Anne Mahlum Shares How She Built And Sold Company For $100M

It is about self-worth, self value, confidence, and again, thinking that you deserve a better life for yourself.

In many ways, you ran Back on My Feet, much like any for profit company. How did you scale that organization ?

Sometimes we just are born with some of these innate talents. I don’t really know where my knack for scaling came from, but I really seem to understand organizational infrastructure, process, efficiency and systems. And so I just applied all of that to thinking about how I could scale this organization to help as many people as possible and get it in as many cities as I could. So we had an incredible team for 6 and a half years, and grew it to 14 cities across the country.

You speak a lot about tackling limiting beliefs. How did your own beliefs of what you could accomplish help drive you especially as other people doubted your efforts?

With Back on My Feet, people called me naive, and a pollyanna. Everybody thought it was cute. But also irresponsible. They would say, you need to get a job like the rest of us. And it was the first time that I felt like I looked at the world differently from others.

I had this curiosity that things could work differently…that my life could look differently and that I could approach problems differently. Back of My Feet was an opportunity to execute that thought process.

I think particularly for women, we are told, “Be quiet.” “Be a good girl.” I grew up in the eighties and nineties in North Dakota, in the Midwest and we were told to fit in a little bit and not make too much noise. “Don’t draw attention to yourself.” And I just realized that’s not going to get me anywhere.

I wanted to be noticed and I wanted people to wonder who I am. So cutting my hair off and having really bright platinum hair, is how people recognize me everywhere I go. A lot of times, we don’t want to draw attention to ourselves, or we’re trying to fit in and not cause any disruption. And I didn’t want that kind of life. I’d rather stick out in every area of my life, including what my career looks like.

I’ll give you another example. I was running a lot and doing marathons, and I was thinking, what makes me more interesting. If I’m going to run these marathons, I don’t want to do the same marathon over and over again. So I ran a marathon on every continent, including Antarctica.

I’m not trying to fit in. I’m not kidding when I say fitting in will get you nowhere. Fitting in makes you like everybody else, and you’re not special. You’re not noticed, and you don’t get the promotion. Speaking up at a meeting and having an idea that no one else has thought of…even if people think it’s stupid,…at least you’re thinking differently from everybody else around the room.

You founded Solidcore in 2013, as a pilates-inspired fitness boutique. Why ?

I pick things that are unique, right? Using running in the homeless community. It got people’s attention because they’re like, “Wait, what? I’ve never heard anybody using sport or running to approach helping the homeless issue…that’s interesting.”

So when I came across pilates, I thought, nobody knows you can work out like this. And I’m going to put my own athletic spin on the workout. Yes, it was a challenge, because it’s hard to describe. So we leaned into that in the beginning, and we said, “It’s the hardest workout you’ve never heard of.” So it got people in the door, and once people experienced it they had the same reaction. “I’ve never done anything like that before.” And then they felt so sore the next day. And when you’re sore from working out, what do you want to do? Tell everybody how sore you are! We had this massive word of mouth that was happening, and in such an authentic manner.

And people would come up to me and say, “Oh, my God! Solidcore changed my life.” That was such a motivation for me as a woman who struggled with her body for years and had her fair share of food and body issues. Founding [solidcore] and watching my body – feeling my body get strong – I just wanted to give that to as many people as possible, but particularly women, who were tired of spinning their wheels and putting in the effort to workout, but not feeling like their effort showed up on their body.

You opened your first studio in Washington, DC. And you had so much success that within the span of one year, you opened five studios. Why DC? Why grow so fast?

I had a good network in DC. I went to grad school there, I had worked there. I opened Back on My Feet there, so I had a lot of connections in the DC area. AndDC is affluent. It’s a very fitness focused city. It is always ranked in one of the top five most fittest areas in the country, and it just has a progressive way of thinking.

Also, when I started I was a part of a license agreement with the exercise machines, and that particular territory was open.

