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How I Built This with Guy Raz

Gymshark: Ben Francis. From pizza delivery to billion-dollar fitness brand.

with Ben Francis

Published November 17, 2025
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About This Episode

Ben Francis tells the story of how he went from a student delivering pizzas and building websites to founding Gymshark, a global gymwear brand. He explains how Gymshark began as a dropship supplement site before pivoting into apparel, leveraged early YouTube fitness influencers, and grew rapidly while remaining bootstrapped. Ben also describes bringing in experienced operators, learning each function of the business, navigating a co-founder split, and eventually returning as CEO to lead Gymshark as a multi-hundred-million pound company with global reach.

Topics Covered

Entrepreneurship Bootstrapping Scrappiness in business Side hustles Web design and branding Manufacturing in China Personal development Relationships Hiring philosophy Small business financing

Disclaimer: We provide independent summaries of podcasts and are not affiliated with or endorsed in any way by any podcast or creator. All podcast names and content are the property of their respective owners. The views and opinions expressed within the podcasts belong solely to the original hosts and guests and do not reflect the views or positions of Summapod.

Quick Takeaways

  • Gymshark began as a dropship supplement website created by two students who simply wanted to sell one thing online.
  • The pivotal move was pivoting from low-margin supplements to higher-margin gym apparel that they printed and, later, designed themselves.
  • Early, direct relationships with YouTube fitness creators gave Gymshark enormous organic exposure at a time when social media reach was far less constrained.
  • A single fitness expo where Gymshark brought YouTubers to its stand led to a complete sellout and £30,000 in online sales in 30 minutes, convincing Ben to quit university and his Pizza Hut job.
  • Ben bootstrapped the company, reinvesting every pound of profit and avoiding outside capital until Gymshark was already a major, cash-generative business.
  • He hired experienced operators like Steve Hewitt and effectively apprenticed under them, rotating through brand, product, marketing, and tech roles to learn each function.
  • A serious co-founder disagreement led to Lewis Morgan leaving the business, forcing Ben to manage both emotional fallout and rapid growth at the same time.
  • Candid 360 feedback about his abrasive style pushed Ben to significantly change how he led and worked with teams.
  • A minority investment from General Atlantic marked a transition from opportunistic, instinct-led growth to a more structured, long-term plan with a formal board.
  • Gymshark's strategy is to stay tightly focused on gymwear, using physique-accentuating design and credibility with top lifters rather than broadening into every sport category.

Podcast Notes

Cold open and pivotal Body Power Expo moment

Selling out at the Body Power Conference

Ben recalls the Body Power weekend as surreal due to unexpected demand[3:04]
• Before the event they were doing about £200-£250 a day in revenue
• At the event they spent the whole time grabbing and selling product
• They completely sold out of everything they took to the stand
• Another exhibitor came over afterwards and asked, "How did you do that?" and Ben genuinely had no idea

Introduction to Ben Francis and the origins of Gymshark

Shift in fitness culture and early insight

Guy describes early 2010s shift where workouts became public via online video[4:26]
• People started filming workouts, posting progress, and building bodybuilding identities online
Ben, a teenager at the time, noticed gym culture turning into an online community[5:25]
• He was in college, delivering pizzas at night, going to the gym in the afternoon, and tinkering with websites in his bedroom
He wanted to build a "uniform" for this emerging global gym community[4:53]

Concept of building a brand via relationships, not ads

Ben's strategy was to reach out directly to powerlifters and bodybuilders on YouTube[5:21]
• He focused on real people with small but trusted audiences, not celebrities or agented athletes
When those creators wore Gymshark, the brand's growth was explosive[5:37]

Ben's unusual leadership development path

As Gymshark scaled, Ben intentionally did not pretend to know everything[5:46]
• He hired more experienced people and effectively built an apprenticeship for himself within his own company
• He studied logistics, design, marketing, supply chain, and tech until he could step into the CEO role with confidence

