Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 004: 2015 New Years Fitness Strategery

Episode Date: January 8, 2015

2015 is here and it is time to get fit! Sal, Adam and Justin reveal how to choose a club, how to get the best deal on a membership, how to stick to a plan and how to hire a personal trainer. They reveal some of the deepest, darkest secrets that the fitness industry doesn't want you to know and some side-splitting tales from the time they managed large fitness chains.

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind, pop, mind, pop with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Everybody, welcome to Mind Pump. Welcome back. We're going to do a show today on something that the three of us have experienced every single year. We've all come from the fitness industry, all of us, I think in management positions, right? We've all been management, upper management positions.

So we're recording this. It's close to the end of the year. And for anybody who's in fitness, the dreaded January comes. January comes, the New Year's resolution. Oh, it's insane. Now, from a business standpoint, it's amazing. A gyms will sell on average,

anywhere between 20 to 50%, or maybe even double their normal monthly revenue. Oh, yeah, easily, definitely. Yeah, just because it's January, and you know what I always found that was kind of fascinating? Is the first week of January sucked It was always like December just extended into January and we're all stressed out

Well, I just showed you who we really were signing up. They're that lazy. They got a free memory They got it. They made their new It's a cardio people did. It's all the treadmill They made their new years resolution. I'm gonna get back in shape, right? Every day from the first to about the 17 They're talking themselves behind me into it took them three weeks to even from the first to about the 17th, they're talking themselves behind the end to it. Took them three weeks to even get in there to get the follow up.

And they're like, fuck, it's, I gotta start this. I said it made it my new year's good resolution. I got at least got to get in there by it. I would work in a gym and my goal would go from like, you know, I could say advanced in pretty big clubs. And so the goal would be like, normally would be like 180, 220,000 and then boom, $300,000 goal. And it's like the 10th of January and I'm like 50% of gold that's first sweatin' every year.

And then the rush. Right, yeah. Then the rush, it's insane. It's insane. I lived on Speedstack and Rip Force in January. I'm with a good old speed stack. Those are the ones that had a fed thread about it. Forget it.

It was crack. That's the Forget it. It was crack. That's the real stuff. It was crack. Yeah, it was damn you Adam for ever exposing me to the speed stack. You got almost every button. You guys remember the ingredients? That's up, bro.

You remember the ingredients, all the ingredients in a speed stack? Caffeine, a fedra, aspirin. The aspirin, they did have aspirin. Yes, it was the ECA stack. So they put white willow bark, which is herbal aspirin. It's like, you know, that's, they make it sound a little bit better, but it's actually aspirin.

You had 25 milligrams of a fedra alkaloids, which is like the FDA's maximum. You put it in total to RDA right there. We're drinking fucking four by noon. Yeah. Oh, we used to, yeah, it's a willow bark. I just poured out on a table, dried out, collect the powder and inject it directly into my eyeball. It was more effective though. We really, this is so bad.

We used to actually have, you know, you remember these big, the big kick off of the morning and stuff like that for close out to you. So the middle of the month and the end of the month is always the best time to buy a gym membership. If you guys don't know that typically the end because the end is like really the end. Yeah, because they have all the specials. The way gym memberships for those you guys are going out of business. The way Jim memberships for those you guys are going out of business. The way Jim memberships for those you guys are going out of business. The way Jim memberships for those you guys are going out of business.

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You're listening if you go get your membership listen This is how this this is how this works So like Sal was saying we had goals every single month and you know that that's as a if you were in management for a fitness club That's what all the pressure was about in fact I'm during I know Sal and my era for sure when we were managing If you did not hit goal for three months, you're out. You're out and you're into a small, you're doing good. And we might as well talk about the company we work for

because I mean, can we say that? I mean, we just let people assume. I'll just tell you guys this. It's, it's, it was the number one fitness company in the world, the only business that, fitness business that was ever in the billions of dollars in it. Sold the forceman world. But we won't tell you guys the name.

