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Being STRONG is more than just how much weight you can lift.
The Strong New York Podcast is dedicated to inspiring you to become your strongest self- in the gym, in business, in relationships and in life.
Join Kenny as he sits down with his strong as fuck buddies and shoots the shit on what it takes to be strong willed, strong minded and physically strong. Season one features everyone from entrepreneurs and local business owners to doctors and industry leaders in the fitness and wellness space.
With over a decade of experience, Kenny Santucci has made himself known as one of New York City’s top trainers and a thought leader in the health and wellness industry. After transforming his life at 15 years old through fitness, Kenny made it his mission to transform the lives of those around him.
Kenny has trained some of Hollywood’s biggest stars, including Jon Bon Jovi, Liev Schreiber, and Frank Ocean, and has been tapped as a fitness expert sharing his training approach with Men’s Health, Men’s Journal, Runner's World, SHAPE, Well+Good, among other publications.
Kenny is the creator of STRONG New York, NYC's only Health and Fitness Expo. Strong New York is an immersive day of workouts, wellness experiences, panel discussions, and inspiring conversations with the best in-class wellness professionals, industry leaders, and change makers who are sharing their expertise on today's hottest wellness trends and first-hand experiences on how to optimize your overall health and life.
You can find Kenny at The Strength Club, his private training and group strength training facility in the heart of Manhattan located on 28th and 5th Ave in New York City.
Oh, we're good. Okay. Welcome back to another episode of the strongest podcast. I am your host Kenny Santucci. And as always we are talking about how strong you have to be to live in the busiest, craziest city in the world, which is New York. And today we have a young lady who is the founder and CEO of chill house.
If you don't know what it is, go check it out. It's right in Tribeca. Great space. I've actually been there myself and had a phenomenal massage. My friend Cindy Ramirez. Thank you so much for coming on the strongest podcast. Let's jump right into it.
Thank you for having me
Thank you so much for coming. Um, so With starting a business here, you know, you started, uh, very traditionally, right?
You had a blog and then you jumped right into the brick and mortar. Give us some of the harder times that you came up when you were starting to do this. Because having brick and mortar, you have to deal with so much shit. You have to deal with the landlord, you have to deal with the city. What was that like transitioning from what you thought was enjoyable to now this?
Big project with a lot of overhead.
Yeah. Um, definitely not for the weak of heart or the faint of heart, I'd say having a physical space, but, you know, you touched on this blog that I had back in the day. And I think for me, it was always, I wanted to have a physical space. It felt just like A real kind of coming home, like for me to actually be able to open something and make something, you know, like a concept and kind of put it now in like the physical manifestation of it.
It was like a dream come true. Um, but. Yeah, what are some of the things that we dealt with? I mean, back in the day, it was 2017, there were really no rules around, like, you know, this kind of cafe and nail salon hybrid, and we just, like, kind of opened it thinking that we would kind of fly under the radar with, like, the health department, and we ended up definitely not flying under the radar.
We were, like, immediately, like, flooded with customers. Amazing press and like, obviously like a lot of people walk through the doors. And I think at some point, you know, the health department came in and they're like, what are you doing? You can't have a cafe next to your nail salon. So things like that.
And we didn't,
what is the rules and regulations around that?
There weren't any. So we're like, Oh, like, I think it's okay. Let's try it out. I mean, we had non toxic polish. We did non acetone nail remover. Like we, we did things as clean as possible so that we would be kind of like, Uh, you know, with the keeping in mind that we had a cafe and we're gonna put out like some small bites and obviously like beverages, but yeah, it was never, uh, you know, something that we, uh, I guess accounted for was this idea that we would have to reconfigure the entire space because the health department was wouldn't be, you know, Okay with this.
So things like that, that was like immediately two months in, it becomes a whole thing. We don't have enough cash reserves to actually fund this. So it's like, you know, Adam and I, my husband and I like going into our own pockets to try to figure this out. It's, it's that, and it's, it was so much of that for so many years and so many, you know, little like just things that you don't even, Fathom could happen to your business like pipes bursting during winter Uh, we had multiple floods in that space in particular.
I feel like this space was cursed
So give us give us a little backstory for those who don't know. I know you started on the lower east side
Backstory you started on the lower east side Um on essex street between rivington and stanton great little storefront,
but all those buildings are shit. They're 200 years old
We also didn't know that we would be, um, we're the back of a residential building or we were in the back of a residential building.