Ben's childhood, education, and early tech skills

Growing up near Birmingham and discovering IT

Ben grew up near Birmingham in England's Midlands in the 1990s and early 2000s[6:23]
At school, IT changed his life because it taught him how to learn[6:31]
• His school accelerated tech education for reasons he doesn't fully know
He had access to Adobe Creative Suite: Dreamweaver, Illustrator, Photoshop, etc.[6:50]
• By 18, knowing how to use that software felt like knowing how to use magic

First ventures: number plate flipping and fitness apps

Personalized license plate website

His first business was a website selling personalized car license plates while he was still at school (~17)[7:35]
• In the UK, personalized plates can sell for thousands of pounds
He and partners bought cheap plates (~£300) they thought could resell for £2,000-£3,000[7:50]
• They essentially flipped plates, holding inventory and reselling via the website

Inspiration from the first iPhone and fitness apps

Ben got his first iPhone around 18 and became fascinated by app development[8:50]
• He taught himself app development via YouTube
His apps focused on fitness: exercises, how-to text, images, and videos[9:22]

Discovering the gym and its impact on his mindset

Starting to work out as a teenager

He began going to the gym at about 16 or 17[9:55]
The gym taught him that he would get out what he put in[9:24]
• Going five days a week for a year would leave him in a better position than at the start
He and friends went after school in a group, following a simple split (chest Monday, back Tuesday, etc.)[10:17]
• The gym was intimidating at first; as a thin teenager he assumed big lifters were judging him
• He later realized most people in the gym are more focused on themselves than on others

Early business attempts and understanding risk

Multiple failed digital ventures

None of his early ventures-including plates and apps-made real money[11:05]
• Most apps were free; paid ones had tiny download numbers, generating just a few pounds
He never felt these failures as true failures; they were learning experiences[11:39]

Work experience with his grandfather and concept of risk

At 14 he did work experience with his grandfather, who owned a furnace-lining business[11:55]
• They lined furnaces in Midlands factories with brick or ceramic fiber for insulation
He learned hard work and also heard about the real risks his grandfather took starting the business[12:14]
• Grandfather had a mortgage, a wife, and two kids, and risked the house to start the business
Compared to that, at 17-18 with a Pizza Hut job, Ben felt he had virtually no risk[13:03]
• Domain names cost about £3.50; he earned £4-£5 per hour at Pizza Hut, so experiments were cheap

Starting Gymshark as a supplement dropshipping site

Initial goal: sell one thing online

At university, his only aim was to sell a single item online[13:57]
He and a friend opened a Shopify site but realized they had nothing to sell[13:32]

Attempt to sell supplements and MOQ roadblock

He wanted to sell supplements because he and friends were taking protein and into gym culture[13:42]
• He called a friend named Dan who worked at a supplement shop to negotiate a deal
Dan removed minimum order quantities but the lowest he could go was about £10,000[14:09]
• £10,000 represented years of Pizza Hut income to Ben, so it was impossible

Discovering dropshipping and naming Gymshark

The MOQ problem pushed them to explore dropshipping as a way to sell supplements[14:43]
• They loaded the site with hundreds of supplements priced slightly above dropship cost; the dropshipper fulfilled orders directly
They ran the site on gymshark.co.uk from the beginning[14:54]
• Gymshark was chosen arbitrarily; Ben mainly remembers that the domain was cheap (~£3.50) and available

Meeting co-founder Lewis Morgan and the Birmingham bodybuilding scene

Relationship with Lewis

Ben knew Lewis from school but they became friends through the gym[15:51]
• They joked about racing to get the biggest arms quickly
They bounced business ideas off each other and together discovered Shopify and dropshipping[16:03]

Birmingham as a bodybuilding hub and Body Power event

Birmingham hosts one of the biggest bodybuilding and lifting events in the UK, possibly Europe: the Body Power Event[16:34]
• Legendary bodybuilder Dorian Yates is from Birmingham
As teens, Ben and friends attended Body Power as fans to see US bodybuilders and brands[16:43]

From first online sale to making apparel

Slow early sales and first online profit

After launching the supplement site, nothing happened for weeks[17:33]
• Ben initially assumed people would just find the website once it was live
They created Facebook pages for Gymshark and generic lifting content to drive organic traffic[17:49]
After a couple of months, they made their first sale: £52 revenue with £50 cost, £2 profit[17:15]
• That £2 profit over two months equated to £1 per month, but the emotional impact was huge
• Ben danced around his bedroom from excitement at 18-19 years old

