Cassey Ho: I Built a Multi-Million Dollar Brand With Zero Ad Spend | @Blogilates

She started with YouTube workouts for 40 people — and ended up building two multi-million dollar apparel brands. In this honest, behind-the-scenes conversation, Cassey Ho (Blogilates) talks about content, community, AI theft, burnout, growth, and what it really takes to build something real in 2025. Links: Follow my Newsletter:⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://siliconvalleygirl.beehiiv.com/⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://siliconvalleygirl.beehiiv.com/ Companies & Products: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Marinamogilko.co⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://Marinamogilko.co Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/siliconvalleygirl/ ⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.instagram.com/siliconvalleygirl/ YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@SiliconValleyGirl⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.youtube.com/@SiliconValleyGirl LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠linkedin.com/in/marinamogilko⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.linkedin.com/in/marinamogilko/ X: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x.com/siliconvalleymm⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://x.com/siliconvalleymm

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  UKG is the workforce operating platform with unified HR, payroll, and workforce management. Built to solve the unique challenges of frontline work. Powered by People First AI and decades of labor data, UKG turns workforce intelligence into real-time decisions around staffing, pay, compliance, and productivity, enabling every worker to confidently take action as work happens. Because when work works, everything works. Learn more at ukg.com/work. UKG, HR, Pay, and Workforce Management.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  I love football season. The games, the rivalries, the food, getting everyone together. No game day feels complete without a trip to Total Wine & More. I can find everything from cold beer and canned cocktails to wines and spirits for the whole crew. And if I want to bring something different to the watch party, the Total Wine team always has ideas. Plus, it's nice knowing I'm getting the lowest prices. Get your game day lineup ready at Total Wine & More. Spirits are not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly, be 21.

• 0:57Speaker 02

  Every day, there is a new fire, a new problem, problems on problems, and like, you think you're gonna explode.

• 1:04Marina Mogilko?

  It looks like you were dealing with a lot of online hate. People just shaming you, et cetera.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  People sent me the video of her wearing the pure wet score. I went numb. I couldn't even feel anything. Swifties just started coming over. They found it. And then we get like 16,000 pre-orders for that one score in that color. I absolutely hate AI. There have been instances where my videos are just stolen off of my page. They've used AI to actually change my face. I'm gonna keep fighting because it's not right. I can't work for free for somebody else. As a principal, I will never stop fighting.

• 1:39Marina Mogilko?

  Hello, everyone. Welcome to Silicon Valley Girl. I have blogilatus today. I am so happy that you're here. We met in 2022, I think, the creator.

• 1:50Speaker 02

  Summit, right?

• 1:51Marina Mogilko?

  I remember. And you were doing this pilatus thing in the morning, which is amazing, and I still have your mat.

• 1:56Speaker 02

  Oh, good.

• 1:57Marina Mogilko?

  Which is a huge business for you. So I'm excited to chat about AI.

• 2:02Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:02Marina Mogilko?

  Taking over everything. And I'd love your take on what it's like to run a business in 2025 as a creator and also a woman.

• 2:10Speaker 02

  Hmm, let's do it.

• 2:11Marina Mogilko?

  Welcome to Silicon Valley Girl.

• 2:12Speaker 02

  Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

• 2:15Marina Mogilko?

  Can you tell me what's going on with your business right now?

• 2:17Speaker 02

  So there's two brands. There's Blogilates, which is the retail exclusive to Target brand. And just at the top of this year, we launched apparel at Target for the very first time. It was all at all eighteen hundred stores in the very front gateway, which was so cool because it really felt like winning the retail Super Bowl. Like you just don't get those opportunities. So that was fully manufactured by our team. We're the vendor. Um, that was a, that was such a crazy thing to pull off. Because in under a year, we had to figure out how to produce one point one million units. Yeah, and we had never done anything like that before. The Popflex brand is my D to C brand that we mostly sell online.

• 3:02Speaker 02

  Um, and, and that one is at a higher price point. And really focused on innovation, um, and performance. And also just like testing all sorts of things. I would say the Target one is more activewear, whereas Popflex started out with activewear and then has now evolved into swimwear and underwear and like casual dresses and stuff. So I'm having a lot of fun playing around with innovation over there.

• 3:28Marina Mogilko?

  That's, that's amazing that you have kind of just similar, but at the same time, uh, different brands. How does it work when you think about launching a new product? Which brand does it go to?

