December 11, 2025 • 26 mins
In 2015, Corey Lewis expanded to a second gym before he was ready. He ended up with two failing locations instead of one thriving facility.
This mistake nearly sunk his business. Now, as a Two-Brain mentor, Corey helps gym owners avoid feels-good-in-the-moment traps that come with severe long-term consequences.
In this episode, Corey joins Mike Warkentin to break down some of the most costly mistakes gym owners make:
✅ Expanding before systems are in place.
✅ Promoting staff too quickly.
✅ Abdicating instead of delegating.
✅ Discounting rates.
✅ Chasing shiny objects instead of caring for "the golden goose."
Corey explains how mentorship helps gym owners see past emotion to make decisions based on data.
For example, if a gym owner is avoiding a much-needed rate increase, Corey will run the numbers, lay out the plan and provide accountability. He's successfully guided dozens of Two-Brain clients through this process: None lost all their members, and all made more money.
Don't make mistakes that will take years to fix. And don't avoid correcting your errors because you don't have a plan. Get help, make smart decisions and reach your Perfect Day sooner.
Use the link below to get free tools to help you run a profitable gym!
Don't have a gym yet? Start one with help from Two-Brain—just click the link below.
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2:33 - Expanding too soon
5:44 - No systems and poor retention
10:17 - Promoting staff who aren’t ready
13:09 - How to avoid costly mistakes
20:59 - Resources to start a gym
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:02):
Confession, I solved a problem by offering a discount
so deep that I was almost payingmembers to keep training at my
gym.
SPEAKER_02 (00:12):
And I decided to expand to a second location long
before I was prepared for that.
SPEAKER_00 (00:18):
These were both costly errors.
I'm Mike Working, and that'sCorey Lewis, and we're going to
talk about very common gym ownermistakes that feel good at the
time, but turn out to havehorrible, horrible downstream
consequences.
So I've owned a fitness businesssince 2009.
Corey is the 14-year owner ofExtraMile Fitness in Missouri.
He's also a tuber mentor.
So after we lay out some of oursins, he's going to tell you how
(00:40):
he helps clients avoid similarpain.
So, Corey, you're you're readyto hit the uh hall of shame here
and see what's going on.
SPEAKER_02 (00:48):
Absolutely.
I'll lay out all my confessionsfor mistakes I made.
SPEAKER_00 (00:51):
Yeah, it's gonna be rough, and I'll start with my
quick one there.
Is like uh we started abootcamp, and that I was
operating inside a global gymand I had some clients, and then
when I started to open afacility, I had decided to, you
know, I offered to bring themover.
And because they were giving mea chance when I had really no
credibility and no experience, Iwanted to reward them.
So I gave them a founding memberrate of$84.
(01:14):
And I don't know how I came upwith that.
It was maybe like$7 times 16visits or 12 visits, or maybe it
was half of our unlimited price,which was still too low.
Whatever it was, I came up with$84 and it was not based on math
or anything like that.
I put it in place and I said itwould never change.
And I'm gonna, you know,interject here that Two Brain
literally has a plan called theFounding Members Club that helps
gym owners now launch theirbusinesses in the black on day
(01:37):
one with like 50 to 70 members.
It happens, I've seen it, it'sincredible.
This didn't exist in 2009, 2010,so I just made it up.
And when things got really bad,I realized that like I'd have
two or three of these members,and they were great people, you
know, they were awesome people,and I don't begrudge them, you
know, that discount, but I'dlook and there was two or three
of them.
They were maybe paying$15 totalfor the class, and I was paying
(01:58):
the coach 20 to 25.
I was losing money on everysingle class, and at the worst,
I was losing$5,000 a month and Ididn't know what to do.
And I wanted to be a man ofhonor, right?
So I said, okay, I'm not gonnachange their discounts, I'm not
gonna change their discounts.
The business was bleeding out,and because of that mistake, I
was going to have to shut downthe business.
Eventually, I got with a mentor,we did a rate increase, saved
(02:19):
the whole thing.
I got my staff costs in line andwe went through the analytics
and the metrics, fixed it, butthat was that mistake, honorable
at the time, felt good, hugeconsequences that almost sunk
the business.
I needed someone like you totell me not to do it.
What have you got?
SPEAKER_02 (02:33):
So that's a common one we see.
Mine was in 2015, my my locationwas thriving.
We were making money.
I thought we were crushing it,so I figured if I just open a
second location, I'm going todouble my money.
Yep.
Make all the money I ever wantedto make.
So I actually acquired alocation in 2015.
(02:53):
And not only did I make tons ofmistakes that I could have
avoided with the mentor ontaking over a gym and you know
making changes, but my focus gotpulled so much towards that
location and trying to make thatwork that my golden goose, my
original location that you knowwas thriving, that's what made
me expand.
(03:14):
Now began having staff issues,losing money and going
backwards.
And now instead of having onethriving gym, I had two that
were going backwards on me.
SPEAKER_00 (03:25):
Yeah, and that's I heard I've heard that's so
common.
When again, when I started out,we opened a gym, there were
always these like unicorns thatyou hear of out there who had
opened a second location.
We all thought, what an amazingthing.
You just double your revenue.
It just never goes like that,right?
And like you ended up exactlywhat I've heard from other
people.
You have one good gym, so youtry to double up, and you end up
both of them are mediocre orfailing.
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
Yep.
I saw others, you know, like yousaid, we see others online doing
it.
Yeah, and I thought I was reallygood at what I did, so I could
easily duplicate that.
But unfortunately, now I kickmyself.
I look back and realize all mymistakes, but it wore me into
the ground and almost sunk mygym that was making me all the
money.
SPEAKER_00 (04:04):
Yeah, killing the golden goose.
Chris Cooper's written aboutthat a number of times, and like
it's so tempting to just do thatother thing, and then all of a
sudden the the plates that arespinning over here all collapse.
Yep.
You know, I'll and I'll saythough, now that we have systems
and business best practices andtwo-brained principles and
tactics, there are gym ownerswho are able to replicate that
existing business.
(04:24):
Like Oscar Joe had one of thementors over in Sweden, is now
doing this, and there's otherslike him.
It's doable, it's just notdoable without a plan.
So if you do have a goal to runtwo businesses in our tinker
program, people do that.
Or they start a differentbusiness, or they start like,
you know, a whiskey distilleryor a sports beverage company or
real estate investing.
There are other things thatpeople do, but it's according to
(04:45):
a plan.
We didn't have that at the time,we just winged it.
SPEAKER_02 (04:47):
No, and that's what that's why I kick myself now
looking back.
Like, no, I had no SOPs.
I had no staff playbook, and Ijust figured, well, I'm really
good at running this gym, I'llbe good at running too.
And needless to say, uh, itdidn't go well.
If you could have to be able todo that, now looking back, if I
had that staff playbook andSOPs, it could have been a whole
different story.
SPEAKER_00 (05:06):
Yeah, and if you could have cloned yourself in
that founder stage, Corey Onecould have run the first one,
Corey two could have run thesecond one, it would have gone
fine, but that's the founderproblem.
You can't actually do that.
The only way to clone yourselfis to document all your systems
and then replicate those systemsin a second spot.
But we never did that.
You and I just like, uh we'lljust wing it and it'll turn out
fine.
