Hey there, and welcome to Episode 001 of The Brandon Sneed Show, where we’re telling stories about everything, with a loose eye on how to navigate the chaos of life.
I’m glad you’re here.
In today’s episode, I sit down with Coss Marte, a former drug kingpin who, after spending the better part of a decade in prison, has reinvented himself as a fitness entrepreneur. He now runs ConBody, and is positioning himself to also become one of New York City’s first-ever legal marijuana entrepreneurs — bringing his whole story full circle in a wild sort of way.
I’ve known Coss for, as it turns out, nearly eight years now, ever since I profiled him in one of his first years out of prison. A few years ago, I also helped him put together his workout book. He’s still one of my favorite people to visit and grab dinner or drinks with when I’m in New York City. I think you’ll love hearing from him.
As we walk through his story, we cover:
growing up broke as a brown kid in Manhattan’s Lower East Side
starting to sell drugs at a young age and simply accepting incarceration as a fact of life and learning how to play that game
upon his conviction as a drug kingpin at age 23, being told by a prison doctor that he would die within five years if he didn’t do something about his weight and overall health
having to watch his young son grow up in pictures and letters and across visitation tables
getting the hell beaten out of him by prison guards
solitary confinement
the near-impossible nature of rebuilding one’s life after serving time in prison
how he built a successful fitness empire that has trained some 70,000 people
the hate he still receives from people — and how he’s learned to make “my haters my motivators”
and the ways that many people completely misunderstand people like him.
Thank you for being here, and for bearing with how sometimes some of this might feel a bit like a rough draft. This is an independent passion project for me, and I’m learning a lot as I go. I’m planning to bring you many more great stories and conversations like this one, and if you’d like to support the cause, please subscribe to this newsletter, at least for free, and spread the word.
In the future, I’ll also have some other rad things for you to buy to support us more — original feature stories, books, and some swag.
For now, I hope you enjoy the episode as much as I did.
Thanks again for being here, and for listening.
More soon…
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