and what that looks like in terms of inventory management ?
Yeah , that's such a great question . I mean , inventory is the largest danger with any retailer , large or small . So it's really really important to proceed with caution and , as I keep saying , to start small . I think knowing that our ship times are really quick is really helpful , so you can buy a tiny order .
You know it's going to arrive to you within factoring the shipping , five to six business days .
¶ Effective Studio Retail Strategies
You just have to be on a replenishment cycle versus buying big and continue to accrue your learnings , figure out what people are gravitating towards and what they're not Like . There will always be some things that just don't move . You can't plan for everything you know .
Once or twice a year you may want to offer a small discount just to move through anything that you have sitting . You don't want to have aging inventory for too long and of course , that allows you to bring in newness , which a lot of your first movers like . I'm a creature , I love new things .
A lot of your first movers , those people in your community , will want to see newness and we do offer that seasonally and that's really fun to be on top of . So I think it's just really keeping a monthly pulse on your inventory and how it's moving and knowing when you have to replenish .
I mean you can set up prompts for yourself , you can set up reminders , like just little tricks you can also get . We have a wholesale team to support you . If you said , hey Bree , who's one of our reps in , she's in Connecticut and really supports the East coast , hey Bree , will you check in on me every three weeks ?
Then she can support you to check your inventory and she used to be a buyer so she knows all the nuances far better than I do . On how to be really smart with your inventory bias too .
Yeah , I love that you can buy small but frequently , which means that if you run out of something you know you can , you can sort of you can order on behalf of a client if they're looking for something in particular that you have run out of , and so you always want to be looking for ways to continue the conversation and continue that , leading the client down
the path of that next purchase , perhaps from your amazing sort of retail store . And the newness is also really powerful too for that energy and that community and so on , and there's really fun things you can do around the holiday season coming up with creating bundles or gift ideas and so on .
I think that when you have a community like a Pilates or a bar or yoga studio has , where folks are often looking for great ideas for gifts for friends or family , where folks are often looking for great ideas for gifts for friends or family , and if you can be someone who can give that really special idea , then it really can be fun for both you and very
profitable for you as a studio owner , but also really a good community builder , because your clients want to support you as a business owner , as a small business owner as well . So this is the perfect time , right , I would say , to get thinking about perhaps some holiday picks for gift ideas and so on .
Yeah , all of the webinars my team and I are participating in are saying start early , start communicating , planning for the holidays , basically now , and communicating in October . So you're absolutely right .
And just on your point about the community , like there's such a line of trust that is , you know , between Be Half Moon , like we really have strong ethics and high quality products and a really a team with deep integrity that supports the studio and then the studio has this huge trust base with the community and that's such a magical formula whereby the community
is going to be inspired by and trust your offering . So that's why I see there's such a beautiful opportunity and why we see so many studios that thrive with their retail offerings , because it's all trust base and it's all rooted in this shared passion for wellness , especially around the holidays and then leading into January , new year , new you .
So , yeah , it's a very ripe time to support retail , for sure .
For sure . And so let's just take a minute and think about the timeline . If someone was listening and they think they were thinking to themselves okay , this is , I do want to get this . I've been thinking about this for a while . I do want to set up a retail section in my studio .
The best way for them to get started would be go to Be Half Moon and set up a wholesale account . Don't buy from the retail . Go set up a wholesale account , right ? And what does that look like and what does that mean for the studio owner ?
Yeah , yeah , I mean it's basically as you said . You can go to our website , behalfmooncom , and you can find the wholesale form , or you can email myself , andrea at behalfmooncom , and I can connect you with the right team member based on where you're located , and we can just get you set up with a wholesale account .
And then , once you get your login info , you basically go into the Shopify site and it's almost like a consumer shopping experience . We try to make it really simple and easy to pick your items and to check out . So all you need is the login . As I said , you can email me or go to our website and fill out the wholesale application form .
Wonderful , and then you'll select your items , select the quantity you hit buy and then you will receive them very , very quickly , so you can do a really small order . I think your minimum is $300 for your first order and so you can try a couple of items .
You can have a small number of items and , like Andrew suggested , even pre-sale some of those items , right ? So get talking to your community , show them what you're thinking . You'll find that people are really open and excited about this . People are often very concerned that people won't buy anything and what you'll find is probably quite the opposite .