SPEAKER_02 (05:24):
Corey one coached from 5 a.m.
to noon at one location, andthen Corey 2 coached from one
o'clock to 8 p.m.
at the other end.
That gets exhausting.
SPEAKER_00 (05:32):
And then Corey 3 probably just sat at home
staring at the carpet andwondering where his life went,
right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
What else you got?
Any other feels good uh horribleconsequence mistakes that you uh
have in the past?
SPEAKER_02 (05:43):
Unfortunately, I made a lot of them pre-two brain
and many years ago, but I wouldsay I could relate to the uh
discounting drastically to getnew members in the door.
I made that mistake like many ofus.
I would say the other bigmistake I made was, and it kind
of goes back to the systems andstaff playbook in place was
(06:03):
hiring a you know uppermanagement or GM for my gym and
not having A, any idea how topay them properly.
So I overpaid, but also B, nothaving the systems and things in
place for them to be successful.
SPEAKER_00 (06:20):
So how did you Yeah, because that's one where you you
realize you're burned out andyou're stressed, and she's like,
oh, I'll just hire someone andoffload, but then you abdicate
and abdicate instead ofdelegating.
I'm guessing that's probablywhat you did because I've done
similar stuff, not quite to thatlevel, but I did it with other
stuff where I'm like, okay,you're my programmer head coach
and you're my retention person,figure it out.
And then my retention wasterrible.
(06:40):
Did you have a similarexperience?
SPEAKER_02 (06:42):
Very similar.
Mine was out of desperation whenI had that second location.
Well, I need someone to run myfirst.
They're gonna know what to do.
I made that mistake.
They're gonna know what to dobecause I knew what to do.
unknown (06:53):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (06:53):
And yeah, I expect them to do this, I expect them
to do that, but I never gavethem the roadmap or gave them
the expectations or the systemto do it.
And then I was justdisappointed, and then kind of
like you looked at grudgingly atthe people that were paying
less.
Now I'm looking grudgingly atthem because they're not doing
what I think they should, but Inever told them what to do.
SPEAKER_00 (07:15):
And it's so tough.
Like, because you're trying tosolve that problem.
Like it probably felt good.
You're like, I'm taking a clearstep to buy back my time.
I'm hiring a manager, and oh,I'm overpaying and the work's
not getting done.
And like, same thing for me.
I I had a retention thing and Ididn't lay out any systems,
complete failure on my part.
The retention plummets into themountain, I'm losing 30 to 40
members, and I realize theretention nothing's being done,
(07:37):
but I didn't put out that systembecause it's just I would have
done it.
So I thought it was assumed andit wasn't.
And like, it's so, so, socommon.
And again, listeners, I'll tellyou again, if you're in this
position, TwoBrain now has astep-by-step plan called the
value ladder to help you buyback your time and move into
those upper level roles withoutabdicating responsibility for
the roles you're leaving.
So you're gonna documenteverything you do and you're
(07:58):
gonna hire a cleaner and tellthe cleaner, do this checklist.
And then you'll go all the wayup the chain.
Corey does this with his clientsall the time, and you can get
yourself right up to CEO and youhave general management all this
stuff, but it follows a pattern.
It's not whimsical, and here's50 grand to do some stuff that
you think will build thebusiness, right?
It just doesn't work like thatanymore.
SPEAKER_02 (08:15):
No, it's much smoother now, and it makes us
wish we had two-brained back uhwhen we opened our doors
originally.
It would have saved us someheadaches.
And now it would have made awhole lot more hard here.
SPEAKER_00 (08:24):
Yeah, that's and that's the point of the show, is
really that these early mistakessometimes and they're
well-meaning.
Like we both tried to do theright thing.
It wasn't from a position ofstupidity or greed, it was just
inexperienced with lack ofguidance.
So we made these decisions andit cost me hundreds of thousands
of dollars and years to pullmyself out of those holes.
I'm sure you have the sameexperience.
Chris Cooper's had the sameexperience, so many people have.
(08:46):
And now you can kind of justskip to the good part.
So this is like here's a this isa cool story where uh this was
back probably around the time2015 when you were thinking
about opening a gym.
That was, or second gym, thatwas kind of when I was like,
people were starting to do thatand they were starting to buy
buildings and things like that.
I'm like, oh, this is maybe agood retirement plan.
Maybe I should do this kind ofstuff.
In certain cases, it can work,obviously.
(09:06):
However, I remember sittingdown, there was a guy in my gym,
he was one of our seed clients,and he was a construction guy.
He built everything,skyscrapers, all sorts of stuff.
And I said, dude, like would itbe a good idea to build, you
know, to build a building and soI'd own it?
He's like, hell no.
He's like, Do you know the costassociated with this?
He's like, you would beunderwater for so long before
(09:26):
you'd ever make a profit, youwould have all these headaches
and problems, it would be adisaster for you.
And then he literally off thetop of his head quoted me this
per square foot building priceand was like, would you prepare
be prepared for that?
I was like, no.
Yep.
And I immediately pulled backand I realized that I talked to
an expert who knew the numbers,the metrics, the data, and had a
system, and he saved me from ahuge, huge mistake.
(09:50):
And interesting enough, that'swhat you're doing now with your
clients.
SPEAKER_02 (09:53):
Absolutely.
That's the beauty of mentoring,is now we you know, we've had
numerous probably over theyears, and it's having that
person that can help you see theactual picture that, you know,
get through all the noise andall the optimism if they're if
you want to say that, but helpyou see the actual picture and
make a knowledgeable decision,not just fly by the seat of our
(10:15):
pants like we've done.
SPEAKER_00 (10:17):
What are some of the things that you see with mentees
now?
So we're fast forwarding all the2025, we both got all our hall
of shame behind us.
What are some of the things thatyou see now, whether in you know
in the mentors group that youtalk about with other mentors or
with your own mentees, thingsthat like people want to do that
you have to just say, hey, let'spump the brakes, let's run the
numbers, and let's see whatreally should happen?
SPEAKER_02 (10:37):
I would say the biggest, kind of go back, and
this is where I think myexperience and my failures help
me prevent others, is you know,just in the last couple months,
I've had mentees come to me thatwanted to, you know, expand to
another location when they'renot quite ready for that.
Or um, I've had numerous thatwant to elevate staff.
(10:59):
A to because they're now seeingsuccess of mentoring, they're
making more money.
So their first thing is let'sjust start elevating people
without going through the propersteps to get them there.
I would say that's probably themost common thing.
It's usually around that yearmark of mentoring because
they're seeing lots of success,they're making money, and now
they start getting ahead ofthemselves a little bit, wanting
(11:21):
to promote staff that maybearen't ready or maybe not the
right person to sit in thatseat.
SPEAKER_00 (11:26):
Yeah, there are a few things more dangerous than
an entrepreneur with time onher, you know, their hands and a
little bit of extra money,right?
Because then you start thinking,like, what can I do?
And sometimes you come up withgreat ideas, but sometimes you
come up with really, you know,really terrible ones.
And like the one that you'retalking about there, like hiring
uh or advancing staff peopleabove above the systems and
above maybe even their skill ordevelopment or whatever it is,
that creates huge problemsbecause you've got these key
(11:47):
people in these smallbusinesses, and once they're
drilled into place, it's reallyhard to change things and move
them and change like it's it canbe horrible and that can cost
you years.
