Episode 60 - How an Interview with Hulk Hogan on Their Wedding Day Started a $40 Million Business with Jeff and Ally Davidson of Camp Gladiator
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Episode 60 - How an Interview with Hulk Hogan on Their Wedding Day Started a $40 Million Business
Today we’re on the road, connecting with Jeff and Ally Davidson down in Austin, Texas. They’re the founders of Camp Gladiator, a Fitness Franchise that has over 3500 locations across the country with 1,000 trainers and 100,000 members. They have a remarkable story of how God used a unique experience in the early days of reality TV to propel them in their entrepreneurial story. Just to give you a little taste, it started when Ally decided to try out for American Gladiators on the morning of their wedding. It’s an origin story unlike any other!
As you listen, you’ll find that not only is their beginning remarkable, but the way their faith interacts with their work is as well. They know the value of community and of running a business on Biblical principles, and in this episode we get to hear them talk about both! Listen to find out more about their entrepreneurial journey, how it started, the hard decisions they’ve faced, and how they’re using their business to glorify God and serve others.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
*Some listeners have found it helpful to have a transcription of the podcast. Transcription is done by an AI software. While technology is an incredible tool to automate this process, there will be misspellings and typos that might accompany it. Please keep that in mind as you work through it. The FDI movement is a volunteer-led movement, and if you’d like to contribute by editing future transcripts, please email us.
Henry [00:02:23] Jeff and Ally welcome to the Faith Driven Entrepreneur podcast. We're really pleased to have you on.
Jeff [00:02:27] Yes. Thanks for having us. Excited to be here.
Henry [00:02:30] Yes. He uses one of these really, really cool stories that we come across of a faith driven entrepreneur, which makes it sound like we come across stars of reAllyty TV shows all the time and we don't. But we did this time and years is this great story that has in its birth been on the American Gladiator, which is a show that a lot of us kind of grew up with and know about and have familiarity with. And much of Camp Gladiator, the company that you all now run, starts with that. And we want to hear that story. But actually, I may even ask you to go back a little bit further. Talk to us about your background, where you both are from, and then, yes, lead us through that day when you went ahead and did the audition for American Gladiator that ended so well. Let's start at the beginning, please.
Jeff [00:03:16] Awesome. Well, maybe I'll take it off with my background because I'm a little older and then Ally's got the most interesting part of that story.
[00:03:23] So I'm originally from DFW and went to University of Texas. Grew up around the church. A number of different churches going to evangelical Baptist base in DFW became a Christian at early age. And after you see, you want to be an entrepreneur and you know, had a couple of experiences that didn't work out great. Then I got into the financial advising business and started building my career in wealth management and financial advising. And then along the way, I met Ally when I was a senior at u._t. And we dated throughout college. So I'll kick it over to you and you can take a story from there.
Ally [00:03:54] Yeah. I was born and raised in Austin, Texas, and that's where we live today. That's where can't go to your HQ's.
[00:04:01] And so blessed to be able to live close to family here and just love this city and grew up playing sports my entire life, played four of our city sports in high school. And that was really the thing that I did. You know, year round and just loved it, love centeredness, loved exercising really from a very early age, love being outside. So, yeah, we met and I just said dated through college for me. I played basketball in college at Ole Miss and also Texas State. And yes, graduated from college and kind of like a lot of student athletes that finished playing. I didn't really know what was next. And so I was kind of searching for that thing and honestly, with kind of a lonely time in life, because it was the first time after graduating college that I wasn't on a sports team. And so I definitely felt the effects of that. And we were, you know, getting pretty serious. We got engaged and I was working at the time at a direct mail marketing company. Basically, I was in sales. I was an ad sales rep for a magazine. And so we were dating, got engaged. And the funny part of the story is on the day of my wedding, we're really the night before my wedding.