• 3:37Speaker 02

  Popflex is where the innovation begins, where I get to have fun. Nobody tells me what I have to do or, or, or can't do. Well, actually no, the customers tell me what I have to do. And so I love going into the comments and figuring out, hey, what are they looking for? What problems do they need solving with? Um, but with Popflex, we innovate, we product develop, we try it out. And then with Target, um, pretty much the, the playbook right now is that we take what works really well with Popflex and I redesign it so that it can hit a lower price point for the Target audience. Which has been really great because one of the biggest complaints we get about Popflex is it's too expensive. I can't afford it. And like specifically, please launch at Target. And so when that happened this past January, it was, it worked.

• 4:20Speaker 02

  I, and I was afraid though, because here's the thing, you launch with a brand. At a higher price point. And then my, my next question was, is launching a brand at half the price point going to cannibalize my original brand?

• 4:35Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 4:35Speaker 02

  Right? And this was really just up in the air. We didn't know. But the weird thing is, when we launched at Target for Blogilates, it actually helped increase revenue for Popflex, which is crazy. But if you think about it, it was like marketing, being in front of the store. Everyone got to see it. Things sold out so quick. There were like three specific styles that ninety percent of the inventory sold out within three days. It was insane.

• 4:59Marina Mogilko?

  Fascinating.

• 5:00Speaker 02

  It's crazy. But then on the tag, on the tag, it tells a little bit of a story about me and it says, CEO and head designer of Popflex and Blogilates. And so people can go and figure out, oh, maybe there's more if I can't get it here. So I think it was really, really great for legitimacy as a brand and as a designer.

• 5:18Marina Mogilko?

  How do the margins work? So with Target, you get a licensing fee or you get like, how, how does it work in general?

• 5:24Speaker 02

  Okay, that's a really good question. So with the apparel, it wasn't licensing. That was fully like we are the vendor. So essentially we are selling wholesale to Target and then they mark up how they decide to mark up in the front. However, there is a fitness section where you see the yoga mats and the dumbbells and things. That is a licensing deal. And so I get paid a percent royalty on, on that. But the apparel is all manufactured by us.

• 5:48Marina Mogilko?

  Got it. In terms of revenue split, what does your business look like these days?

• 5:53Speaker 02

  Okay, so this is a really interesting question because us both coming from the creator space, from the YouTube space, it is not what most people would think it is.

• 6:00Marina Mogilko?

  Not like Google Ads?

• 6:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, I had just talked to my husband, who's also the COO of the company. I was like, oh, wait, let, let's like, look at these numbers again. It's actually less than one percent of our revenue comes from anything related to like ads or pre-rolls or anything like that or brand deals because I do not do brand deals anymore. And let me tell you, I'm so happy about that. Because honestly, any tension that came between me and my husband were like about stick to the brand deal guidelines and they told you to do this, but I'm like, but I did do that. And he's like, but legal says, and it was like so much, like I hate that. So yeah, over ninety-nine percent of our revenue comes from the apparel businesses.

• 6:37Marina Mogilko?

  In terms of marketing, what works these days?

• 6:40Speaker 02

  For marketing, it's organic, which is also very different than a traditional D to C online brand who, from what I hear, they rely heavily on, you know, meta ads and things like that. So luckily for me, because I do come from a content creator background, I really enjoy making content. And so you probably have seen some of these videos where I'm talking about the design, the why, where it came from, what problem we're solving. I show them the actual sketch throughout the development, some samples, things that didn't work out. And taking people on the journey behind a product is really interesting. And I didn't think it would be, but people are really interested. And what's crazy is that what

• 7:21Speaker 02

  is a fun piece of content for me to film, edit, voiceover, and by the way, I still do all of that myself, which is kind of crazy. Wow. I know, I know. I know. It's like really unconventional. It's, it's really hard. It's too much going on at once. But like, one 60 second video takes about nine hours to make. And I am literally the one editing in cap cut and in shot on my phone. But I choose to do this. Mm hmm. Everyone's like, Cassie, you need to get an editor. And I had that life before. I had the life of horizontal content, long form, fitness videos. We had an editor. We'd come back, you know, you go in, I forget what that program is, but you know, put the notes and everything. Mm hmm. But that, I lost the joy in all that. And being able to talk about the product and

• 8:03Speaker 02

  the design, because each design feels like my baby, has brought the joy back into editing for me. How many videos a week? Um, I'm averaging one right now, but sometimes I feel like it. I can do like two, but it's a lot because it's like I'm part content creator, part CEO and head designer. And so like during the normal workday, I have the normal meetings and product development calls and fittings and things like that. It's only after hours when I can like, sit in the corner of the couch and like I'm just editing for like seven hours straight until my hands cramp. But anyway, what I was trying to say is that the organic videos, they work and they sell. Like sometimes a video goes viral, the thing can sell out within a few hours, which is insane. So that's working for us, which is very atypical of a D to

• 8:48Speaker 02

  C business. Now that's the blogalotis, and this is where it gets confusing. So I started out on YouTube with the screen name Blogilates. So essentially these days, I think if people started out, it'd be like at Cassie Ho or something. So anyway, Blogilates is my, my channels across the board. So I make my content for my pages. Nobody touches that. However, I will say that there is a pop flex IG and YouTube and Tik Tok. And that is a separate marketing team. So we have videos go over there too. And I will say both organic videos on both sides really do sell really, really well. And one type of organic video that sells well on the pop flex side is what we produce at what we call a content house. And so we reach out to women in our community, sizes, extra, extra small, all the way to three X.