So, but you guys figured that out on your own. Lots of locations, open most hours. So, but you know what, you know, like we could pick up them all day but almost so, I mean, pretty much everybody followed their format as far as how to, how to structure a compensation plan to, to motivate these young, young speed stacked out kids that were selling memberships and personal training. So, and absolutely we're all part of this era.

Some good times. But the way of membership back to what we're talking about, the way it works is you've got these goals. So then what happens is somebody up there, whether it be at the district level, or regional level has the authority to basically, drop rates and prices and wave enrollment fees. And they kind of keep that in their back pocket till it gets

closed. They want to try and see if they can hit goal by just driving leads and driving new people into the clubs. And if they start to get to a point where it's looking like they're not going to, and this is when I say they're not going to collectively like as a whole area. So all of San Jose, all 10 of their clubs, if they're all hurting really bad, then somebody up in like the regional area decides, okay, this is what we're going to do. We're going to go ahead and roll out this special.

And we're going to drop the enrollment fee. We're going to weigh 50% off the processing fee. And we're going to give you two personal training sessions that are valued at $180 for $99. So and you get all these crazy stuff. So if you want the best deal, you wanna go with the very end of the month, the last day, if there's ever a possibility that they can give you a better price or hook you up with a deal,

you're not gonna ever beat the 31st. That's always gonna be the best. Right? And as Jim members, now of course, his guys who worked there and were making, our goals were to sell as many memberships as possible in generate revenue. We loved it. But could you imagine, I mean, how did the members,

what do you think the members thought about January? They cannot stand on this influx of people that are just like coming in and like, ah, and then this is where all the rules come in where there's like, you know, 15 minutes on the treadmill and then you get lines of people waiting right behind them and getting all pissed off and I used to love this in my favorite things. I used to love seeing people fight for parking outside.

So they fight for parking to park closer to the zone. And then they come in and then they'd get on the treadmill and walk. I never understood that. I'm like, what? You could have walked from the back of the treadmill and walk. I never understood that. I'm like, what? Yeah. You could have walked from the back of the fucking parking lot. What do you do? It never made any sense to me.

As, you know, it's interesting, people don't realize this, but in the fitness industry, especially in some of these big, money-making fitness, you know, big box gyms, the sales process is extensive. As a matter of fact, I've worked with a lot of sales people. I've worked with financial advisors, car salesmen, real estate agents, some of the best sales people, pure sales people that have ever met in my entire life, sold gym memberships. Oh yeah.

End of story. Done. Let's be honest. You could be 20 years old. You didn't have to have a degree and you could make six figures. Oh, yeah, I mean I bought I was making a hundred twenty grand a year I was 19 years old 21 years old I bought my house So and I I come from anyone that knows me it came from a very poor family like food stamp poor, so it wasn't like You know, I had some money waiting for me when I got older, you know

I paid for all any sort of schooling I did and he sort of education, like it all came out of my own pocket. So, you know, to be able to buy a house at 21 years old is, you know, we're in, I'm not 60 years old. So that's, so that, that was definitely what was so great about that industry was, you know, if you did have any talent and you had, if you had that work ethic, it definitely drew a lot of those people, you know, to get out. Well, yeah, and let's talk about why those sales,

those sales guys were so good. I mean, two things, here's, I mean, there's two reasons I think that this, the guys who sold gym memberships were so good at sales. Number one, you're selling fitness. You're not selling a tangible product. You know, it's pretty easy, so I think you can think about it. Well, I mean, it's easy, but it's not because what do people

leave with when they buy a membership? Nothing. They don't, they don't an idea. They leave with a, yeah, a dream, but you paint that picture for them. Thank you. That's the sales aspect. Right. That's the sales act. Cause I would sell one, two, three thousand dollar, you know, memberships to someone who came in who'd never worked out before and they just spent three thousand dollars. I mean, people don't go to buy electronics and spend $3,000. And they walk into a gym and invest that much money.