So all of the trash was like on in front of our storefront and yeah, like rats, like people, like homeless people would like throw up. And like, it was just like. Just disgusting at times. I'm like, I'm trying to build a beautiful sanctuary. This is not really part of the aesthetic that I'm going for. So it was, you know, just chaos, like the standard, traditional New York city chaos from the get go.
And eventually I was like, I don't think the space is going to work for us. We tried to keep it around for as long as we could, of course, because you know, you have contracts, you have leases. Um, but then COVID happened. So yeah, a lot changed.
So you signed that lease in.
The, so 2017 we had the, we opened the small space and then 2019 we opened up a bigger brick and mortar in 2019.
And the idea is that we would keep both. We have, so at some point we actually transformed the Lower East Side space to a face and body studio. Um, and then that was very short lived because that was around COVID times, like right before COVID really hit. And so.
Now you open this beautiful space in Tribeca.
Um, I look at it all the time because I actually
Soho.
Is it Soho?
Yeah, it's above Canal.
Okay. Yeah. So it's right there on the map.
It's right there. It's like in the
I, I train a, a guy at a building right across the street so I always look at it, I always see it.
Yeah.
And it's a, it's a great space, but you opened that in 2019.
Yes. COVID hits, what's going through your head?
Oh my god, I was like, uh, I mean, and my husband and I, we own bars too, we can get into that. So, yeah, no, we had to close all of our physical spaces, as you know, it was like, uh, really, really unprecedented times. Uh, with no answers, no one could, you know, no real rule.
Book for how to navigate such a crazy time that no one has ever experienced in their lifetime so yeah, it was very much just a game of like surrendering and kind of leaving things up to The government and fate too. It's like you can kind of sit around and wait for things to Be handed to you or be told This is what you have to do, or you actually have to take matters into your own hands and pivot and do weird shit and like try to figure out how to survive, and that's what we did.
What did that pivot look like? Because you guys were like a service industry business, right? You relied on people coming through the door and getting these services. How, how do you pivot the brand?
So, a few ways. We Luckily, I'm like not good at sticking to one thing really well. And like, I'm trying to actually shift that mentality a little bit now and stay a little bit more focused.
But for many years we were still, uh, kind of like trying to survive just off of the services and it's not easy. The one to one service business model is really, really like, it's hard. It's not really margin friendly. There's not a ton there for left for the business owners. So we always had like multiple business models happening at any given time.
We had a little. Retail shop, we had, uh, like a online retail shop, but then also we had little curation in store. Um, we did a lot of partnerships. So luckily things to kind of like my personal brand, I was able to leverage a lot of brand partners to come and like, you know, host events or do more like editorial based partnerships.
I had my blog before chill house. So I actually took that blog and turned it into a chill house blog called the chill times. So we had multiple little. Different revenue streams happening for chill house. So when we had to close the doors, we focused our efforts on trying to build those other things up, which helped, but then product obviously ended up superseding that.
Yeah. It's, it's, it's funny how similar our two businesses are because I said the same thing. We're in, we're basically doing the same thing. I have a small space where a service industry business, we couldn't provide that. I have shirts and I sell, uh, you know, um, second, uh, You know, product, I buy product from other people, whether it's supplements or whatever gym stuff.
Um, but yeah, during that time you're like, Oh shit, how do I bump this up? But you pivoted really nicely. How'd you wind up getting into the nails and the products?
Yeah. So that's hard.
I mean, to start that from the ground up is very hard.
Yeah. It's definitely like you could, I always say like, they're both very hard businesses, but if you strike it, strike strike gold or whatever the strike while the iron's hot with product the The u curve is much greater Faster.
Yeah, so that's kind of what happened to us and
that was all during covet.
It was during covet It was obviously the right product at the right time in the right market for it. Um, we had been like Talking about doing this concept prior to COVID happening, but what we ended up doing was actually like fast tracking it Um, so we ended up launching it in august of 2020 As things I mean salons in la probably didn't open until like end of 2020 Like there were still a lot of salons across the country that weren't reopened yet Or even so like a lot of people just weren't comfortable comfortable going back into like, you know, their normal sort of beauty routines.
So we definitely launched at a time that it was at the height of, you know, at home nail care and at home beauty and all that. Um, so yeah, the second we launched, we got retailer interests from urban, from all sorts of retailers. And that's how it sort of,
So how, I mean, how intricate is building something out like that?
For me, I'm always like, all right, maybe I'll, and during that time I was like, all right, maybe I'll try to sell supplements or something. What's the, what's the backend of that look like? You know, kind of creating this product, where do you get it manufactured? How hard is it to get it licensed and everything
else?
