---
title: "Nick Bare of Bare Performance Nutrition on Bootstrapping Supplements, Overcoming Eating Disorders, and Morning Running Solitude"
url: "https://authoritymag.co/articles/nick-bare-of-bare-performance-nutrition-on-bootstrapping-supplements-overcoming-eating-disorders"
publisher: "Authority Magazine"
author: "Authority Magazine Editorial Staff"
authorUrl: "https://authoritymag.co/authors/authority-magazine-editorial-staff"
interviewee: "Nick Bare"
company: "Bare Performance Nutrition"
category: "Wellness"
datePublished: "2022-09-13T18:53:45.380Z"
dateModified: "2026-11-12T17:07:38.132Z"
tags: "Wellness"
---

# Nick Bare of Bare Performance Nutrition on Bootstrapping Supplements, Overcoming Eating Disorders, and Morning Running Solitude

*The founder of Bare Performance Nutrition shares how military discipline, overcoming a severe eating disorder, and daily early morning runs built his multimillion-dollar brand.*

> My early morning run provides me just as much mental benefit (if not more) as it does physical. I spend the majority of these runs below my max aerobic heart rate (zone 2–3), which is a comfortable and “easy” pace.

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T*he global health and wellness market is worth more than 1.5 trillion dollars. So many people are looking to improve their physical, mental, and emotional wellness. At the same time, so many people are needed to help provide these services. What does it take to create a highly successful career in the health and wellness industry?*

*In this interview series called “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Health and Wellness Industry” we are talking to health and wellness professionals who can share insights and stories from their experiences.*

*In this particular interview, we had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Nick Bare.*

*Nick Bare founded Bare Performance Nutrition in 2012 out of his small college apartment in Western Pennsylvania at the Indiana University of PA. During this time, Nick was studying nutrition and on the path of joining the military upon graduation. The company was built upon the values of transparency and service from its infant stages of launch and today remain instilled in the brands primary mission.*

*After graduating college, Nick commissioned in to the US Army as an Infantry Officer, where he spent the next four years completing various military training schools, such as Ranger School and Airborne School, before taking his position as an Infantry Platoon Leader stationed out of Texas. During his time in the military, Nick learned the values of leadership, integrity and team building which have been directly applied to Bare Performance Nutrition.*

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**Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you grew up?**

I grew up in a small town in central Pennsylvania called Palmyra. My father’s family were dairy farmers and my mother’s family had deep and proud roots in the United States Military. After watching my cousin, Matt, transform into a confident young man through multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, I chose to follow his footsteps and serve my country. I enrolled in college to study nutrition at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania, while on an Army ROTC contract, to pursue a commision into the United States Army after graduating. The Army provided me the opportunity to complete challenging schools such as the US Army Ranger School and lead an Infantry Platoon, while stationed at Fort Hood, Texas. These life-changing experiences and lessons helped me build a strong and successful health and performance supplement company after transitioning out of the military.

**Was there a particular person or event that inspired you to live a wellness-focused lifestyle? Can you tell us about your main motivation to go all in?**

In 2014, when I was 14 years old, I developed a severe eating disorder. This ended up taking over my life and controlled every decision I made on a daily basis. My health declined, I struggled to get out of bed, obsessed on exercise and was slowly killing myself as my body and organs shut down. After many hospital visits, being confronted by my family and doctors, I made the difficult decision to get better. This disorder and unhealthy relationship with food was hard to overcome, but sparked an interest in a wellness-focused lifestyle.

Initially this spark ignited a reason to learn more, but it quickly turned into a burning passion. I not only wanted to optimize my health and fitness, but I wanted to help others as well. I realized food is fuel and that fuel allows you to live a full life filled with purpose.

