Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Semi-private
training is a revenue home run
in gyms.
So, how do you know if you'reready to set up this revenue
stream and how do you launch theservice?
You're going to find out today.
Daniel Purrington is a two-waymentor and the owner of Woods
Lawn Fitness in Oregon.
He specializes in generatingrevenue outside of the big group
model.
Daniel, welcome from Oregon.
(00:21):
How are you?
SPEAKER_02 (00:22):
I'm great.
Thanks for having me in thismorning, Mike.
SPEAKER_01 (00:24):
I am pumped up to
talk about this because we're
going to help some gym ownersmake some money.
Before I ask you my firstquestion, I'll give a very short
summary small group one coachone workout modified for a small
number of people it's usuallylike four six something like
that they're doing variations ofa workout semi-private different
one coach personalized workoutsdelivered to about four people
(00:45):
can be less two to four at thesame time it's essentially
personal training in the samespace and it takes a lot from a
coach to deliver four programsto four different people, but
it's very possible if you havegreat coaches and these are
high-value programs that makemoney in gyms.
So, I want to know, Daniel, asan expert two-brain mentor on
this subject, what kind ofrevenue is possible per hour
(01:06):
with small group andsemi-private training versus big
groups?
SPEAKER_02 (01:09):
Yeah, so with our
with ours, we do majority small
group private training, we do doa little bit of the semi
private.
So I'm going to kind of staymore towards a small group.
But I did some quick numberswhen you sent this over to me.
For a one hour session with oursix people in our small group
private training, we're lookingat about$230 for an hour.
And then for our group, we'relooking at with the same six
(01:33):
people, you're working at about$80.
SPEAKER_01 (01:36):
When I was running a
group class, I was making like
18 sometimes an hour.
SPEAKER_02 (01:40):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (01:41):
Three people, seven
bucks.
SPEAKER_02 (01:44):
And that's the cool
thing about that is we tend to
use a much smaller area with thesmall group private training
than we do with my larger group.
And because I have such greatmargins on the revenue, I pay my
coaches about 3x an hour for thesmall group private training
versus the group privatetraining or the group, the
(02:04):
larger group.
SPEAKER_01 (02:04):
Is it fair to say
this is a career building tool
in a gym for a gym owner?
SPEAKER_02 (02:09):
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
I mean, we run...
So when we started this programabout eight years ago, we
started with two or foursessions a week.
We now have 25 small groupprivate training sessions a
week, not including some of oursmaller ones.
We have 28 large group.
As far as like the revenuesplit, just I'm going to look at
some of my numbers.
(02:29):
We're looking at about$24,000 amonth.
Within the small group, if weuse the same amount of people
and in that large group, thatsame amount of people will be
12.
Really?
Yeah.
Now, these aren't my numbers.
My numbers are thankfully higherthan that, just based on the
city that I live in.
But again, that allows me to paycoaches in my small group
(02:51):
private training$11,000 a monthversus$4,000 a month.
SPEAKER_01 (02:56):
Wow.
And that's, that's, that's awage, right?
Like that's a career wage whereyou can then retain good people
and pay them what they're worthso they can live versus$20 an
hour for CrossFit classes orwhatever, where all of a sudden
you're maxed out at 40 hours,you're burned out and you can't
make any more money.
You're not making enough money.
And then you put in theapplication at the fire hall,
right?
And that's always, that's a bigproblem in the fitness industry.
So this is an obvious win andmany two brain gyms on our top
(03:18):
10 leaderboards rely on theseprograms.
When I interview them, theyalways point to the stuff
because it's generating bigrevenue in gyms.
So how does a gym owner know ifIf they're ready to launch
something like this, because I,you've told me that this is not
just something you can push abutton on.
There are some steps ahead oftime.
SPEAKER_02 (03:33):
Yeah.
There's a, there's a few mindsetshifts specifically if you're
accustomed to running groupfitness and there's a few
systems and processes.
And so talking just kind ofupfront with the systems and
processes, like, You've got todo an introductory consult.
You've got to learn why peopleare coming to you, what they
need, and not just assume thatthey want something that has
(03:54):
worked for you in the past.
That is critical, critical.
You've got to know who youravatar is.
That is also very key because wecan't build these small groups
without that.
