Meet Joe & Samantha Todd | Owners/Coaches of Spartan Barbell

We had the good fortune of connecting with Joe & Samantha Todd and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Joe & Samantha, how has your work-life balance changed over time?
Having a family, running a business, and competing all require their fair share of time. Until recently, we both had other jobs in addition to our business as well. In fact, I’m not really sure we are balancing, but rather prioritizing what’s truly important to us. We do our best to always prioritize our family first, so whether we are at the gym, at a meet or at a rehersal, more often than not, the whole family is together. Some weeks we are in the gym more than others, and some less, but it all depends on what’s going on… Is it competition season for our daughter’s dance team? Is there a meet scheduled this weekend? etc.

Boundaries are also crucial though. It’s a hard line to draw, but we do our best to have cut off times for work while we are at home, schedule specific staffed hours at the gym, and block off time for fun with family and friends.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
Samantha and I are the owners and head coaches at Spartan Barbell. We are one of the few powerlifting focused gyms in Colorado Springs. We also train/coach in person, virtually, and starting in August, we will start directing sactioned powerlifting meets as well.

Getting to where we are now wasn’t easy, but at the same time felt fairly natural. Until just recently, I was still working a full time job in addition to our business and Samantha is still working part time in addition to the gym. With that being said, it often feels like there aren’t enough hours in a day to run a business, work a second job, shuttle our daughter to her commitments and activities, and spend quality family time as well. It’s forced all of us to be very calculated with our time to make sure we are as efficient and effective as possible at whatever is currently on our plate. As challenging as the time management is concerened, things can get challenging, but building our team and coaching our athletes has felt extremely natural. Our team seemed to organically grow, and we’ve built a solid following primarily from word of mouth and referrals.

One of biggest lessons we’ve learned from owning our business, is that in order to grow, you have to work just as much if not more on your business as you do in your business. We are still navigating this concept, but focusing on the actual business of running a gym/coaching was big eye opener. Samantha and I both have a big background in fitness and exercise science, but so many of the things we’ve encountered have more to do with the business of what we are doing rather than the actual service itself, so that’s caused us to stretch and grow more than we ever thought we would running this business.

We want that world to know that strength is for everyone, There are different ways to build and showcase strength, but strength should be a cornerstone for most every performance, fitness or health related goal/journey.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
PLACES: -Garden of the Gods
-Pikes Peak
-Various parks with walking and hiking trails

FOOD:
-Marigold Cafe & Bakery
-Bad Daddy’s Burgers
-Slice 420
-Torchies Tacos

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
As cliche as it sounds, we want to shoutout our familes.. our blood family and our gym family lol. Without both of them, there would be no way we would have accomplished what we did. Family gave us the opportunity to grow and expand our business, helped us paint the walls in our gym when we were first getting started, helped us build, break down, and move equipment, they watched our daughter on trips out of state to coach/compete, supported us witnout hesitation. Our families deserve all the shoutout and credit on this one.

Website: https://www.spartanbarbell.net/

Instagram: @spartanbbell