And some people I've heard getso frustrated they just like
burn the business down, youknow.
SPEAKER_02 (11:59):
Yeah, and it costs you good stream.
These were other mistakes I'vemade in the past.
It it takes a A, you know, Aplus or A staff member, and then
you know, if you put them in thewrong seat, that can make them
fail and we want all of ourstaff to succeed, and yes, that
helps the business succeed.
SPEAKER_00 (12:16):
Yeah, and you know, I was at a Tinker meetup one
time and I was watching uh, theywere doing like a hot seat thing
where they have one of thepeople in the middle talking
about you know their situationand what they might want to do,
and everyone kind of asksquestions and whatever.
And this was in a in a focusgroup of peers with you know
some mentee mentors thereleading as well.
But uh, this one person wastalking about she really felt
pressure to do something becauseshe had built a great business
and it was running pretty well,and it was kind of doing what it
(12:37):
was supposed to, kicking in someextra money, having everything
was good.
And so she's like, I you know, Ineed to do something.
And so she kind of startedtalking about some of the things
that she was thinking about, butshe wasn't super passionate into
any of them.
She wasn't like the drivingforce was that she felt like she
should do something becausemovement would feel good, but
ultimately the people in thegroup kind of chatted with her
and were like the best decisionyou can make right now is to
(12:59):
choose to do nothing.
Yeah.
Right?
Because you don't have the rightplan in place, you don't have a
firm direction, you don't knowwhat you want.
And you know, I thought that wasreally cool.
And that was sort of a peermentorship, and I think for you,
that's probably where you say toclients, like, well, ask you,
how do you say to clients, maybenot this, or maybe pull back or
pump the brakes?
Like, how do you talk to peoplewhen they're thinking about
something that you can see isprobably gonna be a problem?
SPEAKER_02 (13:20):
Well, I think that's something we as mentors see a
lot because you know, the gymowners we work with for years
possibly, they were grindinghard, they were working long
hours, and I've even experiencedthis.
And now, you know, we've builtthe business, we've put systems
in place, and we do have thatfree time.
And our natural instinct islet's just fill it with more
(13:42):
work.
And so I think the biggest thingI do with mentees is we just
like talk through the situation,have them really analyze it from
their perspective, and thenbreak it down, you know,
depending on what it is, does itmove the business forward
towards your perfect day?
Or is it gonna be something thattakes you further from that
(14:02):
perfect day?
I think that's one of the bestactivities we do with mentees is
that perfect day activity.
Because that bases ourdecisions.
Like, does this decision move uscloser to that or further away
from that?
Um, and then we can break itdown if we believe it moves us
forward, then we can break itdown more.
And okay, do we have the systemsin place, the staff in place to
(14:24):
expand to a second location?
Or, you know, do we have themoney allocated and the systems
in place to hire a GM?
I think it just allows for aclear mind, and then we can
actually make more, you know,knowledgeable decisions and make
better decisions in the longrun.
SPEAKER_00 (14:44):
And you know, Chris Cooper is blogging about that,
uh, I think it's coming out in aweek or so, and he's talking, he
calls it the just ask method.
And one of the things, I'll givea quick preview of what he's
talking about, is askingimportant questions.
And one of the questions that hetalked about is like, what is my
perfect day?
How do I want to live?
And exactly what you just said.
Sometimes as entrepreneurs, youfeel pressure to do something.
Everyone else is doing this, Ishould do this, or I should I
(15:06):
have some spare time, I shoulddo this.
Maybe the answer though is like,I should spend more time with my
dog or my partner or my family,or I should just relax on the
beach.
Like, that's a valid careerdecision once you've built a
successful business.
It's not always doubling down,even though you certainly can.
SPEAKER_02 (15:21):
Uh, and a lot of times we find talking with
mentees, like instead of chasingthis thing that you think is
going to make you money, maybewe need to focus on investing in
our staff, developing our staff.
SPEAKER_01 (15:32):
Yep.
SPEAKER_02 (15:33):
And are we truly, you know, a lot of times it
comes down to are we trulymaximizing our golden goose or
are we, you know, we still havesomething left in the tank
there, but let's we're wantingto chase something else.
So it's really, you know, I feellike our job as mentors is to
paint the picture for them andthen help them get to the answer
that fits them best.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
Yeah, and I saw an example of that in our one of
our leaderboards.
It was either for revenue or netorder benefit or one of the sexy
ones.
And the gym owner had a it wasjust a spectacular number, and
he's a single gym.
And he we said, Is this?
We asked him, is it consistent?
Will this number continue?
And he said, This number willcontinue.
It's actually low this monthbecause I'm significantly
investing in staff.
(16:13):
And I was like, that's wow,that's you're doubling down
inside your location to getmore, just a better team that's
going to get that golden gooserunning better.
And you don't need tonecessarily like try to
replicate that over there.
There's so much potential inthat one business that you can
like really maximize one placerather than expanding to two.
I'll ask you this when you weregoing to expand to two
businesses, were you bursting atthe seams of the first one?
SPEAKER_02 (16:35):
We were bursting at the seams when it came to
members, but then the one of theother big side effects of
expanding was it pulled my staffin multiple directions and it
did it deteriorated our productthat we were producing that made
us so successful in bursting atthe seams.
SPEAKER_00 (16:52):
Yeah, yeah.
So here's what I'll talk about.
You've laid out some of thestuff, but I'll lay this out and
you tell me what you think aboutthis.
Yep.
If people want to avoid hugemistakes, you know, stuff that
feels good right at the time,but it's a huge mistake down the
line.
My number one thing is gonna beget a mentor who can give you
honest perspective.
What do you think of that?
SPEAKER_02 (17:12):
Absolutely.
And you know, I think, and I andChris talks about this often.
All of us need a mentor for mostfacets of our life.
Um even though I mentor othergyms, I have a two-brain mentor
that I meet with on a regularbasis.
Because we all need that, youknow, that view from outside to
give us the best options for ourbusiness and to also keep us
(17:35):
focused.
Because I I'll be honest, Istill want to chase that shiny
object.
SPEAKER_00 (17:38):
Yeah, we all do.
SPEAKER_02 (17:39):
Um, but having my mentor make sure I'm focused on
what I am and making sure I'mstill aligned with my perfect
day is a game changer.
I, you know, I started with TwoBrain in 22.
I was kind of late in the game,being 10 years into owning a
gym.
I would have paid anything tostart it that earlier just
because it's that big of a gamechanger.
SPEAKER_00 (17:57):
Well, you think about even if the mentorship fee
was$100,000, you would haveavoided like several hundred
thousand dollar mistakes, right?
SPEAKER_02 (18:03):
So that oh yeah, I went and bought a second gym
that cost me uh we won't wewon't discuss how much it costs,
but a lot of money.
SPEAKER_00 (18:09):
It was more than the price of mentorship, though, I
can imagine.
SPEAKER_02 (18:12):
It would have bought me many, many, many years of
mentoring.
SPEAKER_00 (18:14):
Yeah, and that's that's the whole point here,
guys.
Is that the listeners, if you'reout there and you're struggling
with a decision, mentorship andhelp is available.
And the first thing you can dois book a call via the link in
the show notes to talk aboutwhat that might look like for
you.
