Scaling Your Studio with Curtis Christopherson

In the latest episode of The Pilates Business Podcast, host Seran Glanfield dives into the world of fitness business scaling. Curtis Christopherson, the innovative mind behind WRKOUT and owner of Innovative Fitness, shares invaluable insights and strategies to help fitness studio owners thrive in a competitive industry. 

Discover the importance of innovation, digital positioning, systems, and creating personalized client experiences. 

Learn more about WRKOUT HERE: https://www.wrkout.com/

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

How do you scale in the current world? Well, doing things the way they've always been done might not be serving you. Innovation is key, and today I'm joined by a guest who is sharing not only how they've positioned themselves to scale their brick and mortar business, but also how to position themselves to scale digitally. And I'm not talking about online classes Curious you should be and listen in. It's a value-packed episode. Well, hi there, I'm Sarah.

Speaker 1: 0:33

In Glenfield, I'm a business and marketing strategist. Just for boutique fitness studio owners like you. If you're ready to be inspired and make a bigger impact, you're in the right place. All you need are a few key strategies, the right mindset and some support along the way. Join me as I share the real life insights that will help you grow a sustainable and profitable studio. This is the Pilates Business Podcast.

Speaker 1: 1:05

Welcome back to the Pilates Business Podcast. I'm Sarah. Thank you so much for joining me here again today. Now you guys know how much I love to bring interesting folks onto the show to share with you insights that can help you to build and grow your boutique fitness studio business, and sometimes I bring in people who are in the Pilates world and some who are perhaps a little bit outside of the Pilates world, but regardless, I find that, no matter what, there is always something to learn that we can take away and apply to your business growth and development.

Speaker 1: 1:42

Now, today is no exception to that, because I'm here today with Curtis Crisifeson. Curtis is the founder and CEO of the Workout Platform, which we're going to talk about a little bit shortly, but with over 20 years of experience in the health and fitness industry, curtis is also the owner of Innovative Fitness, which is North America's largest network of premium personal training studios, soon to have 23 locations. He was also recognized as Canada's top trainer by Impact Magazine and has been featured in notable publications like Forbes. So welcome, curtis, to the Pilates Business Podcast.

Speaker 2: 2:23

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1: 2:25

I'm so glad you're here and I've got so much that I want to talk to you about today and all of the different things. But why don't we start off by, if you wouldn't mind, sharing with us a little bit about your brick and mortar business, how you got started and the journey that you have seen to what it has become today?

Speaker 2: 2:44

For sure. I mean I'm going to try to condense that because it's been about 21 years or 22 years I played high level sport. Growing up, was academically and athletically inclined and as I was finishing my degree in kinesiology and in a minor business out of Simon Fraser University here in Vancouver, I thought I'd apply really my schooling and education to do something I thought I'd love and enjoy and that would be personal training. I'd worked in the recreation world for five, six years before that, or for five to six years. So ever since I was 16, I was kind of in recreation and I thought why not apply my education? And I thought it was going to be a stepping stone for my career.

Speaker 2: 3:28

And I had ambitions and desires to do something else. And when I started training people obviously we do it because we love helping people, it's a lifestyle, it's flexible and you work with great people and at 22 years old I thought I'd do this for one or two years. And then, sure enough, six months in, I made a commitment to invest my own facility and I took a $450,000 line of credit at 22 years old, which is yeah, yeah. I guess I was ambitious.

Speaker 1: 4:01

My eyebrows are raised. You guys can't see me right now.

Speaker 2: 4:05

I was very ambitious. I remember coming home telling my parents I said, hey, I think I'm going to invest in a gym, and they're like you're crazy, you're 22. And I said, hey, listen, what's worst case scenario? The worst case scenario in my mind was I would do it, I would fail at doing it and then I would have a debt that I would have to get a good paying job and pay it off over time. And that was absolutely worst case scenario that I thought of, and so I embarked on that journey.

Speaker 2: 4:30

I opened my first facility at 23. And from there we worked with the other partners in the business. There was two other founders and we grew the business. We created systems and structure and we built a community-based business that had a really strong purpose with strong values, and we scaled that business well beyond ourselves. We quickly went from three locations to 11. And then we went to 15.

Speaker 2: 5:02

We survived COVID. Well, we've survived multiple bubbles. So we survived the 2003 tech crash, the 2008 financial bubble and recession and then obviously survived COVID. And during COVID and before we were exploring, how could we capture a little bit of the magic that happens between the service provider and the customer? We always saw that there was some unique magic that happened in that interaction, and so we started investing in technology in 2019. We accelerated that technology in 2020, when our physical locations were closed down and fast forward. Here we are 15 locations, with a roadmap of 23 in the next year, and we have a physical platform or a digital platform that enables and helps wellness professionals across North America to monetize the influence that they have with their customer, and so I know we're going to come back to that, but that's a little bit of the journey and in about two minutes of 20 years packed in there.

