The Pursuit Series: Secrets to Building a Culturally Impactful Brand

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25:01Emily Hickey:There were a lot of spin studios. I mean, first of all, how big did you guys get? I think - Emily, there were no spin studios. Let me bring you back to, let me bring you back there. There was no boutique fitness, right? In New York City, there were a couple of yoga studios and not much else. And so nobody was paying per class for fitness. So we actually really had to create a marketplace before we could create a product, which was the harder part of this equation. Training people to pay for something that is included in their gym membership is actually harder than creating a great product. Especially because New Yorkers do not want to be insulted from their intelligence.

25:42Like, how dumb do you think I am? This is for free down the street. Yes. But it's like, and Julie was like, listen, it's going to be curtains up and curtains down on the hour. Like we have to deliver on the hour. And she was like, if we get going in the morning, like the energy will build throughout the day and we can continue to do this. But it was really serious. Thank God she has a theater background and a Hollywood background. It really helped people understand what their responsibility was in order to kind of bring it and let people really experience something in those rooms.

26:18Emily Hickey:that's so interesting so you thought of it as informative like this was an experience you were selling Emily you and I have ponded over this many times our lives with Twitter but yeah the exact way we thought about it was from the moment you cross our threshold until the moment you leave it is curtains up curtains down whether from the person at the front desk that knows your name or remembers your shoe size or knows something about you so that they can make a connection between you and the person that's behind you on the line, which again, you know, forms community to the, I mean, you know, this is the part where I tell people that are still massive SoulCycle fanatics to turn off the, turn off the, whatever they're listening to this on, because, you know, the truth about the SoulCycle experience is it's designed.

27:01I mean, the actual experience is, is scripted. I mean, it's a journey. It's the hero's journey in five parts, right? So we warm you up, we pop the party, we break you down, we give you a soulful moment, and then we send you home like a hero. And you can do it to heavy metal, and I can do it to Justin Bieber, and somebody else can be a Swifty and do it, and the next teacher can do it to show tunes. But we're all taking you through the five emotional stages that are going to take you, right? from I don't want to be here to I can't do this anymore to triumph to moving you through something to allowing you to feel better when you walked in right that is what is going to happen to you every single time and then you're going to walk back out into our lobby and somebody's going to congratulate you and the instructor is going to give you a high five and they're going to notice something's a little bit better different than you than the last time and somebody else is going to say goodbye to you and then you're going to walk out the door and you're going to feel like wow they know me.

28:02I know myself better. There were people in this huge city that care about if I show up tomorrow. And that's what happens there. And it is all designed down to the moment. It is a theater production.

28:16Emily Hickey:That's so brilliant. It's, you know, you could really take that metaphor with almost anything, including yourself and how you show up in any room that you walk into. I mean, the curtains up, curtains down is such a great metaphor in the manufacturing of a, of a, of an experience as the product, like even with clothes, you know, you were selling an identity and you're, you know, anything that actually is worth kind of stepping to the other side of the room and thinking about whatever you're doing as, as a production and a performative experience. That's super interesting. May I just also add in that Julie Rice was the first person to curate athleisure.

28:56And she was the first person to fold that into fashion. She created these capsules inside of the studio where people would walk in in their high heel boots and these tights that I was like, what are those things? And no, I'm serious. And then she would brand them. And it just was such a look. And it was so great, too, because you sweat in your clothes and they get disgusting. And so it was really like an act of service to have this retail there and to see what she curated and then to see this whole world pop up around it, you know, in the ensuing years has been like a phenomenal, it's been a, actually it has blown my mind to think about like what she seeded out there.

29:40Anyway, I just, we had no more needed to say that. Well, that's true. We didn't have a marketing budget. And so we did do t-shirts and we did sort of think about swag in a way that people hadn't really thought about before. We had these like iconic silver bags. I mean, it's kind of a joke. I mean, everything that we're talking about is such a joke right now. Like if someone had an iconic silver bag right now, I'd be like, okay. We had no marketing budget when we were done building this deal. We had$2 ,500 left over and Elizabeth looked at me and she was like, okay, marketing, what are you going to do?

30:12We're going to make t-shirts and we're going to get the 250 coolest people we know to wear them. And then Elizabeth and I got like master press lists from anyone we knew. And we drew, we drove around the city with these silver bags in your tiny station wagon and tried to like deliver these packages. Oh my God. It was, it was what an experience. I mean, it was a long couple of days. It was, but that did that work guys?

30:38Emily Hickey:I mean, so it was, it was like this very early influencer seating strategy before that even existed. You drove around. Because nobody swagged people then. There was no such thing. There was no internet. There were no influencers. So us delivering bags of goodies with yellow Gatorade and yellow shirts and yellow towels and spin shoes, people couldn't believe it. I mean, it was, these were, this was a really novel concept at the time. And by the way, for us influencers, we're the moms that were the head of the PTA at the local school, two doors down from our studio. We thought about our influencers as people that could actually populate our studio and help become fire starters for our community.

31:22And that's what's so interesting because, you know, in this whole world where we're all, you know, paying to play and influencers and this much a post, and this is the engagement and all the things. We thought about influencers as people that were actually going to live in our community, that we were going to be able to take from users and make them evangelists and people that would stir this pot up for us and start these fires. And so I think for us, local marketing strategy was everything. You asked kind of what we did. I mean, we walked up and down avenues, doing everything from putting flyers in mail rooms to going to local businesses, donating to school auctions, giving it away to the employees that worked at the stores around us, all of the things that help take strangers and put them in a room together that live within a five block radius of each other.

32:15It's pretty magical. People don't think about local marketing that much anymore because obviously we have the internet now. But really, most businesses, especially local businesses, you really only need 500 customers to become profitable. And really, most businesses, right? Whether you have a sandwich shop or a dry cleaner or a spin studio, you don't need thousands and thousands of customers. You need a couple hundred loyal ones. It's a really interesting way to think about it.