And they get buyers or morris and all that. Well, hopefully they use it and they utilize it. But, you know, our job was to- I mean electronics. Oh, they're trying to do that. Yeah. My bad. Yeah, that's okay.

But, and then the second thing is the sales process is so fast. So, like, if you sell a home, you know, you meet a prospective client, how long does it take before you sell them home? Oh yeah, 30, 45 days at the fastest possible. Yeah, maybe two, three, four months sometimes, right? You meet a customer when they walk into the gym and they're out the door in an hour with a membership, hopefully, you sold them a membership,

which means your sales skills get really good because you practice all the time. You do 10, 15, you sold them in membership, which means your sales skills get really good because you practice all the time. You do 10, 15, 20 tours a day, and so you just hone your skill and ask any sales person who's worth their saw, and they'll tell you practice makes perfect just like with anything else. These guys were, I mean, some hustlers. And it's amazing. Some of these guys that we worked with, you know, me and Adam have talked about this

before too. Some of these guys that we worked with back in know, me and Adam have talked about this before too. Some of these guys that we worked with back in the day, in these gyms who don't long work in the fitness industry, they're like millionaires doing something else. Almost anybody that I knew that if you were making six figures at the gym back then, you're making that well over that right now doing something else. Yeah, just because from what you learn. Yeah, no, I always refer to the company that we were for because a lot of people bash it and hated this and that. And I always think of them as a bad parents. That's why I got this love form because they're my parents, you know, it's like the first the first real business that taught me business, you know, and I learned so much for them. Maybe

I didn't think it was the right way like because they did everything the wrong way. And so I felt like I learned that way. Right. But at the end of the day, I still learned, right? And they still did buy me a house when I was 21 years old, right? So I always think I've referred to them as like my bad parents. Like they just, if I have some of my things,

some of my most fondest memories were from working in that environment. It was amazing. It was hardcore for those of us who kind of are natural sales people, you know I love to communicate like to talk with people. I have a huge passion for fitness So just I mean I walked in the doors and within three months. I was managed. I was a fitness manager of One of the clubs. I was and I had all these people working for me

It just it just happened naturally for me and it was an environment where if you were driven And you worked with the right people you learned. I mean, I was lucky to have some good managers I worked for. It was an amazing, amazing time. That being said, there was some crazy, it was crazy too. There was some crazy shit back then. And we entered right after all the crazy, crazy stuff used to happen, like, well, you know, people are doing crazy shit in the back room.

I was still there. I mean, we did some pretty wild stuff where, I mean, you could, you could roll on a cake for, for a closeout, you know, there'd be beer. That was really yeah, people are Be very close. I missed that. Yeah, that was that was right before it was a little bit before your time. So I remember that. I remember, kind of one of the best closeouts that my buddy and I had, we had this would have worked. Check this out. So it was for close out and each person we went and Lilly spent like $500 on score guns. And there was all these different sizes, like the little tiny $500 on a score gun. Listen, bro, listen.

So in the reason why I was such a crazy like this, right? So we'll back then we could literally make that right. That night, you know, you can make easily $500 on closeout. Easily, you make a couple thousand. You need if you make five. That you make more than that. Exactly. So, I believe can make easily 500 bucks on closeout. Easily, you make a couple thousand. You're in need if you make five that you make more than that. Exactly. So, I believe it or not, it sounds like a lot of money,

but him and I both as managers put that, put that wasn't a big deal. So this is how it worked was all the sales, people, all the staff, whether you were a trainer, a sales front desk, whatever, you, once you reach certain numbers, you got your score gun. So if you got $500 or sold, you got the first little water pistol.

And you could score anybody who had the same size pistol or didn't have one when you had that gun. And so each level we gave them bigger and bigger guns. So if you sold like $3,000, $4,000 that day in training or in this, in memberships, you had like the fucking super so good. This is fucking brilliant. Super. I've never heard this is the most brilliant thing I've ever heard of in my life. Is it greater?

