From Nonprofit Founder To Building A $300M Pilates Business

**Sam Parr** (0:00)
All right, everyone, today's episode is Anne Mahlum. Anne started this company called Saladcore. Saladcore is a Pilates studio where she bootstrapped it in the first year. She did something like a million and a half in revenue. It cost like $100,000 to start, and she eventually sold this company in the year nine for something like $350 million. And she goes through this entire story. But if you're listening, I think the really amazing part is to copy some of her attributes, because I get done listening to her, and I'm like, I need to step it up in terms of confidence or in terms of being passionate about something. And in fact, there's like, in minute 30, I honestly teared up hearing some of her stories. So check it out. And by the way, if you are interested in Anne, I'm going to give a plug for Money Wise, this podcast I did with her, where she went deep on her finances. So how much money she spends, how much money she made, everything. And because I liked her so much on that podcast, I wanted her to come on here. So check it out. And I hope you guys enjoy this episode, and let me know in the comments. Let's do a little background. So I think you had a normal job, but then started a nonprofit called Back on My Feet. Is that right?

**Anne Mahlum** (1:11)
Yeah.

**Sam Parr** (1:12)
And what was the original idea?

**Anne Mahlum** (1:14)
I don't know if you know much about how the homeless system works, but many of the shelters in the major cities, you can go live there for 30 days, and then you get kicked out. They give you 30 days to get your crap together, which is not very much time for someone who isn't going through homelessness, to be honest, to sort of start over, go back in the city, get back in the system. 95% of the folks we worked with were dealing with addiction on some level. So, Sam, I know a little bit of your background, and I think I mentioned on our last conversation, my dad's an addict, and when you ask my dad, Mark, what was your addiction? He'll kind of look at you and say everything, because my dad doesn't understand moderation. He had unfortunately instances with drugs and alcohol. He went into inpatient program before he was five, so I don't really remember this, but that seemed to do the trick. He hasn't had a drink or used drugs in 37, eight years. Unfortunately, gambling then surfaced for my dad when I was a teenager, and he struggled with that. And now my dad fishes. He fishes every day for hours a day. But you have to find some place to put this thing. And I had felt like if you can master the drugs and alcohol and try to get away from the bad behaviors, having an addictive personality can actually be beneficial because when you get into something, you are in it and you obsess over it. So running was this great alternative because there is no end. You can always do more. It's there for you. You only need a pair of shoes. It was a really great substitute for a lot of these guys who were still chasing the high. I don't know if you know this, but there's a correlation of people who work out who actually tend to drink more because you're chasing the dopamine. You're looking for these opportunities to get the elevated serotonin spikes. So that's why working out can be a great option for people who are struggling with addiction.

**Sam Parr** (3:11)
All right, everyone, a quick break. When you're starting a company, you basically duct tape together a ton of different pieces of software and different platforms. And it's basically impossible to stay on top of everything. And a ton of stuff breaks and it ruins things that you forgot that you even duct taped together. And that's why I use HubSpot for all of my projects, because it does it all. So I don't actually have to use any duct tape, which means it doesn't break. I can build my website on HubSpot. I can write my blog posts on HubSpot. I can collect leads on HubSpot. And then my salespeople can put those leads into the CRM and they can track those leads and build relationships with them. And it just makes life much easier. So if you're interested and want to say goodbye to the duct tape, trust me, you guys have to check it out, hubspot.com. It's free to get started.
Now back to the pod. Yeah, basically, addictions, I mean, I don't know shit. I just, I know my situation, but addictions don't go away. They just get transferred. You know what I mean?