Realizing supplements margins were too low

Supplements business crept up to maybe one or two sales a week, but margins remained tiny[18:49]
They debated whether it was even worth carrying on with supplements[19:17]

Pivot to apparel using a sewing machine and screen printer

Ben's nan had a sewing machine from a curtain-making course, sparking the idea to make clothes[19:21]
They bought their own sewing machine and a screen printer and started hand-making and printing clothing[19:37]
• They targeted lifters and bodybuilders, noticing no one was truly branding clothing specifically for that group
They bought blanks (t-shirts, tanks, hoodies) from a wholesaler and screen printed logos[20:15]
• The screen printer cost about £1,000 and the sewing machine a few hundred more, so just over £1,000 total
Orders were made to order: they'd wake up, check for an order, print it, and take it to the post office[21:05]
Clothing margins were far better: £30 of clothing could yield ~£15 profit vs £50 of supplements for £2 profit[21:43]

Setting small goals and planning for Body Power Expo

Incremental goal setting

Their ambitions were always very short-term: first sale, second sale, one sale a week, then a day[22:21]
• They did not think years ahead for a long time; focus was on the very next step

Deciding to exhibit at Body Power and working with YouTubers

As attendees at Body Power, they went to the show office and booked a stand for the next year[23:03]
• The stand cost a minimum of £3,000, a lot for them, but they believed they could save it through sales and jobs
They spent the year leading up to the event building the business and relationships with YouTube fitness creators[24:03]
• They connected via Skype with US YouTubers like Matt Ogus and Chris Lavado
• They sent product to these creators, got feedback, and the creators wore Gymshark in their videos
By the following May, Gymshark had enough money to both upgrade the stand and fly those YouTubers to the UK[25:09]
• The deal: Gymshark would fly them out, put them in a hotel, they'd hang at the booth and train together

Designing the first tracksuit and managing inventory risk

Creating the first Gymshark tracksuit

They launched their first tracksuit at the Body Power event[26:06]
They had no prior apparel design experience and learned as they went[25:16]
• They found a Chinese manufacturer, likely via Alibaba, and focused on a tapered fit (waist and trousers)
• The goal was physique-accentuating clothing that made shoulders look broader and waist slimmer

Financing and ordering stock

They spent several thousand pounds on inventory, under £10,000 but still significant[27:41]
All cash came from Pizza Hut wages and business profits, fully reinvested[27:58]

Breakthrough weekend at Body Power and immediate aftermath

Impact of YouTubers at the stand

YouTubers had promoted their presence at the Gymshark stand on Facebook and YouTube[28:46]
• Gymshark had no idea how big or famous these YouTubers really were
When doors opened, crowds flooded the stand to see their heroes, then bought Gymshark products[28:58]
• Most attendees at the stand were teenage guys like Ben and Lewis
They sold tracksuits for around £30 each, largely in cash[30:28]

Post-expo online sales spike and Ben quitting university and Pizza Hut

Before the event, Gymshark did around £200-£250 per day in revenue[35:26]
They turned the website off during the expo because they couldn't ship and run the stand simultaneously[35:39]
When they turned the site back on and announced it, they did £30,000 in revenue in 30 minutes and sold out[35:47]
That weekend Ben decided to quit both university and his Pizza Hut job[36:00]
• He was nervous because he was the first in his family to attend university
• His parents were supportive when he called to say he was dropping out and told him to go for it

Early operations: storage, staffing, and international events

Moving from parents' house to first unit

Initially, inventory was stored in Ben's parents' house until it became too much[38:42]
They rented a small asbestos shed by a canal in Droitwich for £300 per month as their first unit[38:56]

First hires and simple fulfillment

As they started doing more events, they hired Ben's brother as Gymshark's first staff member[39:20]
• His brother's job was to package orders while they were away at events
Fulfillment involved packing orders by hand and walking them to the post office[39:44]
At the end of each day they answered all customer queries before going to the gym[39:56]