Well, luckily at the time we were working with a turnkey agency that actually came to us. Oh, wow. They were like, we can do whatever you want. Um, we'd love your brand. Like we can help you figure out what makes sense for your brand and all these things. So they were, we didn't just launch press ons. We had body oils and, and you know, we were trying to figure out what makes sense to us.
And what ended up happening was that, yeah, the nails just made the most sense. We were able to do nail art outside of like our salon, which is like what people love to come coming to chill house for is like for our nail art. Um, But what was nice about working with them as a small business that didn't have a lot of capital or access to Manufacturers and all that is that they did all of that work for us.
That's cool
And you know, we learned a lot through that experience and then eventually now we're working with you know, head of A fraction of product development that has incredible experience across different categories. She's done nail care. She's done, you know, skin care, body. She's done it all. And so
was she a friend of yours or?
No, she just came recommended I'm part of this really great Slack group called founders weekend and I don't even I feel like it's a secret society, but I'm part of this founders group and every now and then when I'm looking for just like really great key hires, I'll throw like a little request out there.
And so she came recommended by that group and, um, you know, having access to people like that, that have been, you know, that are five years deep into the experience that I, you know, now need to like, Unlock is obviously instrumental. So that's the key to anything, right? I was a small business owner, still a small business owner, but it was a small like brick and mortar business owner.
I had no idea how to do product. So it's really just about aligning with, yeah, like whether it's a product developer that you just, you know, allocate a significant amount of like, you know, yeah. Capital, like retainer fees for that individual, or you work with an agency that can just do everything. Turnkey ship delivered done.
I didn't even know that exists.
It exists. I can make an intro.
Yeah, they're great.
But I think eventually just do
any product. Like if you want to open up, that's so crazy.
I mean, I don't know about any product, but beauty and wellness. Yeah. Yeah. There
was a, I went to a really cool, um, seminar like six months ago.
And there was this woman, you probably heard of it. Cody Sanchez. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Unbelievable speaker. Totally. And it was so funny because she said, uh, she said to the audience, she, she's like, everybody should, if you don't have a business, you should be looking for a business to buy. And one of the first questions that was asked by one of the audience members, they were like, well, what business do I buy and where do I go find these businesses?
And she's like, how many people in the audience would sell their business right now for the right price? And the entire room put their hand up.
Everyone's for sale. Wow.
Yeah. She's like, there you go. Ask somebody in this room. So it was so impressive. And you know, you don't even think about it like that because doing what you did, starting from the ground up, right.
You built the foundation of this thing, which a lot of people, most people have the dream of like, Hey, I want to create my own thing, my own line, my own product, whatever it may be. But doing it from the ground up is so much harder than just taking an existing business, you know I always use the example of like the ufc people are like, oh my I was like No, it was a failing business and this guy turned it into a billion dollar industry within I
didn't know that story Yeah, that's interesting
within 20 years.
It was failing. It wasn't doing well They said it was too brutal and all this stuff Dana White came in and kind of, yeah, cleaned it up, rebranded it, and now it's a multi billion dollar company 20 years later, and it's only been like 20 years.
There are a lot of stories like that, I'm sure. Yeah,
it's, it's real, and people always think like the only place you can make big money like that is tech, but I have a buddy who owns a couple, um, car washes.
And people are like, no, if you just brand it and put it on social media, because most of them are owned by
Laundromats, one or the other. She was talking about like dog, doggy daycares. Like, yeah, there are a lot of those like very, like, uh, what do they call them? Just like blue collar, I guess Blue collar jobs, yeah, yeah.
I think those, those make just as much, if not more. Uh, you know, I think there's, there's that dying breed of people who, um, you know, work carpenters or electricians and those jobs. Like I find myself watching that shit on Tik TOK all the time. Just watching people do like masonry work and shit around. Um, so you started the blog.
What was, what was going through your head? Were you just doing this for fun? And I feel like you were ahead of the curve a little bit because we're about the same age. And. I didn't know anybody who had a blog and then when you find out who had one you're like wow shit They did really well off this thing because they started to build this foundation before it was even a thing
I think you know, I don't talk about my blog taste of style much because it feels so Like, I didn't make a lot of money off of it.
You know, it wasn't like a real business, like a real, real business. It was a fun lifestyle business, but, um, it didn't set the foundation. Yeah. Right. You didn't
set out to make it a business. Did you, or it was just kind of,
I mean, that's the hope it was around the time that like infatuation was really blowing up.