Speaker 1: 6:06

I appreciate you condensing it down, because I do have a lot of questions to ask you as well. So, obviously, growth beyond yourselves and to the scale that you have, requires systems, which you mentioned, and so talk to me a little bit about where you began in the early days, or where you perhaps even see now the most important systems playing out in your business. Where do you see the most impactful systems in your business?

Speaker 2: 6:38

Yeah, that's a great question. First off, where we started, I remember reading the E-Mith book and the E-Mith. If you haven't read it, if you're a business owner, I highly recommend it. It's a little bit dry, but after you read it the third time you'll realize the benefit of it.

Speaker 2: 6:53

Scaling a personal service is really difficult. We don't sell a widget. We don't sell even food. We don't sell food at the end of the table. We sell a personality and we sell a relationship, and so scaling a business beyond ourselves require a lot of structure and focus on implementing the things that we all do really well.

Speaker 2: 7:12

As an entrepreneur or someone that even has their own book of business, you're an independent operator, you have great clientele, you have great retention, you know how to service those people. You have to teach that next person that you hire to deliver that same quality of service with the same level of expectation, and the reality is usually that doesn't happen. And so what we did is we put structure and systems around, everything from how you pick up the phone, scheduling, billing, invoicing, how you treat your customer, the amenities. But really I'd say that the systems that we really focused our attention to was actually around the people and personalities are quite dynamic. Human beings are quite dynamic. But how can we provide a framework and a structure and a system that we could essentially enroll other people that we hired into the same vision, into the same purpose, into the same customer service expectation and we spent a lot of time doing that.

Speaker 2: 8:15

We believe that when you focus your time and attention on the people that you hire and that you work with and you help them grow both personally and professionally, it's only going to impact the business directly. A lot of our time is actually helping our new employees not only become great trainers tactically and technically, but also grow as a person. We have systems and structure on their onboarding process, not just about being a great trainer, but really actually how to grow as a professional as grow as a person. We spent a lot of time doing that and it positively not only impacts who they are, but it positively impacts the business. A lot of the systems and structure is obviously on the basics Scheduling, billing, invoicing, cancellation policies, all of those things that I think you should do and many of us probably have, but it's that next level. How do you actually provide structure and systems around continual education, continual empowerment with the people that we have in our business that are delivering the services at the expectation that we have for them.

Speaker 1: 9:27

Yeah, absolutely. Can you give some context to how much time you dedicate in your business to onboarding a new team member.

Speaker 2: 9:35

Yeah, that's evolved a little bit over the years. Yeah, before we used to be almost like a two-week to three-week tryout before we even hired them and paid them. We believe that if you want to be part of the team, you had to put in the time on shadowing and evaluating if they were a good fit and if we were a good fit for them. Obviously, employment laws and things have changed over the last 20 years, but overall we have a three-stage interview process. Two interviews that are traditionally like you meet with someone. You have some specific questions you have for them. We go quite deep in our interview process and our interview questions. We have a tactical and a technical interview. That's the third interview. What's their competency in delivering the services? It doesn't have to be perfect. We obviously have a team and management that can support brushing up their skills as a professional.

Speaker 2: 10:31

Then after that it's about a two-week integration process. We talk to them and we have an onboarding process. It's about three to four hours that talks about our philosophies, our values, our service expectations and really refining and being aligned with what we represent as a brand. Then there's three to four hours around how to actually be a phenomenal service provider as a technical trainer, ensuring that the systems and approach is relatively consistent. There's some wiggle room. If you have a sport background, as an example, or you have some other experience or another certification, you can continue to provide that your own flavor. That is totally fine. But relatively speaking, we have to come from the same philosophy. If you're going to scale a business, the service has to be relatively the same.

Speaker 2: 11:21

After that it's about 10 days of shadowing and integrating in the business. How do you shadow an experience, shadow a training session? How do you train our staff? You essentially take what they apply, let alone their education experience, and then they go through the process of training our staff before they train our clients. Because when you scale a business and you have lifetime value, we have a really strong LTV, which is lifetime value of our customer.

