[2] Hoffman starting creating barbells in 1929, the same year he began to host meets in the oil burner factory.
The same year Hoffman opened the York Barbell Company and began promoting weightlifting.
Hoffman reached out to ostracized minorities of the time to train and compete at York Barbell.
Today, the corporate office of York Barbell Company houses the official Weightlifting Hall of Fame and Museum and continues to host a variety of powerlifting and bodybuilding competitions.
[6] The fact that Bob Hoffman owned this company, was a weightlifting coach and a founding member of the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, as well as Hoffman's athletic career, helped make him "a major factor in the growth of nutritional fads for athletes", according to alternative medicine critic Stephen Barrett.