[00:05:04] My sister, who was my maid of honor, ran up to me and she said, hey, do you want to do one last crazy thing before you get married? And she knows me very well. And so I was like, well, yes, of course. Sounds awesome when you have and more American Gladiators is having trials just down the street from your wedding. You should go trial for the show right before your wedding. And so we thought this was a great idea.
[00:05:29] And so I had all my bridesmaids spend the night with me the night before the wedding. We wake up the next morning and we basically go missing. Nobody knows where we are. And we go to this American Gladiators, try out. And by the time we have. Let we get to the line. It's like two thousand people deep in this line or like you're gonna have to wait here all day. And so I was like, oh, man, I'm going to miss my wedding. What am I going to do? So we decided.
Henry [00:05:54] I'm sorry. I hate to interrupt. I shouldn't do that. It's a bad podcast host. But the thought didn't cross your mind. Well, I guess I won't be able to try out for American Gladiator Dylan too long. The thought that crossed your mind is, oh, my God, it's not going to have to miss my wedding.
Ally [00:06:08] Right. Yeah, I said it at that point. I mean, I committed to it. Yeah. But, you know, I was committed to gladiators at that point.
[00:06:17] So, yeah, we actively search for a solution. And so we are on my veil, my garter, we ran up to the front of the line with my entire bridesmaid posse and we begged the producers to let me cut the line and do the trials. And of course, everybody thought we were lying. But I was like, no, I really I have to get to the church. I'm about to get married. And so luckily, they let me cut the line. Do the trials. They loved the story. I did really well. The trials ended up making it on the show and won the season in 2008.
Henry [00:06:46] That's great. That's amazing. So you show up, you've got your bridal veil on and you go through this tryout and obviously you make it. What was this season like? You know, how did all transpire? What's it like being on the show? Presumably you did make it to the church on time and maybe you did a little bit more working out a little more exercise in your honeymoon than you otherwise would have. Because now you're in training. You got well, is it $100000 or something like that that's on the line?
Ally [00:07:11] Yeah. Yeah. That's the funny part I left out. I didn't make it to the church on time and we did get married. And it wasn't until we were getting and now after the wedding in our rehearsal dinner that I told Jeff I'd like, maybe I did something kind of crazy today. He's like, what? Your hair and you got your nails done, your makeup. I'm like, no, no. I tried out for gladiators. And so he was pretty surprised by that. But yeah, the funny part about it is we both just kind of thought it was just a fun, crazy thing to do. Right. We didn't think anything would actually come from it. And obviously, God had different plans. And so, you know, the honeymoon just was kind of joking, like, oh, you better go work out. You're going to be on that show. Oh, yeah. Right. Well, lo and behold, I got chosen for the show. But really the coolest part of all of it was when I went to L.A. to do kind of the final auditions. I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with the producer there. And he got to know me. And I convinced him of how athletic my new husband is, which is true. Just a great athlete himself. And so I convinced him to let Jeff try out as well with me and that we could hopefully compete like as a couple during that season. And so that's how that played out. We're actually both on the show.
Henry [00:08:22] Oh, my goodness. So, Jeff, did you know this along the way? Had you said, honey, you know, guys seen and her. How did it go down?
Jeff [00:08:31] You know, when I give this talk, I always tell people, if you're feeling like you've got your life plan, I'll figure it out and you want to maybe spice things up and make things a little bit wild and unpredictable. There's a shortcut to doing that. And you can just do what I did and marry a crazy person.
[00:08:48] And the crazy people like Ally think of these things as like totally normal, like trying out for a show on your wedding day. And, you know, this is like the highlight of her life here is like getting to go have this crazy experience.
