Success Story: Unite Health Grad, Jo, Opens Own Pilates Studio, The Core Cartel

APPI Pilates Instructor Certification grad, Jo, sat down with Unite Health to chat about all things Pilates - from her transition from a demanding corporate job to living her dream life owning her very own Pilates studio, The Core Cartel. Now 6 months old, her studio has seen tremendous success and is showing no signs of slowing down. 

With plans to expand both locally and interstate, Jo is proof that when you go after what you want, you can have both professional success, and personal fulfilment. 

What was your professional background prior to your entry into Pilates?

In the time leading up to my course, I was working at the head office of Coles Liquor managing the alcohol B2B there. It was during the second year of covid in 2021 that I started to think about other options, and what else I could do. It was then that I started studying Nutrition. Alongside that, I had been doing Pilates for a long time and always loved it. 

About 5 years ago I thought about buying a Pilates franchise, then started working at Coles and all that went out the window with covid. From there I became much more interested in doing something for myself, rather than working for someone else. Studying Nutrition I thought I could marry that and Pilates together, so I put together the business plan for The Core Cartel and it’s honestly been the best thing I ever did. 

Initially I wasn’t planning to be an instructor, that wasn't part of my overall plan, but then the more I looked into it the more I realised that you’ve got to be really hands-on when running a studio in order for it to be successful, especially when it’s stand alone. You need to know the people that are turning up to train with you and the best way to achieve that is to actually train them. 

So that’s what led me to Unite Health. I’m so thankful that I signed up and did the APPI Pilates Instructor Certification with you guys. The Core Cartel is 6 months old now, and it’s just been the most amazing, exhilarating ride, I’m just so proud of it and it’s been really a great success too which is amazing. 

When did you first develop an interest in Pilates? 

I’ve been practising Pilates for roughly about 13 years and I always loved it. What I noticed through the covid lockdowns was that it was the one thing that I missed the most. I mean I could still go out and walk, I could work from home, so nothing else was missing in my life except Pilates. I realised how important it was to my mental health and my physical health. 

When I was studying Nutrition I wondered how I could marry that together with something else I love, which was Pilates. The nutrition side of the studio is just an add on. I have quite a few clients at the studio that use it to aid their health so it’s been a really good marriage. We’ve got infrared saunas as well so it’s like a little wellness centre that we’ve set up there. But Pilates was definitely the motivating factor to start the business, the Nutrition I figured was a good back end option for our clients. 

Why did you choose Unite Health as your Pilates teacher trainer? 

I looked around and I asked around and basically everyone recommended the APPI Pilates Instructor Certification with Unite Health, so it was more of a word of mouth thing for me which is the way I tend to operate. If someone I respect and trust gives me a recommendation I’m much more likely to go with that. 

So I looked into the Pilates course and spoke with someone at Unite Health and they gave me a breakdown of the course. The thing that was the most important for me, was that I could do the intensive option and complete it as a full time condensed opportunity, which worked really well for me, because I had deadlines and timelines that I needed to meet. 

To be perfectly honest I was sold just based on the feedback that I’d had from other instructors I’d spoken to who had trained with Unite Health. So that was the reason that I decided to go with you. 

So from thinking about buying a franchise, you ended up opening your own studio. Talk me through that process? 

I live in the area so I knew there was a little hole in Camberwell. I also knew what I wanted from a studio, I was clear on the way I wanted it to feel. The looks weren’t as big a deal to me, there’s a lot of beautiful studios out there but for me, that wasn’t the be all and end all.

It’s about how you make your clients feel, it’s about the follow up, it’s about being able to address their injuries, it’s about knowing their name. When I was looking to set it up I wanted to make sure we got this one right, but the business plan was always to open additional studios. 

So we’re looking for sites at the moment and there’s a focus to open in Queensland as well. I've got very clear motivations around how I want The Core Cartel to be rolled out. It won’t be franchised, anyone that works in the business will have an ownership of the business with me and we will manage together ongoing, so that we can keep control of all the things that are really important to us. 

Pilates, nutrition and infrared saunas - which are really good for pain relief, and have been a really fantastic addition to what we do - are the three components we’ll focus on as we roll out the additional studios.

What do you love most about Pilates? 

There’s so much! There literally is, I am the best sales person for it! 

I grew up playing basketball, which I played for years and years. When I finished that I found it difficult to find something else that was competitive and was something I loved. And whether you like it or not, Pilates is extremely competitive - you’re competing with yourself. When I’m doing Pilates my aim is to never stop. To push through and hold the exercise for longer, or go up a spring or down a spring depending on what you’re doing. So it's really competitive for me. 

Why I really love it for me personally, is because I feel so invigorated after a class. Why I love Pilates in general is that anyone can do it. You don’t have to have any fitness level, and it doesn’t matter your age. 

What I’ve loved most about opening The Core Cartel is that we’ve had a beautiful buy in from the community that we’re in. The thing that I love the most is that mums train with their children, dads train with their children and couples train together. We have one particular family where all 5; the mum, the dad, and 3 daughters all train together.