And the whole, the long andshort of it is you're going to
find out about a concise planfor your business to help you
maximize growth and capital,just PR all your metrics.
(18:37):
And that's kind of what we'relooking for.
And that's the second thing thatI'll say is that I think if
you're struggling out thereright now and you don't have a
mentor, I think the problem thatyou probably need to solve is
start looking at your numbers.
Yep.
Dig into your data.
What do you think of that?
Because what happens when you'retalking to a mentee and you
start running numbers?
SPEAKER_02 (18:54):
Oh, it's a game changer.
So I would say, and you probablyagree with this, 90 plus percent
of the mentees that start withtwo-brain haven't looked at
their numbers before.
SPEAKER_00 (19:02):
I hadn't.
SPEAKER_02 (19:03):
Yeah.
And I hadn't, you know, Iavoided them because especially
when times got rough, because Ididn't want to know what the
true picture was.
And I think it just not onlydoes it paint a clearer picture,
it allows us to identify thebiggest opportunity.
You know, when we have ournumbers, it tells us what we
actually need to address.
(19:25):
And most gym owners out therethink we only need to address
getting more members in thedoor.
But when we have our numberslaid out, then it lets us know
maybe we need to work oncharging more.
Like you, you know, maybe are weundercharging?
Are we not keeping people longenough?
Um, it allows us to make betterdecisions that actually move the
needle forward instead of justconstantly chasing new members
(19:47):
for the rest of our lives.
SPEAKER_00 (19:48):
Yeah, and someone, if someone had sat down, like if
I had sat down with you in 2009or 11, 11 when I opened the
physical location, and I'd said,hey, I want to offer this
founding member rate at 84bucks.
What you would probably say tome is like, let's run the
numbers and see how manymemberships you need to sell to
break even to pay for all thestuff that you're buying right
(20:09):
now and your lease and all thesenew things and your staff.
84 doesn't sound like a goodplan.
150 at the full price does notsound like a good plan.
And let's put a mark, let's getthe real numbers in place.
Instead, I just guessed.
Like I made those numbers up.
I literally looked at anothergym, I was like, nah, close
enough and whatever.
It was gutting.
And I ended up, I've told thestory before, but I ran the
(20:30):
numbers by 2013.
I knew that I needed to do arate increase.
I didn't do it for five years,but it was literally in my
software.
I just never pulled the trigger.
$100,000 mistake.
I could have had that money inmy bank account, and I didn't do
it because no one told me topull the trigger until I
actually got a mentor who showedme exactly how to roll out a
rate increase.
And guess what?
(20:51):
When I did it, I didn't lose asingle member.
My business didn't go under, andI earned more money, and my
stress went down.
SPEAKER_02 (20:58):
Well, it actually made me smile when you were
telling the founder storybecause there was a gym not too
far from me in St.
Louis that you know she was asmart gym owner.
She got with Two Brain beforeshe opened.
SPEAKER_00 (21:10):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (21:11):
And I think when I met with her right after she
opened, she opened with like 60or 70 members and was
profitable.
And it made me jealous.
I opened with a couple ofmembers and was not profitable
for a very long time.
SPEAKER_00 (21:22):
Yeah, I had 11 and I had an Excel spreadsheet and I
had an envelope where you putyour checks on the door or cash
payments every month if you feltlike it.
That's literally how it went.
It was it was a grind, and likethe only reason I got through
was because we were the like oneof two gyms doing CrossFit in a
big city.
And I got by just because ofthat.
And then when business gottough, I had to get by because
(21:43):
of TwoBrain.
And so that changed everything.
You mentioned something reallycool starting a gym with
TwoBrain.
The start of gym course and freeresources are available.
I'll put a link in the shownotes.
You can go there and take a lookat that.
If you are thinking aboutstarting a gym right now and do
not want to make$100,000 10-yearunraveling mistakes, let's go
there.
Click that link down there.
Corey, anything else, any otherfree resources?
(22:04):
And I'm gonna point to the bigforum that we have for gym
owners.
Do you uh spend a bit of time inGym Owners United and see what's
going on in there?
SPEAKER_02 (22:11):
I do.
Chris has always thrown up goodinfo.
I think that the community as awhole ask good questions, but
they also ask a lot of questionsthat I know a mentor could help
them get through a lot of theirheartache a lot faster.
But I think the the resourcethat I use, I'm using with
several mentees right now, andI've used for years is like you
talked about the rate increasetoolkit item that TwoBrain
(22:34):
produces is a game changerbecause not only does it allow
you to make an intelligentdecision on how much to raise,
but it walks you through thesteps of what needs to be done
to avoid.
I we both probably heard thehorror stories of people losing
half their members doing a rateincrease.
And I've done now rate increaseswith over probably two dozen
(22:56):
mines, and we haven't losthardly any members.
So and they're all making a lotmore money now in serving the
clients they want to serve.
So it's a beautiful thing.
SPEAKER_00 (23:04):
And I think like your experience is not out of
line.
Uh, Greg Stroud, one of ourlongest serving two-brain
mentors, I feel like he's done,I think it's 60 or 80 rate
increases.
Every single one went fine.
Nobody lost their members,nobody went under all those gyms
did better.
The plan works, it's availablefor two-brain clients.
But I will tell you this,listeners, if you want to take a
look at a high high-speedversion of that plan, a primer,
(23:25):
DM Chris Cooper head atgymownersunited.com right now.
Look up Cooper and ask him forthe rate increase guide, and
he'll help you out with that.
And it's not the full packagefor two-brain clients,
obviously, with the support of amentor, but it can get you
started poking in the rightdirection.
Uh I'm also going to push youguys over to another package,
uh, goldenhourchallenge.com.
(23:45):
I'll put a link in the shownotes to that as well.
That is Chris Cooper's attemptto get you to focus for one hour
a day and do one thing to growyour business before you do
anything else.
So if you head there, you canget a free resource hub, access
to a free resource hub, andyou'll get a bunch of stuff that
Chris will teach you how tofocus and give you some ideas on
exactly what to do.
But if all that stuff isn'tmoving the needle, because
(24:07):
again, it takes somebody to holdyou accountable, you're gonna
want to work with someone likeCorey.
So, Corey, what is the best wayfor people to get in touch with
you?
SPEAKER_02 (24:15):
Uh, they could send me an email at Corey C O R E Y
at TwoBrain Business.com.
I'd love to help people and uhthe entire team here at
TwoBrain, we all are mentorsbecause we want to see other
gyms win.
That's what fills our cup andthat's what helped, you know,
motivates us to get on the callsto help mentors or to help our
mentees through difficult timesat times.
(24:37):
Uh, we want to see them win justas bad as we want to win at our
own gyms.
So we'd love to help as manygyms as we can.
SPEAKER_00 (24:42):
If you want to take the first step today, book a
call, link in the show notes,head down there, and you will
match up with someone who canchat with you about your
business and give you some ideasabout how mentor can help you
supercharge that, avoid badmistakes, improve your metrics,
and not lay bad tracks in thewrong direction that are gonna
make you come on the show withme and Corey in five years and
tell us I should have listenedto you then.
SPEAKER_02 (25:02):
Yep.
And have you achieved thatperfect day so we can all enjoy
life a little better.
SPEAKER_00 (25:06):
That's the one.
