Advertise on podcast: In Person

How do you build a fitness career that belongs to you, not to the studio you teach at? Starr Hawkins, known online as Baby Momma Fit, has spent nearly ten years teaching classes and building an audience online. She started out working the front desk of a fitness studio, became a trainer at Barry's, and now has 130K followers, sold out classes at Mimi Yoga and a Pilates teacher training that has become her most lucrative revenue stream. In this episode, Starr shares how she built her own brand while teaching inside other people's studios, and how she turned that brand into paid work. Lucy and Starr cover: - Building your personal brand when the studio wants you to wear theirs - How to negotiate your rate with a studio, even without a big following - Why her Pilates teacher trainings out-earn her classes - Charging brands one rate for showing up and another for posting - Pitching brands you already use, from the hospital that covered her birth to Raising Cane's sponsoring her marathon - Why celebrity clients matter less than your 7 a.m. regulars - What to do when a post goes viral for the wrong reasons - The mom fitness market that is still wide open Starr also opens up about how getting sober led her into fitness, bringing her daughter to every class while she built her career, and doing it all again with a new baby. If you're building a career teaching in-person classes and want it to grow beyond the studio you teach at, this one is for you. Connect with Lucy: IG: https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles IG: https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast Apply to work with Lucy and grow your IRL community events business: https://communitybuildingcollective.com/ Connect with Starr: IG: https://www.instagram.com/babymommafit Links: https://linktr.ee/Babymommafitness Take her classes at Mimi Yoga in The Grove, Aventura and Wynwood Chapters 00:00 Intro 00:47 Building a Brand by Being Real Online 04:25 Her Upbringing and Getting Sober 11:16 Early Days at Barry's as a Young Mom 15:32 Balancing Work With a New Baby 18:18 Advice for Moms Getting Into Fitness 20:30 How Baby Momma Fit Started 23:29 Why Pilates Trainings Are Her Biggest Revenue Stream 26:28 Building Your Own Brand Inside a Studio 29:42 How to Negotiate Your Rate With a Studio 31:45 Social Media Tips and Going Viral for the Wrong Reasons 37:25 Brand Deals With Jackson Hospital and Raising Cane's 39:48 Show-Up Rates, Posting Rates and Charging What You're Worth 44:57 Do Celebrity Clients Move the Needle? 48:25 ClassPass and the Dream Dinner Party

An inside look at what it takes to leave something you love for the next chapter. In this first solo episode of In Person, Lucy Nelles, co-founder of Coffee & Chill Miami and founder of Community Mastery, takes you through the full story of building one of Miami's biggest wellness communities, why she is stepping away, and what comes next. Lucy moved to Miami five years ago with no friends and no network, and found a social scene built around alcohol. She quit her remote 9-to-5, started hosting alcohol-free Hi Vibe Wellness events, and in 2023 met Eric, the attendee who would become her Coffee & Chill Miami co-founder. She breaks down how they brought Coffee & Chill from an LA backyard to Miami in three weeks, and grew it into 250 people at the first event, to 2,000 guests at an event six months later. She shares how she built the paid sponsor system, and earned equity in the company. She also gets into the core memories: going from an F1 cease and desist to an official Formula 1 partnership, the Miami Dolphins' first-ever sober tailgate inside Hard Rock Stadium, Camp Chill as Art Basel's largest wellness event, and partnerships with some of the biggest brands. Finally, Lucy opens up about the transition, why change is hard even when you're ready, and why she is going all in on Community Mastery to give community builders a home and empower the next 10,000 communities. If you've ever built something you love and had to decide what's next, this one is for you. Connect with Lucy: IG: https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles IG: https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast Apply to work with Lucy and grow your IRL community events business: https://communitybuildingcollective.com/ Chapters 00:00 — Intro 01:07 — Moving to Miami and Starting High Vibe Wellness 03:42 — How Coffee and Chill Began 06:17 — Launching Coffee and Chill Miami 10:15 — Midroll Ad 11:27 — Growing to Austin and New York City 13:33 — Top Events and Core Memories 20:24 — The Community We Built Together 21:13 — Why I'm Leaving Coffee and Chill 22:12 — What's Next: Community Mastery 25:06 — Closing

