Want To Buy A Gym? Look Under Recreation!
By a quirk of standards adapted from the Federal government’s SIC codes, you will find gyms for sale on business broker sites under recreation. Whether you’re in the market for a gym business or not it helps to know what’s going on in your neighborhood, state and industry in the way of gym businesses for sale.
Information Is The Ultimate Resource
There may come a day when you wish to put your gym on the market. The more information you have, the better you know what to aim for when the time comes. Alternatively, you might decide to buy a gym, either as an expansion and a second location, or as a way to get into the business to begin with.
Before you decide to do anything like buy a business, make sure that you have thoroughly reviewed your abilities and resources, and of course make sure you get specific advice from a business attorney.
This is not a strategy for beginners to make a quick buck; the knowledge you gain over time in running your first business is the difference between profit and bankruptcy. But if you already know how to run a small gym business, work with members, lead trainers and staff, manage systems and deal with equipment and service vendors, given enough capital, you might be able to bring a second location into your gym empire.
Rebrand Redecorate And Bring In New Equipment
If you spot a gym business that appears to have potential think about what you can do with it. Consider ways to leverage it before you buy it. Based on your business experience you have to come up with something different that will dramatically increase the return on your six-figure investment.
The objective is to take a business that is surviving and turn it into one that is thriving. One way to do this is by increasing the revenue stream. If you can immediately add features and services to a gym you can rapidly add value and that is when it all becomes worthwhile.
Add Value And Move Up Market
If there is no retail section it could be that adding one will generate cash at the front desk. Or you could rebrand the location to pursue the premium end of the local gym market. The premium customers are out there and if you can make your service appeal to them you will gain a very healthy income.
Gym Insight can help with software tools that can increase the revenue that the site is already producing. You can efficiently manage 24/7 operations remotely to bring in the late night and early morning members. Insight software enables you to manage tanning beds remotely as well.
Not Like You See On TV
Unfortunately, in the real world, you’re unlikely to do a turn-around in a weekend like a reality TV show. It is going to take time and paperwork. Make sure you get all of the appropriate building permits before you begin any renovations. It’s vital that you understand that the job won’t be complete until the building inspector says it is. Cutting corners and ignoring building codes is just a way to wrack up costly fines that will put you under before you’ve started.
One thing that I notice from the TV shows that do rescues for businesses such as restaurants and bars is that the problem is usually because of the attitudes and behaviors of the owners, once the host convinces them to change everything else follows easily. If you do it right when you buy a business the previous owners will be out of the way anyway and then it’s up to you to make it work.
Even so, there are going to be issues of transition such as bringing new staff from the site into your company culture and way of thinking. You may have to spend a significant amount of time winning over the existing membership. There’s no point in purchasing an operational business if the purchase kills the business.
Murphy Was An Entrepreneur
Murphy’s Law, which states anything that can go wrong will go wrong, is about par for the course in business ownership: Whatever you think it will cost, double it, however long you think it will take triple it, if it still sounds like a good idea then you may be on to something. Expanding your business by buying gyms to rehabilitate is certainly not a beginner’s pursuit. This is one where you should proceed with caution.
Bibliography
Fagan, Lawrence. "Gym Rescue" Your Own Gym without Relying on Randy Couture. July 29, 2014. https://blog.gyminsight.com/1136-gym-rescue-your-own-gym-without-relying-on-randy-couture/ (accessed September 23, 2015).
-. On The High Road To Premium Gym Ownership Success. February 17, 2015. https://blog.gyminsight.com/3188-on-the-high-road-to-premium-gym-ownership-success/ (accessed September 23, 2015).
-. Pros And Cons of Gym Retail Revenue. November 14, 2013. https://blog.gyminsight.com/2167-pros-cons-of-gym-retail-revenue/ (accessed September 23, 2105).
-. The Best Time To Sell Your Gym. November 10, 2014. https://blog.gyminsight.com/2972-sell-your-gym/ (accessed September 23, 2015).
United States Census Bureau. North American Industry Classification System. August 4, 2015. https://www.census.gov/eos/www/naics/ (accessed September 23, 2015).