And like, I looked to them as like, you know, um, potential roadmap for, for taste of style at some point, but no, it just never really took off to the point that I could actually make a good living from it. So I think I, And it was around the time that my husband was opening up these bars and I come from a hospitality background.
I was really missing that, like, one on one, in person experience that I wasn't getting from, like, being behind a computer and, like, doing, like, this, like, digital, like, media work. Um, so I was just really, really craving that and I think it all came, like, flooding to me at once and that's kind of what happened with Chill House.
I was, like, really craving that. We need a space that people can go, like a third space. Like I can't keep going to bars. Like I can't keep eating and drinking my way through New York City. I need to like find a place where I can actually go and like get a manicure or get a massage, but also get a matcha and work if I want to, you know?
Um, And then it all kind of hit me. I was like, Oh my God, like I grew up in this world. My mom, my mom is an esthetician. I grew up in spas and I would tell her we need a nail salon and she wouldn't listen to me. She's like, I don't know how to do it. I'm like, well, I'll help you. And she just wouldn't listen to me.
So there were a lot of things I think growing up that kind of stayed with me. And I was like, wow, I've been trying to tell my mom how to run a business for the modern girl and she just wasn't taking to it. They have open offices Iverson just saw it out to fix it and luckily Adam and his business partner, Gavin, they had been through this before.
They've opened up physical spaces. They know how to negotiate leases. They know how to do build outs. So definitely lean on lamb. I can't say even now to the state, I know. I don't have the handbook for it. Um, but yeah, it's like, if you can do something here, you can apply it into any physical space. So that's what we did.
It's funny because
Gabin Anytime, uh, you know, I have somebody on here and they're like, Oh, well, you built your business by yourself. I go by no means that I build it by myself. I go, I failed twice. I go along the way, I've met different people who helped me handle different parts
of the business.
Like there's no one person who understands all parts of the business.
My
husband may be that person. He's so annoyingly good at it. But he couldn't do what
you did.
No, like you
you found this and this is another point that I love to make is that you found something It was almost I hate using the word selfish But you're like I want a space where I can go and do these things.
Oh,
yeah, but if
you have that feeling
Yeah,
there's a million other people who are like wait. I want that too. Yep So now you created this space, but at the same time like I I hate doing a lot of the stuff that Christy does. And she's so on top of it. She's really good with logistics. I am horrible at that.
So when people are like, oh, did you do it all yourself? I was like, no. There's a whole side of the business I really don't understand. And that I couldn't manage myself. So it's great. Take us through that situation, right? You meet you guys. When did you guys meet? And
then, yeah, a long time ago. So my husband and I, we've been kind of at this entrepreneurship game for quite some time together.
Um, he's broken off and he's had different businesses with different business partners and kind of has had successful businesses on his own and his own, right. But luckily he's been my only business partner. I've done things on my own, but he's been my only business partner with chill house. Really? That like, we're like, you know.
It's him and I really running the show here.
Do you find that easier or harder to work with you?
We've gone through some rough times, for sure. And we still, we still have to work at it, 100%. Um, but I think it's really important to identify your roles like so clearly to the point that if it's like you have to have, like someone has to make the final decision, it's like, well, does it, Kind of land on my plate.
Is this like,
you
know, does it fall under creative direction, which technically kind of, I am, even though he likes to have some creative control, then like, maybe that's the argument that can be had. Right. It's like, this falls under my role.
Well, you guys are both very stylish. Every time I see him, he's always dressed the nine guy looks great.
So yeah, I'm sure he's got some. He's got, yeah, he's got
good taste. He has good intuition for the brand too. So I do feel like I'm so hard. We're both super hard headed. He's not used to hearing no, I'm not used to hearing no. So that's the hard part to navigate. But yeah, like anything, you just have to work through it.
And I'd rather do it with him than anyone else, honestly.
And I mean, I've had two businesses that with partners in the past, and you're always, you always, you know, Hope that it's going to work out for the best. But I think, I think a lot of the problems, especially for myself came when the business actually starts making money, right?
Because when you first start out, everybody's got bright eyes and bushy tails and like, Oh my God, this is going to be amazing. But there's no real money to chop. Then when you have to start chopping out money. So I think that's where you guys kind of might be a little bit easier because it's going to the same.
There's no
greed. Yeah. There's no greed. Although I always said I wanted to have more equity in that.
Oh, really?
Oh, yeah. I have more equity than him and Chilhox. 100%. I have to.
Yeah. Cause it's my face. That's your baby. And he has
his own bar. So it's like, this is my only real thing.
So how do you guys, how do you guys navigate, you know, running all these businesses together, having two kids?
