Today is International Women’s Day and what better way to celebrate the brilliance of ladies everywhere than with a bit of a meet-and-greet, talking to the stellar women of Gym+Coffee.
The ladies outnumber the lads now, both at HQ and in our retail store. Our growing sisterhood has become an awesome space to bounce ideas, do a little blue-sky thinking, be reminded of our talents and our growth, and do our best to create a supportive environment where we’re all given the opportunity to shine our lights.
We hail from all over the globe (every day at G+C is IWD), we range in age, we have varied personal and professional backgrounds, our interests, hobbies and skillsets are diverse and we all come together each week to keep the Gym+Coffee fires lit.
Here’s us, raising a big cup of delightful coffee to the women of G+C, to the women in our community, and to all women every day working to Make Life Richer!
Natalie Conway, Retail Manager
Spirit Animal: Pink Flamingo - pink, a bit glam, and kinda feisty.
Natalie is the kind of person that you want to hang out with all the time partly cos she’s so sound and partly cos you just KNOW she’s got some good stories to tell. She has spent her career working for some of the biggest global clothing brands in the world and her skills in the retail game have helped bring the Gym+Coffee brand, product and community to where it is today.
With a background in both fashion buying and retail management (forget about the short-lived job cutting hair for €1.01 per hour), she’s the only person we can imagine leading the charge for Gym+Coffee’s retail ambitions.
She likes her coffee strong and her Bon Jovi loud.
When asked which three celebrities she’d most like to go for pints with, she was amazingly specific and is also definitely not going for pints with anyone: “1. Champagne with Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel as I'm so obsessed with how she completely changed the face of fashion: liberating women by making feminine, sporty fashion super chic and still influences and dominates the fashion world to this day. 2. Sparkling water with Jennifer Lopez as I'd love to know what deal she's done with the devil to look so bloody good at 50!! 3. Wine with David Beckham, for obvious reasons…”
All hail, Queen Retail.
Adele Biggs, Content Creator
Spirit Animal: Raccoon - curious, scrappy, adaptable + hungry.
Adele’s path to writing has been a slow burner. It started with a weird poem at age 6-ish about lambs in NZ and another one about Neopolitan ice cream a few years later and then she stopped for stints as a bar manager, city planner, pro-sports events worker and relationship manager before getting back to where she really belongs.
Born in Canada, raised in New Zealand, Adele traveled for a couple of years before making Toronto home for 7+. She immigrated to Dublin close to 2 years ago and has been desperately trying to pick up the local lingo ever since… what does ‘gaff’ mean again?
At G+C, she has settled in as the person most likely to not understand what anyone else is saying and the person least likely to say no to something she’s not qualified for (see previous post re: cycling 42km).
She’s dog-mum to a tiny pup, god-mum to a distant-but-dear little babe and bonus-mum to a beautifully rambunctious 8-year old; she prefers dancing to singing and singing to swimming with sharks (just).
She’s altoegther awkward about writing in the third person.
Allie Sheehy, Digital Marketing Executive
Spirit Animal: Irish Setter - Energetic, red hair.
Allie is the gal you call in a pinch. Most of us spend at least part of the day asking her how we can do something fancy online and Allie spends a bunch of her day wondering when all the rest of us are going to get up with the play on all things digital.
She has a knack for meeting celebs, is working on her marathon game and will be running one this year in Dublin, her fave coffee is a cold brew, her fave martini is with espresso and she’s a big fan of burlap (no wonder she ended up here).
With a background in film & television plus a post-grad education in advertising, her fit in the snappy world of digital marketing has been almost seamless and we’d truly be lost without her. She knows every acronym you can think of in the online world (trust us, we checked) AND she knows how and when and what acronym to implement. Even better though, she keeps a stash of crisps in the kitchen and she doesn’t mind sharing.
Here’s to the woman who happily puts up with so many questions that start with ‘Hey Allie, do you think it’s possible to…’
Kate Lloyd, Customer Experience & Community Manager
Spirit Animal: Penguin - team player, flexible and also, who doesn't want to slide around on their belly as a key mode of transport??
Kate’s favourite snacks are jelly and rice crispies which means you already know she’s pretty great.
She studied Sports Management, then Event Management and on top of looking after the G+C Community, she also tends to our ambassadors and helps to plan our events. If you’ve ever contacted us here at Gym+Coffee, Kate’s more than likely the person you dealt with and based on all the compliments she reads out to us, you guys seem pretty happy with her work.
She’s a hockey SUPERSTAR (though she’ll downplay it if you ask her). One of her big goals this year is to win the All-Ireland hockey league with her club and to be perfectly honest we don’t doubt she and her team will achieve it. She has a lady-dog named Frank, she lived in Belgium for a year, she’s a big fan of brunch, she was the very first employee at Gym+Coffee and she’s the youngest on the HQ team.
Basically, Kate is incredibly impressive and incredibly humble and we are exceptionally lucky to have her.
Female Retail!
Our retail team are so important to us and act as our daily ambassadors to the G+C community. Louise, Siobhan, Ashlea, Sophia, and Jey are our boots on the ground. They work hard every day of the week to show people just what Gym+Coffee is all about. They make sure that our store is welcoming, that shelves are stocked with all the G+C gear our customers want to see, to feel and to try on. They are the constant faces of our brand and they do an exceptional job of presenting who and what Gym+Coffee is.
These gals are a varied bunch, hailing from all over the world and interested in all sorts of things. They study, they work, they raise kiddos, they have pets and they are constantly working to make the lives of our community members richer.
Jey has 2 dogs and likes to go surfing in Lahinch; Louise played hockey once and got a black eye so she tends to avoid the pitch these days; Ashlea likes to walk, hike and procrastinate doing her college work; Sophia loves sushi and has a boxer dog named Mylo; Siobhan’s favourite form of exercise is walking to her car and her favourite cafe is her kitchen, proving that everyone’s version of Gym+Coffee is a little different and that is exactly what makes us tick.
We hope that you’ve learned a bit about us today. We hope very much that you enjoyed meeting us. And we also hope that we’ll get to see you soon at one of our Gym+Coffee events.
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The Women of G+C