As far as opening several locations, when I started [solidcore], I never wanted to have just one. I always had the idea to build 100 locations. That seemed like a big, hairy, audacious goal, and one that would motivate me. I wanted to just see if I could do it.

As I mentioned, I know how to scale things, and so, after leaving Back on My Feet, I knew that for my next thing, I wanted to choose something that I knew how to grow. What I know how to scale is high quality, branded experiences that are authentic to me. Based on fitness and community. That’s what I know how to do. I know how to do that better than anybody, which means I have a leg up on my competition.

How did the market environment and the competitive landscape influence you?

There are a lot of Pilates studios out there that have 1, 2, 3 locations, right? It’s not just about the idea. It’s about the execution of the idea. And there’s a lot of amazing concepts out there that go under because of operational mistakes or financial irresponsibility, or whatever it is.

I didn’t really think about that. I just knew that I’m going to provide a killer experience inside an inspiring community that people are going to want to be a part of. And if I focus on that, my business is going to win.

I really didn’t pay too much attention to any other concept going on. And I think a testament to that is when we got into a dispute with the manufacturer of the machines we were licensing. I spoke to another licensee in New York about coming together and making our own machines, and she was like “No, I just think people come to the workout for the machines.” That may have been true for her concept, but people came to [solidcore] for the workout and the community.

Thankfully, she said no. And I went on my own – we started making our own machines. And eventually once we opened up in New York, we sort of ate their lunch and just became the dominant player. So, it’s the community and our operational execution that sets us apart from everybody else.

Can you say more about ending your licensing deal? It’s interesting because had you not pivoted towards making your own machine – the famous “Sweatlana”- you wouldn’t have been able to scale in the same way.

With the machines we were licensing, they were charging us all these fees. But the thing that pushed me over the edge was, I was talking to other licensees and taking the lead on giving feedback on what I thought could be changed to improve the machines. And the manufacturer sent me a cease and desist letter, and said, if I ever talk to another one of his licensees, he would never let me open another studio.

And I thought, “Oh, my God, he can actually do that!” I’m putting all of my eggs in this guy’s basket, and if he just decides that he doesn’t want to sell me any more machines, he can do that. And so I just knew at that point that I’m not going to be able to build the empire that I know that I can build if I have to ask permission or be associated with somebody that can actually tell me, “No.” So that was the real impetus for me to start to make my own machines.

I think he just thought that, “Anne’s getting too big here, and I don’t like that.” He wanted control. I remember when I told him, I’m gonna be your largest licensee. I told him that from the very beginning, and he wanted to keep me in check.

I had to go through a lawsuit. My lawyers were great, and we won. He had to buy all of his machines back from me. And, after that, we started expanding like crazy.

Congratulations! That could have been one of those make or break moments for you.

Totally. I just say there are those moments in everybody’s business, where you have to have a clear vision for what you’re trying to achieve. Once you have a clear vision, the decision making becomes so clear because it’s like, does this decision support the vision and us getting there? Or is it a distraction? Is it a detraction?

Talk about growing your team. Because one of the things that I found interesting during your panel at Female Founders Day, was that you were very intentional about leaning into the coaching aspect when you needed to, but then putting your efforts in other aspects of the business, like negotiating leases as you grew.

Well again, the question always was like at some point, if I want to scale this business, I can’t coach 20 classes a week. I have to be doing bigger things to support the growth of the business that have more financial impact than a hundred dollars an hour. And if I can’t find coaches to execute this workout as good, if not better than me, then I don’t have a business.

So really quickly I realized, we have to have incredible coaches, which is why we hired from our client base. I mentioned this, at the Female Founders Day, how important the coaches’ personalities were, and that people gravitated toward them. It was really important to set that culture from the very beginning. People saw me interact with clients. They saw me use clients’ names. And when we hired a director of training, these soft skills were non-negotiable. The coach’s job is to make clients feel seen and encouraged.