• 9:33Speaker 02

  So that's nine different sizes. And we put the girls in like the same baby doll dress or something. And they all get to walk out, model. And now people get to see, oh, this is what someone like me might look like. Okay, that's a medium, that's a one X, that's a size small. And it's really fun to like create with our community. So that, that also sells.

• 9:55Speaker 00

  UKG is the workforce operating platform with unified HR, payroll and workforce management. Built to solve the unique challenges of frontline work. Powered by people first AI and decades of labor data. UKG turns workforce intelligence into real time decisions around staffing, pay, compliance and productivity. Enabling every worker to confidently take action as work happens. Because when work works, everything works. Learn more at ukg.com/work. UKG, HR, pay and workforce management.

• 10:25Speaker 04

  I'll admit it, I'm one of those people who gets excited for football season way before the first kickoff. That's why a trip to Total Wine & More has become part of my game day routine. I can get the cooler ready with my favorite beers and ready to drink cocktails. I'm usually picking up enough for everybody, so it's nice knowing I'm scoring the lowest prices. This season, make Total Wine & More part of your game day tradition. Spirits are not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly, be 21.

• 10:55Speaker 02

  How does it work? So you just DM your customers like, hey, do you want to be in the video or? So we do an open casting call. We do an open. casting call, people have to send in videos because honestly, it's not just even about like the modeling. It's about the personality that's charisma, like what shows through the screen, right? And also the girls having a good time with each other because they're all nice and kind. And so luckily, the ones that we have put on, everyone is just so excited to be there. Um, of course, they get compensated through pay, but also they get to keep all the clothes that they get that day that haven't been released. So that's super exciting for them too. Yeah. So on the organic side, that is what's working for Blogilates and then for Popflex. But I will say something really interesting we should talk about is TikTok lives.

• 11:35Marina Mogilko?

  Mm hmm. Oh, yeah. That's a huge thing these days, right?

• 11:39Speaker 02

  Huge. Oh, my God. Okay, so this was wild. Sam and I were on a little weekend trip and we were just checking like Shopify sales and we're like, whoa, did someone just mention something like what's going on? We started seeing like all these pirouette scores, which is the score that Taylor Swift wore. Um, and my patented score, just like for whatever reason, it was just going like up. And we're like, what's going on? We couldn't figure it out. So we go on Slack, we're messaging everyone like, hey, did something happen? Did someone mention us? And we find out there's this girl with nineteen hundred followers on TikTok. So she's not like really a big, a big content creator at all or creator at all. She has gone live for like five or six hours and she's just showing the score that she's wearing and answering questions and she brought a huge spike that day.

• 12:22Marina Mogilko?

  Oh, wow.

• 12:23Speaker 02

  It was insane. There's something about like, I don't know, like this is also another conversation, but like, I feel like as the influencer industry has evolved, it's like consumers have lost trust in it because it's become almost like this fancy pedestal like thing. Whereas a normal girl with nineteen hundred followers, she's going to tell you the truth, like, or at least that's the perception, right? And she sold some skirts. So that was crazy.

• 12:50Marina Mogilko?

  Talk to me about Taylor.

• 12:51Speaker 02

  Oh, my God. Okay, so I am a huge Taylor Swift fan. I've been listening to her music since two thousand eight, Teardrops on My Guitar. And she's honestly like my favorite musician, singer songwriter, and honestly, businesswoman. So, um, when on April nineteenth of last year,

• 13:12Speaker 02

  People sent me the video of her wearing the pirouette score. I went numb. I like couldn't even believe it. I couldn't even feel anything because I was feeling everything. Do you know what I'm saying? Like I basically died and it was insane. Um, one, because that was like ultimate dream fulfilled. Like it out of any celebrity in the world, if there was one person I wanted to wear pop flex, it would be her and it happened, which is so crazy.

• 13:36Marina Mogilko?

  Did you, did you send it to her?

• 13:37Speaker 02

  No. No, no, no, no, no. People ask me all the time. Oh, did you send it to her? Like, no, like Taylor Swift was a billionaire. She can buy whatever she wants, right? And also she's very intentional with what she buys. So sometimes I wonder, I wonder like, did she know all the stuff I was going through, fighting for, you know, the rights to protect my design in the same way that she protects her music? Or did she just see it on TikTok and she liked it and she bought it? I will never know.

