From Stay at Home Mom to Franchise Owner

Meet Carol Boykin of Stretch ‘n Grow

Inspired WebWorks is pleased to introduce you to Carol Boykin from Stretch and Grow.

www.kidsluvfitness.com

Year Business Started: 2010

What type of business is it? We offer FUNtastic Fitness and Nutrition classes for kids.

Why did you start this business? Children have always been my passion, and I started working with them at church even before I had my own. It is like I go into my own little world when I get with them. When I did have children, two beautiful girls, one of them wound up struggling with her weight.

I worked with her to teach her about proper nutrition and exercise, and since I started early with her, she was able to develop a healthy lifestyle, and now at 20, she is maintaining that lifestyle even in college! Because of my daughter’s experience, I was able to see what being overweight can do to a child, and I also realized the importance of teaching a healthy lifestyle early on.

So because of my love for children and my experience with my daughter, Stretch-N-Grow was the perfect business for me.

What keeps you moving forward?? Getting children started with a healthy, active lifestyle keeps me going because I don’t want any child to suffer the stigma of being overweight. I want them to know that they can do fun things for exercise – they don’t have to participate in a team sport to get exercise.

I also want to get them thinking about healthy foods and choices while they are little and their minds are still like sponges. I want to help reverse the childhood obesity rate, and the increase in childhood diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure that are due to children (not just overweight children) living sedentary lifestyles and eating unhealthy foods.

What advice do you have for new entrepreneurs? I would say to find a mentor, like Patty, that will keep you on track. My mind is always swimming with a thousand different things that I want to do or could do, but Patty helps me to prioritize my thoughts and not “get the cart ahead of the horse”!

I would also say to let someone who knows what they are doing get your social media started for you because even though you can learn to do it yourself, you will spend valuable time learning that when you could be building your business. Then once you get your system going, learn how to do the technical stuff if you want. Also read what successful people are reading.

What else would you like to tell us about your story?
For the most part, I stayed at home with my girls from the time they were little, but over the years, I tried different commission only jobs trying to find something I could do and still set my own hours. For one reason or another, none of the jobs ever worked out for me, and then at 48, I found SNG.

What I learned from all of this is that you need to be very honest with yourself about what your passion is, don’t try to make something be your passion that isn’t just so you can make money.

You have to truly love what you are doing and believe that your product is valuable if you are going to make it as a business owner because it is not easy, and if you are only in it for the money, you will not last long…

Facebook: facebook.com/kidsluvfitness

Twitter: Twitter.com/kidsluvfitness

awww, thank you, Carol! I truly appreciate your kind words and I know you will be a huge success! You already are because you’ve taken steps to move forward with what works best for you.