So that goes back to community and learning from Back on My Feet as to why those guys wanted to be there. It’s because we made them feel good. You know whether it was like saying “Hi” and touching you on the shoulder or shaking your hand. Something that made you connect with the coach. So the coaches and the training was not just, we will teach you how to do this workout. Half the training was embedded a little bit in How to Win Friends and Influence People, which is my favorite book, and teaching people how to fill your classes, and how to get people to like you, because the coaches were going to make more money if they had full classes.

So then, I would ask myself regularly, am I spending my time on things that are supporting the financial impact to this business that line up with me being the CEO. As the highest paid person in the room which I was (with the most equity), I better be sure I’m making big financial decisions and impact for this organization for the sake of my team and my own equity and my own value on a daily basis.

So even though nobody could fire me, I felt like I had to earn my job every day, and the best thing I could do for the coaches and anybody else was always communicating with my team what I’m spending my time on, whether it was building the brand, negotiating with landlords, or going through a lawsuit for the machines.

It’s interesting because for a lot of fitness brands, the founder is the face of the business.

Yes, and I really made sure that [solidcore] was not revolving around me. I think that’s one of the things I’m most proud of. I always checked myself to make sure I wasn’t in the marketing materials. It sounds really fun for founders in the beginning, because you get all of this attention and everything. But it’s really dangerous when you’re raising money, when you’re trying to scale, when you can’t delegate. Your business will get stuck. And, at some point, you will not be able to grow as big. So you have to constantly check that ego.

I was super mindful that my definition of success would be sitting here today, two years after I sold, and seeing [solidcore] continue to build on the foundation that I put in place for the first 10 years. It just makes me so proud that I took the time with my team to build something so sustainable.

I want to talk about your leadership style. You make decisions quickly, and you stick to them. And that has been, almost a trademark of yours. Even the decision to have this conversation with me. You said yes on the spot.

Yes, so I have this mantra that there is more than one right answer, and an example was deciding where we would scale when we were in DC. There’s literally a dozen neighborhoods where we would be successful. I told my team to find me the best deal in those neighborhoods, and that will be our second location. A lot of people get hung up on perfection. People get stuck in analysis, paralysis.

People have meetings all the time over things that I’m like, even if we make a decision on this, it’s gonna have $10,000 of impact. Why are we spending an hour with four people in this room? And a lot of people don’t think that way. They spend time on things without realizing the impact of the result. Is this meeting even necessary? Or can someone just make the call?

I mean, I remember when we took retail out of all of our studios. It was right before the pandemic. And I’m so mad at myself that I even did this for this long. We didn’t make any money off of it. It’s a pain point for our studio managers that would be better off selling memberships to clients than doing inventory on clothes. So, it’s taking up space in the studio, and we have to spend money – cost of goods right? And it gets stolen or lost. There’s literally zero benefit. Why did we fall into retail?. That’s not what we do. We’re an experiential business. I think sometimes those critical thinking skills get lost. And we just think, well, SoulCycle did it, or Barry’s is doing it, and they’re the big brands.

Although you seeded the company with $175,000 of your own savings, you ultimately did bring on outside investors. What prompted you to seek growth capital and what was your experience working with private equity ?

Well, I wasn’t growing fast enough. The profits from the studios wasn’t enough to grow at the rate I wanted. And I was getting to the point where I needed specialists. For example, I hired Bryan Myers, who eventually became CEO when I stepped into the Executive Chairman role. He came from Sweetgreen. They already had a hundred locations, and Bryan was responsible for development and finance.

And then hiring a chief financial officer was important. Just leveling up the talent of people who had done what I was trying to do.

And, because I knew at some point that I wanted to sell, getting private equity involved was actually smart at that stage because with their help, I was able to understand, what do the EBITDA numbers need to get to? What do the same store sales need to look like? How much growth do we need to be having? What other markets do we need to get in to show that this thing has a ton of white space. It was helpful to have their guidance. We started to make decisions to really optimize the brand and the finances of each studio.