I mean, my boy did this, right? So, of this. Super. I've never heard of it. I've never heard of it. Is it greater? I mean, my boy did this, right? So, you know, I got to give him credit for it for sure, because this was his idea. I was just part of it, you know, which was, I thought was one of the most amazing things we ever did. And so, dude, this is note, like, we were fucking blasting me- close out, right?

Close out during prime time. I mean, you- Oh, it's insane. I mean, hundreds of members came through that. Hundreds, right? So- Especially in January. It got so out I mean, hundreds of members came through that. Hundreds, right? So, especially in January. It got so out of hand, dude, people were dumping buckets of water on each other, right? The middle of a presentation, didn't put someone with a big supersoaker and somebody

would try to sell something they had this, a little gun, they could get blast in the face right where the middle of a presentation, like with the members. And you sold more members. Oh, we sold more members. Loved it. Yeah. It was all ingrained. I mean, no one did anything stupid. Like, we didn't hurt any members.

We had all the caution wet signs up to try and cover our last liability wise and everything. But what a blast was. Obviously, this was pre big time HR in our company. So once this company got really huge in HR. Oh, yeah, then they slammed the hammer. No, yeah, then all the fun shit went away like that because all the possibilities

of something happening around with it. But let me tell you, that was probably one of the most memorable close outs I ever had was when we did that. It was awesome. I got a story, man. I got a story. So I started off as a personal trainer, went up to fitness manager. And then in those days, they didn't let the fitness people, the people who were trainers, didn't move into management, you know, general manager. You either were sales and you moved up to general manager or you were trainer and you moved up to fitness manager. Well, trainer and you moved up to fitness manager

Well, I wanted to move up to General Manager So it made me a senior sales counselor. I don't know if they had did they have that position when you were there Okay, so basically senior sales counselor you run one of the weekend days So I'm running a weekend day and I'm extremely competitive anybody who knows me will tell you I hate to lose and I love to win. So here I am on it's a Sunday And I'm competing with all these other clubs for first place, right? I hate to lose and I love to win. So here I am, it's a Sunday, and I'm competing with all these other clubs for first place, right? So I'm behind, I forgot what club it was.

I was at, I'm not gonna say the name, should I almost say the name, but I was at, you know, $10,000, let's say, and the guy ahead of me was at, you know, $11.50. So I had to sell at least $2,000 to beat them for this weekend contest. Well, it's getting late, it's about 9.40 something and I look out into the parking lot

and I see a family walking in and you can always tell if it's a member or if they're coming in to check out the club because they're in street clothes, they don't have a gym bag and they're walking in and I'm like, okay, this is it. I have to close the steal. So these people come in and they were Japanese. So they were from Japan.

So they spoke broken English. And I give this guy a tour. I sit him down and we start going, and we start negotiating back and forth, back and forth. And I'm like, I gotta get this deal, right? So I'm presenting them a membership. Personal training comes at $2,000. Finally, the guy stands up and he's like, okay,

I'm not gonna get this. I'm just gonna come back tomorrow, which of course we all know what that means. He's not coming back. Right. So during this time, during this month, we had this big contest. So I don't know if you guys remember this, but we would have contests every month. And the way the contest usually worked was, if you were a member and you worked out, you got to fill out an entry form.

And so the more you worked out, the more entry forms you had filled out. And then there was a prize. Well, this particular month, there was this beautiful big like chrome barbecue that we had in the middle of the club. And so like, if you worked out, you fill out an entry form, you could potentially win this barbecue. So this guy's in my office right now. I'm trying to sell him.

He stands up, he's like, no, we're gonna leave. And so I'm like, okay, hold on one second. I'll be right back. So I go out and I get this fucking barbecue from the middle of the gym. He stands up, he's like, no we're gonna leave. And so I'm like, okay, hold on one second, I'll be right back. So I go out, like get this fucking barbecue from the middle of the gym. And I roll it into the office, and I'm like, if you enroll today, I'll throw in this barbecue, right?