On the flip side of it,Recognizing what you're selling
when it comes to small groupprivate training versus group
training.
When I talk to CrossFit gyms,oftentimes they're like, well,
(04:16):
my CrossFit classes only havefour or five people in them.
How is this going to work,right?
You're selling something verydifferent.
Cooper says this all the time,but private training sells you
speed to your result.
And that is what you're doing.
So you're selling specificity.
You're selling accountability.
You're selling speed.
You're selling specificprogramming to get to a specific
(04:37):
goal.
CrossFit is a lot moregeneralized.
So the subtle nuances, they arecritical.
And as we move down along thelist, I would say the next most
important thing system-wise isyour organic messaging.
We grew our small group privatetraining and all the mentees
that I work with, the firstthing we do is grow it within
your doors, right?
(04:57):
They're already purchasingfitness from you.
That know, like, and trustcontinuum is ongoing.
Don't forget that.
Like lead nurture is equally asimportant as member lead
nurture.
Your members are your next bestclient here.
So if you're...
don't have a strong organicmedia you're not doing emails
you're not doing in-house stuffyou're not using sugar water
(05:18):
whichever posting board yourcoaches aren't trained on how to
talk to this stuff you don'thave an audience that's right
for your knowledge and for thisprogram so deploying it before
you do those things really endsup having it fall flat on its
face
SPEAKER_01 (05:32):
before you get to
the next one let's just i'm
going to give you a summary hereif you are just dumping every
person who comes to the doorinto big group classes and it's
just like in you go there's noon-ramp there's no call
consultation.
You just go right into big groupclasses.
You don't blog.
You don't have any of theseservices like personal training
or anything else.
And you just start saying, I'mdoing small group training and
I'm raising your prices.
(05:52):
It will not work.
That's just not going to work.
And if you're doing this like byaccident, because I did this, I
ran big group classes, whichwere at five o'clock at noon,
where 20 people rocking thewhole deal.
And then at other stuff, threeor four o'clock, there were two
or three.
I was running a small group bydefault.
I can't just tell those peopleat that point, oh, your
membership price doubled, right?
(06:14):
None of that works.
Like all of this is a bad plan.
What Daniel laid out is based onthe prescriptive model, where
you're going to get people inthe door.
You're going to sit down.
You're going to find out whothey are.
And you're looking...
You have your avatar in mind andyou know how to solve their
problems.
You'll talk to them, find outwhat they want to do, what their
problems are, what they want toaccomplish.
You'll prescribe them a solutionthat would be, I know that you
need to do this by this point.
(06:34):
I'm going to recommend thisprogram.
It could be PT.
It could be small group.
It could be big group, but youhave options there and you have
to start telling your insidemembers, your current members
that this program could solveyour problems faster.
If you have none of those thingsavailable to you, if you're just
dumping people in a big group,don't consider this yet.
You got to talk to a guy likeDaniel who can help What else
(06:54):
have you got on that,
SPEAKER_02 (06:55):
Daniel?
So if you're running justexclusively a big group, you've
got to work out some of yourlogistics.
Oftentimes when we have biggroups, the people fill the
space that we have.
So it's dialing in some of yourbig groups.
And this is really criticalbecause you don't want to all of
a sudden bring in this smallgroup and push your big groups
over without having theconversation.
(07:16):
Animosity can develop veryquickly in that environment.
So getting that involved issomething that can be missed.
Do we have a separate area?
So our small group privatetraining has a separate area.
It's got separate Bluetooth forspeakers, separate weights.
It's got everything.
It feels different.
SPEAKER_01 (07:34):
That's good.
SPEAKER_02 (07:34):
The music selection
is different.
The whiteboards are different.
The way that we talk about it'sdifferent.
So you can do some subtle thingsthat differentiate this.
And you can do this in an opengym.
We'll use lines of weight treesor things like that just to kind
of give that subtle line.
The coaches know what it is.
Running logistics with thecoaches.
So before a launching this heythis is how this is going to run
(07:56):
this is where they go like thesepractice runs so it feels
professional again we're sellingspeed we're selling
accountability we're selling ahigher level here the members
should feel that day one
SPEAKER_01 (08:08):
yeah and here's a
thing i'm going to just jump in
with this one goal reviewsessions listeners if you are
not doing goal review sessionsevery 90 days you need to start
them because at that goal reviewsession is the perfect time to
say to a big group plan hey i'venoticed your attendance is
spotty what's going on like i'mnot making enough progress I
have a new program launching.