So in 2017 I raised $18 million dollars from Peterson Partners; I took $6 million for myself (in what’s called a secondary transaction), and I put $12 million into the business. I showed the investors a path of how we were going to get to 100 studios and then sell. And frankly we would have done that, but Covid got in the way. But we opened 50 studios over the next 22-ish months, which was amazing. Because of Covid, we had to pivot. In 2021, we did another growth round raising approximately $50 million from VMG Partners, and delayed the exit a few years.

But yeah, I found my relationship with private equity to be really strong and really great. Most bad experiences with private equity are because the founder forgets that the private equity partners are in it to make as much money as possible, and you need to know that. You don’t get to have that many strikeouts when you’re investing in businesses. So I just understood that.

You ultimately did sell your stake in [solidcore] in April of 2023 for approximately $88 million to Kohlberg & Company. Then, in September of 2024, the private equity firm L Catterton bought a majority stake in [solidcore] valuing the business between $600 to $700 million. Did you think about doing a rollover and retaining some equity in the business?

I didn’t. I got to decide my number. I got to decide when I sold it. I had the controlling votes on the board, and I just knew if I rolled like 10% of my equity, but I didn’t have a say in anything, that was going to be hard for me. I am a leader and entrepreneur, and wouldn’t have liked sitting with a minority stake in my own business. I wanted to be in control of the ending and move on to whatever my next chapter would be. And sure did I leave money on the table? Yeah, I definitely did. But I put in $175,000 and, sold for $88 million plus another $10 million that happened when the L Catterton deal closed. And I negotiated that. So I pretty much made $100 million.

I’m good, you know. I moved on. I got married. I moved to Florida, and it was time for the next thing in my life.

That makes sense. You knew there was a point where you wanted to transition, and I think that’s a powerful message for a lot of entrepreneurs who can’t seem to let go of their baby.

Yes, or they hang on because they don’t know what else to do. And you know, I challenge a lot of people when I speak about growth, because growth means letting go so that you can have new uncertain experiences.

A lot of times if you look at people’s lives and you’ve lived in the same house the last 15 years, the same job, the same whatever. How is that growth? How can you say you value growth? But you’re hanging on to everything, and you’re looking for certainty. Growth is scary, uncertain, and uncomfortable. You are not sure what the next thing is, and that makes me feel alive.

And where [solidcore] is at right now, the big risks are over, you know. You just kind of need to keep opening studios. It’s very well capitalized. That’s not where I want to be. I love figuring out the big problems.

Well this has been such an awesome conversation. I want to end by just asking if you have any final advice for entrepreneurs.

I don’t think entrepreneurs think enough about what their niche is and what really motivates them. I’m a community builder. I have a beach volleyball court in my backyard. I bring people together. I introduce people to that sport. It isn’t a business for me right now. That’s just what I’m great at and what is really important to me.

I just felt so in my authentic self building both Back on My Feet and [solidcore]. People talk like, “Oh my God, the sacrifices you must have made!” And I have to be honest, I didn’t feel like I was sacrificing anything. I felt so in alignment with what I was supposed to be doing, and I think the best entrepreneurs would say the same thing. I had an incredible time, and again felt very much in my purpose building both of those organizations.

I think there’s a couple of things with the exit. Everybody’s business is different, but if you want an exit, you need to know who your buyer is and what they’re looking for. And make sure you’re building a business that’s going to be attractive to that buyer.

Also, have an excellent lawyer when you’re doing deals. Spend the money on a great lawyer who’s going to protect you and help you think about things that you’re not thinking of. I work with Steve Siesser at Lowenstein Sandler LLP. We’re close friends…he was at my wedding!

Anne Mahlum, founder of [solidcore] and the nonprofit Back on My Feet, brings her bold, no-nonsense energy to a conversation about leadership, resilience, and redefining success. With a track record of building both purpose-driven organizations and high-growth companies, Mahlum challenges conventional thinking on what it means to lead, scale, and show up with authenticity. A dynamic and candid speaker, she inspires audiences to embrace discomfort, take risks, and own their story unapologetically. Contact WWSG to host her as your keynote speaker.