Why gyms quietly die

Rents, poor retention, coaches who leave with clients. Why I'll never open a second space, and the model we flipped.

In our area, at least 20 gyms have opened within a kilometre radius,” says Bhargava. “Those on rent struggle to break even and often shut within a year.” To keep members loyal, her centre constantly innovates, offering Zumba, Masala Bhangra and specialised programmes. “We see much higher renewals as we reinvent,

It’s a neatly written piece on why the gym business is dying slowly.

1 Rents kill and operating costs are high 2 Gym equipment is expensive 3 Clients are loyal to coaches. Not to barbells and equipment. And coaches are employees. So when they walk away with clients, gyms go empty. 4 Retention is poor due to competition. 5 Commuting is a pain and apartment gyms are getting better. People are also open to working out at home.

Before COVID, there was a point when we were thinking about a second space. We had been steadily growing. And things were looking good. A second center felt logical. Covid hit, online started and we have not looked back.

I would never start a second space. Simply because:

1 it’s too expensive. 2 most of urban India is stupidly crowded. There is no one killer location that enough people can get to quickly enough.

But the current space is awesome. I want it to remain open as long as possible. Beyond my coaching career if I can help it.

But it’s also a subversive love letter to my industry. We flipped the usual model:

1 Minimum overheads. Just the ten fans. No AC. Semi outdoor setting works since it’s the sea to our east with no neighbours. The locality is not crazily dense yet. So light and ventilation are good for now.

2 We built 90 percent of our equipment. And it’s better than what we could have purchased. And it cost us less to build more durable equipment. And it’s going to last much longer since it can all be repaired. None of it rusty. Worn out parts can be swapped.

Owner-operator-coach model. I can’t imagine owning or running a gym that I wasn’t coaching in or building equipment for. Is it scalable? Doesn’t look like it. But do we have a moat? Hell yes we do.
Retention is great since we have control over the hour. We control the program and the experience. We focus on one service and only one: S&C based on sound exercise selection, progressive overload, curated adaptations, building skill and monitoring outcomes. No Bhangra, Pilates, yoga or animal flow in our space. Doing one thing right for our clients is what we will always do.
We optimise programming to ensure we optimise how the training hour works. This means make the most of the hour. Coaches work hard for 3 hours in the morning. And they stop. And come back to coach later. Every bit of equipment is put to use for the hour. And every clients gets their quota of work done.

A second presence will be a pop-up gym. Something that drives around and can use a space for an hour to give 8-10 people a great workout and drive away with no fixed costs.