Jennifer Maanavi
(Posted on Monday, August 29, 2022)
Jennifer Maanavi grew up north of New York City. She was an early entrepreneur, starting a cheerleading squad in third grade and selling pom poms to her fellow cheerleaders. Her mother was a corporate executive at a time when that was a rare path for women.
After college Jennifer worked at Morgan Stanley. She loved the transactional part of Wall Street – she always got excited when the phone rang. She left Wall Street because she learned the hard way that Wall Street at that time was not supportive of young mothers.
When she was a child, Jennifer loved dance. By the time she got to Wall Street, she was attending a regular dance-based exercise class at a fitness studio in Manhattan. The fitness studio abruptly shut down.
Jennifer decided to create Physique 57, which has grown to hundreds of classes a week in New York alone, with additional studios and franchises nationally and internationally.
Jennifer started Physique 57 before it became fashionable to have mission statements for every business, but she feels the mission deep in her bones. She quotes a line from her company’s manifesto: “We thrive on equal parts unshakable strength and unbreakable faith, and in feeling strong, seen, and worthwhile every day.”