**Most people with a wellbeing centered lifestyle have a “go-to” activity, exercise, beverage, or food that is part of their routine. What is yours and can you tell us how it helps you?**

My “go-to” exercise is an early morning run. I believe that there are three things that you need to start your day off right: Wake up early, move your body and search for solitude. Running before the sun rises provides me with all three of these things. In a distracted world it becomes difficult to find moments of solitude, so we often have to schedule them into our routine. My early morning run provides me just as much mental benefit (if not more) as it does physical. I spend the majority of these runs below my max aerobic heart rate (zone 2–3), which is a comfortable and “easy” pace. My mind wonders and achieves clarity that I haven’t been able to find anywhere else. If there is a problem that I am experiencing in life, it will pop into my head during these runs and I begin to navigate these issues in hopes of creating a solution. I’ve had some of my best business ideas during these moments of solitude and have reached depths in my thoughts that I couldn’t have experienced anywhere else. These early morning runs are the most powerful part of my day.

**To live a wellness-focused life is one thing, but how did it become your career? How did it all start?**

In 2012 I was sitting in my college apartment, frustrated with the current supplement offerings that were in the market. Most were formulated behind proprietary blends and many were being pulled off shelves because they contained banned substances. It was the wild, wild west of the supplement industry. Since I didn’t trust much of what was being sold, I started purchasing my own bulk ingredients and mixing up my own supplements to use. After my friends saw me doing this they all convinced me to start making trustworthy products for them too.

Bare Performance Nutrition (BPN) was born when my burning passion for health and fitness met an opportunity to create a line of trusted products that were needed in the market. I took out a $20,000 loan, sourced a manufacturer, built the brand out of my college apartment and launched a website designed by a friend. I had no idea what building a business looked like, but I was “all-in” and prepared for the crazy adventurer that is entrepreneurship. It was by no means an overnight success, but after 10 years of building the brand, product offering, online community and internal team, we are now taking a lead in the industry by creating health and performance supplements, you can trust.

**Can you share a story about the biggest challenges you faced when you were first starting? How did you resolve that? What are the main lessons or takeaways from that story?**

Biggest challenges as a bootstrapped entreprepreneur? Where do I begin…

When I decided I was going to start BPN in 2012 I told my dad that I was going to make one-million dollars that year. He responded with, “Nick, if it were that easy everyone would do it.” I set out to prove him wrong.

For the first three years of business we did $20,000 in revenue each year. The first problem I encountered was the lesson of supply and demand. I assumed that if you had the supply then demand would follow, but I was sadly mistaken. Noone knew about my business so sales didn’t flow in as expected. After two years of realizing that the company was not going to grow on its own (like magic or something) I took to social media. I started building an audience on YouTube by documenting my life as a start up entrepreneur, active duty Infantry Officer in the US Army and sharing training/nutrition information. As this audience grew, so did BPN sales. It didn’t take long for me to realize the power of social media, documenting the journey and sharing the vision with a community of like-minded individuals. To this day I can still see and hear my dad telling me, “Nick if it were that easy everyone would do it.”.

One of the most challenging parts of building a business for me was the timing. I started BPN just one year before graduating college and commissioning into the US Army as an Infantry Officer. That first year in the Army was incredible. I completed the Infantry Officer Course, Ranger School, Airborne School and the Bradley Leader Course, all before getting stationed at Fort Hood, Texas. The first four years of building BPN was done in my “free time”, which was extremely limited. My job with the military was very demanding and 9 of those months were spent in South Korea on a training rotation. Every single day that I got home from work, no matter what time, I went straight to working on the business and documenting the journey on social media.

When it was time to transition out of the Army in 2017, the business was making enough money for my brother, Preston, and I to survive. We didn’t need much, but we understood the opportunity with BPN so we continued to invest all the profits back into the business. 2017 was a pivotal year for the company. It was the first year we did 7-figures in revenue, we signed our first warehouse lease and I now could dedicate all of my time to building the business. With all that being said, we could never have made it work if I didn’t put in those hard days the previous 5 years. The lesson? Consistency compounds. Building a business is hard, but if you start with the expectation of succeeding in that first year, you are probably going to be disappointed. Consistency always wins. Show up day-after-day, week-after-week, month-after-month, year-after-year, and keep putting in those hard days because they will compound over time.