[00:09:00] Different than that. I'm more let's plan it out. You know, let's have a little more structure. And so I find out at the reception and I'm like, wow, OK, that's that's interesting. I'm glad you made it back. You know, we'll see what happens if she flies out there and I'm thinking maybe, you know, what am I gonna go get to watch some of this? I get a phone call from the executive producer and he says just how he's been telling me just what an amazing athlete you are. And my response is, why would she say that? Like, why are you all talking about me at all? And they wound up convincing me to come out and be on the show. And, you know, I get this amazing wife list and all these wild things and spice things up. And she has been ever since. But we wound up spending almost two months out there in L.A., about six weeks. And I accomplished my goals, which were to survive. These are some pretty big guys. And not to totally embarrass myself, but I did pretty good, admitted the semi's. But Ally was really, I think, born for the moment, and with her sports background and her making fun personAllyty. And she just dominated and did great. And we were on a number of the episodes and just got to have a really fun summer as the episodes come out. We have watch parties and we, of course knew the ending, so that was a good part of it as well.
Henry [00:10:10] So my kids and I watch The Amazing Race together and you know that they film it well in advance. You know that they're supposed to not tell anybody. Well, I guess you probably under legal contract. I guess the time to announce the world that you actually told your friends is probably not on a podcast. It's distributed to 100 countries. So maybe maybe I won't ask you the obvious question, but that must have been an interesting dynamic knowing that the story ends out really well. As you're watching it with your friends unfold.
Ally [00:10:38] Yeah, I think that was a cool part of the story. Yeah, we filmed the show and we cannot. Well, anybody what had happened for about three to four months until the grand finale aired and really actually this is part of the story.
[00:10:48] I think God again had a hand in this because as soon as I won the show, they literally like the next day they fly you back to your normal life, that your normal job and you can't act like anything is out of the ordinary. Right. And so one day I'm here like hanging out with Hulk Hogan and Lee Lollie and fighting gladiators when the show then the very next day, I was literally back in my cubicle at my normal job by like noon the next day. So very much so.
[00:11:17] This it just felt like it was a dream. And I was like, oh, man, you know, God put us on this show for a reason. And I told Jeff I was like, I don't know what it is, but we have to use this opportunity for something. We've got to capitAllyze on this. This is a once in a lifetime deal. He didn't just put us on the as a whim. Like there's some kind of deeper purpose here behind this. And so we really started praying about it and thinking about me and how can we use this opportunity? And it was over those three to four months before the finale aired where we really created the idea of starting Can't Gladiator, our adult outdoor fitness program. And so within those three months, we had the idea and then we started to kind of get our ducks in a row of getting the business ready to launch, like getting a website built and getting some flyers made and all that stuff, so that as soon as the grand finale aired, we could open the business.
Henry [00:12:07] Tell us how that happened. Tell us what came next. And walk us through the formation of the business, which has really led to what you do today.
Jeff [00:12:16] Yeah, well, I'm I'm back to my finance business and loving it and feeling very at home. Now, the TV shows overseas, you know, back in ad sales and feeling like, oh, I don't know. I mean, this is way cooler, you know, chasing gladiators and that kind of experience. It was really something that was stirring inside of her. Like she said, to make the most of the opportunity. And so taking that from a feeling into a business concept was a process of a couple of months. And there was just something that she intuitively sensed there was missing in the fitness industry. And because she had played on all these different teams and college sports and they played every sport imaginable, the thought of a workout being just a gym that you go to and getting on a treadmill. It was just such a letdown, I think, for Ally. And she can speak more to the vision of the product. But as she would articulate that and we started to say, OK, well, maybe there's this opportunity for a fitness program. We sort of started to morph into what our rules kind of. So Ally's creating that product and thinking about the customer experience and thinking about how to market it. And I'm going into the mode of, OK, well, let's get the website built. Let's get the business incorporated. Let's get the bank account set up. Let's figure out our credit card processing. And really from day one there we were a team. And then once it became a true concept, this is what the business is going to be. Now, maybe you can share some of the early hustling that you did to get that first camp off the ground, because it was not without a lot of grit and hustle that we actually, you know, even survived the first month.
