If you are a Voyage Chicago reader, you may have recognized a couple of faces featured on their website this past week. Voyage Chicago did an interview with Charlie and Julie about building Muscle Activation Schaumburg. Charlie discussed the process of first conceiving of the idea of MAS, bringing it to reality, and the struggles along the way.
Today we’d like to introduce you to Charlie Cates and Julie Errington.
Charlie and Julie, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
The idea of owning my own exercise facility started during my freshman year of college. I was really into sports performance but knew I wanted to explore the business side of things, as well. By the end of my freshman year, I had made the decision that I would one day go into business for myself running my own exercise facility.
Right out of college I was supposed to have a job in Connecticut. Two weeks before I was going to move there, I got a call from the person who hired me saying the place was declaring for bankruptcy. At the time, I was living at home with my parents in Wisconsin. One of my teammates from college was attending law school at Northwestern University in the city and said I should come down to Chicago because there were a lot of gyms to work at there. I interviewed at four different places and ended up accepting an offer from FFC in the Gold Coast. It was there that I was introduced to Muscle Activation Techniques™ (MAT™).
[Related: The MAS Story]
MAT™ was the missing link that I had been looking for when it came to exercise and personal training, so I dove head first into the classes that were being held in Chicago starting in January of 2011. Up to that point, I had difficulty growing my business at FFC. I was not sure if I would be able to continue to work as a trainer. A lot of days I thought it would be easier to just look for a salaried position somewhere to pick up a side job at a grocery store or something. I even went as far as to get the application forms for a Trader Joe’s near where I was living. I put the application in my desk drawer and I told myself that if things didn’t get better by the end of the month, I would fill out the application and turn it in.
Some months things would get better. Some months they would not. But I was determined to make a career for myself in fitness and to open up my own facility, so I never ended up turning in the applications.
Read the rest of the Voyage Chicago interview here!
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