Welcome to Top Floor, podcasts where we amplify discussions with CEOs and chief executives driving the future of small and medium-sized businesses. Get ready to be inspired, informed, and empowered as we delve into the unique minds and journeys of these executive leaders shaping tomorrow's business landscape. I am your host, Dr. Krista Crawford. In addition to being an adjunct business professor for two university MBA programs, I also am a Vistage Chair. I coach leaders in peer advisory groups and in one-to-one executive sessions to make better decisions that lead to better businesses and better lives. My guest today is Marie Gallagher. Marie was the founder and creator of The Healing Path. Her intention is to create a safe space for individuals to experience healing, growth, encouragement, and support as they move from a place of imbalance and stress to a happy state of calm. Let this end to the top floor. Marie, thank you so much for carving out time when I know it's a very busy schedule. Leading an organization takes a lot of time. Let's dig in. Tell me about The Healing Path. Tell me about your journey to getting to The Healing Path. Yeah, so I was a little bit of a late bloomer. I was introduced to massage probably in '96 through a friend. I was living in New Orleans and she suggested I try it. I went to the Baltimore School of Massage. I did my first hundred hours and I fell in love with it. I started my practice early on just as a practitioner. I rented space and was on my own. I moved to Federal Hill in 2000. People were asking me, "Where do you go for acupuncture? Where do you go for yoga?" I realized there wasn't anybody doing it and there was a void. That's how I created The Healing Path. Wonderful. What kind of training and education did it take for you to get there, to feel that you were empowered to start this business? Yeah, so I finished my massage certificate and then you need to continue to do continuing education. I did my continuing education with prenatal work, working with the frail and elderly, working with trauma victims, but I did not have a business background. I was kind of winging it for a long time. Really, I built it out of referrals. I just would get creative on how to build a referral network. I did a lot of door-to-door and putting flyers and doors. That's how I really started in Federal Hill. It was a lot of 14 hour days. Often, that's how businesses get started, from literally from the ground up, in this case, putting notices under doors. So, looking into your crystal ball, where do you see the wellness industry headed within the next five years? I think one people are much more self-aware and they are taking the time to take care of themselves. I think what I'm researching is more trying not to pop pills. They want to do things that are going to stop aging, reduce aging, everything is anti-aging, but a lot of the red light therapy is a big thing right now. The cold plunge, those types of wellness modalities that are just not massage or senior doctor all the time. I feel like people are more interested in holistic health and wanting to kind of create a different work-life balance. Out of the pandemic, people work remotely and they can do Zoom and they don't have to do a 95. So, I think overall, everything's changed. We've seen a lot of that since our world shut down for a period and as we've come out of that, there are all kinds of new avenues that come from it. People retooling and regrowth and scheduling. Do you have somebody that is a role model for you, whether in someone that you see on television or read or listen to that gives you some inspiration? I have a whole group of people that do that for me. I'm so lucky. I'm part of the Entrepreneurs Organization, the Accelerator Program. Eo Baltimore opened their chapter house as a block from the healing path and I'm in the EOA program. First, I was in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 small businesses, so I was invited into that. I graduated in 2019. Out of that, I met someone in my cohort and she invited me to the EOA program and it's been a game changer. I've been in two years and it's opened my eyes to just feeling not alone. As a business owner, you're an island and you don't know who you can turn to or they don't have the experience or it's just kind of a mindset too of entrepreneurs. We're a quirky bunch. We take risks and we think outside the box and it might not be the straight and narrow, but I've been very fortunate. There's learning days and accountability group and I think accountability is a big piece of that for me and for a lot of business owners, but that's been great. That's really helped. I feel supported. Have you been able to transfer accountability down to the people that work for you? Do you find how do you hold your staff accountable? I think I've learned a lot. I think my style is I'm not very rigid. When it comes to that, because I do feel like it's a relationship, but one bad hire can affect the whole organization and bad behaviors can also affect the organization if you don't stop them. We work as a team. I have an excellent team. We get a lot of feedback and make those decisions. If we can't train and help that person maybe grow into what we're looking for or need, then they're not a fit. I want to go revisit back the types of procedures that you offer at the healing path. I personally, when I was doing my PhD work, I booked a massage every two weeks because the stress was so tremendous. It kept me going. I don't do that as often anymore, but I use it both as just wellness, but also as a treat. There's sometimes just having someone that sense of touch, the sense of taking time for yourself to be important, but I also enjoy a facial. Describe for me some of the treatments that you offer. On skincare, we offer custom facials, so it's custom for their skin type, peels, waxing, and we just launched microneedling, we do hydrophacials, and we just launched body treatments, so body polish, sugar scrubs. That's something new that we just rolled out a couple weeks ago. Then from the massage side, we have our custom signature massage, which is customized based on what the client needs, but then we have deep tissue, cupping, Himalayan saltstone, bamboo fusion, manual lymph drainage, prenatal, postnatal. We just introduced stretching, which we did out of the pandemic as well, because we didn't have enough workforce for massage, and then we tabled it for a little bit, but we're bringing it back, and now we're adding it into our massage sessions. Fantastic. Do you have like all day kind of packages or? We do have pack, we have series, so you can buy multiples, but then we have packages like the body treatment is a package with a facial, so you could do both, and then we're creating like wellness days, half day, full day