Right? This is a true story. I'm like 18 years old, you know, I have no idea. There's no rules for me, like the fuck, I'll give away the barbecue. So he buys the membership, I win the contest, right? I'm like the hero. So, you know, the next day my general manager comes in,

my buddy Don, I'm not gonna say his last name, but you guys know what I'm talking about. Of course. So he's like, oh, good job Sal, it's your first weekend, you won, you beat everybody this and that, and he's like, you know, and I hear, we're suburbicune. I hear him talking, I hear him talking

to the operation, they say, where's the barbecue? I'm like, I don't know, this is really weird and they're kind of confused. What's going on? I'm not saying shit. Well, about four days later, I see the Japanese dude walking in and he rolls up. He parks his truck outside the front of the gym and the barbecue's in the back of the fucking truck. He's still hasn't the truck. And I know he brought it back. He's so proud of that. No, he brought it back. He can't tell his members. No, no, no, no, no, even worse.

So this fucker comes in and he's got the barbecue in the back of the truck. He walks up to the front desk and I'm like, oh, I'm sitting, I'm behind my general managers at the front desk. So I'm sweating. I'm like, what's this guy gonna say? And he goes, oh, hi, I joined

and I got the barbecue on my membership. But it doesn't work. It's broken. I need a new one. And my manager's like, what barbecue? He's like, that went out there. Oh, that was a tough. Oh, God. I was a tough boy. I don't know how I didn't your fire You just remind me to get the propane started huh, you know you talk about The things that we used to do as far as I guess playing with that gray area right so

I jumped off the line Maybe this is a little bit me. Well... I'll let you guys decide how to rely on this. But something that we used to have also was, as managers, we actually, back then, we used to have a budget of vendors and things that we could actually, we could give out free memberships to them if they came in and they held boosts and they did trade.

We did trade, basically. We traded out with them. So what we would do is we would trade out with massage clinics and dry cleaning and my boy Car wash movie theaters. Dude, I didn't pay for a movie theater for like at least three years of my life I didn't pay for a single movie ticket of my life. I got all my dry cleaning done for free I got my car detail there single week You know what we've those massage deals are great

Not that we're ever gonna work for these companies. Oh, God, did we do it? Now we're really, yeah. We just, we just, we just, we just, I hope it'll go broke, cause I, I think go back there, we're, I don't do corporate, yeah, I just, I just don't do it.

That was always my plan B, but I guess that's over. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. I guess to bring it back to the original subject, we need to do this shit, right? We go way the fuck off course. And then we'll just start talking about the things. Let's talk about motivation, right?

Is that what we're talking about? The January, the people that come in the channel. That's what we're talking about. This is the hype. Right now. If you come in in January, here's a deal. This is what's gonna keep you motivated, okay? You're super motivated first of the year,

you're fat because it's Christmas Thanksgiving, average American gains like five to 10 pounds. How dare you? Yeah, I'm not that fat. No, I'm P-H-A-T pounds. How dare you. Yeah, I'm not that fat. No, I'm PHAT fat. Oh good. Not normally fat.

Okay. So, the game weight that come in, they're motivated to work out, it's January, everybody's new year's resolution. This is what you, this is where people fuck up. You just get started. So, what do they do? They work out every day. Oh yeah, balls to the wall.

Balls to the wall. You're going to burn out and you're going to hate it. So this is what you should do. Give yourself a schedule. Find one, two max three days a week. You're gonna put on your schedule and no matter what you're gonna go. If that means you can only do once a week,

then find, get once a week and commit to that. You know, Monday night or Saturday night or whatever. That's the time I'm gonna go to the gym. Step number two, hire a personal trainer. If they're expensive, if you don't have the money to afford working with a trainer regularly, then work with them infrequently. Train with them once a week or once every two weeks, just to follow up. You're so much more likely to show up when you have a personal trainer.

