Running a Small Business: A Marathon of Work, Joy, and Creativity

Running isn't easy and neither is running a small business.

When I graduated with my Ph.D. in English in 2014, I was initially bound and determined to be an English professor. I love teaching, literature, and language. Lo and behold, the world had other plans, that actually are turning out to be better than Plan A!

Runners Love Yoga started in 2012. I had long been interested in teaching yoga to runners: I was so into my running-related stretching that my college coach put me in charge of leading pre-run team stretching during my senior year at Notre Dame. (I honestly think he thought I was just taking forever for my pre-run stretching every day, and so to speed me up and actually get everybody to stretch, he thought "let's put Ann in charge of this." I am still proud that we had fewer injuries that year!!!) I myself became hooked on yoga when pigeon pose saved my IT band during my own college running career. Fast forward to Charlottesville, VA in 2012: my best friend Louise wanted to be able to do yoga with me all the time, so I decided to make a yoga DVD for runners. During my spring break from grad school, I flew up to Boston where my friend Ingrid was finishing film school: she agreed to help film my first DVD! That same spring of 2012, I would meet my future husband Phillip who was already in the high end technical sportswear industry with his own small business, Cutaway USA. That would lead to the first batch of Runners Love Yoga singlets! (I actually think I can remember everyone who has one of the originals, in teal and red!)

My Ph.D. in English was amazingly helpful in getting RLY off the ground: my time in academia was basically like "teaching bootcamp" and "how to do 1001 things in no time" bootcamp. (Hint: my own yoga was really helpful here too!) Teaching really became second nature to me during this time, and grew into a real passion of mine. Teaching is: fun, spontaneous, energetic, entertaining, plus building connections with other people while helping them all in one.

That first DVD became 12 online streamable workouts which have grown into what is today Runners Love Yoga TV: a resource of nearly 90+ classes and counting, designed to help runners everywhere at any time that they need yoga. During the early stages of the pandemic, I am so proud of the hard work that went into the transformation and growth of this new streamable yoga platform. I upload new classes every week (I am literally transcoding one AS I TYPE THIS!) and it makes all the hard work worth it when I hear from so many happy runners who are enjoying the classes there! Go check it out! There is a free 10 day trial so you have nothing to lose and only yoga to gain! It brings so much contentment to my own heart to be able to share my passion of teaching AND helping runners through yoga with so many of you there.

From that first batch of singlets, the activewear side of RLY has experienced exciting growth over the past couple years. RLY was the first in the running apparel industry to make a singlet out of ColdBlack, a special material that cools you down as you heat up. We use many BlueSign Certified fabrics in our activewear, and in all of our singlets since 2019! In the past month, we launched our first joggers with matching sweatsuits, and our first performance short and long sleeves, the quality of which you just can't beat. My goal is to make really beautiful, really comfortable running and yoga activewear: go check out our new arrivals which are amazing!

I grew RLY from the ground up with no investors, just my grad school stipend and the occasional prize money check from a race (not large!). If you have a dream, keep working! And continue to #supportsmallbusiness this Saturday and beyond!