I mean, you guys got a lot going on.
Oof. Yeah. We have a lot of, a lot going on, but we have good infrastructure. Like anything. We've built the foundation of the building of Chilhox. You know, Cindy and Adam's little empire. So we have definitely set ourselves up in a way that makes sense for our life. We have great support back home.
Our family's down there now. Um, my cousin is our nanny. She's watching both kids. She's young enough. She has energy. Her kids, her family and her live across the street from us too.
So
we've got this little like commune thing where you live in. I'm in Miami.
Oh, wow.
I want to, yeah. So it's funny. We're talking about New York and only the strong survive here, but I don't know if I am, I was, I don't know if I was built for New York at this age anymore.
I'm like, but
most of your stuff is here. Most of your business,
our businesses are here. We technically don't have anything right now in Florida or in Miami, but. Adam and crew are opening up a West Palm beach Rocco's.
Oh, wow. Just really fun.
So we'll, we'll start planting seeds there for sure. But mostly right now it is a place for us to really get a lot of quality work done.
We're just way more at peace there. Um, and then when we come here, we do the stuff, we do the rounds, you know, and like the run around. And I feel like that, that, um, that split or like that kind of balance of both were like, At the peak of our careers because we've been able to do both. Well,
have you ever felt like there was a point in the businesses where you're like, Oh shit, this is because I've talked to many business owners about this.
Like there's always this like make or break point where you have to almost double down on yourself and double down on the business and take it to the next level or. Watch it collapse.
Yes, definitely there. Yeah, and we are we're doubling down We're putting all of our eggs in this basket of chill house and in the bars, too I think we've identified that What we've resisted for so long is like this idea of like identifying one thing that works well and just replicating it I think we both we're just such serial entrepreneurs like in the sense that we'd love to create things that We want for ourselves and sometimes forget that if something's working, you just should just multiply that.
Yeah.
So that's what we're working on. Um, so we're just going to continue doubling down on the success of chill house. Our goal next year is definitely to like do way more nail care, um, have more options for our nail care fanatics. Um, and then we'll see where that journey takes us. You know, we have a bit of a five year Plan but things can change or things modify depending on success, you know But yeah, it's very much like a a go time like we're pressing the acceleration button
Yeah, no, I I find that very scary.
I'm in the middle of
I love it. You're like scary. Yeah
Not exciting even I mean, yeah, I think it does both, right? I tell everybody, when you're doing something, if it doesn't scare you just as much as it excites you.
Totally. Then you
probably shouldn't do it.
Right.
You know, and right now. You can't feel
too safe always.
That's just boring. Yeah,
because if it feels too safe, it almost feels like something's wrong.
Or inauthentic.
Yeah. Yeah. Uh, for me, it's, I completely agree with the idea of like, just if it's working, why not just replicate it and do it again?
Yeah. Stop fucking shit up. Yeah. I've, I've fucked shit up way too often.
Well, I think it's because you're happy to admit to it. Yeah. Creative or just like, like saying, I was like, I don't know. Yeah. Bushy tailed and doe eyed, I guess. And like, I got excited at opportunities and I said yes to them when in hindsight I should have just realized it could have. Yeah, I had been a bad opportunity.
Well, that's
probably where you have a very unique experience, that so many people probably come to you with so many great ideas, or shitty ideas, but they want to kind of piggyback off what you've created a lot. How often is that happening? Like, people are like, Hey, we'd love to include you in on this and you know, new projects.
A little bit. Um, I'm trying to, I'm, I'm like starting to dabble in like advising and potentially maybe angel investing here and there, although I can't get too distracted. So that's always the hard part. It's like, I want to help and I want to be part of all these like female founder groups and get involved and like be a mentor, but it's, it's hard because you know, then it's, it's taking away from my success a little bit, even though that to me is like not an end goal.
Like I don't as someone that's like going to start a venture fund or anything like that. But I would love to be able to have more brain capacity to help people that are very early on in the careers. And I'm, I don't even have the answers all the way through yet because we're still in the building phase.
Right. Um,
because you get asked to speak on a lot of, like we were talking about the create and cultivate, you know, you get asked to speak a lot. What do you find that people are? Most interested that you have to say
people love to find out. Yeah. Fundraising money. How do you do it? Even hiring or branding, you know, marketing, what works, what does it?
We're actually, we're going through some changes, Kenny. I think by the time this actually comes out, people will see that it feels a little different. We're going to make some audits to the website. The brand is going to have a little bit of a refresh. I think like every seven to eight years you have to Take a step back and look at your brand and make sure that it's still relevant.
