From Car Crash To iCryo Franchisee | Matt Magnuson | The Owner Seat

Speaker A: Welcome back to the Owner Seat podcast. The show where fitness and wellness operators, franchisors and franchisees get the real playbook on what it takes to scale with clarity, not chaos. Today's episode is for every owner who believes success comes from pushing harder without realizing that longevity comes from recovering smarter. Too many operators build businesses around intensity. Go, go, go. Passion, passion, passion. They chase growth, chase results, chase momentum. But they ignore the systems that allow performance to last. They burn out teams, they overextend themselves. You. They treat discipline like effort instead of strategy. The consequence shows up slowly. Inconsistent performance, declining energy and businesses that rely on willpower muscling it through instead of structure. Fixing that is not about working harder. It's about building habits, routines and recovery into the operating model so performance becomes sustainable. That is the problem my guest today spent years solving. Matt Magnuson is the owner of one of my favorite brands. You gotta get in there. Icryowichita. A uh, wellness business built around recovery, performance and helping people take control of their health before problems force them to react. He's also an ultra marathoner. I don't know how he does it. Biohacker and DDP yoga instructor whose daily life reflects the same discipline he encourages in his guests. You gotta check him out on LinkedIn. If you follow his journey, one thing shows up again and again. Discipline over self, over ego. Whether it is choosing a shorter race to protect long term performance, reminding people that recovery is the real edge and differentiator, or telling clients uncomfortable truths about weight loss medication, his message is consistent, sustainable performance comes from honest decisions and consistent habits. Matt, so excited to chat with you. Welcome to the Owner Seat podcast.

Speaker B: Thank you Albert. I'm really excited to be here today.

Speaker A: So exciting. I'm loving what ICRYO is up to. I gotta give a shout out to the franchisor based out of Houston, Texas here where I'm at. And so it's been a lot of fun jumping in and out of there and I can't wait to chat with you about it.

Speaker B: So.

Speaker A: But before I get there, you recently made a post. You actually step down from a 50 mile race to protect your long term goal of completing 125 miles. It's called Bucklemania Nuts. All the, all the crazies go there like you. You guys are just running and killing it. I love it. Walk us through that decision I mentioned at the top there. Discipline over ego being a mantra of yours. How is that mindset, that mindset shifted or shaped the way you run a business as a franchisee?

Speaker B: Well I think it always comes down to working smart versus uh, working hard. I also think it's always looking at the long term play. So you know, when it comes to the ultramarathon, you know this Bucklemania race that I have um, a week, it begins a week from this Friday. It's a 48 hour race. Um, I think there's going to be about 25, 30, maybe 40 of us uh, doing this race. It's a 1.82 mile loop that we will just do over and over and over and over again from 5pm Friday night to 5pm Sunday night. So 48 hours, um, I'm going to try to do 125 miles over that time. But uh, yeah, anytime I'm getting ready for a big event like that, I usually sign up for a few shorter events. Going into the event kind of a little bit as a dress rehearsal just to get all my gear out and all that pre rest preparation, um, even down to staying in a hotel the night before. Because the night before an uh, actual big race, I'm gonna stay in that hotel. So let's simulate that process. And so that's essentially what I was doing this past weekend. I was originally going to run a 50 mile race but I had tweaked a few things with my hip a couple weeks before. I could have done that 50 mile race. In fact there were some times during that race on Saturday I'm like, oh, I know I could go this whole distance. But I dropped down to. Last week I made the decision to drop down to the marathon distance, 26.2 miles just to take it a little bit easier. Still a lot. Still. Still. Yeah, it wasn't, wasn't an easy morning for sure. Uh, but uh, it helps make sure that I prepare my body that I'm ready to go on the day of Bucklemania.

Speaker A: Well you, you mentioned it working smarter, not harder. And many of us, we've all been there and those that are listening maybe are there where it's just push, push, push. You feel, you know, overwhelmed, you feel like you're burnt out. Your team members are telling you they're burnt out. As we're all ambitious and we're wanting to make sure that our portfolio, our single unit to multi unit performs and is successful. I love your messaging though. You emphasize pacing, you emphasize recovery, you emphasize consistency in the process. Where did that come from? When did you realize that that discipline is more important than the uh, rah, rah intensity. Go, go, go.