**Can you share with us how the work you are doing is helping to make a bigger impact in the world? Can you share a story that illustrates that?**

Through content and story-telling, BPN has created a massive online community that supports each other through the tagline, “Go One More”. This is much more than one extra rep in the gym, one more mile logged for the week or an extra hour spent working on your business. Go One More is a life principle that when life gets hard, and it will, you push through that resistance. Every obstacle, challenge and hardship is a test to see how badly you want to succeed. The compounding effect of Go One More results in pushing you beyond what you thought was achievable and closer to success over an extended period of time. It is not a quick fix or life-hack, but something you apply daily.

We recently celebrated 10 years in business and hosted a birthday party in Austin, Texas to bring our community together. Hundreds of people traveled across the country and even across the world to celebrate with our team. We hosted a 10k run downtown, put together a pop-up shop and wrapped up the evening with an after party. During this event a young woman walked up to me with her daughter. She told me that she was a single mom and her daughter did not have a father-figure in her life. She then began to tell me that she shows her daughter the videos we produce, the messages we promote and the lessons we share every single day. For her daughter, she uses the BPN team as a father-figure for her daughter. The responsibility of this impact in the world is the reason our team pushes so hard every day. We see ourselves as role models for the people who are watching and to live out the Go One More lifestyle.

**What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? How do you think that might help people?**

This past year we launched a handful of new health and wellness products that we are very excited about. Strong Food is our most recent supplement that was introduced to the line. This is a whole-food meal replacement powder made from Whey Protein, Pea Protein, Oats, Sweet Potato Powder, MCT Oil Powder, Chia Seed and Flaxseed. It is the perfect balance of proteins, fat and carbohydrates that will help people stay on track with their nutrition when time is constricted. We don’t always have the time or resources to cook and prepare a balanced meal, and that is exactly why Strong Food was created!

A large project we have been working on for the past year and plan to role out on January 1, 2023 is our training app. This app will be available for iOS and Android in the app stores. Not only will it offer expert training guidance, programs and supplement recommendations to help people get started and stay on track, but it’s also FREE. That’s right, we aren’t charging users for this service and have created it as a value add for our customers. Based off consumer feedback the hardest thing for people to do is maintain consistency in their training and diet. The new BPN Training App will help people get started, maintain consistency and achieve results.

**You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?**

Visionary. Intentional. Empowerment.

I don’t know if you can boil it down to just three character traits that make for a strong leader, but I do think that they need to be focused around the who, what, where, when and why. Before leading teams in my business I had the opportunity to learn from remarkable, great, good and sub-par leaders during my time in the military. Through this experience I have applied the lessons learned to building a business. I would like to point out that the learning never ends and the leader I am today has evolved from the leader I was 6 months ago. That is the way it works and, in my honest opinion, the ONLY way it works.

Visionary. The first character trait that’s instrumental to the success of a leader is to set and execute a vision. The vision is the north star — it guides the organization, teams and individuals on the right path. Not only does a leader have to establish the vision, but they need to talk about it often and loudly.

Intentional. One of my favorite quotes says, “lack of intentionality leads to a repetition of what is easiest.”. From day one of starting a business and leading a team you will be faced with decisions. Some decisions will be small and some will be large. Some decisions will create jobs and some will take jobs. There will be easy decisions and extremely hard ones too. The decision making process requires intention that is planned deliberately and strategically. Not only do these decisions affect you and the business, but also everyone involved.

Empowerment. Employees want to be empowered to do their job. As you can imagine, very few people enjoy being micromanaged. I personally enjoy leading with context, rather than control. If you put the right people in the right place across your organization you can trust that those individuals can accomplish their responsibilities. By empowering people in your company you are allowing them to grow, develop and think critically about the decision they are making.

**OK, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Let’s begin with a basic definition of terms so that all of us are on the same page. Wellness is an incredibly broad topic. How would you define the term “Wellness”? Can you explain what you mean?**

I’m sure we all have different opinions on how we define the term “wellness”, depending on our athletic abilities, fitness interests, diet preferences or lifestyle. One of our objectives at BPN is to bridge the gap between health and performance through training, supplementation and education.