Ally [00:13:47] Yes. So the grand finale aired. And like I said, we had everything ready to launch the business. And for about two weeks after the grand finale, we got a ton of free publicity. And that was a lot of, you know, working with NBC, which is the network that Gladiator's aired on. It was part of kind of my duty to go out and do newspaper interviews or news interviews or radio interviews promoting the show. Right. And so, of course, every time I would be out there promoting the show, I was plugging my new business. So we got a lot of great PR, but I give a presentation now to all of our new trainers have called the hustle presentation because really two weeks of doing that nonstop, all that free PR publicity, all of that stuff. And I after two weeks of doing that, still had zero sign up for camp. And by this point, I had quit my job like my name was on the line, like my reputation is out there. And I had two more weeks before the first camp launch. And I look back on that moment and I really, truly am just so grateful for that moment because it really was just like a punch in the stomach, a little bit of like, hey, just because you were on a TV show, that doesn't mean that this business is going to be easy. That does not mean that customers are just going to find out. That does not mean that this is just going to be given to you. And so I learned at that moment, man, if I want to make this work, I got to really learn what it means to hustle and get out of my local community and pound the pavement and guerrilla style marketing and just meeting people any way in every way that I can. And so from that moment on, I mean, you name it, I did it. I was joining networking groups. I was doing in sports teams. I was getting more involved in the community any way you could possibly think of. And so the first camp rolled around, you know, two weeks after that. And I had gotten 40 sign ups for the first ever ACG camp locations that I ran. I offered morning location, evening location. And really and truly, every single one of those sign ups was from. People that I got out and I worked events and I met them in person and got them to show up to camp, and so I really from the very, very beginning learned what it really meant to hustle and what it really meant to get leads to actually show up to my classes. And so I continued doing that. So the first month of camp had 40 people and then they fell in love with the experience and the product. And I continued hustling. And so the next month we had 60 campers. Next month, we had 80 campers. Following month, 110 campers. And so about four months of the business, Jeff and I start looking at each other like, oh, man, we kind of have a logit little business going here. And when we first started, we really didn't have like a grand vision of what this would become. You know, in the long run, I just wanted to do something I was passionate about. I love fitness. I love people. And I really was wanting to find that passion in a career. And so we thought, you know, if I can replace my income from my other job, that'll be a win. Well, we had no idea. Like I said, the bigger plans that God had in mind for the business. And about the fifth month, just kind of talk a little bit more about this. There was an interesting turn of events where we were living in Dallas at the time and he had a job promotion come up to move down to Austin to take over the branch in Austin. And so at that moment, we kind of thought, huh, like maybe this is our opportunity to expand Fiji and grow it beyond just Ally and the couple of locations I was running that really create it into a business that could survive in multiple markets. And so that's where we had kind of the idea for a unique business model that we created. It's been really successful for us ever since.
William [00:17:22] And it's really interesting and maybe flash forward a little bit and then we'll come back into how it all, Bill, and just give our listeners a quick view of where is it? You've been in the business 10, 11 years now. What did the business look like today? And then maybe we'll flash back and talk about how it got built.
Jeff [00:17:36] Sure. Yeah. So we operate in six states within those states. We divide them into regions. So we have what we call 14 regions and 10 of those regions, a number of cities. And from those original 40 campers, we now operate right around 100000 campers. Each camp and from Ally trainer, one we have right around a thousand trainers and locations where people meet. You know, we had that first one and Watermark Church parking lot in Dallas, Texas, and we have just under 4000 of those in those six states. So that's a real blessing to have that growth. And fortunate that from the ex-spy thousand, where their Hall of Fame knows the best friend companies last six years in a row. And we'll do just around 60 million in revenue this year.
William [00:18:18] Wow. That's amazing. What story? What a story. It's really great that your sister in the maid of Honor came over and told you about a crazy idea.
Ally [00:18:24] Yes, absolutely. I think her often.