There’s not a lot of exercise that’s really good for you where you see that. Where you see a whole family turn up and all get a brilliant work out, all be exhausted when they leave and all enjoy it. That’s the bit I didn’t foresee when I opened the studio. That's the reason I love Pilates - anyone can do it. 

What is your favourite Pilates exercise? 

I’m all about the core. I’m a core bandit, so I love anything that solidly focusses on my core.  

Ok so being a core bandit, that must have inspired the name of the studio? 

I always loved the word cartel and I wanted this to be a movement. And we have our tagline which is ‘get addicted’ so it kind of all fits in. Everyone that comes into the studio is definitely addicted now! When your core is strong and healthy, generally the rest of your body follows suit. So core is definitely something I wanted in the name. We’ve had people give us a lot of feedback on the name and people really like it. 

What is the best thing about working in the Pilates industry?

As cliche as this is going to sound, it’s the people. The trainers that are working with us are gorgeous, I just love them all. It's interesting coming from a corporate environment that is often stressful and deadline driven and you have to chase budgets and all those things that have an anxious feel to it. But what I love about the studio is that everyone is happy to be there. They’re in a good mood, if they’re not when they arrive at the studio, they’re in a good mood when they leave. 

The vibe we have at the studio is such a positive one and everyone is so friendly. So the people have made the whole experience with our studio what it is and it’s one of the reasons I love what I'm doing. Whether it’s an instructor or a client, everyone’s got a really positive focus and we’re all after the same thing and that’s to feel good about ourselves and to get stronger. 

What makes The Core Cartel unique?

Personally from my perspective what I think we do outstandingly well is knowing our clients, and we pass client information on to every instructor. So if you come to a class with myself or one of my other instructors they will know your injuries, they will know your limitations, they will know any modifications we need to make for you in a class. 

We’ve got a really high retention rate in the studio and we’ve got a high rate of people referring us to family and friends. And I think it’s for that reason, it’s because we care. If people aren’t coming into the studio we send them a note to make sure they’re ok. If they’re injured we check on them to make sure they’re progressing alright and if there’s anything we can do in the meantime. We’ve got clients we service one on one because they don’t speak english very well so they can still train but not feel overwhelmed in the class.

We’re just very focussed on our clients and making sure that their needs are met. We’ve also got a bookclub, we have drinks every couple of months, and all of these things are really well supported. We’ve got a plank challenge going on at the moment and there’s nearly 200 people that have put their name on the wall since November. The buy-in from our clients is a reflection of the care we take with them. And I'm sure most studios would do that but we’ve made that our primary vision, to make sure we know everyone that walks through the door. 

The beautiful thing is, when I set up the studio I was more inclined to think that our demographic would be 35+ but we’ve got a huge percentage of clients that are 18-25 and the great thing about these clients is that they had never done Pilates before. They’re now bringing in their boyfriends and groups of friends. So what we’ve done, and what we love, is if a group is training together we promote them on our Insta and they love that.

Our socials are very real and our community loves that. We’ve got women my age that just love the fact that they’re training with these youngins as well. And they all come to the book club and give us a different perspective on life. We do have that personal feel with every client. 

How would you describe your classes and teaching style? 

I am much more like a personal trainer than a Pilates instructor. We’ve got 13 beds and we literally walk around and watch what every single client is doing, watching their form, correcting them, and we now know each client so well that we’ll tell them if they need to go up a spring, we’ll tell them they need to step it up. So my selling point is that I like to really engage with my clients. The music is daggy because I’m old so my music is always really daggy, but my classes are hard. And in the end clients say to me ‘that was so hard!’ and I’m like yeah that’s what we want. We want to challenge you but make it fun.

I think of myself more like a personal trainer because we literally focus on every individual client in the class to make sure they get everything they want out of each class, so that they leave exhausted but feeling like they’ve worked out the way they wanted to at the end of class. 

What advice would you give to an aspiring instructor or studio owner? 

To the prospective instructors: If you’ve got a passion for Pilates just do the APPI Pilates Instructor Certification. It’s such a well thought out and set out course. I did the intensive option so, if you have three weeks and want to change your life, sign up. Do it. I am so thankful that I did. 

The other thing as the owner of a studio, if someone calls in sick you can go and fill in. So it’s really valuable in that capacity. I just love seeing people get stronger and feel good about themselves. We’ve been open for 6 months now and I’ve seen clients that struggled to plank on their knees who can now toe plank for over 3 minutes. So this is the progression, if you love people and you want to bring out the best in people, do the course. 

In terms of the business, I don’t think you can run a Pilates studio and not work in it, that’s my personal opinion. Because you don’t get the hands-on feel with the clients when you’re not in there at least a couple of shifts a week. So if you’re thinking about opening a studio, I think you’d be mad not to do the course. 

How do we book a class at The Core Cartel? 

Download The Core Cartel app. Jump on and book through that. If anyone wants to come as a result of this interview, please contact me and let me know you’re coming in. We will remember you, trust me we remember everyone that walks through that door!