March 25, 2025 • 24 mins
In today's episode, host Pete Moore is joined by dynamic entrepreneur, Kevin Wathey. Kevin shares his journey from a deeply personal tragedy with his Mom, to becoming a multi-faceted entrepreneur, spearheading innovative projects across the globe. The discussion dives into two latest (and very complementary) ventures, including a new wellness resort set in Costa Rica, tailored for high-performing individuals seeking holistic health transformations.
Kevin also touches on Baseline, his health tech platform designed to revolutionize personal health management by offering customized experiences based on unique biological data. With insights on personal motivation, the importance of wellness, and his ambitious plans for future locations in Italy and South Africa, this episode is a must-listen for those interested in the fusion of hospitality, technology, and health.
On building out Velara, Kevin mentions, "The acquisition in Costa Rica was a preexisting boutique hotel. It was 24 rooms, two restaurants, a spa, and five acres of beachfront, on the Pacific Coast in the in the Nicoya Blue Zone. The intention was never to keep it as is, but to expand it. Right before we closed on it, the previous owner came to me and said, 'Hey. We have two extra plots of land adjacent. Would you like those as well?"
Key themes discussed
- Overcoming Limits Through Determination
- Opens Yoga Studio at 24
- Beachfront Hotel Expansion Project
- Pura Vida: A Subtractive Approach
- Baseline: Life Quality Scoring Platform
- Redefining Success and Profitability
- Embrace Workout Recovery Now
A few key takeaways:
1. Tragic Inspiration: Kevin shared a deeply personal story about how his mother's battle and subsequent passing from pancreatic cancer inspired him to pursue a "life without limitations." This taught him that whatever we focus on, we have the potential to accomplish.
2. Career Path: Kevin's journey from playing semi-pro hockey to getting into acting, then discovering yoga in Bali, and eventually moving into the hospitality industry, showcases his wide variety of experiences. These varied paths have shaped his entrepreneurial ventures today.
3. Building in Costa Rica: Kevin discussed acquiring and expanding a pre-existing boutique hotel in Costa Rica into a larger resort with a focus on health and wellness tailored to guests through testing prior to their stay. This venture targets high-performing individuals seeking more holistic health experiences.
4. Baseline Health Tech Platform: Complementing the resort, Kevin is also developing Baseline, a health tech platform that provides personalized health scores based on lifestyle and behavioral interventions. It's designed to track a client's health progress over time and is aimed at reducing dependence on pharmaceuticals.
5. Entrepreneurial Vision: Kevin is balancing two major projects simultaneously, driven by an overarching vision of holistic wellness and lifestyle improvement. He sees both as complementary, each aiding the success of the other.
Click here to download transcript.
Resources:
- Kevin Wathey: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinwathey
- Baseline: https://www.getbaseline.com
- Velara Resorts: htt
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I am super excited to announce that we now have a formal
partnership with the prospect wizard. And when I say
wizard, I mean wizard. Obviously, you have a website.
This allows you to convert your website traffic visitors
directly into leads. It's not just another chatbot, and it's
not AI, but it allows a visitor to call, text, or leave a
(00:22):
voice mail immediately goes to you, your sales team, or anyone else in the
club instantly. MIT shows a study that if you contact
a lead within ten minutes, chance of them converting goes up nine
times that of the average. We got the Atlanta clubs on
it, Vida Fitness, Gold's Gym, Mountainside,
City Fitness Philly, College Park, become one
(00:44):
of the next halo companies to deploy the wizard. It's
easy to use. Go to the prospectwizard.com. Get
a free thirty day trial. Talk to my boy, Dave Gallon. He will get you
all set up and let the leads flow based on the
wizard. Go get them.
This is Pete Moore on Halo Talks NYC. I'm here with Kevin
(01:06):
Waffey. We're gonna talk baseline to coastline,
biotech versus the coastline of Costa Rica,
both projects at the same time. Try and be an entrepreneur two
x. Welcome to the show. Pete, I appreciate you
having me. And I really appreciate you shaving and getting a nice little haircut for
us as well. It's very, very, professional in your
(01:29):
halo ways. So give us a little background on, how
you became a crazy entrepreneur, what gave you the confidence and
enthusiasm to, to start these projects, and,
let's start with Costa Rica if we can. Yeah. Well, I'll give a little
bit of backstory on myself that I think will help paint the picture of of
how we got to where I am today. When, when I was
(01:50):
16 years old, my mom set out to inspire my younger sister and
I and decided to run the Tempe Town Lake Triathlon just
outside ASU in in Tempe, Arizona. She she's
46, trained for, completed, her
first triathlon, and crossed the finish line complaining of low back
pain, thought she hurt herself in the race, got an MRI, found
(02:12):
out she had stage four pancreatic cancer, and was given three months to live.
So Hello. Went from being the healthiest she had
ever been to giving a a a death certificate,
essentially. And she sat my younger sister and I down, said she was gonna outlive
the prognosis by a year and spend one more Christmas with us.
And she passed away 12/26/2010.
