WE WON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Holy Moley, we only went and won an award!!!! Fusion Fitness Carlow is now an AWARD WINNING STUDIO………..          Just let that sink in a little.

Wow it has such a nice ring to it 🙂

We won in the “Carlow’s Best Start Up/Emerging Business Award” Category by the County Carlow Chamber, 2016 Carlow Business Awards. We are so completely shocked and so completely honoured. What makes this award so special is that we were nominated by the public. This tells us that firstly, you guys are happy with what we are doing and secondly, that you believe we deserve to be awarded for the work that we do. Thank you so much x

Someone said in passing “Ah shur of course you won, I knew you would”  It is so lovely for someone to have that belief in us because I promise you we did not for one second believe that we would win; we were just so delighted to be nominated!!!! Not only that, we were nominated for not one, not two but three awards……. that is the stuff of dreams. Our dreams came true last night and while we would not have been disappointed if we didn’t win, this award just gives us the confidence to keep pushing forward, to keep dreaming, to keep striving for the best and to keep believing in ourselves in a very competitive market.

The other categories we were nominated for were “Carlow’s Hidden Gem” & “Carlow’s Business to Business Award”

To be in business from the outside can sometimes look very simplistic – find a product that people want and sell it.  However, when you are working in the business of health, fitness and wellness not everyone believes they are worthy of the product and will therefore, not even enter the “shop”.  From the outset we never had a business plan (we do not recommend this, it’s just the truth!!!!) Lesley, a natural lover of all things sport / fitness related had fallen out of love with the fitness industry.  It was very male dominated, the personal training aspect was only for the elite and it was hard to earn a living from it. It is no secret Phil, like possibly 50% of the public, never liked fitness, she was never involved in GAA or any other sports as a child but she did love to dance. A chance encounter happened; Lesley was in the right place at the right time and an opportunity to train as a Zumba® Fitness Instructor came up.  Lesley knew instantly that this was the exact type of class that people, like Phil who didn’t like exercise, or people who felt they were “unworthy” of it (true story) would absolutely love.  It was exercise in disguise, you were in a group situation where everyone was too busy following the instructor to notice anyone around them; so that for 60 mins you could completely switch off and just enjoy the music, dance, feel happiness and joy no matter what your age, your size or no matter what stresses were facing you afterwards but also get an excellent workout in the process.  Phil also went on to train as an instructor and with a Social Care background, she specialised her classes for people who are starting out in fitness, returning to fitness, people with disabilities (physical and intellectual) etc and the rest they say is history.  Phil while understanding the physical benefits was far more interested in the psychological benefits.

We may look like an overnight success but really we have been plugging away and building up our customer base for over 5 years.  We decided to quit our day jobs and find a permanent residence for our classes almost 2 years ago when the demand was so great that we could not keep up with it along with our other jobs. Again, we were in the right place at the right time when we found the perfect location. Phil, being born and raised in Graiguecullen, loves being able to work in the area also.

Since then, we have added many new classes, including bootcamps, suspension training, body weight training etc.  We have found that people, who previously believed that they hated fitness, actually found that, once given the confidence to try different things, found a love for it.  We have not had one customer who has ever regretted a workout!!!! While we value the importance of competition, in this forum we believe the only competition is against yourself and we push people to better themselves.

As a fore mentioned, this award will give us the confidence to keep going in an industry that is so competitive.  We are not afraid of the competition because we believe that anyone who is trying to help people to improve their health, fitness and wellness deserves to do well. We know the work that goes into it and we will continue to do it.

We were so happy to meet Sean O’ Brien & very proud to be awarded the same night he was being celebrated.  We hope he will pop in to visit 😉