Opening Second Gym, Advice/Info ?

Off Topic
1

Got go ahead on second gym today, first gym is all nautilus equipment, but thinking about using Atlantis equipment for this gym, mainly because they’re based 2hrs from me, and it saves tons on shipping not to have to cross US border, but I have never used their equipment before. I thought it might be fun to get some input from you guys, keep in mind this is a family fitness facility, although I do try to slip in some hard-core stuff so I can train my athletic based clients, in and around the seniors and soccer moms who allow me to turn a profit, in a small town.

I’ve owned first club for 5yrs now, and it’s been really successful, so going to follow same type of formula in this club. Due to financing it’s easiest to purchase all equip. from one or maybe two sources at first, than add some used pieces latter as needed. I’m living my dream, and I wasn’t a member of T-nation first time around, so might keep a sort of log on what goes into setting up and opening this type of gym, keep in mind it’s a franchise(be nice) so I have to be careful on how I word certain things, I’ll try my best to be open about everything I can

2

Man it was my dream to open up a gym. After some deliberation and trying to crunch the numbers I could not figure out how you guys make money. You probably need close to a quarter of a million dollars upfront for the equipment, insurance and the first 6-8 months of rent. How do you compete with these main chains that only charge 20 dollars a month for membership dues. Seriously how do these places stay open.

Anyways congrats on the second gym. You are obviously doing something right.

How many hours would you say you work a week? Being self employed is often overwhelming. My family is involved in the automotive industry and have our own small business and even with everyone contributing my father still works 60-70 hours a week.

3

Pull a Daniel Lugo and give strippers free mememberships.

4

Is there a lunk alarm in your gym?

Also, strippers.

5

Dont the models of places like Planet Fitness depend on people not un-subbing their payments and signing up thousands to the system with a low payment?

Basically your profits are made by the bottom line. Would you rather have 100 people paying $10 a month or 50 paying $15?

6

Not planet fitness and no lunk alarm lol, first place was in small town 15000ppl, and I’m only place in town, generally 5% join a gym, so that’s 750 members, I’m at around 600 right now, it goes up slowly every year. I charge 40$ so you end up turning over a good chunk of money each mth, lots going out to rent and payments, but you end up doing pretty good.

I do end up giving free memberships to hot chicks to keep the guys happy, and not having sausage fest. As far as start up, your right at 1/4 mil, but I lease the equipment on a lease to own basis, so they don’t mind giving you the money, and you end up owning stuff after three years. The kind of club I own is around 5000sqft, and that means between 120–200 thousand worth of equipment to start up, or about 6000$ a mth in payments.

When the first club opened I was working about 80hrs a week for first year, and now about forty, my club is run by cameras I can watch from home, it’s open 24hrs a day. Right now regarding new club, I’m arranging with a local real-estate broker to look at space for rent, in new town.

I’m also contacting equipment sales reps, to start getting prices and seeing what I’ll need, this is the fun part for guys like us, sort of like Christmas, that I have to pay for latter. It will be easier this time to arrange financing(I hope) Anyway thought some guys on here might be interested in this journey I’m just starting again. My dream gym would be a cross between a metroflex and a Cressy performance center, but in reality I have a mortgage and a family to feed, so this franchise seems to work fairly well for me, they don’t bug me, and the monthly payments are only 450$.

Got approval basically today so hoping to have gym open for sept.–oct. there’s a lot of stuff to do between now and then, I’ll try to keep you guys posted.

7

Oh as far as franchise, think my name sums it up, for the bright ones anyway,

8

That is awesome. Do you charge start up fees with new memberships.

I feel like it is so hard to make money as a gym owner. Like your not going to make million + of dollars unless you own something like ten gyms.

[quote]AnytimeJake wrote:
Not planet fitness and no lunk alarm lol, first place was in small town 15000ppl, and I’m only place in town, generally 5% join a gym, so that’s 750 members, I’m at around 600 right now, it goes up slowly every year. I charge 40$ so you end up turning over a good chunk of money each mth, lots going out to rent and payments, but you end up doing pretty good.