Then of course, all the information and the way they're going to train you and teach you, you're so much more likely to stick with it. We actually have statistics on that, right? People who work with trainers tend to stay something like three times as long and use the gym twice as much as the average member. So those are the two pieces of advice that I could give somebody.

Can I say about the personal training? Do not be afraid to spend money on your personal training. And what I mean by that, and just so you guys know, I don't private personal training was, this isn't like a plug for myself right here. So, okay, this is, I do not do training anymore, I do not do one on ones, but if you go and invest in one on one personal training,

do not go for the cheapest possible deal with a personal trainer because you are better off spending more money on less sessions with somebody who is experiencing intelligent and will design you a very good program and educate you in those four hours than some dumbass is going to spend with you for 12 hours for half the promise. Don't waste your time. I mean, that's really what it is.

Like how much do you value your time? Like I know a lot of people get really motivated, so let's not, I mean, let's try and make that as beneficial as we possibly can for you. And just like Adam said, like, unfortunately, just like any other industry you go into where somebody might have a higher price tag, well, they got there. They got there for a reason and their experience speaks for itself. their client list speaks for themselves. There's a lot of day to day to day to day processes that you have trial and error, you know, there's a lot of things that you experience with clients that you improve on.

So it's not to say the beginner right out of college that knows a lot of book smart processes and protocols isn't effective and they are effective but at the same time, there are a lot of little tiny things that you just tweak an angle a certain degree. You just, you know, you ask the right questions. You guys are on the same kind of a level where the communication is a lot better, which is a huge thing to where you're going to have a much better experience and you're gonna see results. Well, I mean, and you're much more likely

to be consistent when you work with someone. Well, you set it before, this isn't something I've heard you'd say many times is you're gonna like the person too. Yeah, if you don't hit it off with them, if you can't imagine spending an hour with this person every single week just to hang out, then you're not gonna work out with them.

Fuck, I mean, let alone hang out where you can actually chill with someone and you're looking at that person, I wouldn't hang out with that person, and you're gonna work out with them. Something that you don't enjoy anyway. No, they better be someone you enjoy. You know, here's a deal.

You guys, I know you guys will agree with me on this. A half ass mediocre routine that's done consistently is more effective than an excellent program that's done rarely. Do not be that person that was a paralysis by analysis. Don't spend more time designing your program or focus on what you're gonna do than just getting your ass in there and doing.

It's actually funny that you say that because I know you live your life that way. So why? I don't analyze, there's no analysis. I just go, I never paralyzed this fucking, I think I'm gonna do something on this and do it. Why don't we plan for it? What's that?

I'll figure it out a lot of the way. No organization whatsoever on that one, on that end. But yeah, working with the trainer, I can't tell you how many times just that I'm sure you've had this happen to you too, as well. I can't tell you how many clients hire me initially and they're like, okay, I just want to do you know, 10 sessions just to get me ready for and then they're with me for eight years. Yeah. And they're there.

And I stopped you. Well, 14 years ago, dude, how about this? What you just said, too, do not be that person who goes in and tells your fucking trainer what you need. Okay. If you've got a good trainer, his job is to assess you and help you figure out what you need because if you have to hire a trainer, which most people I believe do and should he any these good, he's going to be able to assess you and help you tell you which what you need over what you want. Of course, we all

want a flat stomach and ripped abs and biceps and chest and all these. Well, of course, we all want to cover a magazine. But let him educate you on your body, your overall health and that because it's more about that because you know what, like getting yourself in a shape, like you can do that on your own. If you just want to lose a bunch of weight, stop eating so much damn food and move your ass 10 times more. You don't need a trainer for that.

