Ep. 181 - Is Your Competitive Team Breaking the Bank? 3 Ways to Make Your Competitive Team Program an Asset and Not a Liability

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Show Notes:

Your competitive team can be your proudest brand builder and your biggest silent drain at the same time. This episode we’re opening a month-long focus on competitive programs with one core question: how do you run a competitive team that strengthens your business instead of quietly bleeding money, space, and leadership energy?

We dig into three practical elements gym owners and sports facility leaders can actually control. First, we talk pricing per hour and enrollment strategy, including the reality that competitive programs often earn less per hour than recreational classes. We unpack the “pyramid” of team levels, why bigger lower levels matter, and how upper levels can still deliver real value through credibility, visibility, and long-term member trust even when margins are thin.

Next, we get honest about knowing your numbers. We walk through what to include in your competitive team cost accounting beyond tuition: coaching pay structures, director time, meet-related expenses, travel, and even end-of-year banquets. Then we shift to space utilization and scheduling, including adding rotations like mental training, dance, and strength in auxiliary areas so equipment is never sitting idle and fundamentals actually get better.

We close with a reminder that “liability” can also mean burnout. Audit your calendar, set clear standards before the season, and protect the parts of coaching you love most. If this helps, subscribe, share with a fellow program director, and leave a review so more facility owners can build competitive programs that truly thrive.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:04

Welcome back to Learning to Thrive. I'm Courtney. And I'm Michaela. And today we are starting a new month. And our theme for this month is to be discussing different aspects of competitive team and the competitive programs within your sports facility to make sure that we are holding ourselves to a high standard, using the best practices, using the best systems, and also really being thoughtful that what we're doing in our competitive team situations does align with our core values and the way that we're also operating the business as a whole. Because sometimes when you get into competitive situations, the pressure, the excitement, the uh everything that goes with competition really can kind of skew you and make you more emotional. And when you get more emotional, a lot of times in business, then relying on data values and things that are very static can sometimes not feel intuitive. So we're gonna walk through this month our competitive team. Um, today we are talking about making that program an asset and not a liability, because for the longest time, at least in the gymnastics world, as you your competitive teams grow, because they actually bring in less revenue dollar per hour, they can, if you're not careful, turn into a money loss or an energy loss or a resource loss, depending on how you're structuring it. And we want to make sure that we are paying attention to that and also giving the right amount of time, attention, money, resources to those programs, and also not getting so lost in it that it drains resources from the rest of the programming. So it's it's kind of a tight line to walk.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Yeah, I think it's one of those things where with a competitive program, that is where you might see a little bit more of like the notoriety, especially if you have for people who have successful competitive programs, whether that's gymnastics or a different, you know, sport, dance, you know, what have you. Um, you might get a little bit of the notoriety and things like that. So then it's like, okay, well, you know, they won this or they won that. And so we have to keep feeding into it, feeding into it, and finding that balance between, you know, competitive program requires something different than maybe a recreational program does. It in some ways requires a little bit more in terms of time, energy, things like that. And like you're talking about per hour. But balancing that with the business side of it, which is like your rec program is where you're gonna find your business like success. Yeah, you know, money. Like if we're if we're talking money, your rec program should be an impact for you.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

I feel like an impact because impact for a competitive team, you can only serve so many athletes well. For your rec program, though, you get to serve a wider community because they're coming in for three months or six months or whatever, and so they're rotating through. So you get to have an impact, a bigger impact on your on the community through your rec program than your team program, where you can have a deeper impact, I think, because you're spending more time with them. They're there year after year, you're shaping them. I think both of them hold value. And what hurts my feelings is when I go into a gym and I see 90% of the gym is set up for team and 10% of it is set up for rec. And so you've got your rec program in this tiny little corner of the gym or a section that's like so small. And you, and I know that they're running more athletes through that small section than they're you, you know, like I know the hours are different, but like we love team, we love competitive programs. And also, I do think that making sure that your competitive team is not the end-all be-all of your business and is not the end-all be all of the attention, the resources, making sure you're still highlighting those rec athletes and stuff. I think that goes a long, long way to a sustainable community impacting business versus a sports program that might be winning, but is not making a large impact.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:15

100%.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

So, and this can go for all sports too, because you've got your club level, you've got your rec level. You know, like a lot of times the rec gets the worst of the fields and the worst of this and the worst of that. But honestly, they're producing the most athletes, they're they're the most, you know, impact that you can make. And they're all they also matter, right? Do we all have to do competitive sports at such a high level? We don't. The value there is something that I think that if you're running a sports program, a dance program, whatever, not being very, very mindful not to undercut the people that are not quite not year-round, you know, make sure that they're getting the best of you just like your team is getting the best of you.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

Right.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

So that's my soapbox before we go into how much I love competitive team.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

So we're gonna start off today with three ways to make your competitive team an asset and not a liability. That's our like we're going through three different things.