Corey, thanks so much for beinghere and sharing your story.
I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02 (25:10):
Always a pleasure, sir.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (25:12):
You do not have to suffer because of silly
mistakes.
Skip right to the correct answerwith a mentor like Corey.
Again, book a call via the linkin the show notes.
That was Corey Lewis.
This is Runner Prophet William.
I'm your host, Mike Borkin, andplease hit subscribe on your way
out the door with my thanks forwatching and listening.
And now here's Tubrain FounderChris Cooper with a final
message.
SPEAKER_01 (25:30):
Hey, it's Tubrain 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.
(25:51):
I'd love to have you in thatgroup.
It's Gym Owners United onFacebook or go to gym
ownersunited.com to join.
Do it today.
Confession, I solved a problem by offering a discount
so deep that I was almost payingmembers to keep training at my
gym.
SPEAKER_02 (00:12):
And I decided to expand to a second location long
before I was prepared for that.
SPEAKER_00 (00:18):
These were both costly errors.
I'm Mike Working, and that'sCorey Lewis, and we're going to
talk about very common gym ownermistakes that feel good at the
time, but turn out to havehorrible, horrible downstream
consequences.
So I've owned a fitness businesssince 2009.
Corey is the 14-year owner ofExtraMile Fitness in Missouri.
He's also a tuber mentor.
So after we lay out some of oursins, he's going to tell you how
(00:40):
he helps clients avoid similarpain.
So, Corey, you're you're readyto hit the uh hall of shame here
and see what's going on.
SPEAKER_02 (00:48):
Absolutely.
I'll lay out all my confessionsfor mistakes I made.
SPEAKER_00 (00:51):
Yeah, it's gonna be rough, and I'll start with my
quick one there.
Is like uh we started abootcamp, and that I was
operating inside a global gymand I had some clients, and then
when I started to open afacility, I had decided to, you
know, I offered to bring themover.
And because they were giving mea chance when I had really no
credibility and no experience, Iwanted to reward them.
So I gave them a founding memberrate of$84.
(01:14):
And I don't know how I came upwith that.
It was maybe like$7 times 16visits or 12 visits, or maybe it
was half of our unlimited price,which was still too low.
Whatever it was, I came up with$84 and it was not based on math
or anything like that.
I put it in place and I said itwould never change.
And I'm gonna, you know,interject here that Two Brain
literally has a plan called theFounding Members Club that helps
gym owners now launch theirbusinesses in the black on day
(01:37):
one with like 50 to 70 members.
It happens, I've seen it, it'sincredible.
This didn't exist in 2009, 2010,so I just made it up.
And when things got really bad,I realized that like I'd have
two or three of these members,and they were great people, you
know, they were awesome people,and I don't begrudge them, you
know, that discount, but I'dlook and there was two or three
of them.
They were maybe paying$15 totalfor the class, and I was paying
(01:58):
the coach 20 to 25.
I was losing money on everysingle class, and at the worst,
I was losing$5,000 a month and Ididn't know what to do.
And I wanted to be a man ofhonor, right?
So I said, okay, I'm not gonnachange their discounts, I'm not
gonna change their discounts.
The business was bleeding out,and because of that mistake, I
was going to have to shut downthe business.
Eventually, I got with a mentor,we did a rate increase, saved
(02:19):
the whole thing.
I got my staff costs in line andwe went through the analytics
and the metrics, fixed it, butthat was that mistake, honorable
at the time, felt good, hugeconsequences that almost sunk
the business.
I needed someone like you totell me not to do it.
What have you got?
SPEAKER_02 (02:33):
So that's a common one we see.
Mine was in 2015, my my locationwas thriving.
We were making money.
I thought we were crushing it,so I figured if I just open a
second location, I'm going todouble my money.
Yep.
Make all the money I ever wantedto make.
So I actually acquired alocation in 2015.
(02:53):
And not only did I make tons ofmistakes that I could have
avoided with the mentor ontaking over a gym and you know
making changes, but my focus gotpulled so much towards that
location and trying to make thatwork that my golden goose, my
original location that you knowwas thriving, that's what made
me expand.
(03:14):
Now began having staff issues,losing money and going
backwards.
And now instead of having onethriving gym, I had two that
were going backwards on me.
SPEAKER_00 (03:25):
Yeah, and that's I heard I've heard that's so
common.
When again, when I started out,we opened a gym, there were
always these like unicorns thatyou hear of out there who had
opened a second location.
We all thought, what an amazingthing.
You just double your revenue.
It just never goes like that,right?
And like you ended up exactlywhat I've heard from other
people.
You have one good gym, so youtry to double up, and you end up
both of them are mediocre orfailing.
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
Yep.
I saw others, you know, like yousaid, we see others online doing
it.
Yeah, and I thought I was reallygood at what I did, so I could
easily duplicate that.
But unfortunately, now I kickmyself.
I look back and realize all mymistakes, but it wore me into
the ground and almost sunk mygym that was making me all the
money.
SPEAKER_00 (04:04):
Yeah, killing the golden goose.
Chris Cooper's written aboutthat a number of times, and like
it's so tempting to just do thatother thing, and then all of a
sudden the the plates that arespinning over here all collapse.
Yep.
You know, I'll and I'll saythough, now that we have systems
and business best practices andtwo-brained principles and
tactics, there are gym ownerswho are able to replicate that
existing business.
(04:24):
Like Oscar Joe had one of thementors over in Sweden, is now
doing this, and there's otherslike him.
It's doable, it's just notdoable without a plan.
So if you do have a goal to runtwo businesses in our tinker
program, people do that.
Or they start a differentbusiness, or they start like,
you know, a whiskey distilleryor a sports beverage company or
real estate investing.
There are other things thatpeople do, but it's according to
(04:45):
a plan.
We didn't have that at the time,we just winged it.
SPEAKER_02 (04:47):
No, and that's what that's why I kick myself now
looking back.
Like, no, I had no SOPs.
I had no staff playbook, and Ijust figured, well, I'm really
good at running this gym, I'llbe good at running too.
And needless to say, uh, itdidn't go well.
If you could have to be able todo that, now looking back, if I
had that staff playbook andSOPs, it could have been a whole
different story.
SPEAKER_00 (05:06):
Yeah, and if you could have cloned yourself in
that founder stage, Corey Onecould have run the first one,
Corey two could have run thesecond one, it would have gone
fine, but that's the founderproblem.
You can't actually do that.
The only way to clone yourselfis to document all your systems
and then replicate those systemsin a second spot.
But we never did that.
You and I just like, uh we'lljust wing it and it'll turn out
fine.
SPEAKER_02 (05:24):
Corey one coached from 5 a.m.
to noon at one location, andthen Corey 2 coached from one
o'clock to 8 p.m.
at the other end.
That gets exhausting.
SPEAKER_00 (05:32):
And then Corey 3 probably just sat at home
staring at the carpet andwondering where his life went,
right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
What else you got?
Any other feels good uh horribleconsequence mistakes that you uh
have in the past?
SPEAKER_02 (05:43):
Unfortunately, I made a lot of them pre-two brain
and many years ago, but I wouldsay I could relate to the uh
discounting drastically to getnew members in the door.
I made that mistake like many ofus.