Speaker B: Well, you know, I wish I had that my entire Life, you know, when I Monday M morning quarterback all the decisions I've made. But no, really it was something that came to me later in life. You know, I used to be about almost 100 pounds heavier than I am right now. So I lost 92 pounds. Thank you. I decided 15 years ago, uh, I um, was 36. My daughter was about to be born. First time dad at 36 and I just started mathing and I'm like, you know, she's going to be, I'm going to be in my late 50s before she's out of high school and I'm going to be in my 60s before she's out of college and those different things and think. So I started thinking about my longevity and seeing that, you know, things weren't so sustainable. So I just started cleaning up my diet and that was a long process of really, truly learning to eat better. But you know, I cleaned it up enough that I was able to at least uh, you know, lose the weight. And one of the other things that I decided to do was that I just knew that I had to be active. I, I wasn't, you know, I played sports for fears and, and you know, growing up, but nothing, you know, really competitive, no high school sports. And uh, then as an adult I just really didn't do anything athletic at all or fitness. So I would yo yo diet where I get really motivated and you know, uh, go, go on this diet plan and get in the gym for like two, three months and then it would just wear off and then. So, but, but at this point this was, this was going to be a life change. This was going to be permanent. And so it was just really starting that grind of. One of the early decisions I made was I'm going to get up at 4:30 every morning so I could start my workout at 5, 5, 10, get that workout done before the rest of the world is even up. And I think that that was the first step to building the, building discipline because um, you know it's, it's hard to get up that early. You know, you, you really got to, first off you got to make yourself go to bed a little bit earlier. And then in the morning you've got to fight with that snooze. You got to fight with it being cold outside. You got to fight with all your procrastination. But then once you do, you get that workout in before everybody else is up and, and you have a win and you start, you start your day with maybe, maybe it's a really good workout that you Accomplish a few things and you have two or three wins, but you're starting your day out that way, and then that momentum rolls into everything that you're doing. Well, as I'm starting this fitness journey, I decided that I'm going to try out running. Wasn't a runner before then, and I thought if I could just get up to the point where I could run three miles, four miles, if I could do that a couple days a week, that helped me lose the weight and more importantly, helped keep the weight off once I achieved those goals. Well, what I didn't know was that I was going to fall in love with running, got obsessed and I did. And then so that, that, uh, helped build more discipline because, you know, it started out, you know, I got up to where I could run three miles. I, I did what was called the couch to 5k plan. After a couple months, I'm like, you know, I bet I could do five miles today. And then it turned into six. Oh, wow. Now I'm at a 10k. Maybe I could shoot for eight miles, 10 miles, and. And then before you know it, I'm like, you know what? I bet I could do a half marathon. Well, you know, if you want to sign up to do a, uh, uh, half marathon and not die out there on the course, you have to stick with a training plan, you know, So I signed up for a training plan that gave me these specific workouts that I was doing every week that I needed to stick with and doing that, you know, it slowly built the discipline. And then next thing you know, I'm running my first half marathon and my second and my third, and then it's like, hey, you know what? I bet I could do a full marathon. And, uh, so with each level up, the discipline grew a little bit stronger.