Speaker 2: 11:52

Our average customer before COVID stayed with us longer than six years In the fitness industry. That's significant. So when you have someone and we had clients that have been with us for 12, 15, 18, 20 years all 20. And so when a new person comes in and joins the team, their expectation of a trainer that's been with us for seven years compared to the person that just started. They expect that the services is consistent and the same, and so we have to bridge that gap. During the onboarding process, we have to make sure that the gap isn't 70%. If it's five, that's totally fine. You know, people would expect that people have to find their footing, but it's our job to really bridge that gap and also hire great people, people that have education, experience and have aligned values. So yeah, I mean it's about a two and a half to three week process and we were really diligent with that.

Speaker 1: 12:45

Right, and it sounds like a very involved process as well. Cut touches on everything from values to the interaction with the clients, as well as, obviously, some of those, like you said, the admin side of things as well, and there's a lot of parallels. Just for those listening, if you have, if you're work, if you're studio or you work in a studio where you work one on one. That's very similar to personal training, business right, and so I know a lot of folks who are perhaps studio owners may be thinking, oh my goodness, that's a lot of time to dedicate to training someone else who then I'm going to give my clients to. What happens if they then leave and I've given them all this training and benefited them, and then I get none of the amazing results if they had stayed. How do you kind of manage that or deal with that? Is there something that you do in your business specifically or is it sort of a mindset approach that you take?

Speaker 2: 13:39

I think the first thing is it's totally a mindset. So if you're going in with the fear that people are going to take your clients and leave, I think you have to be cognitive of that and you can have systems and structure and some expectations, contract expectations or contracts in place. But it's also a mindset, like that's the mechanics. The mindset is do you have an abundance mindset or a scarcity mindset? Do you have a fear-based mindset or do you have an open and an awareness mindset? And I think it starts there.

Speaker 2: 14:11

I think also, the only way you're going to scale your business beyond yourself is by hiring people. It's just a reality. And if you're going to fear doing that, then you've got to be okay with the fact that you're going to be a service provider, do this as a lifestyle job, as an example, deliver and manage your own clientele and have the restrictions that come with that. And those restrictions are that when you travel you're probably not going to get paid by the time when you wake up, when you're 50 and you're still training people. You have to be okay with that and that's there's something for everybody.

Speaker 2: 14:43

But if you want to scale your business beyond yourself, you have to be diligent and okay with hiring people and know that there's a risk with that. But if you put the energy out there and you empower people and you invest in their personal development and professional growth and you give without any expectation nine times out of 10, it's going to work out. We've had all of our setbacks and heartbreaks, myself included, put all this energy and time and effort and I had one employee and teammate that was phenomenal for our business, worked with us for nine years. I had her at my Christmas dinner three times with my family because she didn't have any family locally and she left only to take clients with her, which was a massive disappointment and I was frustrated. But there was lessons in that as well and I think at the end of the day, if you're doing it with good intentions and you invest in time and people, you have structure and systems to back it up and support it. You got to do it if you want to scale your business.

Speaker 1: 15:46

Yeah, I completely agree with you. Completely agree with you, and there's so much more to. I think there's so much more to that mindset element as well. I think that is often where people stumble with their growth. So tell us a little bit more. Given that you have obviously scaled your business to the extent you have and there's more to come, where would you say? What would you say are some of the biggest things that hold people back? What specific things have you seen that might hold people back from reaching their full potential in the business?

Speaker 2: 16:17

I think number one is that they're going with the intention that they're the celebrity Plotties instructor or trainer and they build a business right away about themselves. So, whether they call it Curtis Fitness or Jenny Fitness or whatever, that's probably a limiting factor. Right there, you've built a business around your brand and your name and then the only people like people only want to train with you or work with you, and so I think that is a limiting factor right from the get-go and it doesn't mean that everybody has to go and change the sign on their door tomorrow. But think about that If I had a business called Curtis Fitness, probably people are going to more inclined want to train with Curtis. That's just inherently what people want to do, and so we didn't do that and we didn't make it about the person, we made it about the brand. So that's number one. Number two we truly believe that most fitness professionals whether you're a yoga instructor, plotties instructor, a personal trainer we get really excited about the tactical and the mechanics of our jobs. So we get further education and certifications and there's a long list behind our name that might include MD, and we feel like that. We have to be this technically proficient individual and that's all we focus on and there's nothing wrong with that. People expect really thought-out, experience-educated tactical service experience.

Speaker 2: 17:51

But the reality is that we're human beings and usually when someone is working with a fitness professional and a wellness professional, it's because they're not satisfied either where they're at, who they are, or aren't accountable and motivated to do it on their own. Those four things Right, like you know. And 90% of the time it's probably actually like people don't come to you in the first experience or the consultation and say I have low self-esteem, I have low cognitive. No, they say I'm looking to lose the next 10 pounds, I'm looking again, stronger, I'm, you know. So they say these things, but really there's a deep rooted emotional behavior that they're not quite satisfied with where they're at. It's not because they're bored, it's because they want to get better and they want to perform better, they want to live longer, they want to feel better, they want to look better.

