IAM2292 – Founder and CEO Shares Her Mermaid School Success Journey

00:00 - 00:25

Marielle Chartier Henault: I would like to bring this fun and unique feeling I got myself in the water to more people. And I just contacted a few radios around and said, hey, I'm starting my mermaid school. And that was just an idea. But I was kind of caught in my own game because people started calling me, tons of people like, I want to join. And I was like, oh my God, like this is true. Like this is happening. People want to come with me and do this.

00:26 - 00:53

Intro: Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview. If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I Am CEO podcast.

00:53 - 01:03

Gresham Harkless: Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I Am CEO podcast, and I have an awesome guest on the show today. I have Mahiel Shantay Enno. Mahiel, excited to have you on the show.

01:04 - 01:05

Marielle Chartier Henault: Yeah, thank you for having

01:05 - 01:34

Gresham Harkless: me. Yes, I'm super excited to have you on and talk about all the awesome things that you're doing. And of course, before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Mahiel so you can hear about some of those awesome things. And Mahiel is the founder of Aqua Mermaid, a company offering unique mermaid swimming experiences and entertainment services across the United States and Canada. As a professional mermaid and booking agent, she combines her passion for aquatic performance with her expertise in artistic swimming. Mahiel is also an entrepreneur who manages a diverse team of

01:34 - 02:00

Gresham Harkless: performers and athletes, delivering captivating shows for a wide range of events. And 1 of the things I love about Mahiel is before we jumped into this interview, I want to read a little bit more about her and hear about some of the awesome things. She has a love of entrepreneurship, and I would say it might even be in her DNA. I was reading and hearing that she started a window washing company in high school, which I thought was pretty awesome. And 1 of my favorite books is The Opposable Mind, where so many times We think we

02:00 - 02:20

Gresham Harkless: have to choose either or, but I love the passion of everything she started because it's a combination of swimming, sports, fitness, and Disney princesses and bringing all that together to see all the awesome things you're doing. She also has over 88, 000 followers and subscribers on her YouTube channel as well too. So Mahiel, excited to have you on the show. You're ready to speak to the IMCO community.

02:20 - 02:23

Marielle Chartier Henault: Yes, I want to share, but I can and help everybody.

02:23 - 02:30

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, absolutely. So I guess the kick everything off, let's rewind the clock here a little bit more on how you got started, what to call your CEO story.

02:31 - 02:57

Marielle Chartier Henault: Yeah. It's like you were saying, I just love entrepreneurship and I wanted to start my own business, but I didn't know what I wanted to do. And I was like trying to find something, but when you search too much, you don't find anything. Then I just kind of, someone sent me a little video of a mermaid school in Germany because I love swimming and it was funny and I was like, oh my God, I just want to do this. I just want to be a mermaid, swim for fun. And it was, I live in Montreal in

02:57 - 03:29

Marielle Chartier Henault: Canada and it's really cold. It's in the winter. There's snow everywhere. Then I started, bought myself a mermaid tail for Christmas, swam with it. And I just loved it because the energy was so good. People were, when you're a mermaid, people are happy. Good energy, make people smile. And then I thought, maybe I could just start a mermaid school here. There's nothing like this. It exists in Germany. I don't know exactly what they do because it's too far for me to go right now. But I'm saying I would like to bring this fun and unique feeling

03:29 - 03:59

Marielle Chartier Henault: I got myself in the water to more people. And I just contacted a few radios around and say, hey, I'm starting my mermaid school. And that was just an idea. But I was kind of caught in my own game because people started calling me, tons of people, like I want to join. I was like, oh my God, like, this is true. Like, this is happening. People want to come with me and do this, but I only have like 1 mermaid tail at my house. Then I was like, okay, I need to organize myself because there's demand

03:59 - 04:36

Marielle Chartier Henault: for what I'm doing. Then I took some like artistic swimming lessons, monofin swimming lesson, and I got trained in different like techniques for swimming. And I said, I'm going to create my own new sport discipline of mermaid swimming. Then I put that together and then I started offering classes myself and with friends, hiring swim instructor, and that's how I started the mermaid school. Then I can share with you after that the mermaid school people were contacting me and wanted to buy their own mermaid tails, but I had only the equipment for my students. Then I evolved

04:36 - 05:09

Marielle Chartier Henault: into selling mermaid tails to my students. But then I went to a trip to China for manufacturing and then figuring out how do you produce and import mermaid tail costume and doing the design. Then I learned a ton of things throughout manufacturing and selling mermaid tails. And then I expanded to different cities. What was really interesting to me is that people from other cities wanted to come to Montreal or wanted to do those lessons, but I was not available there. And I was like, oh, this is like a big trend that I need to expand. Then