Speaker A: Amazing. And you're, you're running with some of the top athletes in the whole world. And you talk about this, you say it's not just about training hard and getting ready and prepped. That's obviously very important. But what you chat about during that journey and then thereafter the event is about recovery. So can you walk us, uh, through that from a business perspective? And icryo, what changed when you started treating recovery as the core right. Part of this journey of prepping, training, recovering as the core service in a business lens. Right. Rather than this, like, I'll do it when I can, or it's just an add on.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. So it really started on accident, literally. I was in a car wreck. I was in A car accident. So, um, I had been running at this point for, you know, about six years. Had seven marathons under my belt. And at that time, I actually had a bug put in my ear to run ultramarathons. I never. I'd heard of it a few years before, didn't want to do it. And then I kind of started getting a little bit of interest, and then, boom, got in that car wreck. And so that car wreck, you know, the guy who hit me was four times the legal limit. I was at a red light. I was behind an F150. So when he plowed me from behind, I hit the truck that was in front of me and, you know, left me with several injuries. Spinal nose being the most notable. Yeah. Ah. So, you know, kind of took me out for 32 months, and that's when I actually just started discovering recovery. So I didn't want to take one pain pill during my recovery. You know, I'd had. I'd battled alcoholism in years prior, and I knew that, you know, I'd seen what pain pills did to the families of some people I knew, and, uh, was devastating. So I just didn't want to go down that route. I knew that likely I would be addicted. And I also didn't know how long the car wreck accidents would, you know, linger around. You know, I was. I was injured. The doctor was telling me three months. And actually three, four months in my recovery was very minimal. So my doctor said, uh, we got to send you in for an mri. We think there's more damage done underneath there, which there was. And so I was very thankful that I hadn't taken pain pills up to that point, because that's when it kind of was unveiled to me that this was going to be a much longer recovery process. So I'm like, well, I got to figure something out because I am just completely miserable. Um, you know, I wake up in the morning, I'm in constant pain, and that's after a bad night of sleep that's interrupted several times because I'm not comfortable. And then I go through the day tired and irritable and moody. And I try to do some of my physical therapy, but I'm in so much pain that I cut every corner possible. And, you know, I'm just not getting better. And I had heard about cryotherapy before my accident, but it just sounded insane, like getting in this chamber that was sub zero temperatures for a couple of minutes. You know, I didn't see really the value in it. But when you're in Constant pain for about three or four months. You get to the point where you're willing to try anything. So that's where I was at. I'm like, I can do anything for three minutes. Let me just do this. So, uh, there was a little mom and pop cryotherapy shop, which ironically, was about one block away from where my car accident happened. Maybe it was destiny, I don't know. Uh, but I, uh, jumped in that chamber and I'm like, okay, I could kind of feel where this is taken off a little bit of the edge. Let me try it again. So I stuck with it, um, over and over again and started every time feeling just a little bit better, a little bit better. And I started messing around with the other modalities that this wellness center had, such as compression therapy and eventually infrared saunas. And, you know, I remember one day I was in compression therapy after doing, um, a whole body cryotherapy session. And I was just sitting around looking at the way that they operated the place, and I was like, you know, if I ran this place, I would do this different, and I would do that different. You know, my business brain kind of started kicking in. And, uh, you know, uh, along that time, too, I started thinking to myself, where. Why did I know about this place before my injury? Because the reality was I was running marathons. And, you know, I was tore up after those long training runs on Saturdays and needed something to recover after the race and needed that extra tool that would make me feel a little bit better on race day. All those things that didn't exist. And so that light bulb went off. And, you know, eventually that's what led to us deciding that, you know what, let's take what happened here and use it to help other people. Because let me tell you something. Not only was there the physical aspect of my accident, but the mental aspect was much worse. You know, there was m. One day, specifically, I'm 11 and a half months or so after the car accident, and I'm in just horrible pain. And I'd been sitting on the couch that day, and I stood up and I immediately went to the ground because I just couldn't hold my back up. And I went through a whole range of emotions in that moment, from yelling and screaming to crying to just everything. And so I decided, you know what, I'm going to go downstairs, go down the basement, went down there, prayed for a little bit, and I really felt, God, tell me at that moment that, hey, you know what? You're going to get better, and you're going to use this experience to help others out. And I didn't know what that meant at that time, but then that light bulb went off and I started putting that together. And so I set one goal, and that was we're going to open a wellness center and we're going to help at least one person get off pain pills. And if we just do that, if we just help one person, mission accomplished. And, you know, um, I'm happy to say that I've lost track of how many people that we've gotten off pain pills in addition to all the other things that we've been able to help people out with since then.