I would say the other bigmistake I made was, and it kind
of goes back to the systems andstaff playbook in place was
(06:03):
hiring a you know uppermanagement or GM for my gym and
not having A, any idea how topay them properly.
So I overpaid, but also B, nothaving the systems and things in
place for them to be successful.
SPEAKER_00 (06:20):
So how did you Yeah, because that's one where you you
realize you're burned out andyou're stressed, and she's like,
oh, I'll just hire someone andoffload, but then you abdicate
and abdicate instead ofdelegating.
I'm guessing that's probablywhat you did because I've done
similar stuff, not quite to thatlevel, but I did it with other
stuff where I'm like, okay,you're my programmer head coach
and you're my retention person,figure it out.
And then my retention wasterrible.
(06:40):
Did you have a similarexperience?
SPEAKER_02 (06:42):
Very similar.
Mine was out of desperation whenI had that second location.
Well, I need someone to run myfirst.
They're gonna know what to do.
I made that mistake.
They're gonna know what to dobecause I knew what to do.
unknown (06:53):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (06:53):
And yeah, I expect them to do this, I expect them
to do that, but I never gavethem the roadmap or gave them
the expectations or the systemto do it.
And then I was justdisappointed, and then kind of
like you looked at grudgingly atthe people that were paying
less.
Now I'm looking grudgingly atthem because they're not doing
what I think they should, but Inever told them what to do.
SPEAKER_00 (07:15):
And it's so tough.
Like, because you're trying tosolve that problem.
Like it probably felt good.
You're like, I'm taking a clearstep to buy back my time.
I'm hiring a manager, and oh,I'm overpaying and the work's
not getting done.
And like, same thing for me.
I I had a retention thing and Ididn't lay out any systems,
complete failure on my part.
The retention plummets into themountain, I'm losing 30 to 40
members, and I realize theretention nothing's being done,
(07:37):
but I didn't put out that systembecause it's just I would have
done it.
So I thought it was assumed andit wasn't.
And like, it's so, so, socommon.
And again, listeners, I'll tellyou again, if you're in this
position, TwoBrain now has astep-by-step plan called the
value ladder to help you buyback your time and move into
those upper level roles withoutabdicating responsibility for
the roles you're leaving.
So you're gonna documenteverything you do and you're
(07:58):
gonna hire a cleaner and tellthe cleaner, do this checklist.
And then you'll go all the wayup the chain.
Corey does this with his clientsall the time, and you can get
yourself right up to CEO and youhave general management all this
stuff, but it follows a pattern.
It's not whimsical, and here's50 grand to do some stuff that
you think will build thebusiness, right?
It just doesn't work like thatanymore.
SPEAKER_02 (08:15):
No, it's much smoother now, and it makes us
wish we had two-brained back uhwhen we opened our doors
originally.
It would have saved us someheadaches.
And now it would have made awhole lot more hard here.
SPEAKER_00 (08:24):
Yeah, that's and that's the point of the show, is
really that these early mistakessometimes and they're
well-meaning.
Like we both tried to do theright thing.
It wasn't from a position ofstupidity or greed, it was just
inexperienced with lack ofguidance.
So we made these decisions andit cost me hundreds of thousands
of dollars and years to pullmyself out of those holes.
I'm sure you have the sameexperience.
Chris Cooper's had the sameexperience, so many people have.
(08:46):
And now you can kind of justskip to the good part.
So this is like here's a this isa cool story where uh this was
back probably around the time2015 when you were thinking
about opening a gym.
That was, or second gym, thatwas kind of when I was like,
people were starting to do thatand they were starting to buy
buildings and things like that.
I'm like, oh, this is maybe agood retirement plan.
Maybe I should do this kind ofstuff.
In certain cases, it can work,obviously.
(09:06):
However, I remember sittingdown, there was a guy in my gym,
he was one of our seed clients,and he was a construction guy.
He built everything,skyscrapers, all sorts of stuff.
And I said, dude, like would itbe a good idea to build, you
know, to build a building and soI'd own it?
He's like, hell no.
He's like, Do you know the costassociated with this?
He's like, you would beunderwater for so long before
(09:26):
you'd ever make a profit, youwould have all these headaches
and problems, it would be adisaster for you.
And then he literally off thetop of his head quoted me this
per square foot building priceand was like, would you prepare
be prepared for that?
I was like, no.
Yep.
And I immediately pulled backand I realized that I talked to
an expert who knew the numbers,the metrics, the data, and had a
system, and he saved me from ahuge, huge mistake.
(09:50):
And interesting enough, that'swhat you're doing now with your
clients.
SPEAKER_02 (09:53):
Absolutely.
That's the beauty of mentoring,is now we you know, we've had
numerous probably over theyears, and it's having that
person that can help you see theactual picture that, you know,
get through all the noise andall the optimism if they're if
you want to say that, but helpyou see the actual picture and
make a knowledgeable decision,not just fly by the seat of our
(10:15):
pants like we've done.
SPEAKER_00 (10:17):
What are some of the things that you see with mentees
now?
So we're fast forwarding all the2025, we both got all our hall
of shame behind us.
What are some of the things thatyou see now, whether in you know
in the mentors group that youtalk about with other mentors or
with your own mentees, thingsthat like people want to do that
you have to just say, hey, let'spump the brakes, let's run the
numbers, and let's see whatreally should happen?
SPEAKER_02 (10:37):
I would say the biggest, kind of go back, and
this is where I think myexperience and my failures help
me prevent others, is you know,just in the last couple months,
I've had mentees come to me thatwanted to, you know, expand to
another location when they'renot quite ready for that.
Or um, I've had numerous thatwant to elevate staff.
(10:59):
A to because they're now seeingsuccess of mentoring, they're
making more money.
So their first thing is let'sjust start elevating people
without going through the propersteps to get them there.
I would say that's probably themost common thing.
It's usually around that yearmark of mentoring because
they're seeing lots of success,they're making money, and now
they start getting ahead ofthemselves a little bit, wanting
(11:21):
to promote staff that maybearen't ready or maybe not the
right person to sit in thatseat.
SPEAKER_00 (11:26):
Yeah, there are a few things more dangerous than
an entrepreneur with time onher, you know, their hands and a
little bit of extra money,right?
Because then you start thinking,like, what can I do?
And sometimes you come up withgreat ideas, but sometimes you
come up with really, you know,really terrible ones.
And like the one that you'retalking about there, like hiring
uh or advancing staff peopleabove above the systems and
above maybe even their skill ordevelopment or whatever it is,
that creates huge problemsbecause you've got these key
(11:47):
people in these smallbusinesses, and once they're
drilled into place, it's reallyhard to change things and move
them and change like it's it canbe horrible and that can cost
you years.
And some people I've heard getso frustrated they just like
burn the business down, youknow.
SPEAKER_02 (11:59):
Yeah, and it costs you good stream.
These were other mistakes I'vemade in the past.
It it takes a A, you know, Aplus or A staff member, and then
you know, if you put them in thewrong seat, that can make them
fail and we want all of ourstaff to succeed, and yes, that
helps the business succeed.
SPEAKER_00 (12:16):
Yeah, and you know, I was at a Tinker meetup one
time and I was watching uh, theywere doing like a hot seat thing
where they have one of thepeople in the middle talking
about you know their situationand what they might want to do,
and everyone kind of asksquestions and whatever.
