Former Navy SEAL invests $1M in Sarasota-Manatee fitness franchise

Behind a "never complain and never quit" disposition, Jeff Moore seeks a business legacy not of sales records and awards but of developing other leaders. "I'm all go, no stop. All gas, no brakes."

By Mark Gordon
| 5:00 a.m. December 13, 2024
| 0 Free Articles Remaining!

Jeff Moore has been in the fitness business for some 20 years — and he always weears a three-piece suit and cowboy hat to work when not working out.

Manatee-Sarasota

Jeff Moore, after a long and danger-laden stint in the U.S. military — he was a Navy SEAL in the 1990s and worked in protective services for high-target potential kidnap victims after that — went back home to rural western Kentucky. It was 2006. His mom had just died, and he wanted to help his dad.

A local gym owner told Moore about how the place had hired someone to run a boot camp, and that person left town with the deposits for the class in tow. The owner, noting Moore’s military experience, asked him: could you teach boot camp classes?