(02:34):
And if that if if that showed
me anything, it's that by example, she was able to she
showed me by example that she was able to pick the date of her last
breath. And if that's possible, then whatever we focus on is what we're able to
accomplish as well. And as
I've moved forward through my life, I've recognized that the only limitation is
(02:55):
your own imagination. And so I've I've I've made sure that
I only select projects that, are are
a bit absurd, but only because we're only limited by what we place
our own limits upon. Yeah. So I'm sorry to hear about that. At
the same time, it sounds like she's been a inspiration to probably just more than
you and your sister. It it to I've never heard someone,
(03:18):
and I'm sure I'm biased, but I've never heard someone speak negative about her, which
is a a a feat in in this day and
age. Gotcha. So after after she passed, I went and played two years
on the East Coast Hockey, semi professionally. Hockey led me to
acting. I, my dad gave me the ultimatum. He says, you get a
degree, or I never helped you with anything in life. Okay. He's very
(03:40):
conservative New Yorker. And What time is this
from again? Syosset. Okay. Yeah. I'm from,
I'm from Westbury. I was a big roller hockey player back
in the day. I didn't play ice hockey. That's what I started. A range of
game last night, actually. Okay. I was with Kraken. And so
Adam Fox, who grew up in Jericho, who's now playing
(04:02):
defense for the, for the Rangers at five eleven and one
eighty. So I would say whatever you set your mind to, you could do,
regardless of your stature. I agree. And, so
he gave me the ultimatum. I said I would get a I would get a
degree, in theater of all things because
I was acting at the time. Did my undergrad at ASU in three
(04:24):
years. My second year, I got asked to go perform a show that my buddy
had written in Bali. And I started taking yoga while I
was there. And about three weeks into it, I came
out of a yoga class, and the sky was a different shade of blue. The
the trees were greener. I could smell differently. I made eye contact
with my vocal production coach, and I saw my mom in her,
(04:46):
and I broke. And it was five years after she had passed. It was the
first time I ever allowed myself to grieve her passing. And
I was really I was very well received in that community, and I came
back to The States, and I said, where do I meet more people like that?
So I I enrolled in a yoga teacher
training really to learn more about myself. That was
(05:07):
the only only piece, as well. And then I I graduated
there and my bachelor's at the same time and took a summer internship
at at Hyatt Hotels. I, was a pool boy,
and, it was a great summer. Okay. Where were we
stationed? This was in Scottsdale. So I was at the Hyatt Hyatt
Regency Canyon Ranch. And I was there for for a
(05:30):
summer. I crushed it. They invited me to come on full time.
Two years into that, they invited me on the brand development team, and I helped
open properties. So everything from the ground up. Nice. So the
last property I opened, I was '24, was Andaz
Scottsdale, in Scottsdale, Arizona, miles a couple miles
away from from Gainey Ranch. And
(05:52):
I don't know what led me to to ask, but
I was getting really involved in in yoga and meditation and and
wellness. And I said that, I'll build the food and beverage program
for you, but I also wanna build a yoga and fitness amenity and run it
as my own studio. So at 24, I, ended up
building a yoga and fitness facility at a five
(06:14):
star resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. I ran that as my own
studio for over a year, and at the end of the year, director of
ops came to me, said, hey. We see how much money you're making. We want
50%. And I was like, not how this
normally not how this normally works. So I put together a
proposal of how we could branch wellness to Hyatt Worldwide, with an
(06:35):
external guest program and internal employee program, presented it to
the CEO, CFO, VP of the Americas. And in 2016, they said it would never
be big enough to warrant a corporate partnership. Put in my two
weeks and started a consultancy. Gotcha. Funny thing
funny thing is that nine months later, they partnered with Headspace and brought part of
what I was trying to do in internal. Yeah. Between Headspace, they
(06:57):
also used to own Exhale Spa for a period of time. Mhmm. And it never
seemed to, like, pull all the pieces together that they had under
their their influence, to, to to
really pull it off the way I I I was hoping the
hospitality industry would. So as of now,
you've proven that you've got the requisite skill set to, to to
(07:19):
to launch what you're launching now. So talk to us about the
benefit of building a ground up
resort versus maybe going and buying one or partnering with one. What was the
rationale there? So the the acquisition of Costa Rica
was a preexisting boutique hotel. So it was 24 rooms, two restaurants,
and a spa, five acres of beachfront, on the Pacific Coast
(07:41):
in the in the Nicoya Blue Zone. And the intention
was never to keep it as is, but to expand it. And right before
we closed on it, the previous owner came to me and said, hey. We have
two extra plots of land adjacent. Would you like those as well? They're already
prepermitted for condos and residences. So it went from
a a smaller boutique resort acquisition
(08:03):
to over 17 and a half acres of beachfront and beachfront
adjacent property. And when all is said and done, that'll be 52
rooms, 32 residences, and 54 condos. Gotcha.
And do you feel as if you're,
who's the clientele to to to bring to that resort? Are you
selling any kind of, like, co ops where, like, you buy a unit and
(08:26):
then and then it gets rented out? Yeah. So
we're in talks with a a company right now to
prepurchase the majority of the condos and residences. Yeah. The
resort will stay within our own Opco and be focused
on entrepreneurs, c suite, high performing
individuals that really want the complete picture of their health because the
(08:48):
way the resort is structured is that you will actually do pre pre stay
testing. So you'll do a full exome sequence. You'll do a blood, microbiome, and
metabolic panel, and all of your treatments, activities,
excursions, everything on property is customized to your unique biology.