And this was in a in a focusgroup of peers with you know
some mentee mentors thereleading as well.
But uh, this one person wastalking about she really felt
pressure to do something becauseshe had built a great business
and it was running pretty well,and it was kind of doing what it
(12:37):
was supposed to, kicking in someextra money, having everything
was good.
And so she's like, I you know, Ineed to do something.
And so she kind of startedtalking about some of the things
that she was thinking about, butshe wasn't super passionate into
any of them.
She wasn't like the drivingforce was that she felt like she
should do something becausemovement would feel good, but
ultimately the people in thegroup kind of chatted with her
and were like the best decisionyou can make right now is to
(12:59):
choose to do nothing.
Yeah.
Right?
Because you don't have the rightplan in place, you don't have a
firm direction, you don't knowwhat you want.
And you know, I thought that wasreally cool.
And that was sort of a peermentorship, and I think for you,
that's probably where you say toclients, like, well, ask you,
how do you say to clients, maybenot this, or maybe pull back or
pump the brakes?
Like, how do you talk to peoplewhen they're thinking about
something that you can see isprobably gonna be a problem?
SPEAKER_02 (13:20):
Well, I think that's something we as mentors see a
lot because you know, the gymowners we work with for years
possibly, they were grindinghard, they were working long
hours, and I've even experiencedthis.
And now, you know, we've builtthe business, we've put systems
in place, and we do have thatfree time.
And our natural instinct islet's just fill it with more
(13:42):
work.
And so I think the biggest thingI do with mentees is we just
like talk through the situation,have them really analyze it from
their perspective, and thenbreak it down, you know,
depending on what it is, does itmove the business forward
towards your perfect day?
Or is it gonna be something thattakes you further from that
(14:02):
perfect day?
I think that's one of the bestactivities we do with mentees is
that perfect day activity.
Because that bases ourdecisions.
Like, does this decision move uscloser to that or further away
from that?
Um, and then we can break itdown if we believe it moves us
forward, then we can break itdown more.
And okay, do we have the systemsin place, the staff in place to
(14:24):
expand to a second location?
Or, you know, do we have themoney allocated and the systems
in place to hire a GM?
I think it just allows for aclear mind, and then we can
actually make more, you know,knowledgeable decisions and make
better decisions in the longrun.
SPEAKER_00 (14:44):
And you know, Chris Cooper is blogging about that,
uh, I think it's coming out in aweek or so, and he's talking, he
calls it the just ask method.
And one of the things, I'll givea quick preview of what he's
talking about, is askingimportant questions.
And one of the questions that hetalked about is like, what is my
perfect day?
How do I want to live?
And exactly what you just said.
Sometimes as entrepreneurs, youfeel pressure to do something.
Everyone else is doing this, Ishould do this, or I should I
(15:06):
have some spare time, I shoulddo this.
Maybe the answer though is like,I should spend more time with my
dog or my partner or my family,or I should just relax on the
beach.
Like, that's a valid careerdecision once you've built a
successful business.
It's not always doubling down,even though you certainly can.
SPEAKER_02 (15:21):
Uh, and a lot of times we find talking with
mentees, like instead of chasingthis thing that you think is
going to make you money, maybewe need to focus on investing in
our staff, developing our staff.
SPEAKER_01 (15:32):
Yep.
SPEAKER_02 (15:33):
And are we truly, you know, a lot of times it
comes down to are we trulymaximizing our golden goose or
are we, you know, we still havesomething left in the tank
there, but let's we're wantingto chase something else.
So it's really, you know, I feellike our job as mentors is to
paint the picture for them andthen help them get to the answer
that fits them best.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
Yeah, and I saw an example of that in our one of
our leaderboards.
It was either for revenue or netorder benefit or one of the sexy
ones.
And the gym owner had a it wasjust a spectacular number, and
he's a single gym.
And he we said, Is this?
We asked him, is it consistent?
Will this number continue?
And he said, This number willcontinue.
It's actually low this monthbecause I'm significantly
investing in staff.
(16:13):
And I was like, that's wow,that's you're doubling down
inside your location to getmore, just a better team that's
going to get that golden gooserunning better.
And you don't need tonecessarily like try to
replicate that over there.
There's so much potential inthat one business that you can
like really maximize one placerather than expanding to two.
I'll ask you this when you weregoing to expand to two
businesses, were you bursting atthe seams of the first one?
SPEAKER_02 (16:35):
We were bursting at the seams when it came to
members, but then the one of theother big side effects of
expanding was it pulled my staffin multiple directions and it
did it deteriorated our productthat we were producing that made
us so successful in bursting atthe seams.
SPEAKER_00 (16:52):
Yeah, yeah.
So here's what I'll talk about.
You've laid out some of thestuff, but I'll lay this out and
you tell me what you think aboutthis.
Yep.
If people want to avoid hugemistakes, you know, stuff that
feels good right at the time,but it's a huge mistake down the
line.
My number one thing is gonna beget a mentor who can give you
honest perspective.
What do you think of that?
SPEAKER_02 (17:12):
Absolutely.
And you know, I think, and I andChris talks about this often.
All of us need a mentor for mostfacets of our life.
Um even though I mentor othergyms, I have a two-brain mentor
that I meet with on a regularbasis.
Because we all need that, youknow, that view from outside to
give us the best options for ourbusiness and to also keep us
(17:35):
focused.
Because I I'll be honest, Istill want to chase that shiny
object.
SPEAKER_00 (17:38):
Yeah, we all do.
SPEAKER_02 (17:39):
Um, but having my mentor make sure I'm focused on
what I am and making sure I'mstill aligned with my perfect
day is a game changer.
I, you know, I started with TwoBrain in 22.
I was kind of late in the game,being 10 years into owning a
gym.
I would have paid anything tostart it that earlier just
because it's that big of a gamechanger.
SPEAKER_00 (17:57):
Well, you think about even if the mentorship fee
was$100,000, you would haveavoided like several hundred
thousand dollar mistakes, right?
SPEAKER_02 (18:03):
So that oh yeah, I went and bought a second gym
that cost me uh we won't wewon't discuss how much it costs,
but a lot of money.
SPEAKER_00 (18:09):
It was more than the price of mentorship, though, I
can imagine.
SPEAKER_02 (18:12):
It would have bought me many, many, many years of
mentoring.
SPEAKER_00 (18:14):
Yeah, and that's that's the whole point here,
guys.
Is that the listeners, if you'reout there and you're struggling
with a decision, mentorship andhelp is available.
And the first thing you can dois book a call via the link in
the show notes to talk aboutwhat that might look like for
you.
And the whole, the long andshort of it is you're going to
find out about a concise planfor your business to help you
maximize growth and capital,just PR all your metrics.
(18:37):
And that's kind of what we'relooking for.
And that's the second thing thatI'll say is that I think if
you're struggling out thereright now and you don't have a
mentor, I think the problem thatyou probably need to solve is
start looking at your numbers.
Yep.
Dig into your data.
What do you think of that?
Because what happens when you'retalking to a mentee and you
start running numbers?
SPEAKER_02 (18:54):
Oh, it's a game changer.
So I would say, and you probablyagree with this, 90 plus percent
of the mentees that start withtwo-brain haven't looked at
their numbers before.
SPEAKER_00 (19:02):
I hadn't.
