Owning a Gym

[jrs]

Looking to start a gym in a year or two. Any input from anybody who has experience?

I'm going to start small, almost a studio size, and I know what equipment I'm getting (at a great cost) etc.

Will cater to a hardcore bunch. Risky, but in my area (college town, many serious bodybuilders/powerlifters/mma fighters/various athletes, etc) I think it'd work well.

[jrs]

These are the things I know to consider:

Lease of the building
Cost of equipment
Utilities for the building
24 hour keycard access system
Licenses (which ones specifically will I need?)
Insurance
Billing Company Fees
Computer and Desk Materials/Cleaning Supplies

What am I missing?

[tomuchgear]

advertising, client base why 24 hour? you would want to look into some form of security. over head for your employees. are you going to offer any sort of protien or any thing like that. you may want to check in to venders license and all that. alot of things to look at. also check out zoning. even if you can lease a building you need to know what the codes are for that area. some places may have odd zoning rules. also parking for the gym.

[oldfella]

What about maintenece of the equipment, advertising, supplemments, facilites like showers tiolets etc, Location as in physical location, disabled access, there are plenty of hidden costs associated with owning a gym. But it can be very rewarding when you get it right.

[tattoojr]

I talked with the owner of my gym which is about 50 miles away about this same thing and decided that the investment was not worth the return. I was looking at a powerlifting type gym and he crunched some numbers with me and after all the out going cash, if I owned all the equiptment and weights, I would've had to have over 300 clients to even come close to making the money I make on my regular job. If you have some name recoginition i.e. some form of powerlifting/bodybuilding acclaim you might get started out all right, but if not then hope the Jock in a Box chain does'nt see your success and try to horn in. J.R.

[jrs]

Originally Posted by tomuchgear

advertising, client base why 24 hour? you would want to look into some form of security. over head for your employees. are you going to offer any sort of protien or any thing like that. you may want to check in to venders license and all that. alot of things to look at. also check out zoning. even if you can lease a building you need to know what the codes are for that area. some places may have odd zoning rules. also parking for the gym.

there's an older powerlifting gym here that has been around a while. i think the only/main way of competing is to have the convenience of being 24/7

a very small pro shop with protein, creatine, etc

all good posts in this thread. thanks

[jrs]

As for being profitable, I'd also add in mixed martial art classes (instructors would have to be brought in) as well as personal training, by myself of course.

With being 24 hours, maybe I'd only have to actually be there 40 hours per week max at the desk. I think everything else could be done remotely from home.

[goof321]

One of my closest frinds owns the gym I go to, Its the only "real" gym around.
He just hit 1k members, average of about 20 per month. 20k per month income.

Minus rent/utilites/employee overhead/etc...lets just say hes doing better than average.

He bought all the equipment outright and has little/no up keep fees so hes in the plus outside of rent/utilities...

Id say he pockets after all his expenses..hes pulling 6-8k per month..no bad for a guy under 30.

[wannagofast]

When I started planning to open a gym this is the VERY quick list of 'need to do' items that I came up with. This isn't listed in any particular order.

List:

Advertising costs
....Local magazines
....Newspaper
....Radio
....Flyers
....Word of mouth
Lease/deposit
Utilities
Facilities
....Toilets (mandatory)
....Showers (optional)
Equipment
....Initial investment
....Maintenance
Employees
....Insurance
....Income tax
....Medicare
....SS taxes
Local business license (LLC, Corp., etc)
....Cost
State/Federal business license (LLC, Corp., etc)
....Cost
Location
....Zoning
....Demographic
....Ability to expand
....Parking
....Physical location
........Needed renovations
........Building code violations (not my resp./if renting, but affects my income)
Security
....Video (optional)
....Physical (will see)
Vendors licensing
....Supplements (optional)
....Equipment/wrist straps, belts, etc (optional)
Training options
....Classes
....Personal training
....Information awareness classes
....Dieticians

[RONJON]

We need more hardcore gyms...good luck to u bro!!!