Speaker A: This is wow. And I did not expect the conversation to go there. And this is amazing. One, thank you for being vulnerable and giving us, uh, some insight. It's not always, you know, happy days when you're in business or when you experience some of these hardships. There's some dark days. And thank you for shedding some light there because I'm sure there's a lot of people that can relate when, especially when it comes to pain. Pain is powerful and pain can get the best of us. And I love that you kept fighting, that you did it on your knees too, in the basement. And God has answered, how amazing. Amen to that. And God, he's always good. So good. So walk us through then, as you're going through this experience. When did you meet Kyle, by the way? Kyle reach back out to me on LinkedIn. I've, uh, been trying to get a hold of him at the time of this recording. Um, when did you meet Kyle? And then walk us through icryo. And you kind of mentioned it earlier, introducing red light therapy and IV therapy. There's. There's much more than the chamber now, which is exciting and they're all complimentary and they all provide a great experience. Can you walk us through what we can expect if we were to walk into I cryo Wichita? What does that look like?

Speaker B: Yeah. So you walk in icryo Wichita. The first thing we're going to do is just find out why you're there. We want to get to know you a little bit. So what brings in Albert? Is Albert an athlete that's looking for that edge and maybe some quicker recovery when he's in the gym? Or does Albert have an injury? Is Albert trying to lose weight? Is Alberta, uh, trying to tighten up loose skin because he's got, um, a Christmas party coming? I don't know, whatever it may be. So we're gonna, we're Gonna find that out. And then we're going to give you a custom tour of the modalities that we have within our center that best fit, uh, what, what your needs are and what your lifestyle is. So for instance, if you came in and said, hey man, I have sciatica, I, I, it's been bugging me for a while. I'm looking for something that's going to help me get over sciatica faster. So I, I'll show you all the services, but we're going to spend a lot of time on whole body cryotherapy and hip compression therapy because we throw those two things out at a one, two punch. In addition to what you might already be doing with a chiropractor or physical therapist, we're going to speed up that recovery time much faster than you would have been able to do without it. Uh, you know, if it's for something else, you know, we'll just same same type of concept. We're going to, we're going to match the services that are going to work. We're going to put together a plan, a, a treatment plan in terms of how frequent you need to come in and use the services and help you get better. And you know what you're going to find out too, Albert, is that when you do the services that are addicted, so you may come in for that sciatica and we help you speed up that recovery, we might even be able to cut that recovery time in half. But what you're going to notice is, man, I have so much energy when I get out of the chamber and I sleep so much better by doing cryotherapy. You know what, even though I'm better, I'm going to keep coming here because there's all these other benefits. And so then, then that's also, we're going to promote some of the other lifestyle things to you and start having conversations with you about, uh, hydration and supplementation and all the other different things that uh, might elevate your lifestyle and help you live just a happier, healthier life.

Speaker A: That's amazing. And you just celebrated your four year anniversary. Right?

Speaker B: And so you, yeah, four, four years in business.

Speaker A: Amazing. Congratulations. And as you mentioned, you've touched, I mean, thousands and thousands of people within your community and outside of it, um, and built these amazing relationships. As you look back, what mattered most during the initial years, even leading up to launch, from marketing to service quality to education to that community trust, how did you attack all of those things? That's where I feel like a lot of owners and we chat about it here on the podcast. It can be a lot to wear so many hats.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah. I think there was two things that we did initially that were really important. First off, we needed to educate the public that we were around and what cryotherapy is. Because you know, I could tell you when I started doing cryotherapy back in 2018, early spring of 2018, I would tell people about it and nobody had a clue what I was talking about. Right. I could go walk into a room with 20 people and if I was lucky, one person might have been, have uh, heard of it, but couldn't even articulate what it was. Right. So I knew that there was that. And then, and then here's the other thing. When you tell people about it, the first thing they hear is cold. People don't like to be cold. Most people don't like to be cold. Especially when you tell them sub zero cold, negative ones, 70 cold. Even in Kansas, Even in Kansas, people don't like to be cold. So there was that whole education brand awareness that we had to do. Um, you know, from kind of like the city macro level, but also from the grassroots level. So you know, we uh, did a lot of pop up events all over town. Whether it was at gyms or health food stores, different things like that. Got very involved in the local business networking community. I built a lot of relationships with chiropractors, physical therapists, gym owners, personal trainers, just anybody in that space. You know, I thought that that was, you know, really, you know, important. And then, you know, the other piece of it was we're going to just build our business around relationships. The first person coming in, you know, we, when Albert comes in, we want to get to know Albert. We want to get to know Albert's background. We want to know, um, you know, maybe he's an athlete and he says he's a runner. Okay, what's Albert training for? You know, those different things because the more that we can get to know you, that's going to build a little bit of trust. Build that relationship where you trust us and uh, we can help put you on that journey that's going to help you feel well.