32:40Emily Hickey:I'm dying with everything you're saying, Julie, because I so passionately agree with everything. I passionately, passionately agree with everything that you're saying. And I always recommend this to people when they're sitting there thinking about how to start their business. And it's so helpful to think about that. You don't need that much like set your sights really you like try to go get your first like 10 people go get them by hand get your first hundred and think locally and think in a very tangible way about who is that target market and how are you going to truman show them and create this illusion of velocity and influence them to want to be a part of what you're doing it's creating awareness and it's creating desire and belonging and self-image tagging and what you did is perfect it's literally really perfect execution of marketing.

33:22Emily Hickey:And I know you, I've gotten to work with you enough that I, that this is still the pattern of how you think. And it hasn't changed. It still works. It's still the right thinking. I'm just so impressed that you guys did this. It's one last piece, Emily, that I think people don't think about anymore. Make it good when they get there. right? Yeah, good idea. Make a great product because why should we have to acquire the same customer over and over again? Why can't we keep some of the ones we have, right? You know, that was the thing for us. This concept was so out of the box that if we could find somebody that was willing to pay$30 for an a la carte spin class and find us in the rear lobby of a building, we had no sign on our front door.

34:09You know, you couldn't even find us. You had to come down this long hallway to actually get to our studio. And then we asked you to clip in a bike in the dark for$30. If you made it all that way, we had to do whatever it took to make you come back. I would babysit your kid. Elizabeth would feed her parking meter. We would walk your dog around the block. It didn't matter. The acquisition cost was so high for us in terms of human capital. You had to come back. We had to love you into coming back. That was it.

34:40Emily Hickey:I love it. How big did it get guys? How many studios, how many employees? The exit, I know you have not announced, but the internet says that you guys each walked away with$90 million. You can neither confirm nor deny, but how big did this get? We ended with 60 studios. I think it was up about 1600 employees. How many riders a day were we seeing Elizabeth? 20 ,000? I think it was 20 ,000 people a day, maybe more. I think it was between 20 and 30 ,000 people. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and the beautiful thing about that too is like people, we were on all these cities in Canada and the United States.

35:19And I remember somebody saying, this goes back to your marketing thing. I'm so bummed out. Like I, we have to move to San Francisco. And I'm like, that is not a problem. Go to SoulCycle in San Francisco and meet the front desk. And within a week, you're going to have a babysitter, two new friends and, you know, whatever else you need that you can't find because that these communities exist as if they're the only one. But like when you walk in there, you feel the sense of familiarity. And that was something that we really focused on in terms of the training so that people could feel like I could trust the brand no matter where it was.

35:58And I think this kind of goes back to like investing in the people like Julie was talking about. Like if you're going to scale something, like commit to it all the way so that people can have those same, make it good everywhere, not just in one place or another.

36:13Emily Hickey:How did you, so were you guys fanatical? Yeah, I mean, that's hard to do across that many studios and classes a day and instructors. But you were just, that was, you know, I think a big part actually of building companies and being successful is being very clear with yourself about what's important, you know, and what are the priorities? what are the pillars of this thing that we can never screw up and so the consistency of that curtains up curtains down that experience and the familiarity and you belong here how did you guys that like that was just you knew that that was core pillar of success was the consistency of that experience oh 100 i mean that and and by the way like that was our big biggest investment was to make sure everybody who worked for us was a user you know you have to use your product you have to learn your product.

37:01You have to learn your customers. You have to listen to your customers. They, I mean, I've heard you guys talk about this a million times, but they tell you everything that you need to know. Yep. Look, we, I mean, obviously, you know, in the beginning, you know, Elizabeth and I were feeling our way around in the dark, obviously making great instinctual decisions, but there became a clear moment where we became, you know, CEOs that needed to scale and begin to build a big business. I mean, when we left the business, I mean, we're talking about a business that had a really high valuation, had 60 studios, was seeing 20 ,000 to 30 ,000 people a day, had 2 ,000 employees.

37:35I mean, we were not. So realistically, I mean, we got very lucky. We had an employee number one, literally, who became our chief culture officer, our chief experience officer, all the things. And we like to say we don't know the day that Amy went from being a rider to being an employee, but somehow she just kept showing up. And she began to codify everything. And she is a maniacal human being about codifying training. Training and customer service is her entire life. And eventually, by the time we got to about 15 studios, we had a corporate headquarters. And in our basement, we had SoulCycle University.

38:12And at SoulCycle University, we had 100 units of hospitality. Everything from history of the brand to why we make decisions to how to listen to a customer to how to connect customer A to customer C. You signed on to become a SoulCycle employee. It's what Elizabeth said. Nobody, you had to have already been a rider to become, you know, we didn't hire people that didn't use the product. But then it didn't matter. If we were hiring you to be the CFO or we were hiring you to be an instructor, you worked at the front desk for two weeks to a month so that you could understand what our customers were saying and what it was like.

38:48And training went from there. But we invested tens of thousands of dollars and each of our employees to train them. And we would send ahead. So if we were opening, if Los Angeles had just opened, but we were opening Texas next, we would take seasoned people from Los Angeles and we'd send them ahead to Texas and grow the bench behind. I mean, it became very methodical, but I will never forget the day that Elizabeth and I went to our first opening in Los Angeles. It was the first DVO that we opened outside of the tri-state area. Before that, we could touch everything. If I hated the retail, I could drive up to Connecticut and change where the bras were hanging.

39:26If Elizabeth didn't like the way the studio looked in Scarsdale, she could get up there and tell them to, you know, to move a wall. But this was the first one that we opened and then we left. And we went back for the one year anniversary. And we took a ride. We rode in the anniversary ride and we stood in the lobby afterward. And as soon as the doors opened to the studio, people started to come up to us in the lobby. And they would say, they'd pull us aside like they just like they had in New York. and they'd say, you know, I came because I thought I wanted to lose a little weight, but like, that's not what happened to me.