SPEAKER_02 5:12

An asset adding lasting value and a liability draining resources. So that's the that's the context in which we're using those words today.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

Yeah.

Enrollment-Per-Hour & Price-Per-Hour Tuition

SPEAKER_00 5:20

So number one, our first thing that we're gonna look at is your enrollment hour and your price per hour tuition. So, you know, Courtney, you already mentioned you're making less on the competitive side in a dollar per hour sense than you are on your rec side. So what we try and look at first is in terms of this like enrollment and then tuition and things like that. One is your larger lower levels tend to help offset your smaller upper levels, at least in the world that we are in, in kind of the gymnastics world, but I feel like it would probably be similar within other, you know, sports and and industries as well. You have it's kind of like a pyramid shape. Your lower levels, your intro, your beginner levels have a lot more interest. And then as the demand in terms of time and physical demand, monetary demand, all of that, as that continues to increase, your number of athletes per team tends to decrease or per program or things like that. Just because maybe people don't want to specialize in this, or they, you know, a million different reasons. So having those larger lower levels and really filling those as best you can can help then support the smaller, higher levels.

SPEAKER_02 6:40

Yeah. And I think you've got, I think as to to be mindful and to be smart about it means not putting your head in the sand as far as what the what the revenue actually is, right? And what the expenses actually are. Because I think a lot of times when you when you say, is this team making money, right? And and or is this team taking too much too much time or too much gym space or too much whatever? Like you need to really know what resources each of the teams is taking and what what they're actually bringing. And I think the I think from that perspective also there is a your higher levels may not bring you in as much revenue, dollar per hour, so to speak. However, are they are they driving the image of your gym, right? Are they, are they the reason some people sign up because they can see their toddler someday being that, right? There's there's multiple value ads that they all have. And I think the mistake that a lot of uh program directors or gym owners or sports facility owners make is you put your head in the sand because you don't really want to know. You see that the athlete is paying five dollars and sixteen cents an hour, and you're like, that's right. Like, but knowing what each level does and looking at the program as a whole and not by level, right? Is this program as a whole profitable?

SPEAKER_00 7:57

I was gonna ask, just out of curiosity, when you are going through, you know, the finances after each year, and you're looking at the teen program. Pause.

SPEAKER_02 8:07

Oh, we're not going over the finances after each year. We're going over the finances prior to the new season during the season.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

Right.

SPEAKER_02 8:15

Yeah. So so yes. Yes. But keep going.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

So at the end of the season, yeah. When you're you're looking at your whole picture because you've been gathering data throughout. Do you when you we look at team, do you tend to look at the overall number with team expense versus revenue, or do you look at it per level?

SPEAKER_02 8:36

We have it broken down. So we have a PL for every year, broken down by level. And then then summer summarize by program. So dev and Excel. So in in the gymnastics world, you have two different competitive programs, think think club and think travel, right? Like um, and so we I look at it by level and the and the cost per level being the coaching cost is in that. I don't take out the rent, so to speak, for team um, because that comes kind of out of the overall like what they what they bring in after coaching. So we look at I look at the revenue that they bring in per month, the coaching costs per month. Um, I put a a fee on there for each team for our team directors, right? Because the team directors are essentially a cost to the team program. Um, and then I can look at it by each program, and then I look at it as the program as a whole. And I do the same thing with like our registration fees and things like that too. So what are we ex what are we spending to go to meets? That's what our registration fees cover. What are all the extra expenses that that those fees cover? Is are we meeting our expenses, right? I'm not trying we're not necessarily trying to make money on the registration. It's just to meet the meet fees and like that kind of thing. So yes, it it can be broken. Now that has taken. Did I always have that in place? No. That's probably in the last five to seven years. Um when we got dev, because I knew dev was could be a drain on a business.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

So there tends to be a lot more travel.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

There's more levels, which is more coaches. And they are. There are are the upper levels making any money? No, they're they're generally not. And they're adding so much value.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

Right.