It's called Small Group orSemi-Private Training.
(08:29):
I think it's going to help youget to your goals faster because
we're personalizing some stuffin this semi-private program.
You get your own, you know, yourown program, the whole deal.
And this is a way to roll outthese programs.
Again, it's not available to youif you don't do goal review
sessions.
In goal review sessions, TwoBrain Data proves that revenue
goes up, retention goes up,average revenue per member goes
up.
They are the key to everythingin a gym.
(08:50):
If you're not talking to yourcurrent members, you are lost.
Start doing that.
Daniel, what happens if a gymjust launches?
I think it's obvious, but we'lljust lay it out.
What happens if a gym justlaunches a program like this
without any of the prerequisitesthat you have laid out?
SPEAKER_02 (09:03):
You're going to get
frustrated right off the bat.
You're like, this doesn't workwith my gym.
Like we've learned that with,oh, no, sort of shows don't work
here.
They don't work because we don'thave the foundation set up.
And so it's, Yes, the numbersare great.
Yes, it's awesome to pay a coachthis, this.
It's really amazing to be ableto provide your members with
faster results and betterresults, but you've got to lay
(09:25):
the foundational work before.
Number two, you've just devaluedthat service to your members.
You just showed it out like, oh,we can't fill it.
Now we've got to backtrack.
Now we've got to have some formof a waiting period before we
can go back into it.
And just really to piggyback offthe goal reviews, I cannot
emphasize any more than youalready have.
Like goal reviews are critical.
We built this program based offof members within our gym.
(09:49):
And it was done through goalreviews.
It is a huge checkbox.
If you're not doing that, it'sgoing to be very difficult to
truly know what your membersare.
need and so be aggressive withthat goal review it doesn't have
to be in person zoom phone getto know them then you can figure
out the problems that they'reneeding to have solved
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
yeah the mistake
that i made was i brought people
into a gym and i just assumedthey all wanted big group
crossfit and dumped them intoclasses eventually after two
brain helped me out i startedtelling people hey we have
personal training available anda I can get help with this
one-on-one so I can do a muscleup?
Yeah.
And I didn't even tell peoplethat.
Same thing.
We have a kid's program.
Oh, I'll sign my kid up.
(10:30):
This warm pile of no like andtrust people inside your gym was
available.
They're available to you outthere right now, but you have to
stay in contact with people andthen you have to get everything
together so that you can solvetheir problems with a new
program and do it properly.
And that is, I have talked toother gym owners.
They have done this convertinggroup clients to small group or
semi-private or PT clients tosemi-private.
(10:52):
They're doing it successfullyand their revenue per hour
revenue per square foot both aregoing up dramatically daniel
tell tell listeners how muchspace you allocate to this in
your gym this is cool this isvery
SPEAKER_02 (11:03):
cool so i'll give
you a really brief brief
overview so i have two spacesthey're separated by a very
small block wall big door youcan hear everything on either
side my crossfit side has 1100square feet of usable space
SPEAKER_01 (11:15):
so small by crossfit
tavern standards super small
SPEAKER_02 (11:18):
yeah my semi or my
small group private training
side is 650 square feet we havesix wall mounted squat racks we
run a six-on-one and afour-on-one small group private
session concurrently
SPEAKER_01 (11:34):
so 10 people in 650
actually
SPEAKER_02 (11:36):
it's 12 because
you've got coaches coaches so
back to what i was talking aboutabout running logistics like
when people say i don't haveenough space i'm like we do it
in a postage stamp
SPEAKER_01 (11:45):
yeah i think there
are russian submarines that have
larger gyms
SPEAKER_02 (11:49):
you can like i'm the
office i'm standing in now is
half the size of my my smallgroup
SPEAKER_01 (11:53):
isn't that
incredible so listeners like
think about that think about therevenue per square foot and
daniel mentioned this before theshow so i'm going to steal
something from here but realestate isn't getting cheaper
Your rent is not going down.