So I would encourage you to start small , and starting now and getting this set up now will also give you time to perhaps prepare a nice display and so on . So let's touch on that really quickly . What does that typically look like ? How do you recommend that studios showcase their items ?
It's very much bespoke depending on the space . As you can imagine , Most spaces are a little bit tight for retail , so we start with like little counter display . We don't have anything that we offer .
But we see people buying a lot of things from Umbra which are more like stationary stands or jewelry stands that they repurpose for some of our smaller items , and then for the B-mats , for the bolsters , which are our second biggest seller , for the blankets , which are our third biggest seller , those we often advise people to get floating shelves from .
One great example is the container store I can send you the link and there are these beautiful modern shelves that are modular so you can have your mats displayed on them . You can have your bolsters at the bottom . Super cost-effective , doesn't take up much space , showcases the products beautifully in a modern , minimalist way which is very much on brand for us .
So that's where we start , Like it doesn't have to be over the top crazy and I love that these units are modular so you can really work with the inventory you have . Yes , yes absolutely . And I should say a lot of spaces . Just use baskets and it looks great One basket for B matsmats , one basket for blankets or bolsters and things like that .
Those are really simple and effective too , yeah absolutely , and we know when you start small , you can also then add to your offer and you can add different things , right , so you can start with mats , but I know you also offer some jewelry and the diffusers and candles and sleep masks all of which are in my cart right now and but you know it's really nice
to have a wide variety of offers , but it's also important , like you said , to sort of gauge what your clients and your community really want and would like more of . So what do you see as sort of being increasingly popular amongst your studios ?
I would say neutrals . There's a big push for neutrals . So you see that in our props , where we're really offering black charcoal and then like what we call a cacao , like a neutral beige which you saw in the Pilates ring .
So from a color scheme perspective , we've really developed into those two colorways to keep it neutral and then we've layered in some beautiful simple beiges which just look great with anything . So that's one element . Functional movement is just on fire . I'm sure you know this better than me and most of your audience knows this better than me .
But we've just seen a huge uptick in our resistance tools , our weights , our grip socks , things like that . And then a very happy surprise is our crystals . I'm a huge crystal fanatic . I really do believe in their healing properties . I love practicing with them , I love being in meetings with them .
We offer a huge array of crystals and these have just been trending like crazy . So those are probably the most notable kind of trending movements right now , aside from the BMAT which is just it's always just outperforming month over month .
Wonderful , fantastic . This was so helpful and insightful . I really appreciate you coming on and talking with us , andrea , and sharing all of your wisdom about retail , and I would absolutely recommend to anyone listening to think about whether this is the holiday season that you will step into , or dip your toes into , the retail sector if you haven't already .
And it's not as hard as it sounds . It really isn't and for the studio owners I know who do this and have this it really is a wonderful revenue generator for their business , but it also , like I said , creates a sense of energy and buzz in your studio .
It's also really fun for you to pick out some new items every month or every quarter , so I would encourage you to go to check out , be Half Moon for all of the amazing things that they have to offer and setting up that wholesale account and browsing there .
I also want to let you know that when you do that and you can get 5% off your order when you use Saran 5 at the checkout and you also get 5% off your order when you go just for the wholesale part of it . Is that right , andrea ?
That's right . So you're getting 50% off retail plus another 5 . Right .
Which is a great deal , great deal , and there's so many different items to browse through . I know that you'll certainly find something that you and your community will really , really , really love for sure . So I really appreciate you coming on , andrea . Thank you so much for sharing everything you've shared with us today . It's been wonderful to chat with you .
Oh , my pleasure . I really appreciate the time and it's really fun .
Love this so good . So I'm going to put all of the details , all of the juicy details , in the show notes .
¶ Boosting Your Studio Business
So click on through for that , grab that link , grab that coupon code and head on over to Be Half Moon and check out what you could be putting in your studio . So I hope this is helpful to you as you go about building your boutique fitness studio business .
If you loved what you heard today and would like to hear more just like this , then please take a quick minute and go to wherever you're listening and rate and review this podcast .
It would mean so much to me and will help to get this podcast out into our community so that more people just like you can feel encouraged and supported on their journey in our industry . Did you love this episode and want more ? Head to spring3.com and check out my free resources that will help you run a profitable and fulfilling studio business .
And before you go , one last reminder there is no one way to do what you do , only your way . So whatever it is that you want to do , create or offer , you've got this . Thanks again for joining me today and have a wonderful rest of your day .