SPEAKER_02 10:12

Right. So they the in the in the ways that maybe they don't add the revenue, they certainly add the attention value, the brand value, the uh credibility value. Like they and them as humans being out in the world representing Thrive adds a ton of value. So you just have to, you just have to know, yeah, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

Well, this actually

Knowing the Associated Costs

SPEAKER_00 10:35

is a perfect segue to our second point, which is knowing the costs associated within your program, not putting your head in the sand, like you said. Yeah. Um, I mean, you kind of hit the nail on the head with several of those with the coaching, the expenses, things like travel need to be put in there. You said you break it all down by level and program. Um, meet pay, which we structure differently than our hourly pay for our competitive coaches. The other thing I wanted to throw into this list of you know, expenses that you need to be aware of and not have your head in the sand about when it comes to your competitive program, is if you do any sort of end-of-year celebration or end-of-year banquet, this is definitely something that if you do it, you can start super small in the beginning and grow it, you know, as your program grows. But I know a lot of programs, at least in our industry, they do some sort of end-of-year banquet. It's something everyone looks forward to every year. We've gotten to the point where our end-of-year banquet is huge. I mean, 200 plus athletes plus their families.

SPEAKER_02 11:40

300. We're yeah, we're 29 tables.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

Yeah. Whatever that is. It's like a wedding.

SPEAKER_02 11:46

Yeah, it's like putting on a wedding every year, but less complicated.

SPEAKER_00 11:49

Yes. And there's, you know, obviously expenses that go to that. And it's it's just one of those things. You don't want to get to the end of the year and not be planning for it, and then or like go all out, blow a ton of money on it, and then you're looking at the end at your PL and you're like, man, I wish we wouldn't have spent so much money on.

SPEAKER_02 12:06

Right. Well, we and we but we charge our parents for that. But so I think that I think the thing there is making sure you're not making money off that. Like, or okay, that's that's a me thing. Yeah. It's that that's a kind of a me thing, but like, I don't want to be making a time, like that should be a net zero. Like, we only charge for the expenses that we spend. Right. We try to get that as close to a net zero as possible. But yeah. Yeah, it's knowing, right? It's it's it's it it just is that that thing of like you cannot know or you can know, and both of them are gonna be painful in different ways. Right? So choose your hard. If you know the numbers, then sometimes that stresses people out and it and it feels it can feel like, oh gosh, are we gonna, you know, make make it or what not. But knowing at least then you can actually take action to influence the numbers, not knowing you're just flying by the seat of your pants and hoping it all turns out well, which I think then creates a lot of anxiety that maybe is even unconscious anxiety that comes out in different ways.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

So Yeah, well, you don't want to be blindsided by something that you did not need to be.

SPEAKER_02 13:10

No, ideally not. Ideally not. Not if you're gonna run, not if you're going to run a long-standing successful program that has a reputable brand. You can absolutely succeed in business and run it by the seat of your pants. But if what you're trying to create is something that will be lasting and impactful and really make a difference in the community, then no, you need to be responsible for putting on your big kid pants and knowing your numbers.

unknown 13:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:35

And we can help you with that. So if you need help with that, reach out to us. Happy to get on a call and help people walk through that. But um, it is something that it takes you from one level to another level. And once you start operating at that next level, you will never go back because there's so much more peace of mind knowing than not knowing.

Using Your Space with Efficiency

SPEAKER_00 13:55

Our third and final tip here for how to make your competitive program more of an asset is, and this kind of goes back to those larger levels, using space in your facility. It's the idea of using your space as efficiently as possible. So what that might look like is adding or using auxiliary space to add additional team rotations so that you can fit more people in at one time. So, just as an example, we do mental training every week for our athletes from a certain level up, kind of once you get to that optional level, both within the dev program and the Excel program. So that's a whole rotation. That's a 45-minute, 30-45-minute chunk of time that they're not using equipment, that another team can use equipment. I think sometimes, especially within the sport of gymnastics, we get stuck into the like, okay, well, there's four events, so I can have four groups going at one time. Or, you know, if you have a field sport, okay, I well, I have two fields, so I can have two teams. And yeah, you could have six divided, right? Yeah. The question is, how are you using your space? Who is using it, and is it being used efficiently? So things like mental training, we also do dance, a dance rotation outside of the gym. And we are adding in this year a strength rotation outside of the basic four events.