05:09 - 05:38

Marielle Chartier Henault: I started to travel, go to other cities, train some staff and then open schools there. Because what's really good about the mermaid school is I just rent time at the pool. I don't need to own the venue. I just rent 1 hour if I need a 1 hour lesson. Then my costs are really low. I just buy mermaid fins and then train as instructor and I can open the new city. Then I did that for a few cities around my city. But then I was like, more people were contacting me from other cities. Then I started

05:38 - 06:12

Marielle Chartier Henault: selling licenses for people who wanted to open a mermaid school in their own city. I give them the training and I put them on my website and I started expanding this way. Then that's how the mermaid school really grew fast because I was able to expand really quickly with low cost. Then COVID hit and then I was like, oh my God, all the pools are closing. My business is over. What should I do? But then what I, I like pivoted and I said, okay, I, before I was receiving some requests because the mermaid lesson, you can

06:12 - 06:44

Marielle Chartier Henault: only start at 7 years old. That's kind of the minimum age. You need to be a good swimmer. Then I started booking mermaid performers to go at your house for kids' parties for younger kids, because I was receiving requests from parents that wanted to do mermaid activity, but their kids were like 3, 5 years old. And I was like, okay, I can do something for those people. And we can travel to private's house in their backyard and offer mermaid performers. And that was really good for me because I reduced my costs. I didn't need it to

06:44 - 07:21

Marielle Chartier Henault: rent any pool. I was subcontracting to local artists and mermaid performers. Then I became like a booking agent for local mermaid performers. And I was not limited to 1 city because performers already have their own mermaid tail costume. Then I was booking all over the US and Canada and reducing my costs and reducing my time. Then I was like, this is even better. I work less. I make more money. I'm growing. Then that's kind of where I'm at now. Then I still have a few mermaid school. I'm running it, selling the mermaid tales and now booking

07:21 - 07:29

Marielle Chartier Henault: performers for events. Then yeah, everything related to mermaid, I cover it and I'm the mermaid chief.

07:30 - 07:50

Gresham Harkless: There we go, the mermaid chief. I absolutely love that. Do you feel like that's part of your secret sauce? It could be for yourself, for the business, or a combination of both. Success is like much more like a plate of spaghetti, where sometimes you're going around and around and around until you get to where you need to be. Do you feel like you understanding that and being willing to step into that as part of what sets you apart and makes you

07:50 - 08:29

Marielle Chartier Henault: unique? I think you need to tolerate risk. And you need to be able, I was really lucky because when I started, I was living at my parents' place. Then my cost of living were really low. And I think if anybody has this possibility to start a business with your, when you live at your parents' place, you should do it because what's the worst that can happen? Then that's really a good thing. Also, something that is kind of counter-intuitive is that my parents or my family were giving me advice from the heart, but they are not entrepreneurs.

08:29 - 09:03

Marielle Chartier Henault: And I learned from my boyfriend, who's a business owner, that those advice are normally not the best. And that was true. They were telling me what they thought would be good, but coming from a corporate world, coming from a parent eye. But yeah, like at the beginning, I was not making money. I was all over the place, knowing what to do. And my boyfriend was like, you're exactly where you should be. And I was like, okay, but I'm not making any money. This is not working. And I think you really need to find someone that has

09:03 - 09:41

Marielle Chartier Henault: a business that was successful, that can coach you and tell you if you're on the right path compared to family. That I feel, yeah, sometimes they can discourage you or give you something that will really not help you. That was a big things that I think you should think into account. Something also, especially in my niche, in my business, a lot of people were like, okay, this is ridiculous. This is not the business. This is going to pass. And then I think you should, especially as a woman also, like you should take those comments and use

09:41 - 10:14

Marielle Chartier Henault: it as you feel like people are not taking me seriously, This is going to push me to do even better and just use it also as like, fine. You don't think it's a business. I'm just going to take the whole market. And this is super niche. I mean, who books mermaid performers for event? And when I share what I'm doing as my work, that I'm a professional mermaid, people are like not even understanding what I'm saying. It's so funny. But there is a market that exists. There's a lot of people that want mermaids and like they're

10:14 - 10:47

Marielle Chartier Henault: international. Then You just need to find something you like, something that there's a market for, and just take it all. And then leave people that just want the big businesses and all the money for them, do their own things. Like, you know, because I'm myself my client, I know other people want it, then I understand this niche much better than anybody else. I know what are the demands about water aquatics and stuff, especially a lot of, there's not a lot of female entrepreneur, and I feel it's too bad because there's so many women buying stuff, and

10:47 - 10:58

Marielle Chartier Henault: you know exactly what they want like you, then I think you should use it as a strength and not as getting discouraged of something more feminine or frivolous, something like that.

