Before West Coast Strength was a brand, it was just a squat rack in the back of a supplement shop.
This company started when I figured adding personal training to my small sports nutrition store in Monmouth, Oregon might help cover the bills. The store opened with a solid buzz, but as it turns out, selling supplements in a rural town during a recession isn’t exactly a gold mine. Who would’ve guessed.
To stay afloat, I started writing training programs for local athletes and clients. I had just finished a few years as the Head Strength and Conditioning Coach at Western Oregon University, so I knew how to build programs. Before long, I had 30 or 40 kids stopping by the shop every week to grab their workouts and meal plans.
Enough people asked to train in person that I decided to make it work. The only space I had was a 10×10 office in the back of the shop. So that became the gym.
One squat rack, a small set of rubber dumbbells, and a couple plyo boxes. That was it.
We lasted four months in that room before I moved the shop into an old 1950s gas station on Main Street. The move was partly about space, but mostly about survival. The supplement business was going under, and training was the only thing bringing in money. So I doubled down.
That gas station was the real first gym.
My friend Brad Worden helped me put together the equipment. Everything was heavily used. We started with one heavy-duty squat rack, a home-gym power rack with a plate-loaded cable attachment, a full set of dumbbells from 5 to 150 pounds, those same plyo boxes, and a few adjustable benches. I couldn’t afford it all, so Brad let me pay $150 a month until it was paid off. Some months I couldn’t pay. He never said a word. Just told me, “Catch up when you can.”
Most of the workouts were just free weights, but I became MacGyver with that setup. I rigged up hamstring curls with a towel and a flat bench. Made people do wall sits until they dropped. I found a thousand ways to use that one cable machine. Years later, I added a beautiful mustard yellow leg extension and hamstring curl, but back then, we made it work.
Every session was a hustle.
For six years, I trained more people than I could count. What started with a few clients turned into something much more. I was running 60 to 70 sessions Monday through Friday. Saturdays, I drove to Portland and trained clients from 6 a.m. to 4 or 5 p.m. And Sundays, I spent the day programming for the countless online clients I had.
Session by session, I built a reputation. Part hard-nosed trainer. Part bodybuilding coach. Part friend.
Half of my clients were everyday people just trying to get in shape. Moms, working folks, couples, and friend groups.
The other half looked like they walked out of an action movie.
That contrast always stuck with me. People from completely different worlds showing up to the same gritty little gym to get after it.
That gas station didn’t just save my business.
It lit the fuse.
And we haven’t stopped since.