• 13:58Marina Mogilko?

  What happened to sales?

• 14:00Speaker 02

  Oh yeah. Okay. So that digital lavender pirouette squirt sold out within one hour on the website. Like Swifties just started coming over. They found it. And when Taylor Swift styled the Instagram account, like confirmed it, that's when the sales started coming in like wild. And then within two hours, every single color of that squirt started selling out. Um, and then we're like, oh, okay. Well, what do we do? Right? Because we're getting all this traffic. We gotta do something. And we usually never do a pre-sale, but we're like, okay, may, maybe it's time to do a pre-sale. I don't know. So immediately we put a pre-sale up that night. Um, and then we get like 16,000 pre-orders for that one squirt in that color.

• 14:42Marina Mogilko?

  Wow.

• 14:43Speaker 02

  Yeah. Which was insane. And then we had to work really hard to get that reorder up and going because, you know, we've got to weave the fabric, dye the fabric, cut and sew. Like it's a whole process. Um, and people eventually got it a few months later and I'm just so happy.

• 14:57Marina Mogilko?

  That's amazing. Such a cool moment. Okay. With all the crazy things that you're telling me, have you ever had thoughts like, let just Sam, your husband, handle everything and I will just enjoy life?

• 15:07Speaker 02

  You know what? Sam says that to me all the time. He is, he's often tired and he's like, what, what, what if we just like chilled out for a second? What, what if all this growth was enough? You know, like what if we just sailed? But like, it's the way my ra, my parents raised me. I'm just like, nothing's ever good enough. And like, we must keep growing and, and to be honest, like it's fun, but at the same time, I do feel especially this year, you know, running two different brands. I am exhausted. I'm exhausted mentally, often emotionally too, because not only am I dealing with bigger problems with the business. As we grow our team, I'm now taking on the emotional toll of what my team's going through. So if they're tired, then I'm tired for them. And so.

• 15:52Speaker 02

  Uh, yeah, it's extremely exhausting. And I think what is not helpful, but maybe helpful is that this way in which we hire is. I think it's different than how other businesses may hire. I I hire slowly because I've been through toxic employee periods and. I I'm terrified. I'm terrified of that because that can crumble everything and it almost did in like twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen times. Um, and so. Any fractures that we're seeing right now, they're stress fractures and it's coming from our growth is outpacing. The pace at which I'm hiring. And so that's something that I'm trying to deal with right now. Like, I know there are good people out there.

• 16:34Speaker 02

  But it's not just about the skill. It's about the culture fit and what we have on the team right now is so good. And I'm just terrified of breaking what we have.

• 16:43Marina Mogilko?

  How many people do you have?

• 16:44Speaker 02

  So we have thirty people right now.

• 16:46Marina Mogilko?

  Mm hmm.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  And.

• 16:48Marina Mogilko?

  That's so cool. That's a really lean team.

• 16:50Speaker 02

  Very lean, very lean for what we do. I think that's why we're all really tired. Yeah.

• 16:55Marina Mogilko?

  What do you think is gonna happen with AI? What is your take? Are you automating things? What apps are you using?

• 17:02Speaker 02

  So. My husband uh is a very, he's a fan of chat G P T. Um, but me coming from more of a designer artist background. I absolutely hate AI when it comes to stealing from original artwork because AI. Would not be able to do what it's doing without pulling from previous work. So in that aspect, I absolutely hate it. I think there needs to be some type of. Royalty built in or something so that if you are taking inspiration from, you know, whoever artist. And you have to type in that person's name to get that look, then just based on that alone.

• 17:43Speaker 02

  Okay, five percent needs to go back to original artists or ten percent or whatever. I think that needs to be in place. And I think people would be less mad. But right now it's like totally Wild West with AI. That's how I feel on that front. Um, but in terms of like, you know. Travel plans and like fun little searches here and there. It's helpful. I'm I'm warming up to it, but like on the artist's side, I absolutely hate it.

• 18:06Marina Mogilko?

  But do you see it helping you stay lean with your team like because you're utilizing more AI tools or it's not there yet?

• 18:13Speaker 02

  No, I right now I don't really see, at least with on on the apparel and um the apparel and product development side, I don't, I really don't see how it can help us right now. Um, I think we've dabbled in a little bit of bit of it with the copy on our website. Um, there probably are different areas we could start using it. I think there could be, because what I'm seeing right now as we're growing our design and development team. There seems to be like this lack of new young people in the technical designer space. Because I think everyone wants to be a fashion designer or a graphic designer, but like technical design is really like architecture of clothing. It's very mathematical, very science.