This is an awesome, awesome wayto maximize revenue per square
foot because you don't need aton of space.
SPEAKER_02 (12:12):
And I want to add a
little piece to that too, is it
also is a great way to maximizewhat you pay your coaches.
This year, we had two coachesbuy houses in our neighborhood.
SPEAKER_01 (12:22):
You can't do that.
$20 an hour group class usually.
SPEAKER_02 (12:25):
It's one of the
things that I'm most proud
about.
Like both of those coaches get100% of their home income, their
own personal income from ourgym.
SPEAKER_01 (12:35):
Wow.
Yeah.
I'll ask you this and we don'thave to get into the deep weeds,
but just the high level, how doyou manage 12 people, 10 plus
two coaches in that small space?
What's the plan?
SPEAKER_02 (12:47):
So with our small
group private training, you
always pair people up becausemost of it is done in a strength
training format.
We're not doing a lot of highintensity intervals.
So we don't have to worry aboutspace.
We're not doing a lot ofexplosive or dynamic movement.
Box jumps aren't happening.
Power cleans aren't happening.
And then we role play.
So we've been running thisprogram for about four and a
half years.
(13:08):
The first year we role played.
We did logistics.
We did this and that.
So now the coaches submit theirprogramming materials.
Two weeks in advance.
And then the thing that I lookfor is, is there going to be
flow with this?
Can we run an on-ramp over herewhile we're running this?
So logistics really, really playa huge role.
And all the way down to whereyou set your squat racks up.
(13:30):
Where are your barbells?
Where's your weight tree stand?
What is in there that reallydoesn't need to be?
You can get people ridiculouslyfit.
with a small amount ofequipment.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Yeah.
So you're programming for thespace and for the audience, you
know, your avatar, you know, acoach is not programming 70 foot
sled pushes and dynamic muscleups plus snatches or something
like that.
So Amanda plus sled pushes, likethat's just not happening in
that space.
You don't necessarily need to dothat.
No, that's where the otherspaces are for.
So this is a very, verydifferent program and you can
(14:04):
maximize these small spaces.
So we've laid out essentiallylike what the benefits are, the
prerequisites We've given a lookat your program.
Let's talk about the high-levelsteps of how to sell something
like this.
So what do you do to fill aprogram?
SPEAKER_02 (14:19):
Yeah, so when I talk
to mentees about this, and this
is what I recommend peoplestarting out that don't have
this program is, first off, wewant to look, are you doing
private training?
If you're not, then nope.
And if you're not doing atwo-on-one or a three-on-one, we
need to look at that.
If we have passed all those, Irecommend people doing a beta
(14:39):
test, selling an eight-weekprogram.
The people train two times aweek, same days, same times with
specificity.
So ours typically starts with ahip thrust block on eight.
Day one and then day two isgoing to be some form of
horizontal pressing.
We'll do accessory work for theopposite on each week.
(15:00):
And then there's midline work,core work, things of that nature
in both sessions.
We're going to sell that outfirst.
and deploy that.
SPEAKER_01 (15:09):
To current members?
SPEAKER_02 (15:10):
Yep, to
SPEAKER_01 (15:11):
current members.
SPEAKER_02 (15:12):
And the deal is with
the coaches, because I don't
sell them anymore.
If we're starting a new one,they need to come to me with
three members whose problem thissolves.
One of the big mistakes,especially in CrossFit gyms, is
people try to build programsaround what coaches like to
coach and not what their membersneed.
Do not make this mistake.
SPEAKER_01 (15:31):
Yeah, it's a big
one.
SPEAKER_02 (15:32):
Within my
demographic, and I would suspect
a lot of the demographics,Handstand pushups are more of a
novelty and not actually goingto get people to the results
they want.
So don't just assume like I'mreally good at handstand
walking.
People want to learn how tohandstand walk.
Goal reviews, no sweat intros,talk to your members, make sure
like what we're deploying inthis eight week block is solving
(15:54):
the problems that people aretalking to us about.
SPEAKER_01 (15:56):
Okay.
So that's an internal plan.
Now, when we move, let's saywe're going to start looking for
outside clients.
Let's say we got some rootsdown.
We have some inside people doingthis program and we've got a
little bit of momentum.
What do we do outside?