William [00:18:27] I don't know how much equity she got in the business, but, you know, maybe just something. So now take us back. You mentioned starting a church parking lot. How is the business model evolved? You know, it's funny. I can't hear C.G. without thinking of community group. That's what we call our weekly meetings in our church. Did you talk about the role of community, the role of using anything and everything from facilities and back here, scrapie days or maybe as well continue today that little overhead and facilities might be part of the business model? Maybe just talk us through those two components of the business?
Ally [00:18:57] Yeah. So basically we have the outdoor spaces and you can in two locations on our app, we meet in church parking lots. We meet in parks. We meet in school parking lots or school field. Really anywhere that has an outdoor space is big enough to host large group workouts. And so there's some really cool and interesting places that we meet at and convenient for the really, really key factor for us. And so, you know, our goal is that somebody would have to drive past 10 seedy locations to get to the next big box jam because of the convenience factor that we offer. And we also try to do it at an affordable price point for the masses. And so that location course of it is a really important part of our business model. But, you know, in terms of the product. I mean, this is such a cool way that we get involved in the local community because, you know, like I said, meeting at churches or school and the trainers generally live in those neighborhoods. And so, you know, they really know the community well. A primary part of their role as a trainer is to get involved in the community.
[00:19:59] And then at a camp, you really have that team element, that community feel, which is the way that we even conduct the workouts from team drills, the partner drills to competitions we do at a camp, the relay races, you name it. You know, we say it's really challenging, but taking great work out. But at the same time, it kind of makes you feel like you're an adult recess class because you're having fun and doing a lot of things you used to do as a kid.
William [00:20:22] And maybe you tell us always good stories. Tell us some stories of the community aspect of, you know, that's an amazing amount of people. I believe obviously the fitness craze and I think people are finding community more and more through fitness, which is just an amazing thing to see unfold. Are there any easy, fun stories that you'll have from sort of build the. I'm watching these communities form.
Ally [00:20:43] Yeah. I mean, you have this so many fun stories. We, first of all, have lots of campers that have actually met each other through camp, and I've even fallen in love and gotten married.
[00:20:53] I mean, we have tons of those stories. We have a lot of stories of campers and trainers as well that just love what he stands for and the life change that it's created in them that they've actually gotten. Can't gladiator tattoos on their body. We've got about 300 people now that have a tattoo on their body that we did even start asking for that stuff. People started doing it. And so I think, you know, we're seedy. It's a lifestyle brand. Right. It's a way that we encourage our campers to live life. And that is some of our taglines over the year. Our live adventurously or take it outside or we're better together. And so, you know, people there in need of community, they really are. And Finniss is such a unique way to reach people, because if you think about it, the campers are working out with us two, three, four, sometimes five times a week. Right. And so we might be like, you know, besides the people they work with, the people that they see most often in their life. And so it really just fosters this unique platform for friendships and accountability and is really, really cool things that have come from it. So definitely is our passion can only help people get in great shape. But for them to foster this environment, this team, family like environment, and really have a positive, safe, healthy place to go to that school. You know, our mission is to possibly impact the physical fitness, but ultimately the lives of the many people as possible. So you have tentacle stories that'll come from that.
Jeff [00:22:17] I'd love to share one that we played a video of because it was so impactful at our end of your conference a few months back. So in San Antonio, one of our kind of regular diehard campers has sort of disappeared from camp. And we've been going consistently for a couple of years. And the trainer noticed after a few months, you know, she kind of faded away, gave her a call and found out that she had been diagnosed with a rare kidney disorder. And the trainer started visiting at her house and encouraging her. And this is a pretty serious condition. And turns out that the only way to really save it would have been a kidney transplant. She couldn't afford that. And so the trainer and the community of campers decided to do a fundraiser and they raised money to pay for the operation. And she then found her match is one of the campers at camp that she had known who donated her kidney. And so today that campers back out at camp. She has what she calls her kidney sister as the friends she met at camp that donated her kidney. And that was all paid for by the community of people that she worked out with. And they play that video from our marketing team. And there wasn't a dry eye in the room. And the trainer got a standing ovation for making that choice to intervene, to peel back the onion, figure out what was going on, and then to take action to essentially save a life.
