Is your Fitness Equipment attracting New Members? Further Insights

In an earlier post we had questioned whether the fitness equipment in your gym was helping you attract new members?

We had also talked about how good fitness equipment is critical to success and that it could be a false economy to delay making the decision until your membership numbers (and fees!) fall to dangerous levels.

We are always looking for feedback on the blog, so we were really pleased when we got a comment from RealRyder President – Sean Harrington! Sean was responding, not in his capacity as President, but drawing from his previous experience as a gym owner.

In fact we got a whole blog post with some very interesting insights into the financial realities of running a gym, from someone with a huge amount of experience. Rather than stealing his thunder read Sean’s thoughts on this subject, I think he really highlights the value of buying good equipment:-

I would like to add this comment to the previous well written and explained article. I opened my first health club in 1977 and it became a 38 club chain within seven years. Before I was a manufacturer of fitness equipment I was a purchaser. What I’m writing today is not a salesman’s strategy to sell more RealRyders, but instead sharing my philosophy about how I made my decisions on what equipment to purchase, because it is similar to the decision RealRyder customers have to make today between spin bikes and RealRyders.

When I bought my first line of Nautilus equipment in 1977 it was by far the most expensive equipment available for sale. To outfit my small 4300 square foot fitness center with Nautilus was at least twice as expensive as the more common free weights or the newly invented selectorized equipment from companies like Universal and Paramount. Very few people had ever heard about Nautilus at the time so it wasn’t a well known brand or an immediate draw for new members, but instead it was the best equipment available and it allowed me to differentiate my gym from the other clubs that all had better amenities and more importantly a customer base. I wanted to feature equipment that allowed me to demonstrate to perspective and existing members that my gym was better and different than other health clubs in at least one area, the equipment. I of course also wanted to show I was different in many other ways also like service, results and caring.

Anyone that knows me will agree I’m a story teller first a salesman second. To my family’s chagrin I have a story about everything. You ask me for the time and I’ll tell you how a clock is made, but that is the way I communicate. The Irish are notorious for telling stories. So I wanted a narrative that could also be easily retold by my members (even the ones that were not Irish) and employees. After all membership referrals are the life blood of club sales and making it easy for a member to sell a friend on why his fitness center is best is critical.

For me the Nautilus difference was very easy to explain as the RealRyder difference is also simple to describe. Most successful chains have an easy story. As examples, 24 Hour Fitness was open 24/7 and McDonalds never had the best hamburger, but they were consistently average. A member without any training should be able to describe what about his club makes it better and fitness equipment is the simplest means. Nautilus isolated muscles and trained them quickly to exhaustion. RealRyder moves like a real bike and trains all of the muscles especially the core. Different stories, but similar in their brevity and simplicity.

Club owners unfortunately look at the cost of fitness equipment and give it more importance than it should have. When amortized over five years, equipment is the smallest of any of the important expenses it takes to run a gym.

For example the cost difference of a RealRyder when compared to other indoor cycles over a five year period is only $18.50 more per month (a $900 spin bike versus a $1995 RealRyder based on the price of buying RealRyders without a quantity discount). If you have four classes a day or 120 per month the additional cost to supply RealRyders to your members to differentiate your program from others is only 15 cents per bike per class (and the cost of the instructor is often approximately $40 per class). In a club with 21 RealRyders each class taught on our stationary bike will cost an extra $3.25 or 8% of the cost of an instructor.

The other large expense in a fitness center is rent. When you compare the total cost of 21 RealRyders to the average rent of $2000 per month you get these numbers; $593.25 per month (you get a lower price of $1,695 if you buy 21 bikes!) for the RealRyders, which is less than 30% of the cost of $2000 rent. The monthly expense of $593.25 is also less than your marketing and sales budget or possibly what you will pay to supply water and towels each month.

I know you get the idea so I’ll stop and end this comment by saying. Be better…Be different…Be a smart buyer and buy for success!

So, investing in good quality fitness equipment makes good business sense. Investing in equipment that people will want to use will pay for itself over the life of the equipment, with increased membership fees.

We know from what people tell us that the RealRyder stationary bike creates excitement and attracts customers, but this blog is not intended to be a sales message more a business message. Food for thought – let us know what you think, we would love to hear from you!