Speaker A: I love it. Well, what I love about your messaging today, it's not only about, as we think about it from a customer or member point of view, but you're really chatting with us too. For those that are in the owner seat, in the leader seat, recovery is so important. And I know it's getting a lot hotter and popular out there. Around recovery, recovery. But you keep pushing us to think different. It's not about just push, push, push. Intensity, passion, passion, passion. You have to pace it, you have to plan it. You have to be strategic. And part of that strategic plan as a leader is that recovery space reflection. In this case, using modalities like icryo, which I'm a bigger fan of than the Cold Plunge. Oh man, that thing kills me. I'm not a fan. So I love getting in a chamber. Um, I don't know what it is, but to your point, the hormonal re architecture that you go through, the inflammation decrease, I mean, it's outstanding. Are doing a great job. Well, I know you're, you're tight on time and I wanted to make sure that people can connect with you. You're very active on LinkedIn. Do you, do you mind sharing? How can. For those that want to learn more about you or, or icryo Wichita, or just icryo in general, how can they reach out to you and learn more?

Speaker B: Yeah, it's pretty easy. You could. As you mentioned, you can find me on LinkedIn. Matt Magnuson. You can also, um, I've got a public profile page on Facebook. Um, so if you just type in Matt Magnuson, look for the one with the blue check mark. That's me. Um, you can also find me on Instagram. My, um, handle on Instagram is injured beast. So any, any of those options, you can, you can find me. Um, now if you want, uh, more specific information on I cry, just, uh, go to icryowichita.com and it'll take you to our webpage. And we have information about all of our modalities. Of course, you can also follow our social media accounts. We also have ICRY, Facebook and, and Instagram and LinkedIn accounts too, which, uh, every single day we're putting out content. Uh, this morning we put up some content about glutathione, which is just if you're not taking glutathione and you're over 40 years old, start taking glutathione. It will help give, uh, you more energy. It'll help, uh, your body repair itself more effectively as, uh, go through the aging process.

Speaker A: I love it. Well, if I'm ever in Kansas, I want to make sure I get my drip in as well as that, that chamber. I need to jump in to feel a lot better. My wife just got me on that glutathione and it's already making a big impact. So good call out there. Love loving the social media posts. And education. Well, this has been so good. I know we didn't hit too much on the financial side. Maybe we'll have you come back on but for any of the fitness or wellness operators out there, franchisors, franchisees, if you're wanting to learn more about just cash flow management or that CFO level clarity around unit economics and pricing models, or just your financial back office, your infrastructure, make sure to check me out at, uh, stratego intel.com or again, you can, um, reach out to me on LinkedIn. Well, this has been another episode of the Owner Seed podcast. I'm your host, Albert Ramos, and episodes drop every Monday and Friday at 8am Central. And this has been such a pleasure, sir. Thank you so much. I really appreciate you. Matt, thank you again for being vulnerable, sharing your story. I can't wait for people to listen to this and jump on into icryo.

Speaker B: Awesome. I appreciate it, Albert. I enjoy talking to you today. Thanks for having me.

Speaker A: Soon. Let's keep in touch. All righty. Thank you.

Speaker B: Take care.