So we've been doing a little bit of that. That
was my next question. What, when do you feel is the right time to do that?
Yeah. Every like six to seven years, you should do a little audit on your brand and just make sure that it still reflects your values and where you're heading.
Would you say that your brand is growing with you as you grow or does it stay in that demographic?
It's staying in that demographic. And that's a really great question because I'm getting older. I'm a mom of two. Um, I don't always see myself reflected in, in like the social media feed anymore because it's definitely like people that are a little younger. Um, but that doesn't mean that I'm not the prime customer still.
And it's not to say that like we only have to cater to a certain audience. I want Chill House to feel like, Without, you know, being for everyone because that's kind of impossible, too. I wanted to feel like a place or a brand that, you know, someone that's in their 40s can easily, like, bring into their, you know, vanity as much as, like, the 13 year old.
Like, I think of it like, Mom and 13 year olds, like that is like my core and I'm trying to bridge that gap and still make it cool for like the 20 something that's like very edgy and like, you
know, I feel like definitely in my business, that category is growing the 40 plus category that people want to start taking care of themselves,
man.
Yeah, I'm in that camp. A hundred percent. I've never been more into wellness. I get sucked into all, like, the, the reels of, like,
Longevity and, like, Do you think that's what it is? Is it the social media of, like, all these talking heads always being like, Take care of yourself and do cold plunges and all this shit.
I think we're becoming more aware of how serious it all is and how possible it is to adopt these, like, lifestyle, um, Um, You know, modalities into our life and it's totally acceptable and it's totally available to us now way more than it used to be. So why not do it? You know, I, I think of it like now I'm trying to do Pilates with a trainer, like with like a private Pilates.
Where do you go?
Um, well, I go to Miami, Miami, um, I'm going to really awesome woman there, but yeah, it's, it's just. Yeah. You know, I don't have a, I don't have like a, a therapist, therapist, like a regular therapist. I look to her as my therapist because my body is now something that I am working on. It's, you know, I'm not working necessarily on this muscle at the moment, my mind per se.
I'm working on my body and like depending on like what it is that you're working on with your body. Then you allocate your efforts towards that.
Don't you feel that when you leave Pilates, you're just in a better headspace? A
hundred percent. Mind
space? Yeah. I, I try to, I, I always say, I wish I could bottle that up,
and let
people taste that once, and see if they would chase that like they chase other cravings.
Mmm. Right? Like when you think about it, you feel so good after the gym and after you work out. And I think if more people experience that, then they wouldn't be so hesitant to go to the gym and to take care of themselves.
That's such a good point. Yeah. Like carry that feeling with you forever and then you'll, yeah.
And then you're like, Oh, if you could take like a little shot of in the morning, you're like, all right, if I want to chase this sensation, then I should go and check this out. Yeah.
I'm going Think of that next time. Yeah, I'm trying to be lazy.
But I'm, you know, I think in our demographic and our age group I think people are more aware and I think now we have what we didn't have before was the education And the understanding of like how to take care of ourselves More so than our parents like when our parents were our age.
It was like, oh you guys are hungry Let's go to McDonald's and you're like now would you I mean, I don't know if you do but you don't take your kids to McDonald's
I don't and I gave We gave Hendrik Shake Shack the other day because we were being lazy parents. Totally, if you eat Shake Shack, I mean, I love Shake Shack, who doesn't?
But yeah, he was so nauseous the next day. Really? He was like, thought he was going to throw up. And I was like, I have a vomit phobia, so I'm like, no, and then I realized it's because, yeah, he ate a lot of greasy food the night before. So now I'm just way more conscious of how we feed ourselves and when we give him and yeah, and how we feed ourselves because it really does make a difference.
It's not like news to anyone that I'm saying this.
So, uh, I mean, you, you've talked about a lot of the things you've accomplished, but one of the hardest things is being a mom.
And
I, I always say I admire parents because it is such a hard task these days with, I mean, we didn't grow up with the internet, so they have all this extra information that they're getting fed and, you know, there's so much more, I think, that a parent has to deal with.
I'm not quite there yet. I don't even know what to do. Yeah. In that, in that situation.
Well, because people look to you and they're like, oh, she probably has all the answers. So what, uh,
Well, I don't know what we're going to do when Hendrix is four years old and then Stevie is going to be one. So by the time they have access to phones, what's going to change?