39:56It turns out I became confident enough to, you know, leave my toxic job, or I didn't know how to have a relationship with my daughter, and we come here together now. And it became very clear to us that we had figured out how to scale human experience, which, by the way, Emily, was always the question around the valuation of business. People would go, nice business girls. And by the way, that was what they said. good business girls but how are you going to scale a human experience right because it's a it's this right you know it's a magic right it's a it's it's it's science and it's it's art and it's science and it is very hard to put art on a spreadsheet but we did it like we really did it and we did it in a very methodical way those playbooks live on today if you go to a studio today that they you know people are still being trained the way that we set up that training program to be and you know we I like to say like we really codified magic you guys get me so excited every

40:54Emily Hickey:time I talk to you I'm so dying to build something with you guys and I can't imagine the the respect that you have for each other the way that you talk about each other and the energy that you guys put into every you you guys have this intrinsic belief in what you do that anything is possible okay we'll buy well okay we'll buy a space well you know everything is possible like overnight and you guys just plow in and do it. You're true entrepreneurs. It's so, I just love hearing you talk, but what do you guys think about culture right now? Like I've been thinking about like the last two Superbowls, for example, I'm like, I don't know what we're about anymore.

41:29Emily Hickey:And I don't, I don't want to talk about politics or anything else, but as a country, I feel like it used to be, we all had the same sense of humor. And so all the Superbowl ads would be kind of like of the same genre and everything was, you know, made sense and was cohesive. And, but I feel like we're a little bit lost on culture now. On the one hand, you can make something, the social platforms are so flammable. You can build a meme like overnight and, but then it comes and goes. And, you know, how do you, if you have your ear to the ground, and I know Julie, you've already mentioned sort of the personalization of, of, of medicine and the humana, you know, that becoming more, more human, but what else, if you have the ear to the ground on culture right now, what do you think is happening?

42:12Like, how would you describe

42:14Emily Hickey:or what's hitting right now, whether it's a brand or TV, what themes are you guys seeing? I think that the more and more that we are using AI and becoming reliant on AI, it's like an inverse algorithm that happens to us where we're going inside. And I've heard you talk about the assembly. And I think it's really true that the divine lives inside us. And that can mean anything to anybody, but it's almost like saying yes to the things that we can hear and how much wisdom exists inside our own bodies, our own beings, if we will allow ourselves the space to experience that. And I really think that, you know, whether or not we want to say it in that way, I think that that is going to become so important.

43:06And frankly, it's like time. There's so much awakening that needs to happen. And I just think like this, all of the chaos that's happening is allowing that to get born. So, you know, for me, I just think like, we have done, we've been all trained to like override it and like give our autonomy to other things. And I think it's fine to do that. I think there are, you know, it's interesting. It's fun. There's a lot to be said for kind of playing in that, but then ultimately to come back home, I think is very interesting. And I'm personally really curious about the yin of that with the yang of what Julie was describing.

43:45Like, how do you put these pieces together? And that will become a core element of it for sure in a way that it hasn't in a long time, because we've always looked outside ourselves.

43:57Emily Hickey:I love that. And the way you phrased it, Elizabeth, like as an awakening and this, the creation of inner space and the validity of inner space, I really agree with you. And I think that's why nineties New York is hitting so hard right now. I feel like in so many fashion brands, the love story, JFK Jr. Like the, because it was real, it was unphotographed. it was, there was no Instagram, most people just living, you know, and there was an authenticity to it. And I think Julie, our mutual brand that we admire so much, A24 and the way that they've built community, I think is because they're putting an authenticity stamp and they, people want to be a part of that community because I think it, it says I value my inner life.

44:40Emily Hickey:And so, yeah, I really agree, Elizabeth. I think that is what is driving that need for inner space and feeling real and valuable is what's driving not flammable, ephemeral culture, but the stuff that's really taking root where you can see it and think that's going to be a generational brand. Julie, what about from your angle? You are so good at putting things into culture. What are you feeling? It's really brilliant. No, it's a really interesting time in culture. I think we're in a little bit of a tweener time, right? I think, I think, I really do. I think we're like a little bit in a cusp of, I believe what Elizabeth said wholeheartedly.

45:18I actually think people are actually getting bored of their own phones, which is amazing. I'm seeing it happen. I think it's fascinating. What we're going to put in that void is really interesting. Look, I can tell you, I was thinking a lot about coming here and talking to you today. I was thinking about for me, what brand is my hero brand right now? You know what? The truth is, the New York Knicks have become my hero brand. And I will tell you, and for a million reasons, I will tell you that. But it's so interesting. Like when you ask what I'm craving, I feel like this basketball team has brought me back to life post COVID.

46:01I know it sounds crazy, but I was looking for a reason to live in this city and love being a New Yorker again and not feel divided by the different politics of different people on different street corners and all be rooting for the same thing and be in a place where there's a live experience and we're collectively going through the hero's journey together every night. and I have a common language that is like making my husband and I closer now because we have this thing we do together. And it's just fascinating to me. Like this brand has all the elements of like swagger and there's like style, love a tunnel walk, you know, and there's community and there's, you know, pride for New York.

46:47And when I think about all of those things, I really can't think of any other kind of brand or experience that is keeping me so engaged and feeling so connected and emotionally attached to something. And I think that's really interesting. I really tried to dissect that and think about it. But I think we crave experiences like that. And I and that is why I just think I think consumerism is different now. I think we need, you know, the calls to action have become bigger because we can do so many things in our home. You know, it's up to us to create things that people want to get out of their pajamas for, because we can all work in, you know, a sweater and our pajama pants neck down on Zoom.

47:26And it's really interesting. I think we're waiting for those new things to emerge. And I agree with Elizabeth. I think we're on the cusp of it. I think it's a really exciting time. Can I just tell you what my New York Knicks are? Oh, by the way, Julie, you did not mention the looks. That's the other thing that you love about the New York Knicks. Oh, yeah, the Tunnelwalk looks. I'm obsessed believe me the first thing it takes me the whole first quarter just to calm down and like after I've the whole garden gone through everybody's looks like it takes me one whole quarter to get through the looks before I can focus on the actual athleticism and that's the whole thing that's so I love that you're into it because I like to know who's there you know what I mean it's a whole thing I mean it's really a whole New York moment and we we love I mean it really, I'm back in love with this city because of it.

48:16You know what I love about basketball? It is so it is such embodied movement. Like those guys are in their bodies and they have tuned that and they are in sync with each other and in sync with that ball as they're moving. It's just, it's the it's and it's funny because like the two things that are making my life right now are embodied movement. And the place that I'm getting that is with Taryn Toomey at the class and Soraya, who used to work at SoulCycle. I am obsessed with what is going on in that room. It is like the most potent thing. And then the, the, like the yin to the yang is I am also living for five rhythms dance, which is, I go to this one in the East village with this guy named, well, whatever, it doesn't matter.

