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Platinum Pilates’ Milena Jaksic shares her story of organic growth
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From discovering the practice in 2001 to opening her first studio in 2010, Milena Jaksic talks about the power of Pilates, the tech tools that support her, and the importance of balance in all aspects of life.
When Milena Jaksic first discovered Pilates in 2001, it gave her the language to bridge a gap between being fit and understanding how our bodies moved for her personal training clients. It took their movement to a new level. In 2010, Milena decided she wanted to create a space where people could experience Pilates as a philosophy, and Platinum Pilates was born.
Over 20 years later, their offering has grown to six Pilates studios and four physiotherapy clinics with hundreds of classes. Every person who walks through the door has a different body, a different history, a different relationship with movement. Their physiotherapy-led movement programmes sit right alongside their Reformer classes.
Working as an entrepreneur, parent, wellness enthusiast and trainer, Milena has learned a lot about balance. “The body is constantly making thousands of tiny micro-adjustments just to keep you upright. It’s not equal weight on every structure at every moment; it’s intelligent, responsive agility,” explains Milena, and life as an entrepreneur and a mother is exactly the same.
Balance, for Milena, isn’t about giving equal time to every role. “It’s about being agile enough to sense what needs more of me right now and being able to shift toward it without losing the whole structure.” Here, she discusses the tools that contribute to business growth, how being a Vodafone Business customer has benefitted the business, and the next steps for Platinum Pilates.
How has marketing played a role in Platinum’s uniqueness and growth?
Platinum opened in 2010 with no social media presence for the first five years. That word-of-mouth foundation turned out to be the most valuable thing we could have laid down, because when the industry got crowded, we already had deep roots.
Standing out requires real substance and commitment. We invest enormously in developing the next generation of educators, so what we deliver to clients is relevant, grounded in current research and not just a new trend.
We’ve stayed entirely organic – no influencer partnerships. The retention from whom we reach is stronger, the community is deeper, and our referral rate speaks for itself. When our name is attached to something, it’s because it genuinely aligns with what we stand for, whether that’s our clinical services, our wellness programme, or working with high-performance athletes at Leinster Rugby. We’re selective about who and what we partner with, and that selectivity is itself a strategy.
What role do digital tools and agility play in making that possible?
Running a multi-location studio with 38 Pilates teachers, physiotherapists, and a back office team means communication has to be seamless. Our branded app handles the client-facing side, booking, account management, and studio updates, which frees our team to focus on what actually matters. Behind the scenes, we rely on video calling for cross-site check-ins and team communications, keeping everyone aligned across locations without always needing everyone to be in the same room.
With instructors and physios moving between studios throughout the day, that agility is really important. A good network signal is vital. Human connection is one of the pillars of health, along with sleep, nutrition, exercise and stress management, and our digital platforms allow us to access that human connection even when we operate in different locations.
As an existing Vodafone Business customer, what business systems and tech infrastructure are essential in your day-to-day business?
Connectivity is everything when you’re running a business across multiple locations with a large team constantly on the move. What I value most about Vodafone Business is the reliability. The mobile infrastructure keeps our team reachable and responsive whether they’re between studios, with clients, or working remotely. For a business built on real-time scheduling and constant coordination, that dependability quietly underpins everything.
The backbone of our operation is our booking software, which manages everything from client bookings and class scheduling to payments and reporting across all locations. What I value beyond the functionality is the data security infrastructure behind it. It holds sensitive client information, health history, payment details, and personal data, and that responsibility isn’t something I take lightly. The encryption, secure payment processing, and access controls mean I can be confident that information is protected at every level. We’re also very deliberate about how we use client data for marketing; people trust us with their details, and the last thing we want is to abuse that with over-communication. Less, but more meaningful, is always the approach.
What do you think supports such as Vodafone, as a ‘more-than-mobile’ provider, can do to empower other female entrepreneurs?
Infrastructure is so important, and I mean that in the broadest sense. Not just technology, but the kind of reliable, intelligent support that removes friction and gives you back the most precious resource you have, which is time and mental bandwidth. When the operational side of your business runs well, your connectivity is dependable, your systems talk to each other, your team can communicate effortlessly across locations, and you can actually think. You can lead. You can grow.
What I’d love to see from a business like Vodafone is something beyond visibility, though visibility matters. The most powerful thing a company with that kind of reach and resource could do is create genuine access, particularly for women of my generation who built their businesses on instinct, relationships, and expertise long before the digital landscape became what it is today.
What’s next for Platinum Pilates? Any exciting plans for later this year?
We’re actively searching for what will be our final Dublin location, and we’re launching our full series of physiotherapy-led group classes and full apparatus classes. These aren’t add-ons, they’re a significant evolution of what we offer clinically and in the studio, and they bring together everything we’ve developed over the years in a way that feels cohesive and purposeful.
We’re also introducing new concepts around mobility, longevity, and nervous system support, areas that I think are hugely underserved in the mainstream wellness space and that align completely with where movement science is heading. People are living longer and they want to move well for all of it. That’s a conversation we’re very ready to lead.
With Vodafone, your business can work from anywhere. Visit vodafone.ie to learn more.
Photography by Guilherme Resende & Edgar Camargo
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