I don't know. I feel like AI is going to be, you know, 10X what it is now. And it's going to be a world that we have to navigate year by year, you know, decide kind of like, as time goes by, as tech changes, as, you know, studies come out about mental health and kids like that, those are decisions we have to make as we get a little closer.
You know, Adam loves to send me like the anxious generation, like podcasts with that writer and, and, and, you know, we've talked about it a bunch. I'm like, babe, like, we can't make these decisions yet. We're not there yet. Technology moves so fast. Like we don't know what's going to happen. And I actually listened to prof G a lot too.
And he was saying how, I don't know who he was talking to. I forget, but they were talking a lot about how Yes, fine, kids, like, we don't want them to have access to social media at a super young age, but by limiting them completely from having a phone or social and da da da da, it creates social problems that, you know, fine, like, maybe they're not developing, like, certain mental health, you know, disorders at a young age or anything, but they're gonna potentially get bullied by their friends.
Like, they'll, the impact of, the social impact of it may be, yeah. Different and then it could impact them from a mental health capacity too. So what's to say? You know, it's kind of like you can't really make a decision quite until you're in it
It's so hard because I have a well my sister has four kids My brother has four kids one of my best friends has three kids And I I look at them and i'm like their head is constantly on the swivel, right?
They have to be like they got to take them to practice. Where are they? Are they safe? Who are they with?
Yeah, yeah
And it's so hard these days and it's so crazy, you know There's I think there's such a fine line between giving them and you know Obviously you worked your ass off your husband worked his ass off to give your kids everything they want
um,
but there's a fine balance between giving them everything they want and then What they need to survive.
Where do you stand with a lot of that?
Yeah,
because you want to spoil them, right? Like
I mean totally and we do he gets all the toys he wants I mean we try to explain money to hendrix. He's still so young to really understand what we mean, but You know, we talk about mommy and daddy go to work You know, and we go to work because we need to make money.
Money are the things that buy you your toys. And if you want a toy every day, then we don't have as much money. It's like, you're gonna have to break it down step by step. And explain life to them in a way that makes sense to their day to day. So they're just piecing everything together. And they, uh, know that they can't just ask for whatever they want.
Um, You know, I have a hard time with it because I don't think kids should be handed things completely down from their parents I think they should work for everything as hard as i've worked for it You know, I don't want them to feel the anxiety that I dealt with growing up, you know in a very financially rocky um situation same with my husband neither of us come from a lot of money my mom like has We've had a very, very, you know, rollercoaster ride with money and we've had, you know, my mom has been successful but then lost everything and then I've had to help her, you know, we've just, our entire life and same with Adam, um, we've had that relationship with money.
It's kind of like, we're not afraid to lose it, therefore we kind of put everything on the table.
That's very impressive.
It's, it's brave, but that's all we know, right? So it's kind of like, I don't know that I want him to have that. sensation growing up, um, because that's not fair to him, right? And it shouldn't be something that we, or an example that we should set for our kids.
I want to teach them how to save. I want to teach them to be responsible with their money. Um, I want them to enjoy. Money, you know the way that I like to enjoy money and having you know Buying myself something nice when you know I have like, you know something to celebrate or whatever. I think that that's important I think there's a lot of value in instilling those kind of principles with your kids to like Celebrate the wins, you know, but also like don't be an asshole I I would never I if hendrix if I see him out at a you know, like a Miami nightclub spending any money, um, on bottles.
Like I will like rip them out of the club. Like, I'm sorry. I love bottle waitresses, but in no means do I want him giving all his money to for sure owners and bottle.
I totally agree. I think our generation, we grew up with that. That was the coolest thing. And you had to do it. And when I look
birthday and then you, all the guys chip in or whatever, you know, but
I remember, you know, not having that much money, but you're like, I have to do this this weekend.
It was so part of our generation. And I look back and I'm like, how stupid was that? You
know, so wasteful
you spend three, 4, 000 on something that costs the bar 20. Oh, it's totally. It's so ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah, no, a buddy of mine, he lives down in Philly. He's got a very successful brand. It's called Fuel Hunt.
His name is Drew. Great guy. And he, uh, he was telling me, he goes, Ken, sometimes I find myself manufacturing hard times for my kids because I want them to understand what that feels like. I want that
problem.
He's like, yeah, but it's true. And I go, I go, dude, that's so. I, I, and then again, you're like, is that right?
Is it wrong? It's so hard. That's why being a parent, like there's never anything wrong with that, you
know, showing them like, if your life is good, like it can't always be good. You know, we have to like, they're going to go through, they're going to go through everything we've been through and you
want, yeah, but you want them to like, Feel kind of how shitty the world could be.