This is Pete Moore. I wanna let you in on a little secret. There's this
(09:09):
company called Promotion Vault, and what they do is they give out rewards
from retailers that allow you to incentivize your
members without having to do zero down and one month
free or giving away shakes or giving away t shirts. What
you wanna do is build a rewards program that lasts, that
people value, and that doesn't discount your own products and services.
(09:31):
So here's the deal. There's something called rewards vault. The rewards
vault is going to allow a member to set up their own profile.
They are going to answer questions. You are gonna get those answers. You're gonna be
able to target those members, and you're gonna reward them inside your
club, inside your spa, and outside of the club, and
outside of the spa to get them to become loyal, to get them
(09:54):
to pay their monthly dues, and to be rewarded
properly for the actions. A lot of companies are cutting back on rewards.
You shouldn't be. Promotion Vault's your answer. Trust me. This is
real.
And then from from a standpoint of where you're gonna be living, are you gonna
be living as a resort upon opening for several
(10:16):
years, or what's your plan? I'll be down there to help with the
opening, but my intention is once we break ground, we go to Italy and
start looking for location number two, and South Africa being number
three. And why those choices of locations?
Costa Rica, initially, because it was my favorite is my favorite place on the
planet. I have two tattoos. One is I Hope You Dance in my mom's handwriting,
(10:39):
and the second, which was her favorite song, and the second is Pura Vida.
Because the first time I went down there, it it had a
lasting impact on me. It's about a way of life and
they take a very similar approach to living in how
I think of healthcare, how I think of life, how I think of well-being, and
that's a game of subtraction, not addition. It's not what can we inject or
(11:01):
ingest in order to in order to become healthy.
It's what can we remove in order to get back to a place of
vitality, which is where our our bodies are uniquely created
to begin. This is a destination or this is like a
Costa Rican, like, mindset? It's a Costa Rican
mindset, particularly in the blue
(11:23):
zone, which is the Nicoya Peninsula, 5 blue zones in the world where the
life expectancy is the longest. So that was the reason for Costa
Rica. I'm Italian so that's the reason for number two
I'm getting my citizenship right now and I went on a I
consulted for a safari retreat company years
ago and had an incredible experience, happy to
(11:44):
dive into it more, on Africa and of
South Africa particularly, and I think there's more
people who need to experience that. Gotcha. And then from
the unit economics on something like this, you know, it's
it's not necessarily akin to, hey, I'm going
on a one week or a two week vacation. You know, you're really kind of,
(12:08):
you know, coupling that with, hey, him going to like the Mayo Clinic for a
period of time and what would be some other what would be the best analogy
to say I'm going to what two or three things. It's like
a positive mash up, if you will, for lack of a better musical
tongue. The closest comparable to someone that's doing something similar is a
place in Switzerland called Clinique La Perie. They do a
(12:31):
a five day detox retreat for $55.
And we're positioned slightly
differently in that we don't starve you for $55,
but, it's it's a similar,
25 to 30,000 a week. Wow.
Okay. So that that's pretty high margin, but at the same time,
(12:52):
you also got the staff and the the the
actual technology there to to serve that. Correct.
To want that amount. Correct. There's a a suite of medical benefits as
well as practitioners on-site. A lot of that ties
into Baseline, which is the health tech platform we're building right now too.
Gotcha. Alright. So pivot pivot to Baseline, and this is Baseline is
(13:15):
going to effectively be the the CRM
that powers the location in in Costa Rica and then becomes, like,
your internal software, you know, ERP.
And then you're also gonna have other people allowed to use it, or is it
gonna be captive? No. It's so it's gonna be a standalone entity.
Other people can use it as well, and it's not specifically only for
(13:37):
resorts. So the way that we got to to building was
that the the the problem I wanted to solve was how do we
quantify a resort stay? Normally, you go somewhere you feel great, you go
back home, and you do the same behavior that that led to you needing
to to go on vacation in the first place. So I said if we do
pre pre stay testing, that then would allow us to create a
(13:59):
baseline that allows you to not only see what happens at a moment
in time, but track trend lines over your lifetime. And
so Baseline, it's a platform built by your biology for your biology,
and it's meant to score how well you live your life, focused specifically on
behavioral and lifestyle intervention. And if we look at I know we were in
Vegas at the same time, if you look at healthcare today,
(14:22):
95% of spendings on chronic disease, nineteen sixty, that was
zero. 19 60, the first ever prescription,
for a chronic condition was released, which was oral contraceptive,
and it's straight up and to the right since then. Today,
McKinsey came out with a study that eighty percent of chronic conditions can be treated
completely treated with lifestyle and behavior change. But That's
(14:45):
where we're at. Yeah. No one gonna the pharma doesn't
benefit from, from that, though. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. And they spend a
lot of money coming up with crazy needs for a lot of,
pills that have significant amount of side effects. Yeah. Well, they're lobbying
right now lobbying right now to have have, Ozempic
be adopted by children as young as six. What six year old needs a
(15:08):
weight loss management injection that, maybe we should look
at what we're putting in the body, not injecting into it?