But if you want someone who's going to teach you about your body What's going on with it? How to move properly? How to how to live a healthier better life in addition to that? Control your metabolism and actually do whatever it is you want to do with a rebuild muscle lose fat Jump higher run faster. That's what you want. You want a trainer's gonna be able to educate you and teach you on that? So well, here's some other tips to time of day to work out in a gym. It's going to be packed after work. So between prime time, we used to call prime time at the gym between four and eight or nine, so it's going to be right around five, six o'clock, it's a fucking zoo in the gym, especially

in January. I mean, literally some of the big clubs everyone, you had to to walk sideways through certain areas. Like it was a nightclub. Crazy. So, a lot of lines to get on a treadmill. That was always my favorite too. Yeah, give him a line. I would sit and wait for 30 minutes to get on a treadmill. To get on a treadmill, to run on a treadmill for 30 minutes. So many things you could do in there. Just get on something else. They would just stand there and their arms folded and don't you remember as a manager too, we still to have a 20 minute limit. So we had to constantly be managing that

because there'd be people that would be just waiting and waiting and waiting. You know what's funny? We used to say some bullshit line and they told us to say this. And at the time, I had no, I actually didn't know any better. But they used to be like, how come it's only 20 minutes?

Because that's the fat burning zone. Any longer than that, you burn muscle. That's not true. But they told us to say that. I actually believed it. Can you believe that? If you go longer longer than 20 minutes you'll burn muscles. That's why we do the Mac. No, we do 20-minute Macs because there's too many people using cardio. That's the truth. But the other science. Yeah, and so they also, if you're going to go when it's super packed, unless you're one of those people that likes to work out with shitloads of people around you,

it's probably not a good idea to go after work. And statistically, they show that people who wake up and go to work out before they go to work are more likely to be consistent longer. And if you go at 6am, it's a semi-busy time, but it's not even close to the 6pm. And so if you set that on your schedule, like I am going to go to the damn gym at 6am on Mondays or Tuesdays or whatever you set your day and you go before work you're far more likely to be consistent. So I recommend trying that at least in the beginning.

Let's just be like completely honest. Like it is all about consistency frequency. Like it, I mean like sure you guys, you know, we're talking a little bit about like having the right proper techniques and getting involved with the right trainer and everything. But really, it's, you know, get your ass in the gym and then keep going and keep going and keep going. Like as much as you can, if that's, you know, what's going to do it? If you're not self-motivated at your house and you have your own tools and all this other stuff, but I mean, if you're trying to get all shape, you know, rapidly for the new year, like, let's be honest, it's probably, you know, the gym is very easy.

Oh, it's a huge drop off by the time what March April comes around. It's back to normal. Everybody drops off, you know, their memberships. What are some alternatives? You know, what are some alternatives to going to these big gyms? If you want to get in shape in January, let's say. Well, I mean, I of cash the direction I think is in school. Where you see all of us, where we've evolved to is now, I mean, your phone is so powerful. And there's so much great information that you can get out there for really cheap reasonable prices. I mean, all of our e-books are less than what it cost to even spend an hour with us, which is a hell of a lot more than an hour of our knowledge.

So when you think of things like that, you can download information, you can read it, you can educate yourself on it. And a lot of the stuff you can apply, shit, we're working on a game right now that you can actually play a fitness game and it can be outside the gym and not even inside of a gym. And it's designed to progress you through just like you would through your whole phases of working out and we would personal train you. But it's mindless for you. You just got to click it on and re-spawn.

And just go. Yeah. So I mean, there's a lot of stuff. I mean, we're not the first ones to invent something exactly like that. There's a lot of different tools that exist that I think people can actually do a little homework and research.

It's really, I feel like everything is so, I mean, hang in, follow all of us. Between all of us, you can click on a link or start reading and you'll find a lot of good information between YouTube videos and e-books and things that we've already read and all of a sudden we have coming. Well, that's, yeah.

