The Cottage Grove Chamber of Commerce welcomed a new member last week while celebrating the official grand opening of the newest fitness location for area residents. Burn Boot Camp, located at 8700 East Point Douglas Road is open and ready to help you reach your fitness goals.

Owned by Hannah and Lucas Reis, Burn Boot Camp focuses on both cardio and strength training in 45-minute long workout sessions called “camps”. The camps are a balanced fitness routine that target different muscles groups throughout the week. The workouts are designed to help challenge and push you but also meet you at the level you are at. This custom workout helps you create the discipline needed to maximize your quality of life.

The Reis’ were living in Arizona when they began their search for the right opportunity to buy into the Burn Boot Camp franchise. Lucas is originally from Minnesota, so they explored options here as well as near their location in Arizona.

“There wasn’t anything on the eastern side of the Twin Cities. So, we decided to make an adventure of it and move our family across the country and be able to touch the lives of people who don’t know they need burn yet,” explained Hannah.

Looking at the BurnBoot-Camp.com website, there are a number of locations on the western side of the cities such as Blaine, Eden Prairie, Maple Grove, and Coon Rapids, but the eastern side was open, so the Reis’s jumped on the opportunity.

“We are so excited to be able to bring this wonderful gym and brand to the community,” explained Hannah. “It is entirely about empowering our members through hard work on the floor. We really focus on what do you gain from physical movement and from that exercise. We really empower our members and inspire them to flip the script, and to not necessarily always go into exercise with the mindset of ‘I’m going to lose weight’. We want to go into it with ‘okay what do I want to gain?’ I want to gain more energy, I want to gain more confidence, I want to gain strength and endurance and mental clarity and all of these other wonderful things that come from exercise and movement. Burn Boot Camp really is a gym for everybody. We have all abilities all ages, all genders on that floating floor at all times. It’s something that us as trainers make sure to meet you exactly where you’re at. We make sure that your needs are met and again, it’s that individualized opportunity for you. We just are honored to be a part of your journey as we take you wherever you want to go.”

The location had their soft open in December and a true grand opening on January 1, 2023. The ribbon cutting and celebration was pushed back about a month because of the crazy ice and snow storm the area had, but, the Reis’ were happy they were able to hold it and share the space with the community.

“We have a fantastic member base already who are extremely engaged, they come to events, and they come to kids’ camps and they’re wearing our retail merchandise already. They’re excited about burn so it’s been a fantastic experience so far,” added Hannah.

The space includes a floating floor like what you see gymnasts perform their floor exercises on. This helps reduce the stress on the joints with the hard impacts on a solid floor. There is also a large kid’s room with windows so the kids can see their parents working out while enjoying their own activities. This hopefully fosters a positive thought process to physical fitness for kids at a young age. There is a merchandise and coaching area where members can receive guidance on nutrition and other fitness related aspects to health.

To learn more about this new business, visit www. burnbootcamp.com, email [email protected], find them on the various social media platforms or simply stop in. Camps are held at 5, 6, 8, and 9 a.m. for the early risers, child watch available for the last two morning camps. The those that need an afternoon or evening camp, you can come at 4:30 or 5:30 p.m. Both of those camps have child watch available.

Congratulations to Burn Boot Camp on their grand opening and ribbon cutting at their Cottage Grove location. Left to right. Randy Bachman, Michelle Wind, holding the sign are the owner’s daughters Lillian and Holly, Sonja Peterson, Lucas Reis, Hannah Reis, Steve Dennis, Angie Kircher, Karla Bigham, Laurie Levine, Ramona Westerberg, Becky Fox and Dr. Alex Sheppard. Photo by Bruce Karnick