I wanted to throw up a quick blog that discussed some of the caveats to owning your own fitness training studio. I owned my own studio called Lifts in Gainey Ranch in Scottsdale for almost three years and these were some of the best years of my life. Here are my top seven reasons for wanting to own and operate your own studio:

1. Hours of Operation

I’m a night owl. Always been one. For this reason, I made my hours of operation 12:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.. At 8:00 p.m. I’d train for an hour and then I’d write the following day’s workouts til around 10:00 p.m. or 11:00 p.m.. This worked well for me because I hate waking up at 6:00 a.m.. I’d rather die!

2. Family/Friend Discount

I gave my family and friends discounts. Some of them I trained for free. There is no higher reward than helping someone you love take an active role in becoming more fit and healthy. I got to see almost all the people I cared about several times per week; my Mom, Dad, sister, niece, twin bro, step brothers, step mom, sister-in-law, and friends would train with me regularly.

3. Choose Who You Want to Train

If you don’t like a client you can tell them to take a hike. I only had to do this once but it felt great knowing that I could remove a negative person from my life as I was “da boss.” My clients kicked ass and many of them became like family.

4. Employees

I hired really cool employees; high energy, hilarious people who made me look forward to coming to work every day. We had so many inside jokes it was sickening. The synergy was great.

5. System

I was in charge of creating all the systems. If it works well; I’m a star. If it sucks; I’m a loser. It’s cool knowing that you are responsible for creating the framework for something big. I enjoyed the challenge of creating training systems, scheduling systems, billing systems, procedures/policies, cleaning systems, referral systems, etc. I especially liked my training systems as to this day I believe they’re second to none.

6. Own Gym to Train In

At the end of the day, I’d lock the doors, blast music such as Rise Against and pace around like a madman in between sets of deadlifts. When I was ready to lift; it was like a demon possessed me and there was no way I could fail. I love my equipment so much and can’t fathom training in any other environment. Chalk, deadlift levers, chains, and heavy metal? It doesn’t get any better than that!

7. Community/Local Impact

This is actually what it’s all about. You have to experience it to understand it. You’re part of the community. You hear locals gossiping about your place when you go eat nearby. Your clients have camaraderie and “hate” on other gyms. All the clients and employees would wear Lifts and Skorcher t-shirts and brag about how we’re the best gym. I was on a few local news stations and had some articles written about me in local magazines and newspapers, etc. It feels really good to know that you are “taking care” of the neighborhood in terms of fitness.

This was my “deadlift song.” I swear it added 30 lbs to my strength.