What actually happens when a Type-A planner goes to Burning Man for the first time? In this episode of In Person, Lucy Nelles sits down with Daniel Di Lucia, her partner of eight years and co-founder of Community Building Collective, to debrief their week at Burning Man: Lucy's first burn and Daniel's second. Daniel first went in 2023, the year of the mud burn, expecting the greatest party on earth. He came home with a realization that sparked an intensive deep dive into personal development, gave him the push to go all in on building his own business, and made him determined to one day bring Lucy with him. Lucy and Daniel walk through the full experience from start to finish: the planning that began in January, the intentions they set as a couple the night before driving in, prepping in Reno, building a home in their RV, and what they actually spent, between $30,000 and $40,000 all in, plus why you don't need to spend anywhere near that. They also dive into surviving the mud burn with no way to reach home, the welcome ritual for first-timers, sunrise at Robot Heart, a sound bath in the middle of a whiteout dust storm, the truth about the dust, consent and the biggest misconceptions about the event, alcohol versus psychedelics, the temple burn, why Gen Z isn't showing up, and decompressing in Lake Tahoe. For community builders, this is a look inside an 80,000-person city built almost entirely by the people who attend it. Lucy and Daniel break down what it gets right: guests who contribute instead of just consuming, core values people actually live by, presence engineered by taking away the phone, and why profit and impact go hand in hand. If you're building experiences that bring people together in real life, this conversation shows what in person can feel like at its most extreme. Connect with Lucy: IG: https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles IG: https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast Connect with Daniel Di Lucia: IG: https://www.instagram.com/daniel.dilucia/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-di-lucia-818256137 Chapters 00:00 — Intro 00:38 — A Couple's Burning Man Debrief 01:33 — Daniel's First Burn 04:12 — Why It's More Than a Party 05:02 — The Hoffman Process and Quitting His Job 07:22 — Why Burning Man Sparks Transformation 08:46 — Surviving the Mud Burn 10:20 — A Week Without Any Contact 12:29 — Untethered From the Default World 14:17 — Why Daniel Wanted to Bring Lucy 14:46 — The Ultimate Community-Led Event 16:37 — Lucy's Fears Before Her First Burn 18:58 — Nerves Before the Trip 20:28 — Setting Intentions Without a Plan 22:52 — Arriving on the Playa 24:43 — The Ritual Every Couple Should Do Before Going 28:13 — The Sound Bath on Night Seven 29:35 — Sunrise at Robot Heart 30:48 — Finding the Perfect Daily Rhythm 32:13 — Why You Should Go All In on Outfits 33:04 — The Random Magic of the Playa 34:29 — Why It Never Feels Crowded 36:00 — The Biggest Misconceptions About Burning Man 38:51 — The Truth About the Dust 41:31 — Lost in a Daytime Dust Storm 43:28 — Hitching a Ride on an Art Car 46:16 — Alcohol vs. Psychedelics 49:31 — The Temple 52:24 — The Silence of the Temple Burn 54:10 — What They Spent to Go to Burning Man 55:20 — How They Planned the Trip 58:07 — Event Lessons for Community Builders 59:32 — Getting Guests to Contribute, Not Consume 1:02:02 — Why Stacked Values Create Meaning 1:03:53 — Why Gen Z Isn't Showing Up 1:05:36 — Why Profit and Impact Go Hand in Hand 1:07:34 — Decompressing After the Burn 1:10:02 — Their Biggest Takeaways 1:13:18 — Will Lucy Go Back?

