John Foley is the founder and CEO of Peloton, the at-home exercise company. John started out working in a candy factory, before a meandering career took him to Silicon Valley, the record industry, Barnes & Noble and beyond. At 40, he decided to start selling exercise bikes that let you attend spin classes whenever and wherever you wanted. 

Almost everyone told him it was a terrible idea. But after several years of sheer grit (and a few slightly wonky prototypes) the company is now a huge global success — it IPO’d last year, and has been one of the few real success stories of the Coronavirus pandemic, as more and more of us take to exercising at home. 

In this episode, John talks to us about the atmosphere in Silicon Valley during the dotcom boom; about his love for Snickers; about the demise of Kickstarter campaigns; and about his hatred for the phrase “chillax”.