Henry [00:23:33] That's incredible. You hear, of course, the concept that a gem of somebody who's your spotting partner to go to that level. That's that really speaks to what happens with community. And you guys know that. I have a question. You went back we talked a bit about your growth and making on the 5000 Hall of Fame and just how you guys have achieved such great scale with hundred thousand campers. Tell us about some of the lessons that you've learned in growing. Where have you made some mistakes? Where do you think you've done some things that have made sense, mostly from his listeners? Podcasts, I said about their idea. They went and started their business and we'd like to scale it.
[00:24:08] And most of them would love to get to space where they have that type of breath and scale. And yet I'm sure that there's been some great lessons you guys have learned along the way and counseling give to others.
Jeff [00:24:19] Well, let me unpack a little bit more of that transition down to Austin and how guys utilize that. And then I think Ally can chime in and talk about maybe one of our biggest lessons we ever learned about scAllyng. But at that moment, whenever we had to move and the two places potentially at once, you know, moving to Austin, but wanting to operate the business in Dallas, you know, we're just another example of God really putting us in a position that we didn't plan on being in. But once we were in, we trusted him. And then he had a bigger plan than we even thought about. And so that really forced us to decide that Campbell editor was not going to be all about Ally and just how many customers she could serve personally, but instead to view the business of Camp Gladiator as a platform and to go recruit other trainers that would want to build their business on the same platform. And so back in 2010 was when we activated that and said, all right, it's not about Ally any more. She's gonna be the brand and she's going to be the leader of the trainers. But we want each trainer that we all more to have their own story, their own entrepreneurial opportunity. And when we turn that on in 2010, you know, we were just an early company of sort of viewing the business as a platform. And now you see that with Uber and Airbnb andbe and you know, the digital platforms like Facebook and Amazon, where entrepreneurs are able to build businesses. And we were just maybe the first ones to do it other than CrossFit. In the fitness space, and that allowed us to scale very quickly by building the model where we could bring onboard partners, that was difficult and that is knowing when to say yes and when to say no. So you can share some of our learnings on that issue.
Ally [00:25:56] Yeah, well, I think one of the key things recognizes we're in the people business. And if you want to grow and expand your business, you have to have awesome people in place that represent your brand well. And they can go and not just grow the company, just to grow it for numbers sake, but to grow with quAllyty. And they can recruit and onboard people that are in Allygnment with your company's values and mission and vision. And so one of the lessons we learned, especially in 2012. I love going back to this because again, this is the total God thing that he taught us this lesson early on in the business. But at that point, we are four years into starting a business and we had seen a lot of success. And, you know, we're young, we're hungry. We didn't have any kids personally. And we're deAllyng with a lot of like young business partners that we were all just excited. We're on fire for what's happening. We still are today. But I think that we were very naive in thinking of just how easy it would be to grow and expand across the entire U.S.. So we saw a map of the United States and we just started getting hungry to just grow and expand everywhere from CAllyfornia to Minnesota up to Florida, just in cities. Honestly, that didn't make strategic sense for us. But the biggest lesson that we learned is we really grew too fast and we spread ourselves too thin. And what we reAllyzed is that if we want to be successful in a city, we really have to dove deep into that city and have an immense amount of focus. And we have to deploy our leaders there several times a month to really build the culture that we're looking for at our camp. And so it was actually in 2012 where we made a really, really tough business decision to close half of the markets that we were in at the time. And we said, you know what? It doesn't make sense for us to be in Minnesota if we can't get Houston, Texas. Right. Which Houston's only two and a half hours down the road from us. Right. It doesn't make sense for us to be in Sacramento, CAllyfornia, if we can't get San Antonio. Right. And so we said, you know what, we're really going to focus primarily on the drivable markets that are close to Austin first. We're going to get those right. We're gonna go deep in those markets because we said we'd rather have 10000 campers in one city than 10. That is where you just have a thousand cameras in each of those cities. Right. And it was really, truly probably the best decision we ever made in our business to close half the markets and really narrowing our focus. And the next year in 2013, I think, is the year that we saw our most amount of growth throughout our entire company. And so the fruits from that focus really have paid off for a lot of years to come.