• 18:53Speaker 02

  And I just wonder that's probably a good area for AI to like begin helping, especially if the young people don't want to get into that field. Like I'm I'm actually having a lot of trouble hiring in that specific role. Yeah, so maybe maybe someone will come up with something to help with pattern making.

• 19:09Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 19:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, that makes it easier. And I and I know that's probably different than how more of the the techie people feel about it, but it's just because I've been so burned and taken advantage of just even without AI or no, actually with AI and just my my patented products too. And like, uh, you know, they've been duped by the Sheins, multiple vendors on Amazon, TikTok shop. And these days, the big American retailers have gotten in on the game, which is insane. Right now, um, I'm dealing with Nordstrom Rack, TJ Maxx, Kohl's, JCPenney, just recently VS Pink, as in Victoria's Secret. And these are patented products. And what I'm dealing with right now is that

• 19:54Speaker 02

  You know, I pay thousands of dollars to get my design patent approved and obviously it doesn't automatically get approved. You have to prove a lot of different things. Anyway, pay thousands of dollars, the USPTO issues me a design patent. You would think that's enforceable. And for the most part, it kind of is, but when you get to the stage of having to deal with big billion-dollar corporations, it's now a money game. Because do I have any type of police helping me enforce this patent? No, actually, it's me paying thousands of dollars an hour for my lawyers to talk to their lawyers. And this is kind of where I am right now. And it's extremely frustrating because,

• 20:36Speaker 02

  you know, it's my artwork, my work for free, them capitalizing off of work that they've stolen from me. So, that's how I feel about that. And in terms of AI, there have been instances where my videos are just stolen off of my page. They've used AI to actually change my face.

• 20:55Marina Mogilko?

  Oh yeah, happens to me all the time.

• 20:57Speaker 02

  Oh my god!

• 20:58Marina Mogilko?

  And you're a scam with your face.

• 20:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, oh my god! No, it's crazy!

• 21:01Marina Mogilko?

  And they can't do anything, the platforms?

• 21:03Speaker 02

  Cause they just start new accounts.

• 21:05Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah. So what, what happens when bigger companies, they steal your patent, you try to sue them or talk to them? Have you ever been able to win something or it just goes like that?

• 21:13Speaker 02

  Well, right now, my immediate goal is get it off the website or get it off the platform. And it's completely a game of whack-a-mole. And what the problem is, is that the platform puts it on the small business, the creator, whatever, because their hands off. So you fill out this form, it's such a long form, but you fill it out like multiple times a day. Like just for example, the other week, just on that pirouette skirt that I was talking about, the one that Taylor wore, I think there were, what was it? Like 233 or 433, I should look again.

• 21:51Speaker 02

  dupes, separate dupe listings of that one score on TikTok shop alone. I'm not even talking about Amazon, okay? I'm not talking about T-Mo, I'm not talking about AliExpress. That was just TikTok shop. And my frustration with it is, okay, sure, we could be losing, you know, money from whatever that we could have made from the real thing. However, my bigger fear is that it cheapens the design. You see it now everywhere. It's no longer special. And then confusion. I mean, I've even had fans DM me and be like, oh, do you also run this sub-brand? Because they've not only copied the designs, they've copied my marketing too. Even the angles of where I film, hiring a model with my body type and my skin color.

• 22:35Speaker 02

  Like, it gets so deep and so confusing that it ends up hurting the brand reputation. And I've actually had people, what I think, bought from one of these fake videos, right? It links over to their stupid dropship website. They buy it and the pictures are my model pictures, my description, whatever. So they're completely duped. Then they'll receive the product and then come back to my page and blame me for

• 22:58Marina Mogilko?

  Complain.

• 22:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, slow shipping, bad quality, like, things they call out that like, is not even on the real product. Like, that's the level of confusion that is so dangerous and tarnishing to a brand.

• 23:08Marina Mogilko?

  But it feels like at this point, it became part of the culture and there's, I don't know if you can do anything. Like Louis Vuitton bags, the fake ones are everywhere. And you're like, just accept it. Have you ever thought of like, you just know?

• 23:21Speaker 02

  No, I can't accept it. I'm gonna keep fighting, I'm gonna keep fighting because it's not right. I can't work for free for somebody else. Um, I, I just, I, as a principle, I will never stop fighting. I can't. Yeah.

• 23:35Marina Mogilko?

  Talk to me about that. Cause you also, uh, you stopped posting, right? The long form. And I've, uh, from what I've read, it looks like you were dealing with a lot of online hate. And like, people just shaming you, et cetera.

• 23:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:48Marina Mogilko?