49:04There's lots of them all over the city. And honestly, it has made me fall back in love with New York because there's like, it feels so authentic and so real and so cathartic and so fun and so joyful and so challenging and so much aliveness and so weird and so wild and all the things. And so it's just, it's so funny how we found these places for each other, like for ourselves and our personalities.

49:29Emily Hickey:I love it, guys. I love it. it is so it's so you each of you and and so true you know and the knicks i mean i think the nba actually just in general is one of the coolest brands and it like it's just a cool brand and everything nba is just cool and and elizabeth yeah they're you know the physicality it's it's all a conversation around ephemeral social consumerism and ai that's what is our reaction to that i feel like really is dominating kind of human psychology right now and we get to have bodies and we get to have consciousness and to feel alive in a body and to struggle with something and you know like so that's and something weird you know i love that i love everything you just said that's awesome we all belong outside we're drawn to nature whether it's the recorded sounds of the ocean we doze off to, or the succulents that adorn our homes.

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51:26Emily Hickey:So then if we look at peoplehood, you started this in such a different way. This was not over lunch. Hey, let's go do something and buy a space and da, da, da, da. This was three years of research of looking at studying humanity, AA meetings and religious communities and the Harvard Happiness Study. And what did you guys learn about people? What was surprising about that? Are you glad that you spent that time? Did you learn about humanity doing that? And what were the key takeaways? First of all, everything is part of the journey, so I am glad that we did it. I think what we learned, I don't know if it was as much of a learning as a reconfirmation of kind of what we already knew in our souls.

52:15But what I think is really interesting, a big takeaway from SoulCycle was that everybody really wants to be heard. At the end of the day, people want to be heard. They want to feel valued. They want to feel like they're seen. They want to feel like they matter. You know, human beings acknowledging other human beings is really the foundation of life. And I think that's what we learned at SoulCycle, you know, behind those front desks, in those rooms with each other. Something as simple as an instructor giving someone a shout out, you know, making somebody's day. I mean, it's just really feeling seen, right?

52:49And so I think that we always kind of knew that. And I think, you know, to Elizabeth's point, you know, as we're seeing human being skills being sort of stripped out of our culture with over, you know, digital overuse, COVID hibernation, we kind of thought, well, what happens if community is actually the reason we come, right? We're not coming for exercise and then finding community. What we're doing is we're giving people the space and the structure and more importantly, the skills to communicate with each other, which I do think, you know, unfortunately, we teach people so many things. We go to school for so many years.

53:27We learn math that we'll never use again. We learn all sorts of things. Languages will never speak. But what we don't teach people is how to have healthy relationships, right? Which seems so fundamental. And so I think for us, what we learned as we spent all of this time researching was kind of how to relationship. We kind of codified the skill sets that you need to teach people how to be in healthy relationships. And I think mostly what we learned is that's teaching people active listening, giving people a chance, giving other people a chance to share, asking them probing questions rather than sharing your own opinions.

54:09You know, when you think they're done talking, ask them if there's anything else because there usually is, rather than telling them what you think they should do, giving your opinion, telling them what happened to you. And so we learned some really interesting techniques from some really interesting people. I think we learned about what it's like to share vulnerabilities so that other people feel comfortable to share vulnerabilities. A lot of skill sets that I think people would be very well served to not only learn, but practice. That's kind of always how we thought about peoplehood, kind of as a place to practice your human being skills.

54:45And so it was really valuable. And I think we took a lot away from it. I think it really helped us dissect some of the important elements of what we delivered in SoulCycle. And, you know, we ultimately wound up selling the business to Weight Watchers, and they're now using it to help reformat their, you know, their community workshops, which is great. And I would say we would do it again. Listen, a lot of it was during COVID. You know, for me personally, I've learned I like to create in a room with people. I don't like to create on a Zoom screen by myself. And I think we learned a lot. But, you know, that's what I would say about that.

55:19What do you want to share? I'm sorry, I'm rambling, Melissa. No, I honestly, I got, for me, it was everything that Julie said. And I think the takeaway was it was like getting a dose of humanity. And there's something really potent and super nourishing about having those kinds of experiences, especially with somebody you've never met before. And it made me like, I developed a lot of optimism and same at SoulCycle. But like, we just met so many good people. People are really like, there's a lot of very decent humans walking around this country. And it felt good to be in that kind of presence. And in terms of just like the learnings, you know, I think for me, I think for both of us, honestly, you know, the, the call to action has to be so strong.

56:10and people's experience of it has to be like so potent to develop that kind of habitual need. And there was an essence of this that was a little, what's the word I'm looking for? Not obvious. And so sometimes like I just kind of feel like people got it, but then they lost it. And I don't know, you know, I think that that was, that was just a piece of it that we kind of left us really still being curious about, you know, maybe how things could have gone a little deeper. That's not making any sense. But anyway, you can.

56:48Emily Hickey:Well, I think optimism. First of all, I just want to say I love what you said about optimism, because that is so important in life. And I think that all the time of like, like there are so many good people walking around. And so to spend that time kind of soaking that up and coming to that conclusion, I think is actually really nice. but you said something to me, Elizabeth and tell your, I, a while back, we were having coffee one time and you said, you know, I feel like if, if my husband and I, you referenced your divorce earlier, and we don't have to talk about this, Elizabeth, you don't want to, but I, this has just stuck with me for so long.

57:22Emily Hickey:You said, I feel like if we had been better listeners, if we had had really good active listening skills, we would have had a shot at staying together. And I've thought about that so many times because that is the thing of marriage is just it's this constant effort to hang on to each other you know and the role of listening in that and it's such a temptation in relationships to take the self-indulgent the thing that makes you emotionally feel indulged in the moment instead of targeting the long-term health of the relationship and doing the mature thing of just trying to get to that you know so i i i thought that was very that really moved me when you said that and so there was a kernel in what you guys were doing at people that I thought was like really beautiful, actually.