Henry [00:28:37] So one of the things that we've come to understand at band-width and then also in our portfolio is how important fitness is. And I appreciate the quiet on this. Nobody gets it more than you guys do if you're not listening to this and you come to understand that working out together produces the type of real deep relationships where somebody would even donate a kidney to the other. What are some things that the average entrepreneur listen to this might do to encourage fitness and working out and physical activity together? Any tips on that?
Ally [00:29:07] Yeah, I mean, there's so many studies and so many stats on if people are living an active life and they're involved in fitness, they are a more productive worker. They have less sick days. And really they're just happier overall. Generally, their relationships are better. And so that carries over into their work life. So there's tons of studies of the work benefit. I think the biggest thing is to let your employees know that you support their fitness journey and that as a company that maybe you could provide some additional flexibility if they are going to be a part of working out or join a fitness class or a boot camp somewhere nearby or whatever it might be. I think letting them know that as a company you support that. And as an example for our HQ employees, we actually reward them with the more check-ins they get out of camp. They can earn certain things. And so there's definitely incentives for them to want to go out to camp. But I think a big part of it too is is doing it with your coworkers. I mean, it really is a great cultural thing and it's a great way to bond is when people are outside or working out inside even and just sweating together and just the bond that can be formed from that. And so I think that the investment in that is something that you'll see the R0 eye on for years to come.
Jeff [00:30:20] Real tactically within our H.R. functions that reward always speaking of health insurance premiums, keep going up and up and up. And we've seen the correlation between those that are the fittest have the fewest number of health claims. And so we actually do our subsidy of health insurance tiered by how many chickens they receive each quarter and make contributions to our employees. HSA accounts based on the different they're kind of in the high, medium or low. And that's been huge to motivate the rank and file all the way up to the leaders of the company because it impacts their overall health insurance costs. So there's a lot of ways to do it. And it starts with the leadership. But you can also tie in some H.R. and finance rewards as well.
Henry [00:30:58] I think you're a hundred percent right on all of the above, and in our experience at bandwith, we have probably two thirds of the employees at bandwith work out every day at lunch. And it's a big part of community building. That's a big part about keeping our expenses low on health care. But that only happens as kind of a nice dividend of understanding that real community is built and people work better and experience life better when they feel fit. So you guys have got that. Just one last quick question before William closes is out. Have you ever thought about doing a camp in a box type of thing that could be rolled out at the workplace?
Jeff [00:31:31] This sort of digital concept of C.G. is something that we've toyed around with a little bit. There's nothing in the works immediately, but down the road, I think you'd be really cool to be able to potentially experience some of the C.G. style of workout digitally. And then we do have an active group of our trainers that go in to companies and offer corporate challenges and then set those up with the company. So that's something that we have kind of a turnkey program where those employees can engage with CGI locations and we can provide the HRR function with reports on check-ins and they can sort of build challenges based on top of our system and our I.T.. So there's a couple of things that we're doing there.
William [00:32:10] That's great. And one last question and then, yeah, we'll move. DoorCloses. I know we've senior at the C Twelve conference for big fans of C 12B and Mike Share on the podcast a while back. He was great and just really eloquent in talking about how a business owner can weave their faith and their work together. I'm interested in how you guys do that. It came Gladiator. How do you blend your faith and work? You know, each and every day into what you do.