Are you basing this now on theprescriptive model?
How are you selling people intothat program?
SPEAKER_02 (16:13):
Yeah, so we'll fast
forward four years and I want to
reiterate that.
We're fast forwarding fouryears.
This is not how you should startthe program.
We have a small group privatetraining on-ramp.
No one can come into it now.
We have 80 members in our smallgroup private training program.
To give you an idea, I have 110in my CrossFit program.
So it's big and it's not nearlyas flexible.
(16:34):
So when they come in, they havea choice.
They have a small group privatetraining on-ramp or a CrossFit
on-ramp.
They both are the same exactthing, movement pattern are
separate, then one withnutrition, one without.
That's it.
Coming into my gym, you have Twoways, yes or no to nutrition,
CrossFit or small group privatetraining.
That's it.
So we're marketing that on ourwebsite.
(16:58):
We're marketing that in all ofour emails and our social media.
We're marketing it within house.
Right now, we're looking atabout three to one small group
private training to CrossFitcoming into our gym.
That's what they're buying foron-ramps.
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
Wow.
So you're essentially at thewedding and you're just asking,
do you want beef or do you wantchicken?
And it's one of those twothings.
And then you have access pointsgoing into a well-established
program so down the linelisteners after you get this
thing established that'ssomething you can look at when
you're selling outside but thefirst step is not to do that
right now because it's temptingto say i'll just go outside put
up some ads and do this thingand make all this money daniel
(17:32):
is saying that doesn't workwe've laid out prerequisites and
he's got his experience you needto start working on this inside
so let's ask this this is aproblem solving for our
listeners what's the best way toget a new revenue stream like
this set up and what have youseen happen when gym owners
follow this plan
SPEAKER_02 (17:45):
Yeah.
So it kind of depends on whattype of gym.
And I have two really greatexamples.
One is a very, very largeCrossFit gym in Mississippi.
Steve is an absolute stud of anowner.
He's been in the business forabout 15 years.
One of the challenges he washaving is he was having some of
his demographic age out ofwanting that intensity.
And so we started building asmall group a year ago, and we
(18:09):
had a goal of selling out eightpeople in these ones.
Again, All to his currentmembers.
He's now running 10 programslike that in a gym that's 12,000
square feet.
So your traditional big boxCrossFit gym is doing this.
(18:30):
Flip side, I have a garage gymin the Bay Area with Ryan and
Christiana.
They're just amazing.
Outstanding.
Husband and wife only have threelittle kids that run around.
They were doing just one-on-onetraining and Ryan's schedule was
completely stacked.
We started pairing people up,pairing people up.
Then we ran into a calendarproblem.
(18:51):
Then we established solidbaseline.
Now he doesn't accept anyone ina three-on-one training.
or bigger.
Everybody's got to be in aminimum three-on-one.
He gets to take Wednesdays andThursday afternoon off now to go
to gymnastics with his daughter.
He took a two-week vacation inKansas with his wife to see
their family.
And now, instead of having tocover 30 clients, they're
(19:14):
talking about covering 10 to 12sessions.
SPEAKER_01 (19:17):
Wow.
So is it fair to say the averagerevenue per member in these two
gyms has shot up?
SPEAKER_02 (19:21):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
With both of them, it's big,specifically within Steve's.
SPEAKER_01 (19:26):
Right.
And you said a really coolthing.
Now, this is a very interestingthing for a we often say, OK,
you're running big group.
A good way to add more revenueis with personal training with
some personal trainers.
They're so packed that they haveno more hours.
They're just done.
And again, 40 hours of personaltraining is brutal.
Right.
Like that's a very toughschedule to keep.
what can you do you can startpairing people up and now if you
(19:47):
go back chris has talked aboutthis cooper greg glassman and
crossfit the original thing thathe did was he started doing this
and no one knows this exceptchris told you know he told this
to chris at his coffee table orin his kitchen table greg did
just starting with a couplepeople one person one-on-one
training then pairing them upthen pairing three or four and
then it spirals into the biggroup model that we all caught
(20:09):
on to but that model may not bethe best in every single case it
works really well for somepeople it works not so well for
other gyms.
So there's ways to scale up fromone-on-one PT.
There's ways to make more moneyper hour in all these different
formats.