Well, one that has, like, you know, 500 calories per serving in
their, in their, their their kitchen,
closet would be the ones that would need the six year old Ozempic
pills right next to it. Or you can walk in and out of, like, the
(15:30):
snack area and get, like, a shot of Ozempic, like, in a like, a
Amazon, you know, shopping cart or something. You know, you put your
credit card in. Yeah. You go buy stuff and charge you directly. You give,
like, spray them with, like, Ozempic on the way out. Hey. If we weren't
trying to make the world healthier, I think you might have a business model there
too. Yeah. I mean, there's been crazier business models. I I probably gotta
(15:52):
develop it a little more. I just came up with that. You know? I think
one of those, Arizona, you know, like, sprays that they have
outdoors, you know, where you can sit outside. Yeah. I missed this.
Something. You can just be spraying Ozempic on the fat kids. See what
happens. Alright. Probably not the best idea. I'm sorry about
using the word fat. I mean, overweight or lack of
(16:14):
behavioral eating disorders. Put it that way. Yeah.
So so as you kind of, like, flow through as an entrepreneur
at your age, and say, hey. I'm gonna try and accomplish
these things. You know that running two companies at the same time is
not, you know, a a a a the the, you know,
desired path. Obviously, you wanna try and do one at a time. So what
(16:37):
what what's the rationale? Do you think you're gonna miss something if you do
one or the other, or they need each other in order to coexist?
I think they're complimentary. They're under the same umbrella. They hold the same amount
of space in my head. And, I don't see them
as competitive, and I see them as actually helping each other get
across the line. Gotcha. And then then as you look at two
(17:00):
companies like this, you know, for for our entrepreneurs out there that are
thinking about business models, if you if you
own the Costa Rica, let's put put Italy and South Africa on
the side. I own Costa Rica. I own a software company that is going to
power, this Costa Rican entity. How do you think about transfer
pricing? How do you think about raising money? For
(17:22):
obviously, there are two separate investors in my mind that would wanna
invest in a, you know, med spa hotel destination,
best of class, first of its kind. And, yeah, I'm running a software
company. So the first question I would ask is if I'm
investing in both of these, what what are you gonna charge the software company?
Because I might not be on both sides of this this investment.
(17:45):
Yeah. The the Costa Rican the the the commercial real
estate piece is a very kind of PE, maybe family office
conversation. On this on the SaaS side, the health tech side, that's
definitely a venture conversation or an angel conversation.
There's some families that may have appetite for both, and and we've talked to quite
a few. We're almost fully subscribed for Costa Rica, and
(18:07):
then I that will be great because then I won't be raising for two projects
at the same time, which will which will help me mentally. Yeah.
Yeah. But, the way that it's gonna work is there will be a
services agreement with Baseline going to Azul, the property in Costa
Rica. So so how does somebody like you how do you
define success? I mean, you could define it on a daily
(18:28):
basis. It sounds like you've had some life events
that you've had, you know, real, you know, takeaways from,
and it's changed the way you've thought. That's success in and of itself,
right, to to have self awareness and, you know, understand your own mission
and your pursuit and, you know, validation and conviction
over what you're doing. Yeah. At the same time, you know, you got a
(18:51):
software company that's gotta get to breakeven. You got a
location that's gonna be catering to you know, not everyone's got
25 k to throw at, you know, at themselves, you know, to
to actually help themselves. So so how do you define success, and how
do you know how long it's gonna take to get there and be
comfortable with that? Did you know this is gonna be breakeven on day one on
(19:13):
both Yeah. My personal definition of success is is
always striving without sacrificing the present, and I think that that is
something that is often overlooked in society is that it's a
monetary place or it's a place to get to, and I've realized
that life is lost my mom at 17, best friend at
19. And if I've learned anything from that, it's
(19:35):
that life is too short to
be happy when, to be successful when or
if. And I've redefined a
lot of those things in my life. But in terms of, like, a monetary
standpoint, the we're already pre selling the residences and the
condos on property. That's going to
(19:57):
basically return the investor, the equity
raise back 136% once we have a grand opening in
January 27, and then there's a fiftyfifty split on the upside for
anyone on, the on the on common
within Azul. For the baseline
platform, I see that as the next ten to fifteen years of my
(20:18):
life, ideally only raising for it
once and making the economics make sense to where it is
a very profitable company without having to need to raise again.
The thing I will say too is that, yes, a 25
ks price point is not accessible to everyone and I completely understand that.
The way to think of it is we have a freemium, premium, and executive tier
(20:41):
within Baseline. Freemium's free. Premium
is going to be a monthly or annual charge. The executive
tier is the 25 ks or 30 ks a year, where you get the white
glove experience, where you get the, the
the concierge, where you get the five star, seven day
stay. The other two are accessible. You can get
(21:03):
your exome sequence and your labs done every single year for under I mean,
you only have to do exome once, but you have to you can get your
labs done every single year for almost under a thousand dollars.
This is Pete Moore. Here's the last tip for you of the podcast.
We are partnered up with a company called Higher Dose, higher dose
dot com. They are the leader in workout
(21:26):
recovery products, infrared technology, LED
light masks, neck enhancers, and other
products such as PMF mats and sauna blankets.
