How many hours a day is your school busy generating revenue? Is it four hours, or maybe six, if you offer an after-school program? Fitness kickboxing can add hours of revenue-generating time to your facility without having to cut or move any of your conventional martial arts classes.
Martial arts schools have a limited amount of time they are able to generate income. For most schools, that time is between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. at night. These are the hours that the school starts to become busy as parents and students start arriving for classes.
Think about how valuable it would be to be able to add an additional 15 hours a week in revenue-generating time to your school. This is one of many advantages to adding an organized fitness program to your facility.
Have you ever had a student state that you need to expand to a bigger location because you’re so busy between 4 and 8 p.m.? People don’t realize that most martial arts schools are empty the other 20 hours in the day (85% of the time). I’ve always thought many schools make a mistake adding more space when they should have been expanding the time when revenue can be generated.
Many people want to offer my fitness program, the Ultimate Bodyshaping Course (UBC), at their schools. The first objection is, “I don’t have space in my schedule. We’re already filled with traditional martial arts classes.” My reply is, “How busy are you at 7 a.m.?”
The morning hours between 7 and 11 a.m. seem to be a time when a fitness program can be busy and making money, whereas a conventional martial arts program cannot. When have you ever heard of a morning conventional martial arts program drawing more than 100 people before 11 a.m.? I never did, until I turned my morning classes into fitness classes.
I tried for years to start a conventional adult program in the morning and at lunchtime. I had limited success. It would build to 8 to 10 students and then die. I could never operate a strong morning program until I started to market my UBC.
If you only offered fitness training in the morning, then you could still be very successful. There’s a large segment of the adult population that likes an early workout. Many people like to train before they go to work or after they have taken the kids to school. Go to your local fitness center at 7 or 8 a.m. and see how busy they are. If you train, you may have already seen it. People like you, who work or teach at night, need a morning workout schedule.
Before you start thinking about expanding your deck space, think about expanding your revenue-generating time. My 7 a.m. Monday through Friday class has always been one of my busiest classes. I also have 8:45 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. fitness kickboxing and strength and conditioning classes that have consistently drawn 20 to 30 students. We just recently added a Tuesday and Thursday 10:15 a.m. Elite Fitness Training class that’s attracting a good crowd.
An added bonus to a morning fitness program is that it draws some of the most consistent, successful and loyal students. When someone has the discipline to train in the morning, he/she is usually the type of person that sticks to things and doesn’t miss class. People are also not as easily distracted in the mornings. When someone trains at night, they have the whole day to find a reason not to train. Morning people are awake early, go work out and then start their day.
If your classes are already at capacity between 4 and 8 in the evening, then you might want to consider a morning-only fitness program. It’s definitely a more cost-effective way to increase your revenue than by renting a bigger space that will be empty 20 hours a day.