I do end up giving free memberships to hot chicks to keep the guys happy, and not having sausage fest. As far as start up, your right at 1/4 mil, but I lease the equipment on a lease to own basis, so they don’t mind giving you the money, and you end up owning stuff after three years. The kind of club I own is around 5000sqft, and that means between 120–200 thousand worth of equipment to start up, or about 6000$ a mth in payments.

When the first club opened I was working about 80hrs a week for first year, and now about forty, my club is run by cameras I can watch from home, it’s open 24hrs a day. Right now regarding new club, I’m arranging with a local real-estate broker to look at space for rent, in new town.

I’m also contacting equipment sales reps, to start getting prices and seeing what I’ll need, this is the fun part for guys like us, sort of like Christmas, that I have to pay for latter. It will be easier this time to arrange financing(I hope) Anyway thought some guys on here might be interested in this journey I’m just starting again. My dream gym would be a cross between a metroflex and a Cressy performance center, but in reality I have a mortgage and a family to feed, so this franchise seems to work fairly well for me, they don’t bug me, and the monthly payments are only 450$.

Got approval basically today so hoping to have gym open for sept.–oct. there’s a lot of stuff to do between now and then, I’ll try to keep you guys posted.[/quote]

9

Where in Ontario is your gym?

10

I don’t know about making a million dollars, but I spent part of my life trying to get rich, and didn’t find happiness there. I love my life now, I go in the morning, and say hi to my members, sweep up a bit, train any clients I have, and make my own hours. My place clears about 5-6 grand a month, more in Jan. and Sept, but I break a lot of rules that would make me more money, just because it’s what I feel is right, I don’t charge initiation fees, and I don’t lock members in, they can join and quit at will. I also don’t make any money off my trainers, as long as they’re qualified they put they’re name on the board, and start getting clients. Other gym owners tell me I’m nuts on these two things, and that I’m loosing lots of money, but I hate gyms that lock you in for life, and it’s hard enough making a living as a trainer without handing over 30% of your money, plus trainers in most gyms are like car salesmen doing pushy salesmanship on members. So the gym probably clears 80 grand a year, that’s pretty good, and I’ve never been happier, I get to take and pick up my 5yr daughter from school every day, she hangs out with me at the gym, my members love her. The reason I had second thoughts on second gym was mainly the stress, I wasn’t sure I wanted to climb back under all that debt that I just finished paying off, but my head trainer who has been with me four years, since he was 19, is doing a great job running my place while I’ve been stuck at home the last year, so might as well open another. I’ll have a lot more to post on Monday, when people start getting back to me with prices on locations and equipment, I’m going to try to keep posting all info on here, so if anyone has been thinking about this, there will be some sort of template, latter

11

That’s my dream job too. What’s your background in school? Got any degree? How did you started this whole journey? I strongly consider a career as a gym owner. Working in a gym at the moment, just during school to get some cash to pay for my car and expanses, but I’d love to have MY place, MY gym with well-chosen equipment, trust-worthy members and Brothers In Iron training with intensity in my gym. Kinda like Big Jay’s Extreme Fitness, you can check it on youtube, insane place IMO.

Anyway, some pointers or info on the beginning would be cool!

12

Wait so trainers get to utilize your facility to provide a service to other people free of charge? That is unheard of in the states where I am from. Unless they are like in house trainers getting paid salary more or less. Private trainers have to pay to train clients. The gym I train at actually transitioned to soley in house trainers by driving private trainers out via raising the rate for them to train there.

Also in the states, at least where I am from it is illegal to lock people into contracts and you can only pay your membership dues up to a maximum of three months in advance. It can be nuisance since some would want to be the 140 buck yearly dues all in one payment and be done with it. The reason for this though is in the past these fly by night gyms would pop up lock people into contracts collect a year or two even three worth of dues in advance and close after only being open for half a year and disappear. This prompted the government to pursue legislation to prevent this from happening.

I feel you on choosing happiness over financial gain. I am constantly torn between the two.