Wellness is an optimized foundation achieved through practicing healthy lifestyle choices through daily diet and movement.

You can reach a state of wellness by eating healthier foods that are rich in vitamins and minerals, maintaining appropriate levels of hydration, moving your body on a regular and consistent basis, building healthy relationships, sleeping a sufficient amount of hours each night or improving your mental and physical state.

**As an expert, this might be intuitive to you, but it will be instructive to expressly articulate this. Can you please share a few reasons with our readers about why focusing on our wellness should be a priority in our lives?**

If I told you that I could give you a pill that would make EVERYTHING in your life better, would you take it? Imagine waking up feeling more energized, having a healthier relationship with your spouse, feeling stronger in the gym, avoiding illnesses more often and living in a happier state of mind.

There is a way to feel these things, but unfortunately there is not one pill that is going to help you achieve this. When you focus on your wellness, you are making healthier and smarter decisions on a daily basis that are going to allow you to experience the above description.

You can live a life through poor choices and you will probably survive, but is surviving enough? The opposite of surviving is thriving. When you optimize your wellness you can thrive in all areas of your life.

**Since the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been an increasingly growing understanding of the necessity for companies to be mindful of the wellness of their employees. For the sake of inspiring others, can you share steps or initiatives that companies have taken to help improve or optimize their employees’ mental and physical wellness?**

To be honest, our organization has been mindful of the wellness of our employees well before the COVID-19 pandemic. As a health and performance supplement company, the message we promote is more than selling a product or building a brand; it is a lifestyle that we live.

BPN covers 100% of our employee (and families) health care benefits so that they don’t have to be concerned with covering costs if and when they require medical assistance. Every week we bring a chiropractor and sports massage therapist in the office so that all employees can be seen by a certified professional. We built out a state-of-the-art gym in our headquarters that employees get access to before work, after work and on the weekends. Recently, we increased the annual PTO from 10 days to 20 days each year so that team members can take additional time off to spend with family, traveling the world and disconnecting from work.

We are fully aware that our organization would not be where it is today without the people involved. It is our responsibility to take care of our employees and ensure they are able to achieve physical and mental wellness.

**Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Health and Wellness Industry”? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.**

1. Passion — The first thing you need to create a highly successful career in the health and wellness industry is passion. You can’t buy passion and you can’t fake it. The reason I have listed passion as number one is because ,without it, you will struggle to achieve the next couple “needs”. Passion to get started is one thing, but passion for the process over 10+ years is a different depth. A career in the health and wellness industry is much more than a personal enjoyment for working out and eating healthy. You must find fulfillment in helping others achieve success, a continued desire to learn in an evolving space and embrace the responsibility that you have a direct ability to change peoples lives.
2. Empathy is a character trait that is essential to be a strong and trusted leader, especially in the health and wellness industry. People are motivated by different things in different ways. Some like to be yelled at like they are surviving a week in basic training for the US military, others can relate to a life-changing weight loss transformation and some just want to know that they aren’t alone on this difficult journey. We all enter the process of taking control of our health and wellness at different points of entry. To be successful in this industry you must be willing and able to display empathy for people trying to make a change in their lives for the better. These lifestyle changes are easier for some compared to others, but the sooner we recognize that the word “hard” is relative to the individual looking to make the change, we can better show up to help them.
3. Credibility — A few months ago during one of my early morning runs I thought of the phrase, “if you don’t practice what you preach, you should be allowed to teach.”. Credibility comes in many different forms such as personal experience, academia, research, or testimonials. With the explosion of social media in the last decade you will frequently come across people claiming to be experts in everything under the sun, but without any credibility to prove it. Now it doesn’t matter how much passion you have for a certain area of study, without any credibility behind it you will have little trust. There are so many different options to choose from and it’s honestly best to choose from a few. You can start with going to school and earn a degree, get certified through accredited organizations and sign up for continued education courses. If you are going to coach someone on how to run a faster marathon, you should have run a few marathons yourself and studied the principles of training the aerobic and anaerobic systems. I like to refer to the principle that you shouldn’t ever ask something to do something that you haven’t done yourself.
4. Patience is not specifically unique to the health and wellness industry, but when working with people it is essential. When it comes to building any successful career you must be patient. For the first 5 years of building my business I wasn’t able to pay myself. It took us 10 years to really start scratching the surface and now the vision is more clear than ever before. The ability to be patient is a competitive advantage. So many people give up and move on after they don’t see the results they hoped for in those first couple months of business. Building a successful career is similar to helping someone lose a tremendous amount of weight. The answer? Set expectations. Set them early and make them realistic. If someone wants to lose 100 pounds you have the responsibility to let them know it’s not going to happen quickly. It will be difficult and it will challenge every part of their life, but once they commit to the change every aspect of their life will improve. The same lesson applies to building a successful career. If you are “all in’’ and ready to make this a career, and not just a job, be prepared to endure tough times. Tough people survive tough times.
5. Integrity — The three core pillars of our business are Integrity, Transparency and Service. In the health and wellness industry you are often helping people when they are at their lowest. They are vulnerable, searching for solutions to help them make a change and are easily influenced. Unfortunately, many businesses and individuals online take advantage of these people. They continue to over-promise and under-deliver. There is a moral responsibility in building a business, establishing a successful career and helping people reach their goals. The magic pill doesn’t exist and the weight loss program you heard at 1am on an infomercial is probably a load of crap. If you are dedicated to building something that is trusted, respected and bullet-proof you must lead with integrity.

