We Salute You!
Hi everyone, Ash here!
Today is our 4th birthday! 4 years ago we took over a Body Pump class at Fitness First Angel to introduce SMASH and we did our first ever Control class! We had amazing feedback so decided to have a permanent class on the timetable and the following Monday we launched properly... with 3 people! We knew not to be disheartened, it was a brand new class in a brand new time slot and it would take time for people to know what we do and to discover why SMASH was so different. Over the coming months the attendance grew and more classes were asked for and added - it was obvious that people enjoyed this new type of training where mental health was put front and centre of every workout!
We created more classes, involved the community, launched Discovery and SMASHcamp on Saturday mornings and then got really serious about it when we developed a website and I quit my role as General Manager of the gym to focus on SMASH full time! We partnered with CRUK, were featured in magazines and online articles and were beginning to make a name for ourselves as a different kind of fitness and well-being class - one that everyone was welcome to! We believed we had something special and felt we had really settled on where we fit in the fitness world. In year 2-3 we started working with corporate businesses and began to invite people from all over London to train with us, and then....
March 2020. Need we say more! I'm really proud of how Sam and I managed the anxiety and stress of being self employed in the lead up to the first lockdown being announced. We didn't give up, we didn't panic - we focused on what we could do and completely took ourselves out of our comfort zone by creating our first home workouts and learning all about this little meeting platform called Zoom...
Zoom workouts landed and took us into an exciting new chapter! Our community rallied around us and invited friends and family, the workouts became even more fun as we introduced themes we may never have done in the studio and our following grew! We purposely kept classes free so nobody was excluded and you donated to keep SMASH free for all! We raised money for many charities, raised awareness for causes that needed the spotlight and changed our name from SMASH London to SMASH Mind and Body! The team grew as we introduced Yoga (thank you Sandi, John, Amy and Panna!) and the high energy workouts that Sam and I had created became even more diverse once Sammy joined - POWER is one of our most popular classes and we are so grateful for Sammy who has helped make 2021 our best six months yet!
When we sat down on that beach in Valencia with a big idea to change the fitness industry to be more inclusive and mental health focused, we had no idea what it would turn into. If someone had told us what the next 4 years would have looked like, and the success we would have had, we probably wouldn't have believed them! Thankfully our self belief got better as time went on and pushed us to keep going, to fly over the hurdles and celebrate the wins. We are so excited to see what the next 4 years bring and hope you will stay on this journey with us because it's people like you who have made SMASH the success it is. You have celebrated with us, allowed us to lift your mood and promoted our message that we should all Celebrate Every Body. Every day we are thankful for this amazing community, we are grateful for... you.
What are you grateful for today?
Happy Birthday SMASH community, whether you've been with us since the beginning or this is your first week, we salute you!
All our love,
Sam and Ash
