Alumni Spotlight: Shan Singh

Shan Singh

There’s no better way to pursue the American dream than by harnessing your inner entrepreneurial spirit and just going for it. If you have an idea that you want to turn into reality, have a plan and be bold. Sometimes the best time is now, especially in turbulent times such as these when you’re least likely to face competition.

Canfield BHP alum, Shan Singh, is the Co-founder and CEO at GAINZ, a software-oriented company that provides gyms and fitness centers with technology solutions that help them win a greater share of business from new and inexperienced users while keeping them competitive in a highly fragmented market. We checked in with Shan to hear about his experience building a startup during a turbulent year for the economy and how GAINZ has weathered the storm thus far.

Shan was born in India, the second of two children, but soon immigrated with his family to the U.S, where he would eventually call Dallas, Texas home for most of his childhood. Shan wasn’t immediately interested in becoming an entrepreneur. During his first year at UT, Shan’s initial interest in journalism and passion for sports placed him on a path toward sports broadcasting. However, he later realized that he wanted to find an alternative career plan.

“I always had an interest in the markets, reading the news, and about politics. (I had) a general interest in the financial sector. I read more about (Canfield) BHP and the opportunities available in the different career paths and I got really interested in it. I applied to be a sophomore transfer and I got in. It changed my professional career from that point onwards and I ended up working in investment banking for Morgan Stanley. I did that for two years from 2014 to 2016 in New York City and it was a really great experience. I enjoyed my time there and being around really smart people. I learned a lot.”

After his time at Morgan Stanley, Shan went on to work as an Investment Analyst for Austin-based firm Stafford Capital Partners, where after three years Shan decided it was time to move on to his next opportunity.

“One of the things that was always floating around was this thought of starting a company with my brother – a software company, to help provide services to fitness centers. We’re big advocates of fitness centers and have been going there all our lives, but we saw some shortcomings that we thought we could help solve with software solutions. I decided this is the perfect time to go and give this a shot. Obviously, I didn’t foresee the pandemic coming at the same time. It was a challenge and we’ve done our best to meet it.”

Shan credits Canfield BHP’s case-based curriculum for his understanding of business principles that helped guide him during these turbulent times. His experience working with firms like Morgan Stanley and Stafford Capital Partners also heavily contributed to his philosophy that there is no “perfect time” to start a business.

“If you say, “give me a time to start”, I would say, “Hey, when the market’s great and there are no hiccups coming”, but in reality, there are always hiccups, and there are always ups and downs and volatility in the broader economy. That shouldn’t dictate when you start a company and it should not decide some other factors (like) what you should do with the business. (It) shouldn’t be the reason why you started a company because the economy is doing well or there’s perfect certainty moving forward. It really comes down to the idea behind the company and if there is an actual problem that you’re solving, and will that problem sustain without your product?”, Shan explained.

GAINZ focuses on retail gyms and fitness centers, most of which are located inside real estate properties. Shan is confident that these businesses will sustain despite current market volatility and will continue to be around after the pandemic. Shan believes that as long as you hold true to your convictions, your idea, have a solid team in place, and continue to fix the problem you set out to solve, you will weather the storm and come out on the other side.

Suffice it to say, the pandemic has been a challenge for Shan and his team but nonetheless, it is Shan’s belief that their value proposition can bring value to their client’s businesses and provide solutions that would make the end-user experience much better. 

For Shan, working remotely has been a challenge since he enjoys getting energy from going to the office in person from time to time. Currently, the company is run by Shan and his brother (co-founder of GAINZ) so they haven’t had any trouble adapting to a remote work life but the idea is to eventually move into office space after they hire more staff. 

Over the last several months, their biggest challenge has been trying to shorten the long sales cycle that has become the norm under the pandemic.

“We believe the customer sales cycle is naturally longer on the b2b side of the fitness space. Then you compound the pandemic on top of that, it just stretches the sales cycle a little longer than we had previously envisioned, but we think that will go away, hopefully, as things return to normal, crossing our fingers, by the summer or the fall and that the sales cycle shortens a bit at the end of the day.”

At Canfield BHP, we know that many of our students have entrepreneurial goals and dreams. If you want to start a company, Shan explained that you should “have conviction about your idea and your business. Make sure that you do it with a team that you trust, (who) will also have resiliency and confidence (in) the company that you’re starting. Make sure that you can financially go a year or two fully on with the company and not be burdened by some of the financial stress.”