Summary

SweatPals is a platform connecting fitness enthusiasts and communities, streamlining events, payments, and content for a healthier, social lifestyle.

Background

Fitness and health communities often have to use multiple platforms to succeed. From organizing to payment processing to event management, community leaders and coaches are often using 3-5 different tools to manage community events and meetups. SweatPals provides a platform that brings together all pieces needed to build fitness and health communities. The technology allows coaches to organize events, communicate with community members, collect payments, complete waivers, and attract new members all from one, user-friendly tool. Meanwhile, community members are encouraged to share photos, messages, and social media posts on the app as well.

Why Cashmere FundInvested

• Strong Network Effects and Strategic Market Expansion: SweatPals’ platform allows for leaders and coaches to organize and manage their communities in one place. The team launched their first market in Austin last October and, through word of mouth and referrals ($0 user acquisition cost), already has 450+ community leaders and 39K monthly active users on the platform. Prior to SweatPals, coaches were often forced to manage their communities across multiple applications, resulting in a tedious and cumbersome workflow. With SweatPals, coaches can use one platform for event management, payment processing, and community engagement which further incentivizes them to bring their following to the application. Given the success in Austin, SweatPals now has community leaders from new markets reaching out to use the product, leading to market expansion into Miami, Los Angeles, and Denver in coming months and plans to launch 9 additional markets by early 2024. ‍
• Founder Market Fit: Salar Shahini, CEO and Co-founder, has over a decade of experience leading technology teams in the smart cities industry. Chief Product Officer and Co-founder, Mandi Zhou, has worked in product management, designing mobile applications for Fortune 500 companies, over the past 7 years. Both Salar and Mandi immigrated to the United States as young adults and found fitness communities to be the most welcoming place to meet new people, addressing loneliness as expats. Beyond their impressive experience as founders, Salar and Mandi have attracted a group of top tier advisors including the founder of HotelTonight and early employees at Uber, Snap and Google.