58:07Emily Hickey:That would have been a great service to humanity. You know, and it's so interesting. So two things about that. We actually did use, Alan and I did use that, and it really helped us for a long, long time. And I think maybe what I was referring to is if we had had that from the beginning, to Julie's point, like if you are teaching people how to be in relationship with each other, it's such a valuable skill to give and to really, and by the way, the reason why we even started thinking about this is because Julie and I were fighting and like, we couldn't fight and serve the brand because you can't have that kind of strife.

58:42And yet we're very different people. We, we were hit with, I mean, a tsunami of challenges and we had to learn from, we ended up learning this from our coach that we got very early on, which we also fought about. And she had us suspend our own positions to just shut the fuck up and try just and listen to the other person and get their world for five minutes, 10 minutes, not that long. And then we would do that for each other and leave it. Come back the next day and see what had shifted. And I am just saying that was really the seed and the kernel for why peoplehood got birthed, because we wanted to give people what they could get out of that room that you didn't have to have equipment to do.

59:51something so scalable that you could take with you and use in the boardroom, in your bedroom, in your, at your dinner table with at Thanksgiving, for God's sake, you know, all of those places that are, are, you know, can be a little landmine-ish and, and with no good reason. And it really changed, you know, how we related. It changed how we ended up training into the scale of the business. It changed how we taught the people at the front desk to find a yes. For people who came in people come in hot to retail establishments, they do not bring their best selves. And, you know, you've got a 19 year old standing behind the front desk trying to manage somebody's meltdown.

1:00:36And we have to give these guys something to be able to manage the situation that is going to work for them. And so we empower people like Like find a yes. It might not be the yes the person's looking for, but find a yes. And that is also just like a beautiful offering. That's like service. And so we really did all this work in service of our relationship because, like I said, I mean, it was a legit tsunami. And then it started to, you know, filter into the organization. And then it filtered into this next round of creation with Peoplehood. And I mean, I think it's time well spent.

1:01:19Emily Hickey:Yeah, I want to do it. I wish it still existed. I'll come find you. Let me say one thing to you. We also worked with these marital therapists that they are called Harville Hendricks and Helen LaKelley Hunt. And there's a book called Getting the Love That You Want. And my husband and I - I'm interrupting here because I love this story. but like it made me so mad that like my therapist who became spencer's therapist told him about the book before she told me i'm it's true it's true so my husband had a therapist at the time i'm sure he wouldn't mind me saying that who said listen it's no secret we talk about it all the time we had our first child and guess what we went from being two people that could do whatever the hell we wanted and then just come home and have fun together to being somebody had to be home to relieve the babysitter, right?

1:02:10And that's when the games began. And we did not know how to negotiate or communicate or compromise. Because up until that point, we were just two people that also had each other. And so Spencer's therapist said, here's a book, you should read it. If you like it, give it to Julie. And if you both like it, you should go and do this workshop. It was called Getting the Love You Want. And I recommend the book to anybody. And Helen and Harville actually They helped us on the Peoplehood Project. And they teach you how to have a conversation. And it's exactly what you said, Emily. It's about suspending your own disbelief and your wants and needs for the greater good of a relationship.

1:02:47And the conversation goes something like this, right? Hey, is now a good time for me to talk to you about why I hate the way that you load the dishwasher? And then, I just got home from work. I really don't want to talk about that right now. Okay, well, you have 24 hours to give me a time. So then I give you a time when I can have the conversation. Hey, is this a good time? Yes. Okay. When you load the dishwasher with all the knives and spoons and forks mixed up, it makes me pissed off because I unload the dishwasher. Great. So rather than me saying, well, I was at work all day. I don't care how you load the dishwasher.

1:03:19You're lucky I put my spoon in the sink. What I need to say to you is, so what I'm hearing you say is that you don't like it when I mix up the utensils because it makes your job harder. Yes, that is. Is there more? And then your partner will say yes, because I feel like I really do the lion's share of the workaround here. Got it. You feel like you do the lion's share of the workaround here. Of course, that's not what you want to say. You want to say, I also go to work all day. But you say, I understand. What you're saying to me is that you feel like you do the lion's share of the workaround here.

1:03:44Did I get all that? Is that right? Yes. And then I say, is there more? And then he says yes. Because when you mix up the utensils, it makes me feel like you don't appreciate me. And it reminds me of when I was little and there's always a something. It always distills down to a deeper emotional something. And what you find is that if you don't go and dig in and defend your own point because you need to be right or you need to win or it's just you don't want to spend the time. Ultimately, what winds up happening is you get you pop the balloon, right? You distill this down to a place of empathy. And then what winds up happening is you go, oh, my God, I love my husband.

1:04:28My husband's the best choice I ever made. I'm thinking, geez, I got that guy and all I have to do is sort the knives and forks and spoons and that's what's going to make him happy. Great. Do you know what I'm saying? It's like you can get it. I'm making you feel unappreciated or like when your parents got divorced and there was like, you know, unrest in your house and it's bringing you feelings of that all from the knives and spoons. And so it's amazing what happens when you actually, instead of defend your own point, when you take the time to just listen to somebody. And it's a really easy practice.

1:05:01And I will say, you know, and then I'll stop my big monologue. But I really do feel and I've been saying this a lot lately, Elizabeth, so I should say it to you. But I really feel like I'm such a lucky person in my life. I have been given two great teachers. One of them is Elizabeth Cutler and one of them is my husband. And I have done this work with both of them. And I will tell you, it has profoundly shifted the way that we have been able to grow together over years because, you know, we all speak the same language, which is really not what most people do. I mean, this is work that is very worth doing, but it's pretty amazing when you get to the place where you can communicate in that type of a way where you take your own ego and your own sort of need to win and you can just hear.

1:05:47It really shifts things dramatically. I actually think it was also part of the reason our business was so successful. You know, we would go into a room and we'd want to win. And by the time we'd slept on it, we were able to come back into that room and make a choice that was good for the business. And when that happened, everybody won.