If you have not gotten on the workout recovery train
yet, your time and your stop is now. You gotta
get these products in there before these workout recovery and spas end
(21:48):
up saturating your market. Having your members walk out of the club and
going into one of their locations for $200 per
month where they're paying 39 to you. Let's become an
expert in workout recovery if we are already an authority in
workouts. Higher dose, check it out. There's a
wholesale code, and we look forward to helping
(22:10):
you augment your products and services to meet the demands of your
members. And, hey, let's get people happy, healthy,
and sweating, and the recovery should be just as good as the
workout.
Alright. In closing here, we'll have all your info up on the, up on the
show notes here about the location and and both of the cap raises. But you
(22:32):
got a quote that you, that you live by. I'm sure you have
many. But but, Nancy, now you got a takeaway that we can put in our
quote library here at the Halo headquarters. I've got
I've got many, but one that I really enjoy that's been been on my mind
presently is a system theorist, r Buckminster Fuller.
And he says that you can never change things by fighting the existing reality.
(22:54):
To change something, you need to build a new model that makes the old one
obsolete. Nice. Alright. You've
heard it here first. Kevin, we are going baseline to coastline. Welcome to
Halo Talks. Let us know how we can be helpful. A lot of health clubs
and and med spas are our clients and long term relationships, so we should
probably start to plan once Costa Rica is up and running for
(23:15):
people to sign up through their affiliates to
come down there and basically have that as like a club promoted, you
know, destination week, you know, as a team or as a,
as a small community. So congrats on what you're doing. We love the
ambition, and, we wanna be helpful. So glad we got connected.
Appreciate you. Thank you for having me. Alright, man. Great work. Love it.
I am super excited to announce that we now have a formal
partnership with the prospect wizard. And when I say
wizard, I mean wizard. Obviously, you have a website.
This allows you to convert your website traffic visitors
directly into leads. It's not just another chatbot, and it's
not AI, but it allows a visitor to call, text, or leave a
(00:22):
voice mail immediately goes to you, your sales team, or anyone else in the
club instantly. MIT shows a study that if you contact
a lead within ten minutes, chance of them converting goes up nine
times that of the average. We got the Atlanta clubs on
it, Vida Fitness, Gold's Gym, Mountainside,
City Fitness Philly, College Park, become one
(00:44):
of the next halo companies to deploy the wizard. It's
easy to use. Go to the prospectwizard.com. Get
a free thirty day trial. Talk to my boy, Dave Gallon. He will get you
all set up and let the leads flow based on the
wizard. Go get them.
This is Pete Moore on Halo Talks NYC. I'm here with Kevin
(01:06):
Waffey. We're gonna talk baseline to coastline,
biotech versus the coastline of Costa Rica,
both projects at the same time. Try and be an entrepreneur two
x. Welcome to the show. Pete, I appreciate you
having me. And I really appreciate you shaving and getting a nice little haircut for
us as well. It's very, very, professional in your
(01:29):
halo ways. So give us a little background on, how
you became a crazy entrepreneur, what gave you the confidence and
enthusiasm to, to start these projects, and,
let's start with Costa Rica if we can. Yeah. Well, I'll give a little
bit of backstory on myself that I think will help paint the picture of of
how we got to where I am today. When, when I was
(01:50):
16 years old, my mom set out to inspire my younger sister and
I and decided to run the Tempe Town Lake Triathlon just
outside ASU in in Tempe, Arizona. She she's
46, trained for, completed, her
first triathlon, and crossed the finish line complaining of low back
pain, thought she hurt herself in the race, got an MRI, found
(02:12):
out she had stage four pancreatic cancer, and was given three months to live.
So Hello. Went from being the healthiest she had
ever been to giving a a a death certificate,
essentially. And she sat my younger sister and I down, said she was gonna outlive
the prognosis by a year and spend one more Christmas with us.
And she passed away 12/26/2010.
(02:34):
And if that if if that showed
me anything, it's that by example, she was able to she
showed me by example that she was able to pick the date of her last
breath. And if that's possible, then whatever we focus on is what we're able to
accomplish as well. And as
I've moved forward through my life, I've recognized that the only limitation is
(02:55):
your own imagination. And so I've I've I've made sure that
I only select projects that, are are
a bit absurd, but only because we're only limited by what we place
our own limits upon. Yeah. So I'm sorry to hear about that. At
the same time, it sounds like she's been a inspiration to probably just more than
you and your sister. It it to I've never heard someone,
(03:18):
and I'm sure I'm biased, but I've never heard someone speak negative about her, which
is a a a feat in in this day and
age. Gotcha. So after after she passed, I went and played two years
on the East Coast Hockey, semi professionally. Hockey led me to
acting. I, my dad gave me the ultimatum. He says, you get a
degree, or I never helped you with anything in life. Okay. He's very
(03:40):
conservative New Yorker. And What time is this
from again? Syosset. Okay. Yeah. I'm from,
I'm from Westbury. I was a big roller hockey player back
in the day. I didn't play ice hockey. That's what I started. A range of
game last night, actually. Okay. I was with Kraken. And so
Adam Fox, who grew up in Jericho, who's now playing
(04:02):
defense for the, for the Rangers at five eleven and one
eighty. So I would say whatever you set your mind to, you could do,
regardless of your stature. I agree. And, so
he gave me the ultimatum. I said I would get a I would get a
degree, in theater of all things because
I was acting at the time. Did my undergrad at ASU in three
(04:24):
years. My second year, I got asked to go perform a show that my buddy
had written in Bali. And I started taking yoga while I
was there. And about three weeks into it, I came
out of a yoga class, and the sky was a different shade of blue. The
the trees were greener. I could smell differently. I made eye contact
with my vocal production coach, and I saw my mom in her,
(04:46):
and I broke. And it was five years after she had passed. It was the
first time I ever allowed myself to grieve her passing. And
I was really I was very well received in that community, and I came
back to The States, and I said, where do I meet more people like that?
