Andrea and George Savard - Reebok CrossFit Training Centre

George and Andrea Savard – Reebok CrossFit FirePower

Andrea and George Savard - Reebok CrossFit Training Centre Andrea and George Savard, co-owners of the Reebok CrossFit Training Centre not only share a love for a sport, but a love for one another as well. Fitting in marriage, parenthood and a thriving business practice is far from easy, but this fit and athletic couple do whatever it takes to keep everything — including their 7,000-square-foot training facility offering CrossFit, Olympic-style boxing, hockey training, multi-sport team strength & conditioning, and 911 fitness training — on an even and healthy keel.

1. What made you decide to go into business together?

We had a shared love for a sport and wanted somewhere to train together after our twins were born. We set up a small hobby gym as a part-time business inside a high school and it grew to a 7,000 sq ft facility. We are fortunate that George's job as a full-time firefighter in Toronto alleviates the stress of making our business the sole source of income for our household.

2. What's your favourite work-related quality about your spouse?

Andrea: He is a visionary. He sees "what could be" when I'm buried in what currently is. He continuously pushes me beyond my comfort zone which brings new growth ideas and new people to the table.

George: Her business sense and her will to not fail

3. How do you keep married life and work life separate?

We don't. We can't, especially since we don't have typical hours. We moved closer to the gym to have better family time. For the first 2 years we commuted – 2 cars sometimes making 2 trips a day to manage kids in school and business rquirements. Now we are fortunate to have spectacular staff that are extremely capable and responsible so we can take time off as needed. This past year we finally snuck away for our honeymoon, 8 years later!

Our business is also a big part of our social life. The staff and members enjoy spending a lot of time together even outside the gym. And lastly, we incorporate our business into our time ie grabbing a workout together, discussing ideas or issues over breakfast & coffee, etc.
Ultimately we strive to make each other feel like the biggest priority in our day-to-day lives and that nothing at work will ever come between our marriage.

4. How do you divide up various responsibilities, both at work and at home?

At work its based on our area of expertise. Andrea leads anything to do with a computer, sales, marketing, financials, etc and George leads the majority of training and high performance athletes.

At home we share almost everything from getting kids to school, managing the household, etc. Plus we have help at home with a cleaning lady. She comes in 3x per week to take care of all housekeeping. It's taken the stress of doing laundry, dishes, and basic cleaning away from us. We couldn't do it without her. Then we also have help from members with our childrens' needs such as tudoring, vision therapy, etc.

5. The best thing about working with a spouse.

We get to spend tons of time together, celebrate our successes together and with our children. We understand each others' stresses and decision making is relatively effortless. We're both pretty easy going people and simply enjoy being together and sharing in the joy of what we've built and the amazing people who have been impacted because of what we created.

6. The most difficult thing.

Not letting staff and members see if we are having a fight, which is unusual. We don't like to show any personal issues at work.

7. If the other person is having a bad day, do you behave like a spouse or a coworker when trying to make it better?

Spouse, always. It has to be because there is such a fine line between our work/life. We definitely have days when workload is overwhelming or where fatigue gets the better of us. In my opinion, acting like a co-worker would feel like a slap in the face to all the dual pressures at home. Sometimes we have the "I'm work harder than you" days but we usually just need to verbalize that we feel overwhelmed. Once we talk about things, it doesn't seem as bad.

8. Are you both on the same level professionally, or is one person higher? How does that dynamic affect your relationship?

We are not higher than each other, we simply have different areas where we excel. i.e. Geo is head trainer in the CrossFit area, Andrea is head trainer in boxing; Geo manages HR and long term planning, Andrea manages sales, marketing, admin, web & social media. We see each other equals.

9. Tips for keeping the romance alive when you spend so much time together.

That's definitely a challenge because we're so tired at the end of each day that we usually fall asleep on each other! We make breakfast our special time every morning after the kids go to school. Also we found really flexible babysitters next door so sometimes we sneak out for a last minute drink or movie. Recently we booked a date night once a month from now until summer.

10. What's the best advice you have for married couples planning to work together?

Make sure you each have your area of specialty so you feel valued and that you equally contribute. Then I'd add to still take an interest in or time to understand what your spouse is working on to be able to help them when needed or simply listen when they need to vent.

And finally to get help on the homefront. There's no need for added pressure to do the laundry or clean the kitchen when there are better things to do!