1:06:04Emily Hickey:Yeah, everything you just said was so good, Julie. And I'm going to read that book. And it also reminds me, I've been meaning to have the dishwasher conversation with Sean for 20 years and running. So I've been... I would be happy to lose my glass out. I mean, geez, I would just leave, I would leave my things in the sink to grow mold. I could care less, but like, honestly, this whole thing with the silverware sorting, it's, it's a bit much, I think. I don't need it sorted. I just, it is chaos in the dishwasher. And so you can't fit anything. You know, there's just an argument for, Oh yes. I'm well aware of this.

1:06:42This is about life being filled with tiny miracles. And, you know, there is something really satisfying about just allowing the miracles to exist between the people that you love. And if the miracle is a dishwasher, just like you said, Julie, yay. At least you know how to do that.

1:06:58Emily Hickey:I love it. And it does. I know what you mean because Sean and I have been through those same kind of it boils down to something that is you're just so grateful for that person. So that's awesome. Okay. So I want to talk about cost and because, you know, we're talking about sort of pursuit and pursuing everything at once, a full, meaningful life and success and everything else. But there is a cost to choices that we make. And do you guys think, and maybe you could observe this about each other, or maybe you know personally, what did building SoulCycle cost you that it almost hurts to say out loud?

1:07:40You know, I think as a mother, the stakes are high. And, you know, I hate to make it, it's whatever, it just is. And I remember, you know, it's just, it's, you want to keep everything together. And like what it cost me, and Julie remembers this day, I, my husband had a very full-time job where he was expected to be in the office at 7am and didn't come home until 7pm. And here we had SoulCycle, you know, and two small children. And I was the one who took them to school in the morning. And then I would start my day, but I couldn't do pickup. And one day my four-year-old looked at me and she said, mommy, I want you to pick me up from school.

1:08:28And I said, honey, I, I can't, I can't pick you up from school. today. I have to work. But like, and I know that I'm doing this a lot right now, but I will be back. But I just can't do this right now. But I promise you, I promise you I'll be back. And she looks at me right in the eyeballs and she says, it will be too late.

1:08:52Oh, yeah. And it's like we have to weather those storms. Because that is a particular medicine that only we will receive. And everybody's going to get it. You know, whether you are staying at home with the kids, you'll get that own particular kind of medicine or whether you go out and you build a company. I mean, it's going to happen. And there is a sacrifice to your soul that happens because like, I know that I want to show up for that four-year-old like anything on planet earth but i know that i have not figured out how to be in two places at once and i'm not going to ever be in two places at once and so you know it's like sometimes you what's that is that even really a saying sometimes you eat the dog and sometimes the dog eats you i don't know if that's a saying but that is it's a saying i just don't think it's a thing that we have to live with what's that it's not a saying no no It's a saying, it's just not a saying that's applicable to this.

1:10:04It means something else. It does? Oh, boy. Now I'm afraid.

1:10:09Emily Hickey:I actually don't know what it means. So we'll count on Julie. Oh, my God. Anywho. Yeah, so that's an example. And I think that, you know, every parent, regardless of gender, is going to experience that. But I think that's particularly, like, potent for the moms of this world. I do, too. Yeah, that's been certainly my biggest pain as a trade-off. I mean, the other one, you know, we were talking, Elizabeth, about social life and the Ralph Lauren thing of when he was in the thick of it. He only had time for work and for his kids and his wife. And that was it. And he and Ricky were out walking through the neighborhood and there was a party that they should have been invited to.

1:10:52Emily Hickey:And he looked at her and said, they've forgotten us. and he was okay with it because that was a conscious, you know, trade-off that he had made is that this just was not a time he was going to have a social life. And that, that's another trade-off that I think I've, I have made that I'm not thrilled about, but certainly the more, the, the painful one is, is what you give up being a mom that you will never get back. And you just hope that it's made up for in, in the quality of the relationship that you have with your kids because you are a full person and you are doing what you need to do, whether it's financially for the family or for whatever it is.

1:11:32Emily Hickey:But yeah, it is tricky. Julie, what's your take on that cost? I mean, this is a really bad thing to say, but I don't feel that conflicted about it. You know, building SoulCycle, you know, was a thrill and a privilege and a child in its own way. And I was probably never going to be the mom that did pick up. Is that a terrible thing to say? Yeah. It just was not ever going to be in the cards for me. I have two girls. They 100 % know who I am. Maybe they think I'm a selfish beast, but I don't think so. And maybe I'm kidding myself. I mean, maybe I, maybe I haven't gotten there yet, but to me, I really feel like, was there a cost?

1:12:25Is there, was there a trade-off? Were there moments that I missed? There definitely were, but I do feel like I was able to be present throughout most of my kids, throughout most of my kids' years. And I think if there's any cost for me, it has been in the way that I have had the ability to take care of myself. Yeah. You know, for me, it has always sort of been about the fact that there's no real time. You know, I keep thinking about, you know, what am I going to learn when I stop working? What am I going to do? I heard Arthur, I was lucky enough to be in a small group that Arthur Brooks spoke to us the other day.

1:13:03And he was talking about having friends that are useless to you. Meaning friends that, you know, there's nothing you can get from them. There's nothing you can want from them. They're just useless in the best possible way. They're just there because you love them, right? And I think for me, the cost has always been, there's not a lot of things that I have pursued over the past few decades that are just useless, right? Whether it was learning to play tennis or learning another language or, you know, taking an extended meditation retreat or something. I wonder and I know that there are parts of myself that could be more developed just because, just because it would be interesting for me.

1:13:44And I look forward to kind of that chapter of my life where I can just learn obscure things and do all the things. But and that is probably the cost, probably physically and mentally. I have not expanded my own self or taken good enough care of myself. But other than that, you know, it's interesting. I was reflecting on it this morning. Today's my little daughter's 15th birthday. And I called my husband and I said, you know, it's funny. You know, it's there's a lot to be sad about when your youngest child is turning 15. But I feel like, honestly, I've enjoyed every day. I've enjoyed every part of it.