I'm thinking right now too, maybe, I don't know how we're doing on time, Doug, because I'd like to go over maybe the different gyms and what to expect, right? Like, because there might be some people right now that are kind of a Alzheimer's. There's a very, very different demographics at all of them.

Right, so you have your 24-hour fitness, which I put up there with like a ballad, or maybe those type of clubs, right? Those are more of your fitness. Elephant is more of your general big box gyms, 30 to 50,000 square feet. Yeah, 20 to 30, 50,000. The actual like person coming in that knows anything

about fitness is probably a lot lower. Right, so you're gonna get a lot of first timers. Those are the ones that do the big, big, big sales in January. They tend to have more amenities like swimming pools, basketball courts, basketball courts, basketball courts, that kind of stuff. The weight rooms are sufficient, but they're not commercial. And we commercials out in the radios. Now, what are the, what are the pluses? Well, if you join at 24F in this, they have lots of locations, they're open 24 hours, you know, yadda, yadda,

yadda, that type of thing. If you are more serious minded in terms of resistance training, or if you just want no frills, I'd say gold. Oh yeah, definitely. Gold is probably your deal, right? You walk in or worlds, does worlds even exist anymore? I wish they did around here. There was a lot of worlds.

Yeah, in Santa Cruz. But you basically go in, they have weights in cardio. There's no swimming pool, there's no basketball, but they have lots of weights and a decent amount of cardio. And some serious people. And then you have your clubs like Crunch, Crunch Fitness, which is excellent for classes. They're really known for their classes. Yes, they're with their new form. So they'll do things like acrobatic yoga or they'll have a live DJ in their spinning music or Zoom bus style classes, but they're not the generic kind of cookie cutter.

They have the actual salsa dance. The spin with like techno and all kinds of things. Yeah, so if you're like really into like, you know, group classes, I think crunch might be a good option type of deal. And then you have your upper kind of crust gyms where they're a little nicer. Right, like your silver, your country clubs.

Country club type gyms. And you're gonna get a little bit of a nicer cleaner. The ones you don't wanna deadlift or doing. If you drop away the whole gym turns around and serious. And then you have gyms like Planet Fitness where if you go into Planet Fitness, don't subscribe to my fucking channel

unless you're the game. I hate that, dude. I don't follow us. I follow us, Planet Fitness. That is definitely probably. I think we could bash almost every gym and pick them apart, but that's the one where I don't even they don't even deserve We just don't even we're gonna do a separate show on that on that on that gym Just to talk about that. Yeah, we could yeah, and then you have your small facilities your small studios where you know

There's there's specialized in personal training or the specialized in yoga or Pilates those places have great Retention rates they they places have great retention rates. They have the best retention rates. The smaller and more private a facility is with less members but more instructors, you're more likely to stick around. It's gonna be more expensive, but you're far more likely to stick around.

So if you have even a semi-antif... People feel over-service and they get the value of that. Well, what's really ironic about that is that it is the smaller boxes and they have such little traffic in comparison to a 24-off fitness of ballets or any of those big commercial-type gyms because everyone's flocking to that thing. That's what's best for them. But, I mean, just like we talked about earlier, where you're going to find a trainer who charges in the upper echelon like ourselves $150 an hour.

Yeah, that's really expensive, but it's also because he knows he's that good. Yeah, and he's also, we're also in an area where, by the way, because Adam's quoting these rates, and yes, we do charge, I charge 150 a session from a single session, part of that's because I think I'm worth it, and part of that's also because of the location I'm in.

We are in the Bay area, we're located here in Silicon Valley. So if you're hiring an excellent trainer in Mobile, Alabama He's probably not gonna charge 150. He might be like, you know 80 or something like that So you also of course, so I don't want to freak everybody out because people are like oh my god You know if you're living over there and you're like 150 bucks, that's my rant Thank you for listening to Mind Pump for more information about this show and to get valuable free resources from Sal, Adam and Justin, visit us at www.minepumpradio.com. Until next time, this is MindPump.