I once sat on a plane next to the drummer from Loverboy. You know, “Working for the Weekend”? Lovely guy. He had a leather jacket, a Zildjian cymbal carry-on, and a daughter who was a ballet dancer whom he was super proud of.
We got to talking about what we did for work, and it turned out our lives were almost identical. The logistics of getting from city to city. Trying to find a salad and a place to exercise. Performing the same set to a different crowd. Going to sleep in a hotel. Waking up the next day and doing it all over again.
He was coming back from a Canadian music festival. I was coming back from teaching yoga at an REI store in Minneapolis.
That’s when I realized: being a touring yoga teacher is a lot like being a rock star. Except . . . it’s really not.
How My Sponsorship Journey Started
My sponsorship story began with a cold pitch. It was around 2008, and Athleta had just been acquired by The Gap. I reached out to them, pitched myself, and became one of their very first class of sponsored athletes. My contract ran a year. They brought me out to San Francisco to teach a workshop. I wrote blog posts and training plans for them. They outfitted me. It was a lot of fun.
Then the next year, prAna reached out to me.
I didn’t pitch them. They had their eye on me because I’d established a niche in teaching yoga to athletes. They wanted to have a conversation—and that conversation turned into a multi-year deal. At its peak, it was a five-figure sponsorship, plus I could have my pick of anything in the prAna catalog.
As their ambassador, they sent me everywhere. I taught at the REI conference multiple years-yoga classes for store managers and upper management, including Sally Jewell, the CEO of REI, who later became Secretary of the Interior. I went to the Outdoor Retailer event in Salt Lake City, where prAna had set up a lounge with clothes for people to try on and take a yoga break from the trade show. I even got to visit prAna headquarters in San Diego, where every day at 1:30 in the afternoon, they’d sound a huge gong and everyone would take ten minutes for silent meditation.
But the biggest thing I did for prAna was tour the country—and Canada—representing them at REI and MEC stores. MEC is the major outfitter in Canada, and REI was prAna’s biggest purchaser. So they were very interested in maintaining that relationship, and I was there to help.
The Reality Behind the Glamour
REI stores have community rooms—it’s a cooperative, community-focused business. So the tour went something like this: I’d arrive in a city with a big REI. I’d get myself situated. I’d teach a one-hour program at the store. Then I’d try to find dinner, go to sleep, get up the next day, and move on to the next city.
One year, they wanted to hit so many stores in a short period that I got to send some of my assistants around too.
There were wonderful moments. I stayed at the Radisson at the Mall of America and did a podcast interview with Carrie Tollefson. I met Erin Taylor’s parents in Seattle—she’s a colleague in the yoga-for-athletes space—and they were so sweet. I got to have dinner with my friend Sarah Bowen Shea in Portland. I visited friends in Atlanta. The MEC tour took me to Calgary and Edmonton, places I never would have visited otherwise, and to Vancouver, which is one of my favorite cities in the world.
But here’s the thing.
Most of the time on those tours wasn’t spent teaching. It was spent on logistics. Getting from point to point. Figuring out the lay of the land in a new place. Trying to get in some exercise. Trying to find fiber. The teaching was just an hour a day!
One year, prAna flew me from North Carolina to Seattle for the REI conference. I spent one night. I taught one or two classes. Then I got back on a plane, came home, and went straight to Kripalu the next day to teach a workshop there. Seattle to North Carolina to Massachusetts in less than 48 hours.
That’s the life. And honestly? It was during those tours, especially the MEC tour across Canada, that I wrote most of my book Racing Wisely. Because what else are you going to do with all that airport time?
Why I Shifted to Online Teaching
So when you see someone with a brand sponsorship and think, “That looks amazing”—be careful what you wish for. The opportunities are real, and there’s genuine fun in them. But there’s also a whole lot of drudgery in the day-to-day.
I still travel to teach. I’ll be at the Berkshire Yoga Festival in June 2026. For over a decade, I taught regularly at Kripalu. I’ve given workshops at Yoga Tree in San Francisco, at studios in Columbus, Ohio, Shreveport, Louisiana, Atlanta, Washington DC, New York.
But most of my work now is focused online, in Comfort Zone Yoga. Partly because I’m older and less interested in the travel. But also because I’ve realized I can provide the highest-quality education when I have the time and space to curate it carefully-to record it, edit it, and package it so people can revisit it in whatever format works for them: video, private podcast, transcripts.
A live experience can be magical, but it doesn’t give you that same consistent resource you can come back to again and again.
Practical Discounts for Yoga Teachers Right Now
Now, if you’re thinking, “Sage, that’s nice, but I’m not getting sponsored by prAna anytime soon”—I hear you. But here’s something practical you can do right now.
Most of the major yoga apparel brands offer significant discounts for yoga teachers. You don’t need a sponsorship-you just need to know where to look.
prAna Pro: If you’re a Yoga Alliance member, you can get 50% off full-priced items through their prAna Pro program. Fifty percent! That’s better than what I remembered-I thought it was 40%. Sign up through the Yoga Alliance member perks portal.
Lululemon Sweat Collective: Their Sweat Collective program offers 25% off full-priced items for yoga teachers, fitness instructors, trainers, and gym owners. You apply online and verify through SheerID. Note that it no longer applies to sale items.
Athleta WellPro: Their WellPro program gives you 25% off. You’ll need to bring your ID and proof of certification to a store to apply.
These aren’t sponsorships-they’re just perks of being in this profession. And they add up.
The Real Takeaway
So that’s the reality of what sponsorships look like, or at least what they looked like for me. The lifestyle sounds glamorous. But most of the time, you’re just trying to find a decent salad before your flight.
The opportunities are real, and I’m grateful for every experience those sponsorships gave me. But if you’re building a yoga teaching career, don’t wait around for a brand deal to validate your work. The discounts are there for you now, and the real measure of your success is the impact you have on your students, whether you’re teaching at an REI store in Minneapolis or in your own living room.
Want to hear more about my sponsorship adventures? Listen to the full episode of Yoga Teacher Confidential: What Yoga Teacher Sponsorships Really Look Like.