for spa parties, so to speak, like it could be an anniversary or a birthday celebration or a corporate retreat or just a girl's night out, so we're creating those, and those are tailored based on what the clients are looking for and the number in their group. So being flexible to the customer need. Great. If you could go back and talk to 12, 13 or 14 year old Marie, what kind of advice would you give her? I would, I would say, I was very fortunate, I always worked, and I had a very good support, you know, I'm one of seven, so all of us worked, and we had great parents that were very supportive of us. I went to a great school and have, I'm still friends with the friends I've been with my since grade school, but I think maybe one of the things I would have probably done is focus more on my grades, because I did want to go away to college, and my grades weren't where they needed to be to do that. So I, you know, I think looking back, that's probably one of the things, and I have two teenage children in high school now, and I see it, you know, I see what the importance there and how to direct them. I think it's turned out too badly for you, though. You seem to have compensated for it. Yeah. Yeah. What do you have, if you could, like, summarize in terms of your leadership style, how would you describe you as a leader? I think, I don't know, I try to meet people where they are, so that's, I really rely on my, our manager, Krista, who's been with me for a long, long time. I trust her 100%. And she and I work together on that, because she works with the team day to day, while I'm working on the business, and I work remotely. But I feel like I think it's a better question for them, but I don't think I'm a very rigid leader. You know, I really want everyone to kind of grow while they're in our space, and if they have ideas or suggestions or things they want to try, I'm always open to that, as long as it makes sense. Yeah. I mean, I've never worked anywhere else for Massage, so I'm always interested in what they've learned elsewhere and, and what would be a great, you know, benefit to our business and our clients, if it's something we're not already doing. Meeting people where they are and being open, your leadership style seems to fit very well with the industry that you were in. I don't think that that is too surprising. Your, that leadership style would fit the wellness industry. It would be a little unusual if you were really autocratic in an environment where taking care of other people is the whole entire purpose. Yeah. What have I not asked you that you feel others would need to know, either about healing path or about you and your journey? I don't know. I feel like I have, I mean, it's not easy. You know, I mean, being a business owner is not easy and it's, but it, but you love it. You know, it's, it's something I love and I love what we've created and I love our team and being in the community. But, you know, we've had to navigate through a recession and a pandemic and a divorce and a, you know, growing, raising children. And so part of it is just, I'm a person just like everybody else and a mom and I go through the same things other people go through. I do love small business. You know, we support other small business. So everything in our retail store, other than like our skincare line, a majority of it is other small business owners and we carry their lines. You know, so I'm a big advocate of that. I think, you know, where people, they have buying power and where they spend their money matters. You know, it really matters to the small business owners and their families. I don't know. I mean, I, I, I've always wanted the healing path to feel like an extension of my home. And I hope that that's how people feel when they come in. You know, my, I grew up in a, a household with parents that welcomed, you know, there was never anybody could come. You know, we had extra people living with us every summer, you know, so it was, you know, my mom took care of them. So I just feel like that's part of me is just the more the merrier. You're always welcome. There's no judgment. You know, wherever you are, we'll meet you there, we'll help you feel better. And that's kind of the goal or the intention behind the healing path. So as a business owner and leader, what do you think your strengths are? What strengths do you bring to the healing path? I think I'm resilient. And I think I think outside the box. I, I'm always looking at new ways to do either add services or make adjustments or improvements. I'm kind of keeping my eye on the radar of what, what's coming down the pike and where we can add new things. I, it's interesting. I, I talked to a friend the other day and I told him what I was doing next. He, he's like, man, you're always pivoting. You're always doing, you know, and that's kind of I think what people even on my team see that, you know, that I always give something to try. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But we'll at least try it. Fantastic. So what's next for you? What's next for Marie in the healing path? So I just completed my corporate wellness specialist certification and I'm looking to work with more in the corporate sector, C-suite individuals, their employees, getting to the root calls of, you know, the why on, on instead of just handing them a gym membership or, you know, like really working with them and creating a very healthy culture in the workplace. Any idea what that looks like? Um, I'm in the creative process right now. Um, but I've, I'm, you know, the other day I, I, I met with a friend and we're looking to do like, I have a big network of practitioners that are in this wellness space. So guided meditation, sound baths, you know, massage, um, health coaching, the nutrition piece, you know, what's in the fridge at the workspace? You know, you can't, you know, if it's just filled with junk, you know, that's what people are going to eat. So, um, so yeah, so that's kind of, I like tailoring things for either individuals or companies or groups, you know, because I really want it to be what they need, not some program I'm just selling. You know, I want it to be, what are you looking for? Who are your people? You know, let's figure this out. I really like to collaborate and, um, and build, build things from there. If someone wants to get in touch with you, Marie, what's the best way to get in touch with the healing path? The email, I mean, the email is admin@healingpathballtomore.com and our web dress is healingpathballtomore.com. Um, for the corporate stuff, they can email me directly, and that's Marie@healingpathballtomore.com. Wonderful. Thank you so much for your time this afternoon. Thank you. And then we have ascended to the top floor with Marie Gallagher and the healing path. Thank you so much. Thank you.