[quote]AnytimeJake wrote:
I don’t know about making a million dollars, but I spent part of my life trying to get rich, and didn’t find happiness there. I love my life now, I go in the morning, and say hi to my members, sweep up a bit, train any clients I have, and make my own hours. My place clears about 5-6 grand a month, more in Jan. and Sept, but I break a lot of rules that would make me more money, just because it’s what I feel is right, I don’t charge initiation fees, and I don’t lock members in, they can join and quit at will. I also don’t make any money off my trainers, as long as they’re qualified they put they’re name on the board, and start getting clients. Other gym owners tell me I’m nuts on these two things, and that I’m loosing lots of money, but I hate gyms that lock you in for life, and it’s hard enough making a living as a trainer without handing over 30% of your money, plus trainers in most gyms are like car salesmen doing pushy salesmanship on members. So the gym probably clears 80 grand a year, that’s pretty good, and I’ve never been happier, I get to take and pick up my 5yr daughter from school every day, she hangs out with me at the gym, my members love her. The reason I had second thoughts on second gym was mainly the stress, I wasn’t sure I wanted to climb back under all that debt that I just finished paying off, but my head trainer who has been with me four years, since he was 19, is doing a great job running my place while I’ve been stuck at home the last year, so might as well open another. I’ll have a lot more to post on Monday, when people start getting back to me with prices on locations and equipment, I’m going to try to keep posting all info on here, so if anyone has been thinking about this, there will be some sort of template, latter[/quote]

13

What I do with my trainers is they freelance, so they join the gym, 40$ mth than put they’re name on the board, and start getting clients, I have no financial relationship at all with my trainers, once they have been around for awhile and are doing pretty well, I give them a key to the storage room, and ask them to watch the paper towels and spray bottles, replace when necessary, and put weights away when possible.

I have three that have been with me for years, they have keys to my office to sign people up when I’m not there, they make 20$ for every person signed. My head trainer Brandon started with me out of high school, became a trainer at my gym, he has probably 40 clients, makes 1000$ a week, and is basically my manager, except I don’t pay him myself anything. This past year I’ve been away from the gym, my girl does the books and cleaning, and he runs everything else. Its mutually beneficial for us both.

As far as trainers being staff, this is one of the reasons opened first gym. There were two gyms next town over, and neither would let me train clients, unless I worked for them, you had to meet sales quotas, and than you barely made any money from it, you charged 60$ an hour, and got payed 12$ . My trainers set they’re own rates, based on demand and knowledge, best guy charges 60$, and newest guy charges 25$(to build clientele) I just talked Brandon into upping from35$ to 50$ since his roster is full. I give free hour session with membership, so if Brandon doesn’t want to do free hour I hand them around, to help the guys build business. To gym owners that think I lose money on trainers, wonder what I save on wages, and benefit packages, and my members love this system.

14

Here in Canada members pay monthly for gym, but gyms make you sign year contract, and hold you to it if you quit, sending collection agency after you. Very few pay for year, its better for both sides paying monthly, the payments just come out of bank automatically. I don’t chase people if they want to quit just give 30 day notice. I know my franchise still locks people in for a year, even in states

15

Some things I hate about gyms.

  • Monthly, locked-in payment contracts that you cannot get out of.

One such gym had such an annoying set of asshole customers and to top it off I was learning things and realised the flat/incline bench’s were utter crap, even for my size at 6’3". Dont know how other people coped. Then I learned about the no chalk rule.

I couldn’t just get up and leave without wasting £25 ($45-50) and join another gym because I didnt have the income to just fob it off.

  • All of a sudden they decide to change equipment and get rid of things you were using or introduce new rules.

Hasn’t happened to me yet but I do remember going to several gyms with absolutely piss poor equipment, only obvious after you’ve had a session. Always try out the gear before you invest in a gym membership.

The gym I go to now has all the equipment I need, the owner runs it with friends and family and he actually invests in new stuff which is beneficial. No monthly contract at all.

16

At 32 was released from prison, and decided to turn life around. I moved to a small town and had a daughter with local girl, I was working two jobs and living normal life for two years. The town I settled in had no gym, the next town over (25min) had two gyms, but they sucked, and had no cages. I decided to open my own gym. I had 25 grand, and thought this would open a gym, haha.