Expansion to international expos

They did their first event abroad in Germany, then others in Ohio, California, Cologne, and Melbourne[40:45]
Around this time they had roughly 10 employees, with a group traveling to events to sell in person[40:15]
At the first US trip to the Arnold event in Columbus, Ohio, they naively arrived in December without winter clothes[49:38]
• Ben remembers seeing snow from the plane and realizing he only had a t-shirt and tracksuit
Despite being small compared to other brands, hardcore fans and YouTube exposure meant many attendees recognized Gymshark[50:21]
• Three of five core YouTubers were American, giving Gymshark a strong US following

Bringing in experienced leadership: Paul Richardson and Steve Hewitt

Meeting local business mentors at the gym

Around 2014, with about £250,000 in annual sales, Ben connected with local businesspeople at the gym[40:05]
They befriended Paul Richardson, who then introduced them to apparel veteran Steve Hewitt[40:25]

Steve's contributions: suppliers, margins, and basic finance

Ben and Lewis approached Steve initially to help them source t-shirts from European suppliers[41:15]
Steve had worked at Reebok and talked in unfamiliar terms like "margin"[41:23]
• Before Steve, they simply bought stuff and sold stuff without understanding margin
Through Steve and Paul they got connected to an accountant and learned about accounts, bookkeeping, and tax[41:49]
• Before that, they had a table tennis table covered in receipts when asked for accounting records before year-end

Evolving Steve's role from consultant to managing director

They first hired Steve as a consultant one day a month, then one day a week, on a day rate[43:26]
Eventually Ben asked Steve to join full-time as managing director, running the back end of the business[43:41]
• Steve oversaw operations and logistics, while Ben and Lewis focused on brand, product, and marketing
When Steve joined full-time he received equity and a salary that made him the highest-paid person Ben had ever heard of[44:59]
• Ben came to see Steve's compensation as justified by the value he created in growing the business
Ben effectively hired his own boss and mentor to help structure and grow Gymshark[46:14]
• Ben says he learned as much from watching how Steve worked with people and thought about problems as from direct advice

Cash-generative growth without outside funding

Business model and lack of awareness of fundraising

Gymshark was and is cash generative, selling high-margin products and getting cash before outflows[48:22]
Ben did not even know raising money was an option until his early-to-mid 20s[48:52]
• Coming from the industrial West Midlands rather than a financial center, he had never met anyone who raised venture capital
They didn't even have an overdraft for several years; the only path they knew was to make profit and reinvest everything[48:22]

Product evolution: seamless performance wear and failed first women's line

Developing physique-accentuating seamless apparel

Their first notable performance product was a seamless t-shirt[52:37]
Seamless garments are knitted in a tube from synthetic yarns, allowing tight, physique-hugging fits[51:11]
• They knitted darker areas over chest and shoulders to visually widen them and narrow the waist
This period cemented Gymshark's focus on physique-accentuating gymwear as a core product principle[53:35]

Misstep with first women's range and building a design team

Initially, the brand was built in their own image: lifting wear for young men[54:21]
They wanted to expand into women's products and Ben thought he could design them himself[54:13]
The first women's range was a failure: it looked and fitted terribly and no one wanted it[54:37]
This experience convinced them they needed professional designers and a proper design team[54:45]

Rapid growth, co-founder exit, and internal tensions

Scale by 2016 and limited personal publicity

By the end of 2016, Gymshark had nearly £13 million in sales and over 50 employees[54:58]
The brand attracted media attention, but Ben himself avoided much personal spotlight and focused on running the business[55:37]

Lewis Morgan's departure and disagreement over vision

Lewis left day-to-day involvement around 2015, when revenue was between $10-$20 million[56:17]
Ben found Lewis's exit emotionally hard after years of working and traveling together[56:21]
There was definite tension; they had different visions for how to run the business[1:00:38]
• Ben wanted to keep rolling the dice, grow aggressively, bring in more managers, and scale
• He says Lewis wanted it more centered around the founders and to operate differently
A series of disagreements led them to conclude one of them had to move on for the good of the business[59:54]
Ben describes it as akin to a business divorce that took a while to sort out[59:54]
Their personal relationship ended along with the business partnership[1:01:26]
Despite the turmoil, the business kept growing and they still had to lead a team of 20-30 people[57:05]