1:14:21You know, I've been blessed to have, you know, parents that have seen these kids along their way. You know, I have a partner that honestly has been more than helpful and supportive. And I think that's also been a gift for me that I can't underestimate that I've had a lot of freedom and latitude in my career because somebody else was also at home during times that I couldn't be. And so there was a cost. But for me, honestly, if I'm really being like selfish and honest, it's all been a thrill and a privilege and certainly one that I would do all over again. Agreed. Oh my gosh. I just remember when this is one other sort of thing that's so interesting.

1:15:05We have the smallest team and five of you. We had an anemic team. Five of them were pregnant at the same time. Not me. I was one of them, right? Yes. Yeah. How? And now those kids are 15. God, that is so fascinating. I will say, I will say, you know, we got really, we got really lucky with our kids and, and, and good partner and good partners while we were doing it. Yeah, for sure. Really, truly, really, truly. Yeah. Yep. That's key. I agree. So guys, I mean, we're, we're about

1:15:44Emily Hickey:wrapped up on time here, but I guess, you know, are you guys content? You know, you've been so successful. You lived very rich lives. And, or are you guys, do you still have a lot to do? And what do you, what do you, what is meaningful? What, what are you looking for in the next stretch of your lives? What are you seeking? I'm so content. I don't ever think I've been this content. I am so, I love my life and I have a lot more to do and I'm really excited about it. And I've been getting a lot of strong messages about what that is. And I cannot wait. It's really, it's really cool. I can't wait to hear about that, Elizabeth.

1:16:24Emily Hickey:And I guess quickly, how are you getting those messages? Do you have some kind of process for listening to yourself? Yeah, like anything. I mean, no, no, that's not true. I, yeah, I do deep rest meditation, which is basically lying down. And there's a woman named Jaya Ashmore who has open Dharma. and she does these online meditations. They're half an hour and they are the most restorative, most potent part of my week. I think I'm tapping into the limbic part of my brain. I can't even describe what it is, but I feel so nourished when I'm done with that. And then I get a lot of messages in those things.

1:17:06So that's not a big investment. And then I've just been doing a lot of movement to really see like what is in this body and I feel this huge again look here's the word awakening that is happening and I'm getting a lot of information and I think like this is I'm not the only one I think this is happening for a lot of people and I just think it's fascinating timing in terms of the zeitgeist and and and how this is all going to come together and what what will what we'll do as human beings who live in human bodies and with all of this enormous change that's going on and what we have what we have that we haven't even tapped into i mean has anybody ever done breath work i've been doing breath work for years but like i am always astonished what comes up as a result of breathing i've been breathing my whole life all of us have been breathing our whole lives and no idea that i could do these practices and get so much out of it it's fascinating so yeah between that and movement and meditation and i you know That sounds really woo, but I honestly, I also think that's kind of like a disregarding the potency of our human experience.

1:18:15I think there's something incredibly powerful about that. And I think that there's a lot for us to learn and it is just waiting for us to take notice.

1:18:25Emily Hickey:I'm going to check that out, Elizabeth. That sounds really, because I agree, I've been doing breathwork forever too, but not in that. Well, that's not true. Sometimes it has been a really helpful tool for opening up for listening to myself, but I'm going to check that out. That sounds open Dharma is what it's called. Yeah. Open Dharma. And you know, the other thing, like, and sometimes I get messages, like a recent message that I got was like, anything that's marginal moves to the margin. It's like clearing my own runway, you know, and then, you know, that'll kind of fade and I'll get another one in a few months, but it just like helps me just like Julie and I shared when we were thinking about like our own, like the building of this brand, like those messages for me are like literally about, I mean, it's not so weird.

1:19:09I never said this, but it's like building of my own internal brand. What am I investing in? What am I spending my time on? What am I doing to care for this? What am I doing to like align my channel with like what I need to be doing and who I need to know and how I need to know myself? It's, it's, I'm finding this very fascinating, clearly.

1:19:29Emily Hickey:I mean, I love the concept of personal brand and always trying to clarify that. And that's just, that's so cool. I'm happy for you, Elizabeth, that I really am. I'm glad you're in such a good place. And Julie, what about you? Are you content, done, still doing? You know, I think contentment and ambition can coexist. And that's actually the great thing about being older. Right. I'm so content with so many things. I feel so lucky in so many ways. You know, there are so many things that make me feel content these days. You know, I have a grown up daughter that's living abroad that I can go visit in another country and enjoy as a grown up.

1:20:09I have a younger child that's finding her way and growing up better than I expected. And yet I feel I still feel ambitious. And honestly, it's interesting. I'm I'm feeling more ambitious and curious than I even did five years ago, which is interesting. And, you know, part of me thought that I would be ready to be slowing down, but I don't really feel that way. And, you know, I also think. it's funny. I think often people's expectation is that, you know, at a certain point you slow down, you take the time, you've had an exit, you did that. And I've actually made peace with, you know, that my rhythm is motion, right?

1:20:48So for me, you know, my kind of contentment comes in staying engaged in, you know, curiosity and engagement and like living in the world and learning for me are part of my contentment. And so I am just tuned in to the messages that Elizabeth is receiving because I just do whatever Elizabeth receives. You know what? It's worked for me so far, Emily. I'm not straying far from that path. As soon as Elizabeth lets me know what she's received, I am also going to receive that and run right behind her the same way that I did 20 years ago. I will be dragging from her leg saying, take me with you.

1:21:27the funny thing about you coming to the realization that you're being in movement I feel like that came through almost like a meditative experience I think that's right I think that is right I think that um which is not your typical movement I remember I'm sorry I interrupted you but I'm having a memory about like two different kinds of sharks. Like there's one shark that has to keep moving and like will die if it stops moving. And that's the Julie shark. And then there are other sharks who learn how to sleep in a certain part of the ocean. And that's the Elizabeth part shark. Yeah, they're one great shark, Elizabeth.

1:22:07Together we are one great shark. People should watch out for that shark. That's quite a shark.

1:22:17I can't wait to see what you guys do next so I know we're at time guys we I had this

1:22:25Emily Hickey:cute little lightning round thing that I wanted to do which maybe we could try to do in like three minutes it's just three questions so just hot takes from the week as you guys know I spent the last week doing college visits with my son and now I'm in New York City and I've been on a

1:22:44Emily Hickey:So I'm pulling this just from my life of the last week. And so my first topic for you guys is airport bathrooms is something that is a constant source of, I get very upset. Like, and Elizabeth, as you being, you know, with your Buddhist background, there is a precept of leaving a place cleaner than you found it. And there, anytime you have to open like four stalls to get to one that's actually clean enough to, like, I just get really fired up about this. What do you think is going on with women's bathrooms? Like, why is there not the feeling? Some huge percentage of the population doesn't feel like they need to clean up after themselves.

