[REAL ENTREPRENEURS] I Started a Nutrition Business Because My Own Health Was Tanking!

Welcome to post #2 of the REAL ENTREPRENEURS guest blog series

I’ll be featuring a number of health & wellness entrepreneurs who are at various stages of their entrepreneurial journey.

They’re going to be sharing where they’re at right now! It will be real, raw and unfiltered. Just as life should be – when you’re grabbing it by the lemons, that is 😉

All of the posts in this series can be searched under the CASE STUDY category.

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My name is Lynne Faires and I am a Registered Holistic Nutritionist — and a true entrepreneur at heart.

I have two amazing businesses that I love working on — although sometimes I feel like I don’t have enough time for either one!

Both of my businesses were born out of my experience as a practitioner, but also from struggling with my own health issues.

My husband Sean, and I co-founded the Holistic Nutrition Hub (HNH), which is an online consulting platform that helps Nutrition Professionals streamline and grow their businesses.

My second business was a meal prep company called Prepped with Love (PWL) in Vancouver, BC where we create customized meal plans and provide in-home meal prep to help people reach their health goals.

My nutrition business (ad)ventures started with my own health issues

Thinking back, it’s been 7 years since I first became intrigued by how nutrition could impact my health – and the health of others. 

As I became the go-to person for all my friends and family, I realized that I wanted to help even more people, so I became properly certified and began running my own nutrition practice.

I graduated from The Canadian School of Natural Nutrition (CSNN) in 2016 and was working out of a gym, running my own consulting practice shortly after.

To backtrack a little, my previous work had mainly been in administration, working for companies to improve processes or working on their social media/online presence to help them increase sales.

So, while working as a practitioner, I had to find numerous ways to make my own business run smoothly. Anything from automated emailing systems, online forms, spreadsheets, invoicing systems, loads of Word documents (oh, the documents!)…and the list goes on.

To me, this whole process was exhausting – and that’s being a comprehensively trained administrative professional! Every day I had thoughts similar to, “Oh my god, I am so glad I know what I am doing with all this!”. 

Plagued by these nagging thoughts, I woke up in the middle of the night back in October 2016 and was struck with the idea: “what if I created a platform that could streamline all these tools into one? I would be helping way more people in the long run!”

I figured that by helping Nutrition Professionals run their businesses more effectively, more people could be helped overall. You see, I’m a helper by nature.

Holistic Nutrition Hub started with creating online forms that were easy to send and receive and then grew to what we have today – an online platform with over 16 tools and forms, loads of resources, a podcast, a Facebook group – and it is STILL growing!

While that is all amazing, during the launch of HNH, I suffered pretty severely with my own health issues – depression, extreme fatigue, gut issues, you name it. It was all happening…again!

The truth is, I have suffered from similar symptoms on and off since I was a teenager and it worsened, rather severely, since having my last son.

This time, during the launch, it was extreme – and to be perfectly honest, it is still a regular part of my day – but getting better as I work through it!

The hardest decisions are often the game changers

I was still working part-time as a practitioner and part-time at CSNN Vancouver – all while helping Sean build HNH.

I soon realized that something had to go, which is when I decided to put my nutrition consulting practice on hold to take care of myself.

It was one of the best decisions I could have made and has ultimately led me to where I am today. 

Having some time and space away from consulting gave me time to think about what I really enjoyed doing and gave me insight into how I practiced.

I thought I had a magic pill for everyone! If I just wrote an amazing plan and gave it to my clients, then they would be motivated enough to follow through with it.

I was blind to the fact that no one has time to do everything that I was recommending, nor do many people want to know the “why’s and how’s” behind my methodology.

This left me honestly frustrated and feeling like I didn’t have the correct tools to be good at my job. I often asked myself, “how do you make someone do something without physically doing it for them?”

In the end, I couldn’t think of a simpler process – plan meals around the client’s health goals, go shopping and cook for the client. Prepped with Love (PWL) was born from this ideology.

A lot has changed in the last year, even in the last six months for me. In November 2017, I decided to leave CSNN and work 100% on my two businesses.

Within the first month, my community had referred enough clients to PWL that my schedule was full and I hired my first sub-contractor in January 2018. I am now working with a team of two other RHN’s and soon we’ll be hiring a third!

To be honest, PWL has exploded way faster than I even thought it could have! I felt and still feel ill-prepared to run my business most days, but at the same time, it has pushed me to get through all the obstacles thrown at me.

HNH, on the other hand, has been growing over the last year and we are seeing engagement steadily increase each month.

Thinking back on it now, I had no clue if any of this was going to work. I just wanted to be my own boss and hoped for the best.

If I could say I made one mistake, it was not finding help with the “little things” sooner and not just within my business, but around the house as well.

FYI – Children are great at cleaning, but a professional house cleaner is better!

I am very good at keeping my financials in an excel spreadsheet, but I am no accountant. I can write too – but why do it, when others are better at it?

Money Mindset & Outsourcing

Money is a thing that we hold on to dearly and this sometimes can hold us back from moving forward.

Outsourcing to ensure that you don’t burn out will be the biggest key to giving you more time and finding the parts of your business that you love doing. You don’t have to do everything yourself!

Sean has been an amazing support and contributor to the businesses and I couldn’t do what we do without him! A lot of entrepreneurs don’t have a support system and it can be a very lonely endeavour for a lot of people.

Even with Sean by my side being my cheerleader (he is REALLY good at that – it drives me nuts!), being a business owner is a roller coaster.

Some months you make money, other months you don’t. Some people love what you do, others won’t.

If this is what you want to do, make sure you build a network that supports you in your work. This network will be invaluable during the hard times.

Leaving the “workforce” was probably the most insane thing I have ever done. At least it felt that way. I

have to contribute to a household income, take care of three children, and have always been told that without a steady income, from a steady job – I wouldn’t be able to do this. I found out pretty quickly that this is WRONG!!

If I could go back, even just two years ago, I would tell myself that being a business owner is whatever you make of it. It can be as big or as small as you decide it is going to be.

However, if you start off by limiting yourself with this mindset, you will never be able to trudge through the “wastelands” of being an entrepreneur.

It takes heart, courage, time, energy, A LOT of passion, and a deep love for your work. If you don’t love your job or you are not in alignment with what you are doing – honestly, stop now.

This is tough work, but on the other hand, nothing else is more fulfilling, rewarding, or inspiring than doing what I do.

I get to be an amazing role model for my kids, work alongside my husband (and partner in crime), watch my clients succeed in their health journey, help nutrition professionals connect from all across Canada, and am incredibly thankful to provide a support system within that.

The thing I am most proud of — is that I get to call this ALL MY OWN! These businesses are all mine and I made them! I don’t think it gets any more amazing than that. 

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