So I I enrolled in a yoga teacher
training really to learn more about myself. That was
(05:07):
the only only piece, as well. And then I I graduated
there and my bachelor's at the same time and took a summer internship
at at Hyatt Hotels. I, was a pool boy,
and, it was a great summer. Okay. Where were we
stationed? This was in Scottsdale. So I was at the Hyatt Hyatt
Regency Canyon Ranch. And I was there for for a
(05:30):
summer. I crushed it. They invited me to come on full time.
Two years into that, they invited me on the brand development team, and I helped
open properties. So everything from the ground up. Nice. So the
last property I opened, I was '24, was Andaz
Scottsdale, in Scottsdale, Arizona, miles a couple miles
away from from Gainey Ranch. And
(05:52):
I don't know what led me to to ask, but
I was getting really involved in in yoga and meditation and and
wellness. And I said that, I'll build the food and beverage program
for you, but I also wanna build a yoga and fitness amenity and run it
as my own studio. So at 24, I, ended up
building a yoga and fitness facility at a five
(06:14):
star resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. I ran that as my own
studio for over a year, and at the end of the year, director of
ops came to me, said, hey. We see how much money you're making. We want
50%. And I was like, not how this
normally not how this normally works. So I put together a
proposal of how we could branch wellness to Hyatt Worldwide, with an
(06:35):
external guest program and internal employee program, presented it to
the CEO, CFO, VP of the Americas. And in 2016, they said it would never
be big enough to warrant a corporate partnership. Put in my two
weeks and started a consultancy. Gotcha. Funny thing
funny thing is that nine months later, they partnered with Headspace and brought part of
what I was trying to do in internal. Yeah. Between Headspace, they
(06:57):
also used to own Exhale Spa for a period of time. Mhmm. And it never
seemed to, like, pull all the pieces together that they had under
their their influence, to, to to
really pull it off the way I I I was hoping the
hospitality industry would. So as of now,
you've proven that you've got the requisite skill set to, to to
(07:19):
to launch what you're launching now. So talk to us about the
benefit of building a ground up
resort versus maybe going and buying one or partnering with one. What was the
rationale there? So the the acquisition of Costa Rica
was a preexisting boutique hotel. So it was 24 rooms, two restaurants,
and a spa, five acres of beachfront, on the Pacific Coast
(07:41):
in the in the Nicoya Blue Zone. And the intention
was never to keep it as is, but to expand it. And right before
we closed on it, the previous owner came to me and said, hey. We have
two extra plots of land adjacent. Would you like those as well? They're already
prepermitted for condos and residences. So it went from
a a smaller boutique resort acquisition
(08:03):
to over 17 and a half acres of beachfront and beachfront
adjacent property. And when all is said and done, that'll be 52
rooms, 32 residences, and 54 condos. Gotcha.
And do you feel as if you're,
who's the clientele to to to bring to that resort? Are you
selling any kind of, like, co ops where, like, you buy a unit and
(08:26):
then and then it gets rented out? Yeah. So
we're in talks with a a company right now to
prepurchase the majority of the condos and residences. Yeah. The
resort will stay within our own Opco and be focused
on entrepreneurs, c suite, high performing
individuals that really want the complete picture of their health because the
(08:48):
way the resort is structured is that you will actually do pre pre stay
testing. So you'll do a full exome sequence. You'll do a blood, microbiome, and
metabolic panel, and all of your treatments, activities,
excursions, everything on property is customized to your unique biology.
This is Pete Moore. I wanna let you in on a little secret. There's this
(09:09):
company called Promotion Vault, and what they do is they give out rewards
from retailers that allow you to incentivize your
members without having to do zero down and one month
free or giving away shakes or giving away t shirts. What
you wanna do is build a rewards program that lasts, that
people value, and that doesn't discount your own products and services.
(09:31):
So here's the deal. There's something called rewards vault. The rewards
vault is going to allow a member to set up their own profile.
They are going to answer questions. You are gonna get those answers. You're gonna be
able to target those members, and you're gonna reward them inside your
club, inside your spa, and outside of the club, and
outside of the spa to get them to become loyal, to get them
(09:54):
to pay their monthly dues, and to be rewarded
properly for the actions. A lot of companies are cutting back on rewards.
You shouldn't be. Promotion Vault's your answer. Trust me. This is
real.
And then from from a standpoint of where you're gonna be living, are you gonna
be living as a resort upon opening for several
(10:16):
years, or what's your plan? I'll be down there to help with the
opening, but my intention is once we break ground, we go to Italy and
start looking for location number two, and South Africa being number
three. And why those choices of locations?
Costa Rica, initially, because it was my favorite is my favorite place on the
planet. I have two tattoos. One is I Hope You Dance in my mom's handwriting,
(10:39):
and the second, which was her favorite song, and the second is Pura Vida.
