Kia ora team, can you tell us a bit about yourself and where you're currently based?

Kia ora, my name is Amber Reid & my partner is Willis Alatini and we are the faces behind The Cobalt Club - Group Personal Training Facility. Together we have a 2 year old son and are living in Auckland NZ. We are both Kiwi’s born & bread but moved over to Australia together almost 10 years ago.

In a nutshell we moved back home from over the ditch to come back to our people and provide them with a supportive community gym that focuses on training with purpose and transforming bodies (and lives).

Can you tell us a little bit about your mahi and what motivated you to start a business in the fitness industry?

Whilst overseas we saw a huge gap in the market for a gym that specialised in body composition. Don’t get me wrong there are heaps of incredible gyms but weren’t many that really coached nutrition & hypertrophy style training. Without sounding like I’m speaking gibberish, we knew we would be able to help people achieve their personal health and fitness goals and then all of the positive effects that ripple off of that. We also really believed we would be able to make a difference to peoples lives just through our uplifting energy.

You both played sports growing up, do you think that has had an impact on your life and where you get your competitive edge from?

Possibly yes, Willis has played Rugby & Rugby League his whole life and if I were to tell you one of my favourite traits about him is his hard-working ethic, I literally don’t know anyone who works as hard as him. He’s one of those people that coaches and bosses love as he just shows up no matter what, works hard and listens. He is very committed & consistent when it comes to his Mahi & I think the years of footy as definitely impacted that.

As for me, I have very competitive parents both whom have coached and played in numerous NZ representative hockey teams. They were always my coaches growing up & I think my want to coach & support other peoples successes comes from them.

You not only interact with the community at Cobalt, but also you have a presence online from people around the world. How do you find that aspect of your mahi?

Oh, it’s just the best. It’s been so cool watching that organically grow. I think for me when you have a great product, are legitimate, genuine & actually get results the word of mouth and reviews will naturally flow. This for sure has helped us grow our online community & we just love the fact we get to help more and more people!

Gyms are a very saturated market, however you seem to stand out amongst the rest, why do you think that is?

Firstly, I think we are good people with good energy we genuinely care and people respect that. Secondly we have our niche and are good at what we do. A great part of our success has been through our 6 week challenges. These to us is a way to bring everything together, share our knowledge and mass teach our clients by breaking it all down in a way that’s understandable for our people.

If you could give one piece of advice to young entrepreneurs wanting to pursue a career in the fitness industry, what would it be and why?  

Start small & scale.

This is the best piece of business advice I was given and will remember it forever. I had a huge idea of what I wanted to do straight off the bat. We bought all our gear second hand with our savings, we did most of the renovations ourselves, we choose to get a smaller gym, worked all the classes ourselves and didn’t go out of pocket. We kept our costs low and were able to make profits very early on. This allowed us to keep growing & also gave us time to ensure our concept was actually going to work.

If you have a product that works or a service that you are really good at. Give it a go, start small, commit and then time will tell if you can continue to scale up.

Any future plans that you want to give us the inside scoop? 

The current COVID climate is wild, we have decided to keep gym as is and focus a lot of energy on Cobalt Online, so that’s our online programs and challenges as well as a couple of other ecommerce offerings as well. :P

Where can people find you?

Our website www.thecobaltclub.com or instagram page @cobaltclubnz!