**You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would promote the most wellness to the greatest amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)**

Because wellness embodies food, physical fitness and mental optimization, I think creating a movement that impacts a large number of people would be best accomplished by focusing on one area at a time. So let’s choose food…

I personally use a service in the Austin, Texas area by a company called Farmhouse Delivery. Every week I place an order on their website, which offers foods from local farmers, ranchers, bakers and more. I get grass-fed meat from ranches I know are 10 miles from my house, pasture raised eggs from a local farm, produce sourced in central Texas and many other fresh groceries. I love this service, but I also am aware that it can be expensive depending on what I’m ordering each week.

I would love to start a movement that launches farm co-op distribution all over the country, sourced from high-quality foods and delivered for a reasonable price. This type of service gets nutrient dense foods in peoples kitchens, conveniently dropped off at your door and supports local farmers as well.

Food is fuel and the foundation of achieving optimized wellness.

**We are blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.**

Jesse Itzler.

For me, Jesse embodies wellness. He is an established entrepreneur who has built and sold many businesses. Jesse is a proud and supportive husband and father. He has written multiple books, spends his time with his family, works on passionate projects, eats well and trains hard.

I once heard Jesse say, “I don’t hang my hat on my previous accomplishments, I’m focused on right now and what I’m doing in the future.” — I respect that.

**How can our readers further follow your work online?**

I am very active on YouTube, Instagram and I host a weekly podcast. All of the links can be found below.

BPN Website: [https://www.bpnsupps.com](https://www.bpnsupps.com)

Nick Bare Website: [https://www.nickbare.com](https://www.nickbare.com)

YouTube: [https://www.youtube.com/barelifenutrition](https://www.youtube.com/barelifenutrition)

Instagram: [https://www.instagram.com/nickbarefitness](https://www.instagram.com/nickbarefitness)

Podcast (iTunes): [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bare-performance-podcast/id1469466722](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bare-performance-podcast/id1469466722)

Podcast (Spotify): [https://open.spotify.com/show/0FqNvRhcHYBtfxnmhDSt2r?si=1ccbd62d1dad42ae](https://open.spotify.com/show/0FqNvRhcHYBtfxnmhDSt2r?si=1ccbd62d1dad42ae)

**This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success and good health!**

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Source: https://authoritymag.co/articles/nick-bare-of-bare-performance-nutrition-on-bootstrapping-supplements-overcoming-eating-disorders (Authority Magazine, Wellness). Interviewee answers are first-person statements of the guest. Index of all pages: https://authoritymag.co/llms.txt