Ally [00:32:31] Yeah, that's a great question. I think the biggest thing that I've done over the years is we're pretty open and honest with our entire company just about what our personal beliefs are in you. By no means you do not have to be a Christian to work at Camp Gladiator. We have people of all races and backgrounds and beliefs and it's really, really cool. But I think that our team respects the fact that Jeff and I will just kind of tell him who we are as people and what we believe.
[00:32:57] And we tell them, you know, from really the first kind of academy that they go through that we're gonna try our best to run the business on biblical principles. And that the primary purpose of Camp Gladiator is to honor God and serve others. And so we're pretty open with that on the front end. And we just say, hey, we're gonna. Just the way that we conduct our business and the way that we treat each other, the way that we treat our customers, we have a high expectation of ourselves because we're not just representing ourselves or representing more than that. And so I think that transparency is something that they very much appreciate. And I think that kind of is the start of it. And then through the organization, our executive leadership team, we do have the opportunity to pray together every Monday morning, just for the week. And I think that's a big thing. And as much as we can, we try to get with our leadership team and just pray for the business. And our hope is that through the interactions that people experience with Can't Vladimir, is that they know that something is just different about this company. There's something unique. They care a whole lot. And maybe our campers out there or the vendors that we work with, they might just ask, like me know, I wonder what is different about this company and maybe they'll dig a little deeper into what our beliefs are. And then we also run our own nonprofit Christian Kids Summer Camp over the summer. And so that's a big thing that we do and we fundraise for that throughout the year. And so we're able to also run a nonprofit side of our business is faith based and is able to kind of be a little bit more open and transparent about that. And so that's been a really, really cool thing.
Jeff [00:34:31] And then one last thing I would add is we take a percentage of the profits each year and put it into a T.G. gives donor advised fund. And there are four criteria that we look at its funding potential other nonprofits in our communities. And we're looking for gospel oriented, you know, that target youth health and wellness. So we have these four criteria and anybody in the organization, in any of our campers, any of our trainers can submit for a request. And we look at those and just try to give back financially in addition to having the mission and the foundational principle of trying to honor God. So we do the best we can. We're not perfect at it. But I would also give a big plug to see 12- as an organization. That's one of the reasons we joined a few years back was to learn how to better integrate our faith and how to do it in ways that are compliant and also impactful for the kingdom and for the organization.
William [00:35:21] Well, that's amazing. Perfect segue way into our clothes at the end, we always usually like to ask what is God's word teaching you today in the season?
[00:35:30] This could be this morning on the drive in. This could be this week, this could be a season God might have eaten. Or maybe he's pointing to something in his word that's coming Allyve and in a fresh new way, potentially are being applied in a different way to where you are in life. Is there anything that comes to mind as you all think of the journey God has you on right now?
Jeff [00:35:47] Every year we come up with a company theme and it's something kind of in the season of that era we're in and something that fuels me and Ally. And we think that it will resound throughout the company. And this year's theme you're reading in Matthew and Matthew 16, where they talk about let your light shine before others so they may see your good days and glorify your father in heaven. And we decided to roll out with our theme word for this year's shine. And we just wanted to keep in mind that the way we keep score a lot of times on earth is based on numbers or revenue or growth. But that's not really the way they gotta keep score. You'll see the impact you're making. He wants to see the way that you're loving your neighbor and the way that you're being a positive influence on your community. And if you do that well in this fairly dark world that seems to be darkening by the day, you can provide a bright light and shine, you know, and each time a senior trainer is out there on the field or the location opens up in a new parking lot. We just sort of like that metaphor as if we can abide by our principles and our values and have great customer experiences.
[00:36:47] It's just one more way that we can try to brighten up the lives of our communities and try to shine. So that's something that's fueling a lot of us this year and a theme we're trying to build on and just remind ourselves of the way they got. Keep score.
Henry [00:37:00] Guys is great. That's an awesome way to end. We're very grateful for the time that you spent with us today and for sharing your story and hope and pray that you continue scale and feel nurtured in the business and are such an inspiration. Others really appreciate you sharing our story.