Clean Eating App Leads to Relatable Results

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

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What is your method or your practice or your habit, your routine, your ritual for nutrition and lifestyle? Nutrition, lifestyle, fitness, wellness, et cetera. It's all something I've become much more attuned to myself in recent years. If you follow me on Instagram or elsewhere, I'm often talking about my running or something else that I'm working on. It's something I've always been interested in, but perhaps a bit more in recent years.

As I've gotten older, also, it's just something that's better for me, paying more attention to managing depression, anxiety, et cetera. Now, in this story, the one I'm gonna tell you about today, two Aussie friends create a profitable fitness app to encourage flexible clean eating. Their method, which they call Clean 5, great name by the way, talk about that at the end, is all about five days on and two days off. So you may have heard of a cheat day. With this plan, you get two cheat days per week.

So a whole extra cheat day. I know some people are like, oh, I'm gonna look this plan up. I only get one cheat day a month with whatever I'm doing now. Now, naturally, for side hustle school purposes, we're gonna focus the story on the business side of this app. How do you go from idea to income, or in this case, from idea to app?

Idea to money-making app, I should say, because they now have 180 paying members and are earning a few thousand dollars a month on the side, working full-time jobs with a goal to grow it further. So we'll call it clean eating app leads to relatable results. And I'll bring you this short story after this short message from our sponsor. [Music]

Andrew Scott and his best mate, Chris Dalmal, were chatting one day about all the amazing food and drink they'd indulged in during the holidays. And while many of us resolved to hit the gym starting January 1st, Andrew and Chris were already committed to working out regularly, no matter what time of year.

Still, they wondered whether the extra weekend nights at the pub and the holiday treats they were consuming might start to add up. Everything they had ever read about diets suggested that cheating your diet, drinking more than a small amount of alcohol, or getting less sleep on the weekends, would turn your body into a chaotic mess. But even after a few weeks of holiday splurging, they weren't finding this to be true. As long as they were consistent with their workouts and ate a balanced, healthy diet most of the time, they could maintain fit, toned bodies, even with those weekend splurges. This discussion got them thinking, if they could do this, could others reap the same benefits?

They decided to put their theory to the test. They created a plan for eating clean and working out five days a week with room for cheating on the weekends. The results were consistent, and rather than rely solely on their own experience, they enlisted some volunteers to try out this clean method. Their plan included food and workout recommendations, but with plenty of room to have a beer or two or three on Saturday nights. Naturally, the volunteers loved it, and many of them found this lifestyle easier than others they tried to follow.

It meant they could work hard during the week, but not be afraid to have some fun on their days off. Andrew and Chris were thrilled to hear about these results. They learned a lot from the trial and gained more inspiration. What if they could create something on a larger scale that supported others in achieving their fitness goals, whether to lose weight or bulk up or just maintain a healthy body? With the iron pumping, Andrew had the idea to create an app, a project that takes a lot of dedication and skills to bring to fruition.

But luckily for him, he had a background in digital marketing, along with some coding experience, while Chris ran a personal training studio. Combined, they had the perfect skills to create something profitable and sustainable. Even so, it took several months for everything to come together. Andrew focused his time on creating the brand, coding the website, and designing the app, while Chris supplied the content, including detailed meal and fitness plans. Their total startup costs weighed in at around $6,800, just under $7,000.

They knew they'd be able to slim down those expenses pretty quick. In November, 2018, the Clean 5 was ready for launch. The app included meal plans, nutrition advice, workout recommendations, and training programs, all centered on doing that hard work Monday through Friday with room to splurge on the weekends. Or of course, it could be modified for those with different schedules. In less than one year of being in the gym, the Clean 5 has gained 180 members, each paying $5 a week.

They acquired most of those customers through paid Facebook and Instagram ads, though now they also use Google Ads, organic search, and Snapchat. After their advertising and software hosting costs, they net around $3,000 a month in profit. Like losing weight or toning muscles, it took time to build this concept, test it, and see results. They've done all the heavy lifting on their own and occasionally run into issues along the way, from customers who report that the app is crashing to once losing 10 customers in a single day, it hasn't always been easy. But they've learned through the process and use those lessons to go up to the next weight class.

Even with all the hurdles they've jumped, Andrew and Chris say they wouldn't change anything. In fact, they continue to run the Clean 5 on top of their full-time jobs and have no plans to change the pace. [Music]

So first of all, great name, Clean 5. It's just so memorable. I think that bodes really well for its potential.

Reminds me a bit of Whole30, which of course is run by our good friend, Melissa Urban. I took a peek at their website. I like that they price in US dollars for a global audience. $5 a week is something that's manageable. Many people are resistant to subscriptions, of course, but if you can get them, and you get the people that are staying around, they have 180 members right now.

Of course, the more that they build that subscription base, the more profitable their recurring revenue will be. And so from here on out, it's essentially a matter of continuous improvement, both in terms of the customer acquisition strategy, really refining those ads to be able to bring in more money than you spend, which sounds kind of basic, but that is the number one goal of a Facebook or Instagram ad spending strategy. And then as well, just improving the content delivery to members so that you reduce the churn, you reduce the number of people who are canceling over time. And that is the path to scale for this kind of project. So definitely interesting, definitely some things that we can learn, and I wish them every success.

Thanks so much, Andrew and Chris. Hopefully we continue some folks as well. And listeners, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is better. Just like Andrew and Chris found, there's a project waiting for you as well. If you'd like to learn more about theirs or anything else that I mentioned in this episode, just come check out the show notes.

Those are at sidehustleschool.com/1014. This program is completely free. Be sure you're subscribed, which you can do so wherever you listen to podcasts and tell your friends about it as well. We've got more coming up tomorrow. We can recap it after that and a whole new set of stories all next week.

My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]

- From the Onward Project.