10:58 - 11:13

Gresham Harkless: Yeah. I appreciate you so much in sharing that. I wanted to switch gears a little bit, and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So you might have already touched on this, but it could be like an app, a book, or even a habit that you have. What's something you lean on that makes you more effective and efficient?

11:15 - 11:43

Marielle Chartier Henault: Yeah, especially for my business. I don't know if I can help other people, but for example, as a booking agent, I'm using a, I made like a mermaid map and I'm using Google map and I added all my talents to visually see it. And that was really helpful for all my list of pools all over the US and all the performers and the different locations. And then visually I can see where everybody is. And I think that was really helpful as a tool.

11:44 - 11:52

Gresham Harkless: Yeah. And I almost wonder, is that your CEO nugget, like word of wisdom, piece of advice, advice that you might tell your younger business self or if you were to hop into a time

11:52 - 12:33

Marielle Chartier Henault: machine? The best thing I would say is be on top of your numbers. Most people don't like numbers, but If you don't know how much you're making, where your money's coming from, you're not going anywhere. Because yeah, a lot of people are just like, I'm working hard, I'm doing marketing, I'm doing videos, I'm doing this, I'm getting trained. But it's kind of the boring things. But if you start properly with the proper accounting, it's going to be so much easier further along, especially also for the business structure, how you pay yourself, your employees, the bank's account,

12:33 - 12:51

Marielle Chartier Henault: like everything that's kind of structure in managing where you're going with the money. I would say invest like an hour or 2 talking to an accountant, lawyer, and that would be really good further along the way to help you have a good business.

12:53 - 13:10

Gresham Harkless: Yeah, it's those quote unquote boring things, foundational things that again, allow you to be able to show up and do those things. And I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO and our goals are to have different quote unquote CEOs on the show. So Mahila, what does being a CEO mean to you?

13:10 - 13:57

Marielle Chartier Henault: It's freedom for me. It's doing my, like it's enabling me to do what I want to do. I take my own decisions. I'm responsible for the consequence of my decisions, but I also have freedom of time, that I love spending time with my kids and I'm super flexible. I also decide the direction of where my company is going according to my interests, my life goals. And yeah, I just love The harder I work, the more is coming back to me compared to... Yeah. The more I work, the more I earn, the more I grow, and the

13:57 - 14:36

Marielle Chartier Henault: more opportunities are open to me. Yeah. I think that's kind of how I like it and how I want to run my life. I want to be the person that decides where my life is going and I have control on what's happening. And something about me is that I'm really an action oriented person and I don't like people doing stuff and I don't know why I'm doing it. Then now I know exactly like, okay, This is why, this is my end goal and this is my train. I'm jumping on my business to go to where I

14:36 - 14:37

Marielle Chartier Henault: need to go.

14:39 - 15:02

Gresham Harkless: Nice, I absolutely love that. I love that enablement piece and action. And sometimes those things are so much missing in us, like having the vision, but actually seeing that come to fruition. So absolutely love that you've been able to do that. I appreciate that. Of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know. And of course, how best people can get a hold of you, find out about all

15:02 - 15:04

Gresham Harkless: the awesome things you and your team are working on.

15:05 - 15:44

Marielle Chartier Henault: Yeah, then you can check out my website aquamermaid.com. Follow me on social media, go see the beautiful mermaids. And more than just mermaids, I think if you can see yourself, a lot of artists that want to grow their business, I think it's a really inspiring way to see how to take something from a passion, artistic passion to bring it to a business. What I lately added to my business is digital courses. And I think that's something that I was missing. I was not finding enough mermaid performers for the men I had. Then I decided to create

15:45 - 16:00

Marielle Chartier Henault: a digital course to train my own people that are working for me. Then he did a full loop of like, okay, I need performers, I'm going to train them and then book them for jobs. Then when you don't find what you need, you just create it.

16:00 - 16:11

Gresham Harkless: Awesome, awesome, awesome. I truly love and appreciate that. And of course, we're going to have the links and information the show knows as well too, so that everybody can follow up with you, find out about the course, all the awesome things that you're doing. I hope you have a phenomenal rest of

16:11 - 16:12

Marielle Chartier Henault: the day. Thank

16:12 - 16:48

Intro: you. Thank you for listening to the I Am CEO podcast powered by CB Nation and Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at imceo.co. I am CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Subscribe and leave us a 5 star rating. This has been the I Am CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.