1:23:24Emily Hickey:Have you guys noticed this? Yes, I find it. I find it. It's damaging to my day. But I was laughing from the airport bathroom because Julie is a very nervous flyer. Is that OK if I say that? By the way, yeah, I'm getting a little bit better. I know. I'm so proud of you. Yes. During the SoulCycle days, she was not. I'm still not a good flyer. So when you said airport bathroom, I mean, all I could think about was flying with Julie. Oh, yeah. Elizabeth really loves me. It was not easy in the day. She used to carry stacks of SoulCycle free passes so that she could bribe other passengers on the plane to trade seeds, to like do nice things for me.

1:24:12It was like a whole thing. But I actually think it depends on the airport. Like SFO, clean bathroom. Yeah. New Newark, looking pretty good. You know, go land, you know, it really depends on the airport and the bathroom. Listen, it's a cultural thing, right? I mean, go to Japan, you take the coffee cup that you, you know, when you buy a takeaway coffee, it's like you own the cup at the end and have to carry it around in your knapsack until you get to your own house. There's no public, you know that, right? In Japan, like there's no, there are no trash cans on the street. And once you buy like a takeaway something, you own that piece of trash.

1:24:46So it's a cultural thing. That trash is your personal property. So there's no trash cans on the street. There's nothing like that. You hold it, you own it until you get home. The place that you bought it is not taking it back from you, but there is a personal sense of taking care of trash and public spaces, you know, as if they were your own home and it exists and it is a culture. And for whatever reason, you know, we and our culture don't, don't think about it like that. And that's really too bad. So, so, so what's, so what's the take on that? The take is it's, it's, it really, it's, to me, it depends on the airport actually you know what the toilet is wipe the toilet seat there's x unless there's no paper you should be wiping the toilet seat if it needs to be wiped i want to tell you public restrooms at madison square garden looking great really yes ma 'am you can find me at the rest you can find me at the women's bathroom at gate 108 spotless i want to come

1:25:49Emily Hickey:game with you sometime julie next next trip through you know and and secondly guys you know what are you advising your kids you know to do to think how to think about ai and graduating from college and job thinking and you know what what's your advice to them

1:26:11the silence is deafening no it's not it's i i i think i just really think like people figure it out. Yeah. You know, I know there's a lot colliding. I get it. You know, maybe I'm being a Pollyanna here, but I just think like, I don't underestimate human resilience. I don't underestimate our creativity. I don't underestimate our ability to think about things differently and to find something new. It's something that we've been doing for, you know, thousands of years. Like we're going to figure this out. It's maybe clunky. It may be difficult. There may be a lot of stuff that comes along with it.

1:26:49I mean, in terms of what I'm saying to my children, my eldest daughter has figured it out. She's figured it out. What she wants to do, she loves working at a women's health center. She wants to go to nursing school. I think she's going to be in good shape with that. I think there's a lot of AI tools that will support that. We're still going to need nurses. Great. My younger one, I don't know what she's going to do, but I'm really excited to find out. Like she'll figure it out.

1:27:14Emily Hickey:Yeah, I agree. I think it's all going to be okay. You know, look, for me, it's like, I am really working on building children with high EQ. Yes. By the way, that goes without saying. Yes, Julie. You know, it's like, to me, it's like, what does the thank you note look like that you're sending somebody? What is the follow-up here with the person that gave you a shot? How can you go above and beyond? I don't care what it is you're doing, but like when you are given an opportunity, how is somebody going to remember you? And I just feel like it doesn't matter what opportunity crosses their path, what gift somebody gives them, whatever it is, like teaching them to have above average EQ skills to make sure that people remember them and feel like they like feel good when they leave them.

1:28:05Or, you know, That is what I am interested in raising these kids about because whatever they decide to do, those are skills that are never going away. We will always need to navigate organizations. We will always need a lucky break. We will always need to build teams and networks, whether we're using them to leverage AI or not. And so for me, it is just really about teaching these children. It's like, you know, my youngest daughter, like, I hope she gets good grades. I'm way more interested in the fact that she's joined the school play. She's on the student council. And she's on the soccer team.

1:28:37She's learning collaboration. She's learning creativity. And she's learning like, you know, societal responsibility. Those things for me right now, I think that we're going to have a major shift in education. I see it coming. I see, you know, higher education. Some schools are adapting to it and some schools aren't. But what we really need to center on is teaching our kids how to be like human beings that can interact in the world in a very proficient way, because those are the people I think will win.

1:29:04Emily Hickey:The point well taken, I think, Julie. They'll probably be part of the solution. Correct. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Okay. Well, guys, let's wrap there. I could literally talk to you guys all day. You are so awesome. You guys have so much capacity and you're so energizing to talk to. And I truly hope that we get a chance to build something together. And so happy for you guys with everything that you've accomplished in your life. And you've given so much to the world. And I truly can't wait to see what's next. So thank you guys. So the message she's coming back for us, message, and then she's going to give us the call and then we're going to know what it is, Emily.

1:29:45Oh, we're going, we're already going. It's already happening.

1:29:49Emily Hickey:I'm jumping in. I'm catching. Trust this one's messages. They don't.

1:29:56Emily Hickey:I know that. Hi, Emily. I'm just so happy to spend this time with you. I have to say, I really enjoyed listening to your podcasts. And I think that your insights are so important for people trying to figure out how to make heads or tails of what's going on. You always give good advice and it's really clear and it's actionable. And those things are so important. So thank you for your service. Same. That really means a lot to me, Elizabeth. Thank you. Thank you so much. That really does.

1:30:31Thanks for tuning in. This has been a presentation of Cadence 13 Studios. I hope you'll listen, follow, rate, and review all of our episodes, which are available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey, or wherever you get your podcasts.