SPEAKER_02 (19:03):
Yeah.
And I hadn't, you know, Iavoided them because especially
when times got rough, because Ididn't want to know what the
true picture was.
And I think it just not onlydoes it paint a clearer picture,
it allows us to identify thebiggest opportunity.
You know, when we have ournumbers, it tells us what we
actually need to address.
(19:25):
And most gym owners out therethink we only need to address
getting more members in thedoor.
But when we have our numberslaid out, then it lets us know
maybe we need to work oncharging more.
Like you, you know, maybe are weundercharging?
Are we not keeping people longenough?
Um, it allows us to make betterdecisions that actually move the
needle forward instead of justconstantly chasing new members
(19:47):
for the rest of our lives.
SPEAKER_00 (19:48):
Yeah, and someone, if someone had sat down, like if
I had sat down with you in 2009or 11, 11 when I opened the
physical location, and I'd said,hey, I want to offer this
founding member rate at 84bucks.
What you would probably say tome is like, let's run the
numbers and see how manymemberships you need to sell to
break even to pay for all thestuff that you're buying right
(20:09):
now and your lease and all thesenew things and your staff.
84 doesn't sound like a goodplan.
150 at the full price does notsound like a good plan.
And let's put a mark, let's getthe real numbers in place.
Instead, I just guessed.
Like I made those numbers up.
I literally looked at anothergym, I was like, nah, close
enough and whatever.
It was gutting.
And I ended up, I've told thestory before, but I ran the
(20:30):
numbers by 2013.
I knew that I needed to do arate increase.
I didn't do it for five years,but it was literally in my
software.
I just never pulled the trigger.
$100,000 mistake.
I could have had that money inmy bank account, and I didn't do
it because no one told me topull the trigger until I
actually got a mentor who showedme exactly how to roll out a
rate increase.
And guess what?
(20:51):
When I did it, I didn't lose asingle member.
My business didn't go under, andI earned more money, and my
stress went down.
SPEAKER_02 (20:58):
Well, it actually made me smile when you were
telling the founder storybecause there was a gym not too
far from me in St.
Louis that you know she was asmart gym owner.
She got with Two Brain beforeshe opened.
SPEAKER_00 (21:10):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (21:11):
And I think when I met with her right after she
opened, she opened with like 60or 70 members and was
profitable.
And it made me jealous.
I opened with a couple ofmembers and was not profitable
for a very long time.
SPEAKER_00 (21:22):
Yeah, I had 11 and I had an Excel spreadsheet and I
had an envelope where you putyour checks on the door or cash
payments every month if you feltlike it.
That's literally how it went.
It was it was a grind, and likethe only reason I got through
was because we were the like oneof two gyms doing CrossFit in a
big city.
And I got by just because ofthat.
And then when business gottough, I had to get by because
(21:43):
of TwoBrain.
And so that changed everything.
You mentioned something reallycool starting a gym with
TwoBrain.
The start of gym course and freeresources are available.
I'll put a link in the shownotes.
You can go there and take a lookat that.
If you are thinking aboutstarting a gym right now and do
not want to make$100,000 10-yearunraveling mistakes, let's go
there.
Click that link down there.
Corey, anything else, any otherfree resources?
(22:04):
And I'm gonna point to the bigforum that we have for gym
owners.
Do you uh spend a bit of time inGym Owners United and see what's
going on in there?
SPEAKER_02 (22:11):
I do.
Chris has always thrown up goodinfo.
I think that the community as awhole ask good questions, but
they also ask a lot of questionsthat I know a mentor could help
them get through a lot of theirheartache a lot faster.
But I think the the resourcethat I use, I'm using with
several mentees right now, andI've used for years is like you
talked about the rate increasetoolkit item that TwoBrain
(22:34):
produces is a game changerbecause not only does it allow
you to make an intelligentdecision on how much to raise,
but it walks you through thesteps of what needs to be done
to avoid.
I we both probably heard thehorror stories of people losing
half their members doing a rateincrease.
And I've done now rate increaseswith over probably two dozen
(22:56):
mines, and we haven't losthardly any members.
So and they're all making a lotmore money now in serving the
clients they want to serve.
So it's a beautiful thing.
SPEAKER_00 (23:04):
And I think like your experience is not out of
line.
Uh, Greg Stroud, one of ourlongest serving two-brain
mentors, I feel like he's done,I think it's 60 or 80 rate
increases.
Every single one went fine.
Nobody lost their members,nobody went under all those gyms
did better.
The plan works, it's availablefor two-brain clients.
But I will tell you this,listeners, if you want to take a
look at a high high-speedversion of that plan, a primer,
(23:25):
DM Chris Cooper head atgymownersunited.com right now.
Look up Cooper and ask him forthe rate increase guide, and
he'll help you out with that.
And it's not the full packagefor two-brain clients,
obviously, with the support of amentor, but it can get you
started poking in the rightdirection.
Uh I'm also going to push youguys over to another package,
uh, goldenhourchallenge.com.
(23:45):
I'll put a link in the shownotes to that as well.
That is Chris Cooper's attemptto get you to focus for one hour
a day and do one thing to growyour business before you do
anything else.
So if you head there, you canget a free resource hub, access
to a free resource hub, andyou'll get a bunch of stuff that
Chris will teach you how tofocus and give you some ideas on
exactly what to do.
But if all that stuff isn'tmoving the needle, because
(24:07):
again, it takes somebody to holdyou accountable, you're gonna
want to work with someone likeCorey.
So, Corey, what is the best wayfor people to get in touch with
you?
SPEAKER_02 (24:15):
Uh, they could send me an email at Corey C O R E Y
at TwoBrain Business.com.
I'd love to help people and uhthe entire team here at
TwoBrain, we all are mentorsbecause we want to see other
gyms win.
That's what fills our cup andthat's what helped, you know,
motivates us to get on the callsto help mentors or to help our
mentees through difficult timesat times.
(24:37):
Uh, we want to see them win justas bad as we want to win at our
own gyms.
So we'd love to help as manygyms as we can.
SPEAKER_00 (24:42):
If you want to take the first step today, book a
call, link in the show notes,head down there, and you will
match up with someone who canchat with you about your
business and give you some ideasabout how mentor can help you
supercharge that, avoid badmistakes, improve your metrics,
and not lay bad tracks in thewrong direction that are gonna
make you come on the show withme and Corey in five years and
tell us I should have listenedto you then.
SPEAKER_02 (25:02):
Yep.
And have you achieved thatperfect day so we can all enjoy
life a little better.
SPEAKER_00 (25:06):
That's the one.
Corey, thanks so much for beinghere and sharing your story.
I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02 (25:10):
Always a pleasure, sir.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (25:12):
You do not have to suffer because of silly
mistakes.
Skip right to the correct answerwith a mentor like Corey.
Again, book a call via the linkin the show notes.
That was Corey Lewis.
This is Runner Prophet William.
I'm your host, Mike Borkin, andplease hit subscribe on your way
out the door with my thanks forwatching and listening.
And now here's Tubrain FounderChris Cooper with a final
message.
SPEAKER_01 (25:30):
Hey, it's Tubrain 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.
(25:51):
I'd love to have you in thatgroup.
It's Gym Owners United onFacebook or go to gym
ownersunited.com to join.
Do it today.
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