I registered a corp. " theweightroom. inc", and quickly realized didn’t have enough money. I than met a mentor who owned three franchises, he told me once I bought the franchise (20 grand) lenders would help me. So I bought franchise, and also applied to town for 40grand interest free grant. to be continued…

17

So I recieved the 40 grand grant. I signed a 5 year lease to rent a 3700sqft commercial space (strip mall). The lease was 4500$ a month,20$ per sqft, had to pay first and last. It’s important to work out details when signing lease, get landlord to agree to pay for construction. I learned this the hard way. Once construction was done and painted, two washrooms, and two change rooms, total was another 15 grand.

i than had to purchase equipment, at the time Nautilus was chapter 11, and I managed to bargin them down to 56% off list, but had to settle for colour they had available. franchise helps with this, I get big discounts from prefered vendors. Nautilus bill was 96 grand, found a leasing company, because of franchise sucsess record. equipment lease was 5600$ a month. Also had to buy Dumb bells, plates, and assorted gym accesories, this was another 17 grand.

So including the grant and my own money, I started with 65000$. One week before I opened I was flat broke, I had a beautiful little gym, but couldnt affords to eat. My mother, who I didnt talk to for ten years before my jail sentance stepped up, she signed for me to recieve a 100 thousand line of credit against her home ( thanks mom) I opened my first gym on June 1st, I knew that on July 1st, I needed to have 13 thousand for my monthly bills.

I didn`t sleep for the week before or after my opening, but thanks to advertising and word of mouth, I had close to 300 members in one month. Bills got payed, after three tough years, equip. got payed off, had 450 members, and life was good. as far as me, I have no education, as you can tell by grammer and spelling, I thought I was going to become a pro athlete, I went pretty far in boxing and hockey.

This only serves my point, that if a big dumb uneducated ex con like me, can pull all this off, well then, it should be easily attainable for all the smart asses that hack on my grammer, lol, now that the history lesson is over, ill start posting whats involved with opening this next one. Im starting with about the same amount of cash, so we`ll see

18

Wow. That is an awesome sucess story.

[quote]AnytimeJake wrote:
So I recieved the 40 grand grant. I signed a 5 year lease to rent a 3700sqft commercial space (strip mall). The lease was 4500$ a month,20$ per sqft, had to pay first and last. It’s important to work out details when signing lease, get landlord to agree to pay for construction. I learned this the hard way. Once construction was done and painted, two washrooms, and two change rooms, total was another 15 grand.

i than had to purchase equipment, at the time Nautilus was chapter 11, and I managed to bargin them down to 56% off list, but had to settle for colour they had available. franchise helps with this, I get big discounts from prefered vendors. Nautilus bill was 96 grand, found a leasing company, because of franchise sucsess record. equipment lease was 5600$ a month. Also had to buy Dumb bells, plates, and assorted gym accesories, this was another 17 grand.

So including the grant and my own money, I started with 65000$. One week before I opened I was flat broke, I had a beautiful little gym, but couldnt affords to eat. My mother, who I didnt talk to for ten years before my jail sentance stepped up, she signed for me to recieve a 100 thousand line of credit against her home ( thanks mom) I opened my first gym on June 1st, I knew that on July 1st, I needed to have 13 thousand for my monthly bills.

I didn`t sleep for the week before or after my opening, but thanks to advertising and word of mouth, I had close to 300 members in one month. Bills got payed, after three tough years, equip. got payed off, had 450 members, and life was good. as far as me, I have no education, as you can tell by grammer and spelling, I thought I was going to become a pro athlete, I went pretty far in boxing and hockey.

This only serves my point, that if a big dumb uneducated ex con like me, can pull all this off, well then, it should be easily attainable for all the smart asses that hack on my grammer, lol, now that the history lesson is over, ill start posting whats involved with opening this next one. Im starting with about the same amount of cash, so we`ll see[/quote]

19

But that must have been tough. If your overhead is 10,100 and your bringing in around 12000 k a month in dues that leaves you with barely enough money to feed yourself and pay for other life expenses. You must have really been scraping the barrel in the begining.

20

you aren’t the only successful ex-con here.