  Uh, do you think you stopped because of that or was there any other reason?

• 23:51Speaker 02

  That was a big part of it. So I've never really talked about this officially, so I'm glad you brought it up. Um, so I used to make long-form fitness videos since Two thousand nine as a Pilates instructor. That is crazy though. Yeah. Two thousand nine. Isn't that insane? So I did that because I wanted to stay connected with my real life students. And it was meant for forty people. I put up a video for them because I was moving from LA to Boston for my first job. And that's it. I wasn't planning to start a YouTube channel. I wasn't starting a brand, nothing like that. You couldn't even make money on YouTube back then. And then that video ended up getting thousands of views and hundreds of comments. And Bloglotties became like this fitness channel and community.

• 24:32Speaker 02

  And what I didn't expect, because this never happens in real life, was for people to say something negative about my body. Because if anything, I'll tell you, I was afraid to be like, oh, she's not pointing her toes enough. Her legs aren't straight enough. Oh, like her form is bad. Never got any of those comments. The first mean comments I got were, oh, why is she so fat? Why is her butt so flat? Oh, why does she look like that? And having grown up chubby and having to deal with my own like body insecurities, that just hit me so deep in a place that I wasn't ready to like, I was barely even healing from it inside and now I'm having to heal, or not even heal, but just like, deal with it head on in front of millions of people.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  And so that was just a constant thing that was happening in the background. But that wasn't why I stopped everything, if I'm being completely honest. I was no longer feeling emotionally and mentally challenged with my content. And just as the person that I am and content being an extension of who I am, not just something that I do, I want to find the joy in it. And towards the end of when I posted my last long form video, which is probably like twenty twenty one, I wanted to show people more of the other things I was doing. Like, yes, I was doing the fitness videos that you saw, but in the background, I was running an apparel business. And I wanted to show people that side of me. And so my first short form video was just showing people like, oh, the science behind camel toe, like, why does that happen?

• 26:02Speaker 02

  And I was honestly really surprised that it did well. And I was like, oh, maybe I can try to make more of these. And they ended up. Working, they ended up selling the product and they ended up helping me show a different side of myself. And like I said at the top of this interview, it brought the joy back into the editing for me. And so I also, I switched my content for me so that I could feel happy with um what I was producing and and also challenged with what I was producing.

• 26:32Marina Mogilko?

  But have you ever feared that going back will not generate as much views as it used to? Or you're never going back to one form?

• 26:39Speaker 02

  Well, here's the thing, I've never made an official announcement because who knows, like maybe I will one day wanna be like, oh, let's just like do a squat challenge or something like that's still there. Um in this moment right now, I'm just so in love with product development and design that that's the content that I wanna make. Um and should I go back? Like, let's see, I think the other day, not the other day, the other month when I was um launching the the Blogilates for Target brand. I taught a fitness class in front of a group of people, which I haven't done in a long time and it was super fun. Like that part of me will always be here cuz I've been teaching since like two thousand and like six. So um that group fitness instructor Cassie will never go away. I love fitness. I work out every single morning. That's part of my routine.

• 27:24Speaker 02

  I just really needed a break from that. Um but but I will say too, the moment that I switched from fitness content to fashion content, not one person has said one negative thing about my body. Which made me realize, oh man, I was dealing with a lot of toxic like

• 27:44Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 27:45Speaker 02

  negativity for a long time, feeling so bad about my body for a long time. And it was like I was in the wrong industry.

• 27:52Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 27:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I just didn't, I didn't look like the other girls.

• 27:55Marina Mogilko?

  You probably get negative comments still, right? Probably now about your business.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's like, like here's the thing, they they don't attack my body, which is like

• 28:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, they might attack like, oh, your squirts are too short, like, okay, like I can deal with that. Um what I can't deal with though is some one time, this is the worst one. I remember they attacked, this is back in the fitness days. One of the comments was, oh, if you cared more about your career, you would lose some weight. And that one hurts so much because not only did it attack my body, it attacked my work ethic. And nobody attacks my work ethic because I work so hard.

• 28:33Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 28:33Speaker 02

  And so if any comment today, um, you know, say what you want about the peril. Everyone is subjective and it has their own, you know, likes and stuff. But say anything about my, my, my work ethic and that, that really hurts because it's just untrue. Um, but you know, with the negative comments from back in the day, there was a video that I made. Forget when it was like probably twenty fifteen or twenty sixteen where I honestly could not take it anymore because it was coming from every angle. Um, and I really was crumbling on the inside. And so what I did was I took all these negative comments. And I produced this video called The Perfect Body where I photoshopped on camera how these comments wanted me to look.