Again, Two Brain Mentors have anexact plan for every type of
business, whether you're biggroup, small group, PT, access,
whatever it is, they can look atyour business, find your weak
(20:31):
spots, prescribe a fix, boostthose numbers up, and then go to
the next weak spot.
And away we go with tactics andtoolboxes and advice and
accountability.
The whole thing is laid out foryou.
Daniel, Do you talk to peopleabout this as a mentor
regularly?
Is this one of your specialtiesand how do people work with you?
SPEAKER_02 (20:46):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I would say I'm sought out forrequesting that.
I also do a lot of specialtycalls for the small group
private training as well withinTwo Brain.
The mentees I get oftentimes arecurated, you know, through the
sales process of like, this iswhat they're looking to do.
Let's see if Dan has someavailability to take them on as
a full-time mentee.
(21:07):
So I really enjoy working withpeople that are trying to either
combat smaller spaces.
They want to get back more time.
I mean, that's the celebration.
for me is the time.
And with the team in the BayArea, they increased their
revenue last year by 84%.
Their overhead didn't change.
84%.
Yeah, they went from between 7and 8K to more like 18.
SPEAKER_01 (21:32):
That's life-changing
numbers, right?
That's incredible stuff.
SPEAKER_02 (21:34):
They went to Disney
World.
That brings a tear to your eye,right?
They're some of my favoritehumans.
They're wonderful people.
And so being able to help peoplelike that who are like, I don't
have any more hours in the day.
I get that.
Let's fix that, right?
And so that's what we did.
SPEAKER_01 (21:51):
So we're going to
give you a starting point as we
close this show out.
I'm going to tack on one thingat the end here, but Daniel, can
you lay out your most importantprerequisites for starting one
of these programs?
Late at the beginning, let'sseal it up.
What do people need to do rightnow before they can launch this
thing?
SPEAKER_02 (22:06):
Prescriptive model,
if you're not doing that, right?
So goal reviews, no sweatintros.
SPEAKER_01 (22:10):
Link will be in the
show notes.
Put that in there for you.
SPEAKER_02 (22:13):
I mean, you
absolutely got to have that.
you need to be talking to yourmembers through email, social
media.
Google is a huge one that peopleare not posting to nearly
enough.
It is a free call to action inGoogle.
All of that is organic.
So dialing in your organicstructure, using that
information once you get peopleto start to talk to you in the
Google reviews and buildingsomething that solves their
(22:36):
problem, right?
Don't try to build somethingthat you really wanna coach.
If you don't wanna coach this,move it to a coach that does,
but solve their problems, thevalue's there, the speed is
there, then it just becomes atransaction.
SPEAKER_01 (22:50):
And my final point
tacked onto what Daniel just
said, book a call to talk to aTwo Brain mentor about this
program.
If you have questions about thisor any other adjustments to a
business model to change yourmetrics for the better, you can
get on a call.
You can talk about your businessand you can see how we can help
you do it.
So that link will also be in theshow notes.
Do click it.
It's going to take an hour ofyour time.
(23:11):
It's a huge investment.
You will see ROI on that.
I guarantee it.
Daniel, thank you so much forlaying this out for us.
I hope we get some peoplecalling you soon to talk about
it and get some more revenue.
SPEAKER_02 (23:19):
Yeah, sure enough.
I appreciate your time, Mike.
SPEAKER_01 (23:21):
Yeah, that was
Daniel Purrington.
This is Run a Profitable Gym.
I'm your host, Mike Warkman.
Thank you so much for watchingand listening.
Hit a like on this if it helpedyou out at all.
I sure hope it does.
And now here's 2Brain founder,Chris Cooper with a final
message.
SPEAKER_00 (23:32):
Hey, it's Two Brain
founder Chris Cooper with a
quick note.
We created the Gym Owners UnitedFacebook group to help you run a
profitable gym.
Thousands of gym owners justlike you have already joined.
In the group, we share soundadvice about the business of
fitness every day.
I answer questions, I run freewebinars, and I give away all
kinds of great resources to helpyou grow your gym.
(23:53):
I'd love to have you in thatgroup.
It's Gym Owners United onFacebook or go to
gymownersunited.com to join.
Do it today.
Hey!