Because the first time I went down there, it it had a
lasting impact on me. It's about a way of life and
they take a very similar approach to living in how
I think of healthcare, how I think of life, how I think of well-being, and
that's a game of subtraction, not addition. It's not what can we inject or
(11:01):
ingest in order to in order to become healthy.
It's what can we remove in order to get back to a place of
vitality, which is where our our bodies are uniquely created
to begin. This is a destination or this is like a
Costa Rican, like, mindset? It's a Costa Rican
mindset, particularly in the blue
(11:23):
zone, which is the Nicoya Peninsula, 5 blue zones in the world where the
life expectancy is the longest. So that was the reason for Costa
Rica. I'm Italian so that's the reason for number two
I'm getting my citizenship right now and I went on a I
consulted for a safari retreat company years
ago and had an incredible experience, happy to
(11:44):
dive into it more, on Africa and of
South Africa particularly, and I think there's more
people who need to experience that. Gotcha. And then from
the unit economics on something like this, you know, it's
it's not necessarily akin to, hey, I'm going
on a one week or a two week vacation. You know, you're really kind of,
(12:08):
you know, coupling that with, hey, him going to like the Mayo Clinic for a
period of time and what would be some other what would be the best analogy
to say I'm going to what two or three things. It's like
a positive mash up, if you will, for lack of a better musical
tongue. The closest comparable to someone that's doing something similar is a
place in Switzerland called Clinique La Perie. They do a
(12:31):
a five day detox retreat for $55.
And we're positioned slightly
differently in that we don't starve you for $55,
but, it's it's a similar,
25 to 30,000 a week. Wow.
Okay. So that that's pretty high margin, but at the same time,
(12:52):
you also got the staff and the the the
actual technology there to to serve that. Correct.
To want that amount. Correct. There's a a suite of medical benefits as
well as practitioners on-site. A lot of that ties
into Baseline, which is the health tech platform we're building right now too.
Gotcha. Alright. So pivot pivot to Baseline, and this is Baseline is
(13:15):
going to effectively be the the CRM
that powers the location in in Costa Rica and then becomes, like,
your internal software, you know, ERP.
And then you're also gonna have other people allowed to use it, or is it
gonna be captive? No. It's so it's gonna be a standalone entity.
Other people can use it as well, and it's not specifically only for
(13:37):
resorts. So the way that we got to to building was
that the the the problem I wanted to solve was how do we
quantify a resort stay? Normally, you go somewhere you feel great, you go
back home, and you do the same behavior that that led to you needing
to to go on vacation in the first place. So I said if we do
pre pre stay testing, that then would allow us to create a
(13:59):
baseline that allows you to not only see what happens at a moment
in time, but track trend lines over your lifetime. And
so Baseline, it's a platform built by your biology for your biology,
and it's meant to score how well you live your life, focused specifically on
behavioral and lifestyle intervention. And if we look at I know we were in
Vegas at the same time, if you look at healthcare today,
(14:22):
95% of spendings on chronic disease, nineteen sixty, that was
zero. 19 60, the first ever prescription,
for a chronic condition was released, which was oral contraceptive,
and it's straight up and to the right since then. Today,
McKinsey came out with a study that eighty percent of chronic conditions can be treated
completely treated with lifestyle and behavior change. But That's
(14:45):
where we're at. Yeah. No one gonna the pharma doesn't
benefit from, from that, though. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. And they spend a
lot of money coming up with crazy needs for a lot of,
pills that have significant amount of side effects. Yeah. Well, they're lobbying
right now lobbying right now to have have, Ozempic
be adopted by children as young as six. What six year old needs a
(15:08):
weight loss management injection that, maybe we should look
at what we're putting in the body, not injecting into it?
Well, one that has, like, you know, 500 calories per serving in
their, in their, their their kitchen,
closet would be the ones that would need the six year old Ozempic
pills right next to it. Or you can walk in and out of, like, the
(15:30):
snack area and get, like, a shot of Ozempic, like, in a like, a
Amazon, you know, shopping cart or something. You know, you put your
credit card in. Yeah. You go buy stuff and charge you directly. You give,
like, spray them with, like, Ozempic on the way out. Hey. If we weren't
trying to make the world healthier, I think you might have a business model there
too. Yeah. I mean, there's been crazier business models. I I probably gotta
(15:52):
develop it a little more. I just came up with that. You know? I think
one of those, Arizona, you know, like, sprays that they have
outdoors, you know, where you can sit outside. Yeah. I missed this.
Something. You can just be spraying Ozempic on the fat kids. See what
happens. Alright. Probably not the best idea. I'm sorry about
using the word fat. I mean, overweight or lack of
(16:14):
behavioral eating disorders. Put it that way. Yeah.
So so as you kind of, like, flow through as an entrepreneur
at your age, and say, hey. I'm gonna try and accomplish
these things. You know that running two companies at the same time is
not, you know, a a a a the the, you know,
desired path. Obviously, you wanna try and do one at a time. So what
(16:37):
what what's the rationale? Do you think you're gonna miss something if you do
one or the other, or they need each other in order to coexist?