Yeah, and they need to be prepared for it So you can't just like keep them from all of this pain and suffering forever and ever they can't be in this little like Isolated box and granted like we live in Miami now, so things are a little calmer on the day to day But when they're here, they see, you know, the real world and like and yeah, it's um, it's I think it's very important to, to share that with your kids for sure.
So you guys are looking at some spaces down in, uh, West Palm Beach?
Yeah, we already have it. It's like being kind of built out. It's going to take some time, but hopefully by end of next year we'll have a space there.
So you'll have a Rocco's down there. Are you looking to open a chill space down there as well?
No, not yet. Um, we'll see. I am never going to say never. I think in an ideal world, I'd have a couple of flagships for sure. And where I put them probably Miami and LA. That's my dream scenario right now because we have so much work to do on the product front. I think I just say I'm like focused there at the moment.
But yeah, I love physical space, and oh my god, Miami could really use a chill house,
I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, where are your other kind of cities, like dream cities you would go to?
Well, I opened in Paris, and that was a flop.
Oh wow, really? Yeah,
I kind of, it's like, kind of fell under the radar with a lot of physical space.
People I'd say and I don't really talk about it much It seemed like a dream opportunity because Paris is Paris. It's my favorite city But yeah, we had to open up a Paris like a business in France and that part of it was super super super hard It's no
way.
Yeah, and learn how to do HR there. It's Oh harder than anything I've ever done Oh, it's also like overseas not understanding the language like Completely new business practices, it's And no one, I mean, we had someone kind of helping us, but they didn't know everything either.
And it was just, It was just the, remember I was saying like bad decisions that I've made, that was probably one of the worst. Okay. Yeah. That was up there.
So you took a little bit of a loss.
Oh yeah. Uh, and not like a huge loss. Um, luckily, but enough that it was like, we have to put a stop to this cause it's a risk to the greater business.
Stop
the bleeding.
Stop the bleeding. Um, cut the limb off, I guess. And then just basically move on. And um, Say sorry to anyone that was involved and that was that was hard to
awesome. Yeah, so but here in the US I feel like there's a lot of great city. I just got back from Austin. I was down there this weekend,
and I
love that town That's
where we met.
Yeah. Yeah, and like Austin Nashville like those are like really some up and coming in cities They are
really great cities. Yeah, we've got Talked about that. I think the bars would thrive there.
Yeah. Oh, absolutely. I think having that New York city feel in one of those cities, I think that's what works.
Every place we ended up going to, I was like, Oh, this feels like New York. There was just this place we went to. I was called guest house.
Oh, cool.
In Austin and me and my buddy were there. I was like, dude, this feels so much like New York. I think people are hungry for that.
A hundred percent. That New York
vibe.
It depends. So for us, I think, I think those kind of more like secondary cities are great for businesses that are full profitable, like brick and mortar spaces that like you need to have profitability within that versus like what chill houses on in the product world. Like, we're trying to do so much with product that the stores need to be in the cities where we can host the big events.
Okay. We can have the celebrities stop by. Yeah, yeah. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, that makes more sense, yeah. I'm trying to follow a little bit like the salon model, if that makes sense. Like, think about, like, some of the bigger salons in New York. You know, the world or, uh, hair brands in the world like Bumble and Bumble and like IGK.
IGK has salons, but they have them in very specific cities. Um,
LA, Miami, New York.
Yeah.
Cindy, thank you so much for coming by. Thank you. This was awesome. Yeah, this was a great convo. I hope you guys learned a lot. Um, thank you so much for sharing all your stories and stuff, but where could everybody find you?
What's the, uh, the best way to reach out to you?
Yeah. Um, my Instagram is at Cindy Ramirez. C Y N D I, I was named after Cindy Lauper, and my business is at Chill House.
Are you a Cyndi Lauper fan?
Of course.
I'm one of these people where it's like sometimes I watch like old videos from like the, the Goonies song.
Right? Like that old music video. And I'm like, it just gives me such a nostalgia. I'm like, how do I recreate that? So cool.
Do it. Bottle it up.
Bottle it up. Uh, well, thank you again so much. I appreciate it. Guys, go check out Chill House. Go check out Rocco's, which is great spot. I was there the opening night.
That was fun. Yeah. Um, but again, thank you so much for having me. Uh, thanks to you so much for coming here. Thank you. And sharing your time. Thank you. And we will see you soon. Yes. Thank you guys. Always like, share, subscribe, tell your friends about it because we're really trying to make this show a thing.
Yay. That's