"Entrepreneur is someone who is always able to find a way to accomplish a goal."
David Echevarria is the Founder and CEO of VPT – Virtual Personal Training. VPT provides custom workouts that fit your schedule, utilizing your equipment, and helps you reach your fitness goals. He is also the Founder and COO of Earthly Living, a holistic wellness/physical therapy practice in Montclair, NJ. Their office has treated thousands of people since 2016. David received his Bachelor of Engineering degree from Stevens Institute of Technology in 2014 in Mechanical Engineering with a concentration in Biomedical Technology. His senior year involved inventing a surgical tool to assist doctors in knee replacement surgeries.
His first official business was opened in 2013 with college friends of his. They created a YouTube fitness channel with over 100K subscribers and 4 million views. After college, he had many mini businesses in various industries: advertising, a parking app, blogging, etc. All while working full-time as an engineer. They started Earthly Living in May 2016 and he quit his full-time job in March 2019. This has been his full focus until 2021 when he started VPT. Now he runs and operates them both with his fiancé, Ashley.
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Table of Contents
Thank you so much for giving us your time! Before we begin, could you introduce yourself to our readers and take us through what exactly your company does and what your vision is for its future?
David Echevarria: VPT – Virtual Personal Training is the first fitness training service that is built specifically for each athlete.
You tell us how much time you have (15-60 minutes/day), how many days you commit to working out (1-5 days/week), what equipment you have (none necessary), and what your goals are. We take that information and make your workouts that fit exactly those parameters.
The workouts are uploaded to our mobile app and you do them whenever you want! No need to schedule a video session or drive to a location. If you have a trip coming up and you need to change your workout schedule or equipment, let us know ahead of time and we will edit your workouts for that time! But this is not just for home workouts. Even those who have a standard gym membership don’t always know what to do when they get there. VPT can tell you exactly what to do.
The best part is our price. Most personal trainers charge $70+ per session. Because of our technological approach to our workout creation, we can keep our costs significantly low while also serving a large number of athletes.
Your first 8 weeks of VPT are only $149. After that, you can purchase a monthly membership for as little as $134/month. That’s only $6.70 per workout! Our goal is to tear down the typical barriers regarding fitness and make healthy living available to everyone.
NO child ever says I want to be a CEO/entrepreneur when I grow up. What did you want to be and how did you get where you are today?
David Echevarria: I wanted to be SO many different as a child: professional soccer player, FBI agent, flight attendant, and numerous others. My interest has always been widespread. I have dabbled with all different industries and have tried anything that I could.
I think this is what eventually led me to be an entrepreneur. Even when I had a job, I was always creating some other stream of income elsewhere, not just for the money, but also because I had a genuine interest in whatever it was that I was building.
Being an entrepreneur is somewhat of a conglomeration of all those interests. It allows me to combine many of my passions and hobbies into my everyday life (exercise, photography, coaching, web design, finance, social media marketing, writing). Business requires all of these things, so as an entrepreneur, I get to do as much of this thing as I’d like while delegating the rest to my team.
Tell us something about yourself that others in your organization might be surprised to know.
David Echevarria: I once held three school track and field records, one high school and two collegiate. One collegiate record was recently beaten.
Many readers may wonder how to become an entrepreneur but what is an entrepreneur? How would you define it?
David Echevarria: I define an entrepreneur as someone who is always able to find a way to accomplish a goal. Business is a never-ending cycle of goal-barrier-solution-action-success/failure. Most people get stuck at the barrier stage, but entrepreneurs always find a solution AND take action. You have to do both.
What is the importance of having a supportive and inclusive culture?
David Echevarria: Having a supportive and inclusive culture is massively important. Every person on your team needs to know that they and their work are equally valuable for the success of the company. Always.
How can a leader be disruptive in the post covid world?
David Echevarria: A leader can be disruptive in a post-Covid world by understanding that employees are people with lives and issues that they need to address. Therefore, employees need the flexibility and support to do that so that they can then give you their best work possible.
If a 5-year-old asked you to describe your job, what would you tell them?
David Echevarria: I would tell them that I help people to feel good about themselves and live the happiest lives they can.
Share with us one of the most difficult decisions you had to make for your company that benefited your employees or customers. What made this decision so difficult and what were the positive impacts?
David Echevarria: The toughest decision was to make VPT strictly an online offering. This took away a large pool of clients who would prefer In-Person training, but the economics of that just does not support the long-term vision of the company. Our team is instead able to focus on the goal and not be distracted.
Leaders are usually asked about their most useful qualities but let’s change things up a bit. What is your most useless talent?
David Echevarria: I can balance a soccer ball on my forehead.
Thank you so much for your time but before we finish things off, we do have one more question. If you wrote a book about your life until today, what would the title be?
David Echevarria: ‘Jack of All Trades, Master of Self’
Larry Yatch, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank David Echevarria for taking the time to do this interview and share his knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with David Echevarria or his company, you can do it through his – Instagram
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