About Us

One Day at a Time

If you’re reading this, you’re probably looking for a way to get healthier. To be better.

Maybe you’ve recently been diagnosed with a high blood pressure, high cholesterol, a heart problem. Perhaps new bloodwork shows you’re at risk for diabetes. Or maybe you’ve stepped on the scale and are upset with the number, or you’ve looked in the mirror and weren’t happy with what you saw.

You might not have a choice but to get healthier. To be better. But you’re not sure how. Searching the internet leaves you feeling confused. You feel isolated and alone.

We’ve all had these experiences – the diagnosis, the shock on the scale. And getting healthy is hard. If it weren’t, there wouldn’t be fitness fads in the first place.

But here’s the good news: You’re not alone, and there’s real help waiting for you.

Coach Alex And The Better Daily Community are your partners in better health. Our professional, certified coaches will help you set goals and get started on a meal plan and fitness program designed just for you. And you’ll connect with others on their own betterment journeys, who will come alongside you to offer support and encouragement. As part of the Better Daily family, you’ll feel like you belong, and you’ll find hope and inspiration to move forward.

So take the first step. Join our community! Download the free Better Daily app to connect with others taking the same steps as you. Within the app you’ll find other ways to be better. Subscribe to our podcasts and shortcasts for advice and more encouragement. Sign up for coaching. Participate in community challenges – to walk more, to eat healthier, to journal your new habits. To be better.

You can TRY to do this BETTER thing alone, but you’ll be more successful — and have more fun — if you commit to becoming BETTER with us instead!

It’s just 1%. We got this!

The Betterment Mission

The Betterment Co. is a health and fitness company that improves the world by bringing individuals and communities to the next level – body, mind, and spirit. We support the daily betterment of individuals through cutting-edge science, authentic community, fun challenges, practical content, and superior coaching.

BETTER Requires The Practice Of 4 Daily Disciplines:

#integrity is the discipline of aligning your actions and your beliefs.

INTEGRITY

On a surface level, INTEGRITY is the discipline of making our actions match our beliefs.

A deeper practice of INTEGRITY, though, requires an honest evaluation and alignment of the beliefs we hold so that we are “Integral” – which is to say – INTEGRITY is the discipline that unites us within ourselves toward a singular purpose. Click HERE to learn more about the Discipline of INTEGRITY.

#GRIT is the discipline of doing hard things without giving up.

GRIT

In common parlance, GRIT is the discipline of sticking with things even – and especially – when they get difficult.

Physically, mentally, and spiritually, GRIT is the discipline of getting back up when we get knocked down, holding on when we want to let go, and continuing to do what we know is right long after motivation has faded and the pain of doing the right thing has beat us into a weary pulp! Click HERE to learn more about the Discipline of GRIT.

Growth is the discipline of overcoming obstacles.

GROWTH

GROWTH is the discipline of seeking out that which is stressful, uncomfortable, even impossible, and diving headlong into overcoming it.

GROWTH is choosing the challenging road precisely because it is challenging and stretching ourselves beyond our limits for the good. Click HERE to learn more about the Discipline of GROWTH.

The burning bush - #AWE

AWE

AWE is the strangest, yet most important, ingredient in what makes The Betterment Co. process unique – producing real, life-changing results.

While much of the rest of the fitness industry depends on vanity, fear, and pain to achieve short-term outcomes, at Better Daily we recognize that AWE is the core driver for truly transformative change — fueling the fire for each of the 3 other disciplines.Click HERE to learn more about the Discipline of AWE.

Behind Betterment

Coach Alex Van Houten is the engine that fuels The Betterment Co. Alex’s personal journey coping with poverty, childhood trauma and a painful genetic condition called Ehlers Danlos led him to want to better himself, and then to help others do the same despite their obstacles. Through The Betterment Co., Coach Alex is living his dream as he helps people chart a path to their own Betterment.

Coach Alex is supported by a team that includes a registered dietitian and network of tech specialists, as well as the community of clients and members in Better Daily. Coach Alex completed his undergraduate degree at Vanderbilt University in 2010 focused on biochemistry and psychology. In the years since, he has earned certifications in personal training, corrective exercise, performance enhancement, and behavior change through the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM). He’s also written multiple peer-reviewed articles for the International Sport Science Association (ISSA) and published over 500 5-Star podcast episodes. He is a certified nutritionist and health coach through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition (IIN), and has been a professional personal coach and trainer since 2008. Currently while still coaching clients and operating The Betterment Co., Coach Alex is working toward his PhD from University of Central Arkansas (UCA) in Clinical Psychology and publishing his first book “40 Days Of Better – A Christian Fitness Devotional”.

Coach Alex lives with his wife, Christin, and their two sons, Gabriel and Bennett, in Greenbrier, Arkansas.

READ MORE ABOUT COACH ALEX’S STRUGGLE WITH EDS/HSD HERE

Our Journey

The Betterment Co., along with Coach Alex and the Better Daily Community, was rebranded in 2020 after starting as a Fatherhood-focused enterprise called Defining Dad Bod in 2016. The company was built upon the concept of championing sustainable progress over perfection, addressing health and fitness goals holistically, and doing the right thing for people in the long-run rather than chasing short-term profits. In just a few short years, The Betterment Co. has served 500+ individual health journeys, garnered 14,000 social media followers, and earned over 100,000 podcast downloads!

“We have walked farther, lifted heavier, eaten smarter, prayed harder and held our heads a bit higher,” Coach Alex says. “Together, we can change the world by becoming a Better version of ourselves. Don’t do it alone!”

Be you. Just Better.

It’s Just 1%. You Got This!

Community Involvement

We believe that individual Betterment translates into “Better” for the community — like a stone thrown into a lake, the ripples of the 1% Better Daily journey makes a noticeable difference in the world around us!

In addition to the Free resources that The Betterment Co. offers to any in pursuit of Better (podcast episodes and Freemium Better Daily memberships), 10% of all Premium account subscription fees in The Better Daily App goes to supporting various charities.

In the spirit of leading by example, Coach Alex serves weekly as a children’s ministry lay pastor at New Life Church in Greenbrier, AR (Greenbrier Leadership – New Life Church) and as a lead Facilitator for MD5, a non-profit Year-Long Men’s Discipleship Program (Facilitators | MD5 (mdfive.org) ).