• 29:15Speaker 02

  Thinner waist, bigger boobs, bigger butt, um, bigger eyes even, right? And that for me was something I needed to do for myself to heal. Because when I heal, I like taking the negative energy, turning it, turning it on its head and turning it into something positive. So I put that video out for me. What I didn't expect was for it to go crazy viral. I think that was like my first crazy viral video that got on like Good Morning America on like every single news outlet. Like, like it was insane and I got messages from fathers telling me they shared it with their daughters and their wives. And it had like this profound impact and around twenty sixteen was also like the body positive movement.

• 29:59Speaker 02

  And so I think during that time, that's kind of just what everyone needed. So there was good that came out of those negative comments, but man, they, they really hurt.

• 30:07Marina Mogilko?

  Can you give advice to girls, oh, anyone going online these days, trying to make something and getting all this hate? And maybe they're thinking of stopping, um, to do what they're doing because of that.

• 30:19Speaker 02

  Here's the thing, if you really believe in what you're doing and you're not hurting anyone and you're having a fun time. Just do it, right? Like at the core of all of this, we can't keep going unless we're having fun, right? Because we're the content creator. Um, but in these comments, some of them are hateful, but some of them can have a little bit of truth. So. I read all my comments, all the time.

• 30:43Marina Mogilko?

  Oh, you still do?

• 30:44Speaker 02

  Oh my god, yes. Do you not?

• 30:46Marina Mogilko?

  I read them for the first couple hours, cuz I know these are my loyal subscribers watching, but then when the video goes viral, like, I don't really care.

• 30:53Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, it's too much. It's true. Agree, on the first few hours, like, reading everything in and writing back, cuz it's fun.

• 30:58Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah, it's fun. These are your friends, really.

• 31:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:01Marina Mogilko?

  This is your community. But then, if it starts getting more traction than ever, and all of these people come in and like, start commenting on my age, whatever.

• 31:07Speaker 02

  Oh my god. Well, when it gets to the wrong side of the internet, it's bad.

• 31:11Marina Mogilko?

  But it, when it's viral.

• 31:12Speaker 02

  When it's viral, it's viral. No, I know. I know, I know, I know. Um, but yeah, I mean, look, I think there's, there's truth in some comments, and there, there can be self-reflection, but look, if you're having fun, and it's working, like, just keep going, cuz you, your content will find the right people.

• 31:30Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah. So if you stop making your short videos today, how would that affect your sales?

• 31:35Speaker 02

  Ooh, I think that would affect the sales, cuz right now, around, I think seventy percent of the revenue is brought in by organic videos. Yeah, whether it's organic videos by, by me, by, by Blogilates like me, or by, um, the Pop Flex organic videos, but mostly by at Blogilates videos.

• 31:56Marina Mogilko?

  That is huge.

• 31:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:57Marina Mogilko?

  Seventy percent.

• 31:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:59Marina Mogilko?

  That's a lot.

• 31:59Speaker 02

  I know, it's very, very different than, um, normal D2C brands that rely on the ads.

• 32:04Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah.

• 32:04Speaker 02

  Yeah. So it's good, but also, again, if I stopped. If I stopped, um, I, I, look, I think there would be an impact, but I don't think the brand would die, because our SMS, as well as our newsletter, does really, really well. Like, the click-through and the open rate are really high, people love it. Honestly, what's been really cool to see is that sometimes, people might follow Pop Flex but not follow me, or like, they might know Pop Flex but not know me, and I really like that, because that's showing that this is a brand beyond, you know, any... Influencer influence or just, you know, anything that has to do with Cassie Ho, because my goal is for Pop Flex to become a legacy brand that lives on for hundreds of years after I die.

• 32:49Speaker 02

  And that foundation for this type of brand and this type of product needs to start now while I'm still alive, right? So, um, yeah, but, but if I did stop, it would make an impact.

• 33:00Marina Mogilko?

  Yeah, your number one marketing strategy would be your content. The second, the content that your brand produces. Are you tapping into UGC or live shopping?

• 33:07Speaker 02

  Uh, so personally, I haven't done the live shopping myself. I should try it though.

• 33:11Marina Mogilko?

  Try.

• 33:12Speaker 02

  I should try it.

• 33:13Marina Mogilko?

  Perfect for you. You'll see. I, I think you'll see another uptick.

• 33:16Speaker 02

  I should try it. I should try it. I also like, I like being in front of the camera. It's fun. Um, uh, what was it?

• 33:22Marina Mogilko?

  UGC.

• 33:23Speaker 02

  UGC. So, okay. I don't know about you, but I think UGC is trending down over the past few years. They've become less effective for our brand.

• 33:31Marina Mogilko?

  Hmm.