What does it actually take to leave a successful career and build your dream business from the ground up? In this episode of In Person, Lucy Nelles sits down with Aly Barraza, founder of Wild Thing, one of Miami’s fastest-growing yoga studios, to break down what it really looks like to open a brick-and-mortar wellness business. After a decade-long career in engineering, Aly left her six-figure job to go all in on a vision she couldn’t ignore. She shares the financial reality behind that decision, raising capital, signing a lease, navigating construction and permit delays, and building Wild Thing while betting on herself before there was any guarantee it would work. Lucy and Aly walk through the process from the very beginning: creating the pitch deck, finding investors, negotiating with a landlord, choosing what to spend money on, designing a five-star customer experience, and launching in a saturated Miami fitness market. They also dive into how Wild Thing built hype before opening, attracted nearly 1,000 people to its launch, landed partnerships with brands like Nike and Alo, negotiated its way onto ClassPass, and turned intentional design, hospitality, instructors, and community into a profitable business in its first year. This episode is a practical look at what happens behind the beautiful studio, the packed classes, and the brand partnerships—and what it takes to build an in-person experience people genuinely want to return to. Connect with Lucy:IG: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles⁠⁠ IG: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast ⁠⁠ Apply to work with Lucy and grow your IRL community events business: ⁠⁠https://www.communitybuildingcollective.com⁠⁠ Connect with Aly Barraza:IG: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/alybyoga⁠⁠ Wild Thing IG: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/wildthingmiami/ ⁠⁠ Web: ⁠⁠https://wildthingyoga.com/⁠

What happens after you achieve the entrepreneurial success you thought would make you happy?In this episode of In Person, Lucy Nelles sits down with Aaron Spivak, co-founder of Founders Club & Hush (sold for $48M), Forbes 30 Under 30, and an entrepreneur who has built three companies—including one to eight figures in just 24 months.After selling Hush at 25, Aaron found himself with something he hadn’t expected: success, money, and no one around him who truly understood the experience. That loneliness eventually led to a series of founder dinners—and ultimately to building Founders Club.Aaron breaks down how those early dinners evolved into an eight-figure community, why he believes community should create an unreasonable amount of value, and the systems Founders Club uses to protect the quality of its members as it scales.Lucy and Aaron dive into membership vs. ticketed events, pricing premium communities, member retention, using data and AI to identify disengagement, designing admissions incentives, attracting more female founders, building a team, and the one metric Aaron believes every community business should track.They also unpack the human side of building businesses and what makes people actually connect in a room. For Aaron, the best communities don’t just gather great people—they intentionally help them make friends, feel seen, and build relationships they’ll remember long after the event is over.Connect with Lucy:IG: https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles IG: https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast Apply to work with Lucy and grow your IRL community events business: www.communitybuildingcollective.comConnect with Aaron Spivak:IG: https://www.instagram.com/spivak/Web: https://www.foundersclubofficial.com

What does it really take to build a community people want to keep showing up for? In this episode of In Person, Lucy Nelles sits down with Mimi, founder of Mimi Yoga and Pilates, to talk about the journey from discovering yoga during one of the hardest periods of her life to building a thriving wellness brand with three Miami locations and hundreds of teacher training graduates. Mimi shares what pushed her to make the leap from teacher to studio owner, why community—not customers—is at the center of everything she builds, and what she has learned about expanding locations, hiring the right instructors, creating a strong team, and knowing where to invest when opening a physical space. They also get into the business behind boutique fitness: ClassPass, memberships, teacher trainings, brand partnerships, personal branding, handling negative reviews, and why Mimi made the decision to stop filming during classes even when social media exposure could benefit the business. Beyond the strategy, Mimi opens up about grief, vulnerability, motherhood, relationships, therapy, and the philosophy that has shaped both her life and her business: the magic is in showing up. If you're building a studio, hosting experiences, growing a community, or trying to turn something you deeply care about into a real business, this conversation is full of lessons on what it means to lead with conviction while continuing to evolve. Connect with Lucy: IG: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/lucelianelles⁠ IG: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/inpersonpodcast⁠ Apply to work with Lucy and grow your IRL community events business: https://communitybuildingcollective.com/ Connect with Mimi Ghandour: IG: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/mimiyoga_official/?hl=en⁠ Web: ⁠https://www.mimiyoga.com