Clarifying Gymshark's positioning and leveraging DTC economics

Focused niche: gymwear, not all sports

Gymshark decided not to chase broader sports like basketball or running[1:01:48]
Their intent is to be the brand people wear in the gym, while others like Lulu built around yoga[1:02:50]

Direct-to-consumer advantage and reinvestment

The DTC model gave higher profit margins than a heavy brick-and-mortar footprint would[1:03:28]
They used those margins to reinvest heavily in both product development and brand/marketing[1:03:35]
Gymshark's revenue grew from about £13 million in 2016 to £100 million in 2018[1:03:48]

Ben's self-designed apprenticeship across the company

Working with Steve as CEO and Ben's rotating roles

While Steve was CEO, Ben enjoyed a period of accelerated learning with a safety net[1:04:59]
He rotated through roles: first head of brand, then product, then performance marketing, then tech and website[1:05:29]
• He spent time in factories on development, with designers on design, and with developers on the website and CRM
He describes this as a turbocharged apprenticeship at a high level in the business[1:06:35]

Leadership style, feedback, and personal change

From shy introvert to learning to lead

Ben says he was always shy and introverted as a kid[1:06:57]
He had to learn leadership rather than it coming naturally[1:07:03]

360 feedback and the "Hurricane Ben" nickname

At around 24-25, with 30-40 employees, they ran a 360 feedback process[1:07:41]
He was shocked by how bad his feedback was[1:07:41]
Someone described him as "Hurricane Ben" for storming in, dismissing designs as terrible, and telling people to start again[1:08:07]
He recognized he could be rude, abrupt, and poor at working in groups[1:08:11]
This feedback had a big impact and forced him to completely change how he worked over the next decade[1:07:19]

No imposter syndrome due to hands-on experience

Ben says he did not feel imposter syndrome, even when dealing with older, experienced people[1:08:51]
He had personally done every job-from packing orders to customer support to design-so felt grounded[1:08:55]
He viewed working with experienced people as an opportunity to learn, even if they were more experienced and smarter in many ways[1:09:09]

General Atlantic investment, board creation, and returning as CEO

Private equity stake and shift to "serious business"

In 2020, General Atlantic acquired a 21% stake, valuing Gymshark at about $1.3 billion[1:09:55]
The deal allowed shareholders to take money off the table and marked the close of the startup chapter for Ben[1:10:35]
Ben actually increased his shareholding through the transaction and took nothing off the table personally[1:10:41]
He began thinking about building Gymshark into a globally iconic brand, rather than just reacting month to month[1:10:51]
They agreed to create a formal board after the GA deal; before that the business was effectively run by Ben, Paul, and Steve[1:11:41]

Transition from Steve as CEO back to Ben

While working in Hong Kong, Steve told Ben he felt he had taken the company as far as he could and wanted to step down[1:12:13]
Steve said they needed a new CEO and recommended that Ben should be that person[1:12:17]
Ben did not immediately want the role and said he would think about it[1:12:39]
It wasn't important to him at the time to be CEO; he took time to get comfortable with the idea[1:12:13]
There was a handover period of about six months before Ben fully stepped into the CEO role in 2021[1:13:13]

Retail strategy, competitive landscape, and brand focus

Adding physical retail to a DTC-first model

Contrary to early-pandemic assumptions that retail was dead, Gymshark chose to enter brick-and-mortar[1:13:23]
DTC is still by far the biggest channel, but they now have stores in Amsterdam, London (three), and Manchester, with two New York stores opening[1:13:42]
Ben wants to grow stores at a considered pace rather than opening thousands quickly[1:14:12]