• 33:32Speaker 02

  Okay, because it feels, there's something about it that feels too produced or something like that. And like, we, we, you know, I would say three years ago when UGC was like super new and brands were using it instead of like highly, uh, produced content. It, it was interesting. But now, I don't know. I, it just, it doesn't feel as authentic. What feels authentic right now are team content videos. So like, I'll have the marketing team come to my house and like, we'll film like some fun videos and stuff and like, that does well for us. And then also the, the content house videos where we bring our customers over in nine sizes and we wear the same dress and we model around. But yeah, for some reason, like, UGC and it, just in the likes that I'm seeing on the IG posts, like, not as good as they used to be.

• 34:17Marina Mogilko?

  Interesting.

• 34:18Speaker 02

  The reason why Blogilates has been around for so long is because I ebb and flow with the algorithm, with the trends. You just don't know, like, is TikTok gonna be here in the next 90 days? Like, I don't know. It seems to be changing all the time. So I'll change as it changes, but I can't really tell you how I'll change because it's kind of dictated by the, the social media environment. Even in the failing, we're gonna figure something out because we have to. That's.

• 34:42Marina Mogilko?

  I love that. Yeah, I love that. It actually gives you some consciousness.

• 34:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, of course. Like you've made it this far. Like what's stopping you from like figuring it out again and again and again? Like I feel like every, literally every day, there is a new fire, a new problem, problems on problems and like you think you're gonna explode, but you don't and you just figure it out as painful as it is and you get stronger for it. Yeah.

• 35:06Marina Mogilko?

  I read, I think it's on Wikipedia, your father's quote, when you told him you wanna be a designer and he said, you're not gonna have friends and.

• 35:12Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 35:14Marina Mogilko?

  Wh- what does he say now?

• 35:16Speaker 02

  Uh, unfortunately, this is a uh, ed area where I still need to improve our relationship. Um.

• 35:25Speaker 02

  Honestly, we're not really talking too much right now. Yeah. And I think a lot of this goes back to I was always the obedient daughter. I always did what my parents wanted. And when I finally decided to live for myself in college and, you know, drop out of that last class I needed to take the MCAT and you know, possibly apply to med school, I think that was really disrespectful for them. Um, and I became this like rebellious person and unfortunately uh, regardless of everything that's happened now, my, my mom's different, but my dad, my mom is very proud. She's very proud. But I think my dad still holds a grudge um, for many things.

• 36:07Marina Mogilko?

  Interesting.

• 36:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. It, uh, respect runs really, really deep, I think, in like the Asian culture and Vietnamese and uh, uh, Vietnamese and Chinese background and I think he is still hurt by that and some other things that are in parallel to that and because of that.

• 36:23Marina Mogilko?

  Well, I hope, I hope it improves. Can you give advice to everyone who's starting a business in two thousand twenty-five?

• 36:30Speaker 02

  Ooh, starting a business in two thousand twenty-five, um, you know, whether it's two thousand twenty-five or in the future or, you know, even way before then, you have to find the joy in what you're doing. At least for me, I have always followed my heart and it's always taken me to the right place, even if it's the most windiest painful path, it always takes you to the right place. And it's what is going to keep you going when you feel like quitting. Your passion can take you over those humps. Um.

• 37:07Speaker 02

  That's one thing, just on the internal. But on the external, look for a problem that hasn't been solved yet. If you can solve that problem, you've got a business, period. And I guess third, I guess I'm just gonna tack on now. Like, use social media, have fun, make content about the process. People love that. They love being taken on the journey. And I think with those like three different things, like let your personality shine through. And because the business is more than, more than just a thing that you're selling. It's more than just the marketing of the thing that you're selling. It's the story, it's the brand, and it's the journey. And the customer wants to be a part of that journey.

• 37:45Marina Mogilko?

  Love it. Yeah, thank you so much. This was really inspiring. What I'm taking away is that phrase that will have in my head now when I have this fear of like, what if it all goes down? I'll figure it out.

• 37:55Speaker 02

  You're gonna figure it out because you have to. You have to.

• 37:57Marina Mogilko?

  I love that. Thank you so much.

• 37:59Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 38:01Speaker 00

  UKG is the workforce operating platform with unified HR, payroll, and workforce management. Built to solve the unique challenges of frontline work. Powered by People First AI and decades of labor data, UKG turns workforce intelligence into real-time decisions around staffing, pay, compliance, and productivity, enabling every worker to confidently take action as work happens. Because when work works, everything works. Learn more at ukg.com/work. UKG, HR, Pay, and Workforce Management.

• 38:31Speaker 05

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• 38:36Speaker 06

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• 38:38Speaker 05

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• 38:40Speaker 06

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• 38:43Speaker 05

  The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, November 20th, rated PG-13.