Speaker 2: 18:45

And so if we know that about people, that's mindset, like if you look at holistic wellness, five spheres there's the physical component, so that's the tactical component, and then there's the social, spiritual, intellectual, emotional, and if there's 80% of it is on the mental and the mindset, then we have to make it about that. And so if we don't make it about that, if we don't, you know, greet people and make them feel welcome when they walk in the door, we don't give them praise, we don't create community, we don't do those things and it's strictly about the tactical experience. Then it becomes a transactional experience, and so if people come there for three months or six months, they get a great, great, phenomenal service and then they leave to go do something else. Nothing keeps them coming back. So you have to connect with them emotionally and that's all about creating community. So that would be the second one.

Speaker 2: 19:36

And then the third one, I think, is just the systems, like we talked about. Like, if you don't create systems that people can follow, then the service cannot be consistent, like it's just a reality. So the more people you have, the more likely people are going to have inconsistency, and the reality is that you lose trust. Trust is the cornerstone of our business. It doesn't matter, you know, especially in the service industry, and trust is built over time. It does not scale fast and it scales from consistency, a consistent behavior or a consistent delivery. And so if you want to build trust, which then builds loyalty. You have to have consistency across the board, and so that's what you know, and you can do that through systems and the accountability around those.

Speaker 1: 20:29

Absolutely Systems around what the experience looks like, the interactions that people have with the clients of this business, and then also systems around like you mentioned earlier, onboarding and training a team so they can deliver on that experience that you most want your clients to have in the studio. So I want to change direction now a little bit and talk about your latest endeavor, which is the platform we mentioned earlier Workout. Tell us a little bit more about what Workout is.

Speaker 2: 20:57

Yeah, so it's evolved. In 2019, we started developing software and we thought that we wanted to capture the magic between the customer, the service provider and the customer, you know, both in the physical locations and outside, you know, and it wasn't an engagement platform like a programming platform and it wasn't entirely going to be a scheduling, billing and invoicing platform, even though we had that functionality mapped out. But over time it's evolved now into a strictly a recommendation platform. And what a recommendation platform is there's not many of them, in fact, there's none is that we found that this trust that I talked about is that most wellness professionals develop relationships with their clients and they've developed a level of trust and, on the community level or on the local level, they become, you know, a confidant, let alone, you know, someone that people go to for questions or answers around their health, well-being, wellness, you know, and it could be even questions around supplementation or equipment or whatever it might be advice.

Speaker 2: 22:04

We, as these level of influencers, local influencers we provide, you know, programming or provide recommendations or provide advice based on our education, experience and expertise, and we don't get paid for that, you know. We get paid usually for the one-on-one service that we provide or the group class service we provide, but we don't get paid for all the questions, and you know the things that people come to us about because we're thought leaders or we're. You know we have a level of expertise that people you know want to lean on, and what we found is that the only people that were getting paid for recommendations or advice were social influencers. You know, unless you had 200,000 followers on Instagram, you weren't getting the brand deals, and so what we found is that there was a unique thing that was going on behaviorally. You know, all these local wellness professionals were making recommendations and providing advice and they weren't. You know they couldn't monetize that influence. They couldn't monetize that advice.

Speaker 2: 23:00

So we built a tool where we partner with all the leading industry brands and products, everything from equipment, wearables and nutrition like supplements, and now all of these leading brand, the products that we already recommend. You know, now that you recommend them, you can earn rewards, and it's anywhere between 10 and 18% commission, and it doesn't come out of the consumer's pocket. You know, in fact, we have map pricing, so basically, it's the lowest pricing that you're going to find anywhere, including Amazon. But now, instead of the product companies paying the advertisers, such as Facebook and Google, to access their customer. They're paying for the advocacy of these brands and products and they're rewarding the behavior. That already is being done, and so it unlocks revenue streams for the wellness professional and it makes it easy. So now you don't have to send people down to the street to the local retailer and not monetize off that influence.

Speaker 1: 23:54

And you have all sorts of different brands on the platform, everyone from Hyper-Ice to Thorn supplements to equipment, triggerpoint many, many brands that we all already know and are all already recommending to our clients and even using, or even have perhaps considered trying to sell inside of our studios, so this is a wonderful way to really be able to facilitate or access perhaps, an additional revenue stream, but the key is, and the most wonderful thing about this, though, is that obviously, you don't have to hold any inventory. It's all digital right.