Crowded influencer landscape and staying narrow to avoid blandness

Ben notes that early YouTube marketing was easier; now there are tens or hundreds of thousands of influencers[1:14:50]
Gymshark's response is to avoid becoming overly broad, which could make the brand bland[1:15:18]
They deliberately avoid rapidly expanding into basketball, fashion wear, or soccer, and instead double down on gymwear[1:15:35]
Ben believes great brands are built around great products and clear product positioning[1:15:48]
He cites working with top lifters like Samson, Chris Bumstead, and Ryan Terry as validation that the best lifters wear Gymshark[1:16:01]
He shares an anecdote of seeing three serious lifters in a Denver gym all wearing Gymshark, which reinforced their positioning[1:16:30]
The US is now the majority of Gymshark's business and its biggest growth opportunity[1:17:03]

Ben's long-term vision, sense of luck, and family ties

Longevity and commitment

Ben is 33 and feels he has the best job in the world and wants to run the business long-term[1:17:50]
He admires brands that are 50-70 years old and wants Gymshark to stand the test of time similarly[1:17:58]

Balancing luck, timing, and deliberate risk-taking

He credits a "good chunk" of success to luck and timing: rise of social media, Shopify, and more people going to the gym[1:18:43]
He notes that many others saw the same opportunities but did not achieve the same outcome[1:18:57]
He emphasizes that Gymshark took and continues to take risks and commits to long-term decisions[1:19:06]

Grandfather's ongoing work and pride in Gymshark

Ben's grandfather is still working in his furnace-lining business and recently sent Ben a photo of a furnace they worked on together 20 years ago[1:19:36]
His grandfather loves what Ben has built and is blown away by Gymshark's success[1:20:10]
Ben still spends time with him, going on bike rides and to car shows[1:19:33]

Lessons Learned

Actionable insights and wisdom you can apply to your business, career, and personal life.

1

Starting with small, low-risk experiments allows you to learn quickly and build confidence before scaling into bigger commitments.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What is one small, low-cost experiment I could run in the next month to test an idea I've been considering?
  • • How can I define a clear, modest success metric (like a single sale or user) that would validate my next step?
  • • Where in my current projects am I overcomplicating things instead of just shipping a simple first version and learning from it?
2

Bringing in people who are more experienced than you-and then actively apprenticing under them-is a powerful way to accelerate your growth as a leader.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Who in my network (or extended network) has skills or experience I lack but need to develop?
  • • In what area of my work would treating my current role as an apprenticeship dramatically speed up my learning curve?
  • • What concrete steps could I take this quarter to observe, shadow, or work alongside someone whose decision-making I respect?
3

Clear, narrow positioning can be a strategic advantage in a crowded market, preventing your brand or work from becoming broad and bland.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What is the specific niche or problem that I (or my business) serves better than anyone else?
  • • How might trying to appeal to everyone be diluting the effectiveness of my message, product, or service?
  • • What could I stop doing or stop offering to sharpen my focus on the audience that values me the most?
4

Honest, sometimes painful feedback is a catalyst for transforming how you work with others-if you are willing to change your behavior in response.

Reflection Questions:

  • • When was the last time I received candid feedback that stung, and how seriously did I take it?
  • • Which aspects of my behavior as a teammate or leader might others experience as abrupt, dismissive, or confusing?
  • • What is one specific behavior I will experiment with changing over the next month to become easier to work with?
5

Bootstrapping and reinvesting profits can build resilience and control, but it requires discipline, long-term thinking, and comfort with slower, organic growth.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Where am I currently taking on financial or resource commitments that I don't fully understand or control?
  • • How would my decisions change if I committed to funding more of my growth through actual margins and cash flow?
  • • What expenses or withdrawals could I reduce or delay so that I can reinvest more into the highest-leverage parts of my work?
6

Conflict over vision with partners is not necessarily about right versus wrong; sometimes preserving the long-term health of the venture requires a difficult separation.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Are there critical misalignments in vision or risk tolerance with any of my current collaborators that I've been avoiding addressing?
  • • How might the business or project benefit if roles, ownership, or involvement were restructured to reflect current reality?
  • • What conversations do I need to initiate in the next few weeks to clarify expectations and avoid a slow-build of resentment or stalemate?

Episode Summary - Notes by Cameron

Gymshark: Ben Francis. From pizza delivery to billion-dollar fitness brand.
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