I think they're complimentary. They're under the same umbrella. They hold the same amount
of space in my head. And, I don't see them
as competitive, and I see them as actually helping each other get
across the line. Gotcha. And then then as you look at two
(17:00):
companies like this, you know, for for our entrepreneurs out there that are
thinking about business models, if you if you
own the Costa Rica, let's put put Italy and South Africa on
the side. I own Costa Rica. I own a software company that is going to
power, this Costa Rican entity. How do you think about transfer
pricing? How do you think about raising money? For
(17:22):
obviously, there are two separate investors in my mind that would wanna
invest in a, you know, med spa hotel destination,
best of class, first of its kind. And, yeah, I'm running a software
company. So the first question I would ask is if I'm
investing in both of these, what what are you gonna charge the software company?
Because I might not be on both sides of this this investment.
(17:45):
Yeah. The the Costa Rican the the the commercial real
estate piece is a very kind of PE, maybe family office
conversation. On this on the SaaS side, the health tech side, that's
definitely a venture conversation or an angel conversation.
There's some families that may have appetite for both, and and we've talked to quite
a few. We're almost fully subscribed for Costa Rica, and
(18:07):
then I that will be great because then I won't be raising for two projects
at the same time, which will which will help me mentally. Yeah.
Yeah. But, the way that it's gonna work is there will be a
services agreement with Baseline going to Azul, the property in Costa
Rica. So so how does somebody like you how do you
define success? I mean, you could define it on a daily
(18:28):
basis. It sounds like you've had some life events
that you've had, you know, real, you know, takeaways from,
and it's changed the way you've thought. That's success in and of itself,
right, to to have self awareness and, you know, understand your own mission
and your pursuit and, you know, validation and conviction
over what you're doing. Yeah. At the same time, you know, you got a
(18:51):
software company that's gotta get to breakeven. You got a
location that's gonna be catering to you know, not everyone's got
25 k to throw at, you know, at themselves, you know, to
to actually help themselves. So so how do you define success, and how
do you know how long it's gonna take to get there and be
comfortable with that? Did you know this is gonna be breakeven on day one on
(19:13):
both Yeah. My personal definition of success is is
always striving without sacrificing the present, and I think that that is
something that is often overlooked in society is that it's a
monetary place or it's a place to get to, and I've realized
that life is lost my mom at 17, best friend at
19. And if I've learned anything from that, it's
(19:35):
that life is too short to
be happy when, to be successful when or
if. And I've redefined a
lot of those things in my life. But in terms of, like, a monetary
standpoint, the we're already pre selling the residences and the
condos on property. That's going to
(19:57):
basically return the investor, the equity
raise back 136% once we have a grand opening in
January 27, and then there's a fiftyfifty split on the upside for
anyone on, the on the on common
within Azul. For the baseline
platform, I see that as the next ten to fifteen years of my
(20:18):
life, ideally only raising for it
once and making the economics make sense to where it is
a very profitable company without having to need to raise again.
The thing I will say too is that, yes, a 25
ks price point is not accessible to everyone and I completely understand that.
The way to think of it is we have a freemium, premium, and executive tier
(20:41):
within Baseline. Freemium's free. Premium
is going to be a monthly or annual charge. The executive
tier is the 25 ks or 30 ks a year, where you get the white
glove experience, where you get the, the
the concierge, where you get the five star, seven day
stay. The other two are accessible. You can get
(21:03):
your exome sequence and your labs done every single year for under I mean,
you only have to do exome once, but you have to you can get your
labs done every single year for almost under a thousand dollars.
This is Pete Moore. Here's the last tip for you of the podcast.
We are partnered up with a company called Higher Dose, higher dose
dot com. They are the leader in workout
(21:26):
recovery products, infrared technology, LED
light masks, neck enhancers, and other
products such as PMF mats and sauna blankets.
If you have not gotten on the workout recovery train
yet, your time and your stop is now. You gotta
get these products in there before these workout recovery and spas end
(21:48):
up saturating your market. Having your members walk out of the club and
going into one of their locations for $200 per
month where they're paying 39 to you. Let's become an
expert in workout recovery if we are already an authority in
workouts. Higher dose, check it out. There's a
wholesale code, and we look forward to helping
(22:10):
you augment your products and services to meet the demands of your
members. And, hey, let's get people happy, healthy,
and sweating, and the recovery should be just as good as the
workout.
Alright. In closing here, we'll have all your info up on the, up on the
show notes here about the location and and both of the cap raises. But you
(22:32):
got a quote that you, that you live by. I'm sure you have
many. But but, Nancy, now you got a takeaway that we can put in our
quote library here at the Halo headquarters. I've got
I've got many, but one that I really enjoy that's been been on my mind
presently is a system theorist, r Buckminster Fuller.
And he says that you can never change things by fighting the existing reality.
(22:54):
To change something, you need to build a new model that makes the old one
obsolete. Nice. Alright. You've
heard it here first. Kevin, we are going baseline to coastline. Welcome to
Halo Talks. Let us know how we can be helpful. A lot of health clubs
and and med spas are our clients and long term relationships, so we should
probably start to plan once Costa Rica is up and running for
(23:15):
people to sign up through their affiliates to
come down there and basically have that as like a club promoted, you
know, destination week, you know, as a team or as a,
as a small community. So congrats on what you're doing. We love the
ambition, and, we wanna be helpful. So glad we got connected.
Appreciate you. Thank you for having me. Alright, man. Great work. Love it.
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