Speaker 2: 24:29

Yeah. So I always say that we're putting the power of recommendations in the back pocket of wellness professionals, but also turning boutique studios into wellness retailers. The biggest challenge with boutique studios is that we're not set up for retail. We don't have the spaced inventory product, we don't have the cash outlay to actually provide a good variety and variety of product lines, and so then we just don't do it, you know, and when we're not set up to retail. And so now what we have is we have the ability for studios to actually be, have digital inventory and sell all the products that they love and trust already and make income on it or make revenue off of it, off those sales that you're already doing or you're already suggesting around, and so we become, you know, a unique touch point where we're enabling wellness studios or independent fitness professionals to sell products and make money.

Speaker 1: 25:26

Yeah, and so how you know, you now have I think you mentioned earlier almost 7000 trainers and studios on the platform already. So, of the people who are really monetizing their influence and their recommendations, how do you see them utilizing the platform? How do people get the most out of it?

Speaker 2: 25:47

Yeah, so there's a passive recommendation. That always happens, right. So you know you get contacted. Hey, curtis, what do you think about X? And it's a unique, you know, opportunity for me to then provide a recommendation back or validate what they're recommending and then provide the recommendation. So that happens. But that's passively right, like that's that's hoping that someone knocks on your door or picks up the phone and asks you the question, the people that are actually maximizing the platform is they're thinking about all the touch points and when they can integrate these products, brands and, because it's a recommendation link, there's great opportunities to insert it.

Speaker 2: 26:23

So, number one when someone signs up, they have an onboarding bundle. So it's, you know, a supplement package. It is an equipment package. You know it's your kit when you sign up for whatever service you're providing, and so, whether it's online nutrition coaching, all the way to, you know, an in-person group class, pilates class, like what, what equipment or nutrition can actually supplement or support their goals and needs. So, included in the onboarding package, it could be 30 days, 60 days, 90 day, challenges. That you know, when you're signing up and creating a challenge, it's that touch point During the holidays people are looking for, you know, recommendations to buy for, you know, stockings and or for, you know, small gifts for their significant others, and so there's a unique opportunity there.

Speaker 2: 27:10

You know, and most of us, especially if we have children, we're involved in other networks, whether it's, you know, friends and family networks and or local schools, and or you know, our kids and their kids sports, and so a lot of times, like even the coaches they're, they're suggesting X supplement or X piece of equipment for every kid and no one's winning on that, like you know. I mean, the brands are, I guess, but you know, and so there's a lot of ways that you can just, like you know, provide the recommendation, length and doing the work and setting up these bundles for those people.

Speaker 1: 27:45

It's awesome. I'm so excited, so I'm going to link to all of that in the show notes. But really quickly, why don't you share with us where people can find out a bit more about the platform and about you and all of the things that you're working on?

Speaker 2: 27:58

Yeah, the easiest way to find. I'll start with myself, curtis Christoffersoncom. You can find me on LinkedIn and Instagram and Facebook, but LinkedIn and Instagram I'm very active on, and then you can send me a direct message and, more happy, to connect personally. Number one. Number two you know we also have a newsletter called Healthy Ambitions. So it's all those people that have ambitions to, you know, grow and scale their business and live, lead a healthy and well lifestyle, and so that's something that you can look at. And then the business is work out. You know, as, as you mentioned, you're going to, you know, share the link, but work outcom. So wrcoutcom, it's just dropped the first O. You know you can find information on our store product and, you know, get signed up and it's a free, free application, so it doesn't cost any money. There's no barrier. You know. You download it from the app store, you can do that. And then Innovative Fitness if you want to check out our brick and mortar business, it's just innovativefitnesscom. Awesome.

Speaker 1: 28:58

This was such a fantastic conversation and I really appreciate all of your insights and I could keep going I can. I hope you'll perhaps come back and chat with us a little bit more In a few months time to talk a little bit more about the app and the platform and how that's building and growing. But thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of this with us today. Appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 29:20

Awesome. Well, thank you for having me, no worries.

Speaker 1: 29:23

I hope this is helpful to all of you listening as you go about building your boutique fitness studio business. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please go and take a quick minute, go to wherever you're listening to this and rate and review this podcast. It would mean a ton to me and would make sure that this podcast gets out into our community so that more teachers and studio owners, just like you, can feel encouraged and supported on their journey in our industry. Did you love this episode and want more? Head to spring3.com and check out my free resources that will help you run a profitable and fulfilling studio business. And before you go, one last reminder there is no one way to do what you do, only your way. So whatever it is that you want to do, create or offer, you've got this. Thanks again for joining me today and have a wonderful rest of your day.