OK so it is about time to start looking at the trends for fitness in 2015 and the ACSM has released their most recent survey of club owners. There were not a lot of surprises but there are some interesting conclusions from that report and some other things that come up elsewhere that are really worth taking a look at. The trends for High Intensity Interval Training, bodyweight training and an increasing demand for trainer professionalism all seem to be holding course and continuing onward. It's like there is no real change from last year but that is sometime how [...]
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This is another article that takes a look at a particular brand in the gym business. I haven't been asked to write these and I don't receive any payment from them. This is just my attempt to put the gym management business in context and to spread a little knowledge and insight into what's going on, and why it might be interesting to gym owners. As always, your comments are welcome. There is always room in the fitness marketplace for creative and exciting ways to keep the membership interested and coming back for more. The New York born and bred [...]
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After all of the hard work and time you have put into your small gym business you owe it to yourself to maximize the value you get out of it when you sell it. Quite simply, the best time to sell your gym is when things are moving up. When it has gone beyond your expectations and is still going. That is the exit point that will give you the most satisfaction and arguably the most cash in your pocket. To make sure you are prepared, have an exit strategy and clear milestones to indicate when you intend to exit. [...]
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Change Management Is Risky Business Crunch Fitness is on the market for around $200 million. Wow! Wow, not just because that's a lot of dough but because of the company's unique business model that they use and how it could be hit by change coming in from the outside. As far as I know Crunch is in good shape so I assume there is no need to do some sort of elaborate gym-rescue. If Crunch is a successful company, they need to keep doing what they do best, which is to creatively mix and match classes and fitness trends to [...]
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When The Unboxing Experience Feels Like Your Birthday I recently set up a local service with a card reader. The company that sent the reader seems to have a real insight into the concept of experience, particularly the unboxing experience. The reader is well designed but so was the box that it came in. It contained three cleverly designed and satisfying layers of wrapping that had to be peeled away or opened and then a final layer of protective plastic that was strangely the best part to remove. These days, it's no surprise that people unbox their tech-toys and upload [...]
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All of the small business owners I know, be they gym owners or anything else, seem to have one trait in common: They're working all of the time. I can only speak for myself but this permanent work mode has often not felt like work at all. It's been a scramble to make a living out of doing what I love. My colleagues here at Gym Insight seem to feel the same way, judging by their commitment levels. AVOIDING BURNOUT 101: EFFECTIVENESS AND EFFICIENCY Burning the candle at both ends is an apt metaphor for the kind of work ethic [...]
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In this blog post I want to balance out some of the enthusiasm that I put into the previous two articles in the series on mobile fitness apps. This article changes gears somewhat; it's a discussion about where the boundaries lie in mobile computing, in support of fitness businesses. I have already given the case for having apps and now I would just like to mention some of the characteristics and limits that define what mobile apps are and what they can do. A Fork In The Road Mobile friendly websites are not the same as mobile applications. The web [...]
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The Rise Of The Machines The basics of fitness and gym equipment are essential for a professionally operated gym. They are useful tools for the modern workout routines centered on body weight training. They have not changed in years, which is part of the attraction for some fitness enthusiasts. Some of the commercial gym equipment items that you should be thinking about presently are not much more than gym tools. Programs that use simple equipment in body weight training; such as climbing ropes, gymnastic rings and pull-up bars have been very successful in the last year. One example of this [...]
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The power of modern mobile devices lies in the ability to provide new ways to build communities and strengthen the bonds within the membership. In the first blog article on mobile fitness apps I wrote about how you get insight into customer activities and how well your gym is being utilized. In the second part of this series I want to discuss how they can help to keep your members motivated. Content Community And Coaching From Mobile Fitness Apps There is a huge opportunity to make use of the features that you can put into a mobile app. Features that [...]
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They say that price setting is an art form, but in my experience, so is juggling flaming torches. They both can be impressive done well, but there is serious potential of getting burned as you go up the learning curve. Changing prices, after your members have had time to get used to a previous price, is a unique challenge where you can get burned if you are not careful. Price Changing Factors For Gyms Any kind of decision-making about prices in business has to be based in the real world of business success. Sales, marketing and finance are the main [...]
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In the last two years, there has been a huge amount of interest in mobile fitness apps, as confirmed by Google Trends. Fitness apps can be powerful tools for marketing and motivation and there is a new generation of gym members coming up, who expect that they can download an app and immediately get gratification from it. If you don't provide that option they will look elsewhere for their fitness needs. The Fitness App Bandwagon Mobile apps are a very competitive market, driven by many big companies wanting to get their products into everyone's hands. In fact, the market is [...]
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One of the most disruptive trends in technology in the last few decades has been the leveraging and (pardon the fancy talk) disintermediation of the old ways that made the wheels of commerce go round. That means that new technologies that are labor saving and disrupting of the status quo cause big changes. Here's an old-fashioned example: Long before there was MS Word there were typewriters. These days, typewriters are an antique collector's pride and joy, more than objects of any functional uses. For previous generations the typewriter was a labor saving essential for the workplace. Companies had entire typing [...]
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Fitness trends have had lots of ups and downs that are related to culture and fashion. But there is also an influence on trends that comes from the innovations of technology. Still it's hard to read the tea leaves out beyond a year or so, as the apparent trend today can quickly show itself to be a fad that disappears overnight. In the gym business we always have to keep a lookout for what is coming because it can determine the capital investments that we would make and nobody wants to take six months to refurbish for the latest thing [...]
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When television production companies catch onto a formula that's cheap to produce and popular with viewers, they really work it for all it's worth. Having an expert, who rescues failing small businesses, is a simple and compelling formula within the genre of reality TV. The premise is usually that a business, in some specific industry, gets help and a makeover just as it's about to go under. The super-expert, no-holds-barred host comes in with a camera crew and they proceed, in a period of about three days, to whamp the tar out of the downtrodden business owner. They clear out [...]
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Dirty Work Continued... As a business owner there's a plethora of rules regulations and certifications that you have to navigate through. Of course, on top of that, gym ownership comes with its own specific headaches. When you own a business of any description you quickly find out that there are all kinds of tasks that seem to have been designed to distract you from your purpose and the mission of your enterprise. As always, I try to avoid the controversies and politics of ownership but we all have to deal with them. So, my discussion point here is how to [...]
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