SPEAKER_02 15:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

So how are you using your space? Yeah. If you think you can only fit four teams in at a time, can you fit five? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:36

And I think that goes to that goes to realizing that there's fundamentals that must be worked on in order to create successful teams, right? The most successful teams have really strong fundamentals. And really strong fundamentals are not fancy. They don't take a lot of equipment, they don't even take a lot of space. I mean, our dan our dancers use our basketball court. So we so we have a gym side and then we have a sports, an indoor turf area that does sports. So the gymnastics kids come over to this, the indoor turf and they're gonna be doing their strength there in the fall or summer, fall, I'm not sure where when that starts. And then they're also just using the basket. We have like a third of a basketball court, they're using that for dance. Like it's not fancy. I mean, it's just efficient. And it works on the things that they need to work on, and it also allows them to focus because if you pull it down and you pull away all of the extra equipment, you know, and and you strip it down to where you've got space and you've got a purpose, right? We are in this space with no other equipment other than to dance. What are they gonna focus on? The technique of dance, in theory, right? If we're working on just strength in a strength, you know, in a small area and there's only certain amounts of equipment there and we're all doing the same thing and we're all paying attention to form and that kind of thing, that adds so much value to your program. And it's going to benefit your other events, right? And if we're taking this to field sports, if you have a, if you have a full turf field and you have littles, especially, like anybody under fourth grade, right? You can split that field into three, go horizont, you know, go horizontal on that, set up four drill stations, because you should be drilling drilling the fundamentals in field sports early creates lasting advantage later, right? And lasting advantage in gameplay. So you spend most of your practice on that. Then maybe you open up, you know, to half field and you have the three teams rotate through and play sixes. You know, like so there's just so many different ways to do it. It's thinking outside the box and being aware of the fact that your team does not dominate, right? And they're always going to tell you they need more.

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:44

And your job as the leader and the person who's looking at the space is to go, I hear you. And sometimes they're right. And other times it's it's not necessarily we need more, we need a different focus. Or we need, or we need to break something. Something is complex and we need to break it into the simpler parts and then do that. And then if in the gymnastics world at least, when you're talking about gym space and we're talking that about that rec team dynamic, intermixing your, your like making sure that there's an intermix between your rec and your team students, even if it's in the sense of they're side by side or they're allowed to use different pieces of things, I think that goes a long way to add value to your show your rec program and get the whole program bought in and cheering on your team versus just saying, well, this space is only for this and we can never use it for anything else. No, fill that up. If teams rotate in mental training and there's an open floor, gosh, in this facility, we either have a asteroids class, uh higher-level class on there, we have a tumbling class on there, we have a middle school high school class on there, or that we we have a cheer team that runs from us, we'll put the cheer team on there. Like, maximize your square footage and don't let your team talk you into the fact that they need exclusive use of certain things. That may be an unpopular opinion. Right.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

Right.

SPEAKER_02 19:01

But that's that's what I think.

unknown 19:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:04

About that. So just to wrap up, your three ways to make your competitive team an asset and not a liability. Yep. In terms of, like you were saying, money, energy, time. Make it make it eight out.

SPEAKER_02 19:15

Time and energy. Audit your time and energy.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

And if you're spending a lot of time and energy, and this is this kind of goes to the relationship building, if you're spending a lot of time and energy on either parent meetings or athlete meetings because athletes are not meeting expectations, or coaches meetings because coaches aren't meeting expectations, and we can get into this in a different episode, you've got to look at your standards and what you what you have laid out for people to understand first, because this can be an a huge drain on your energy and your time. And then you won't love it anymore. And that's where burnout comes from, right? So making sure you have the standards in place and the things in place before the season starts so that you do not end up giving too much of your time to things, you know, like that could be prevented, I think helps a lot. And I think I think when you're looking at that, you know, asset liability piece, I think the asset piece of that is the deep relationships, and sometimes the liability can be the time and the energy. And so you just have to make sure that you're auditing that as well.

SPEAKER_00 20:15

Right.

SPEAKER_02 20:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:16

Right. So number one, know your numbers and your price per hour. Number two, know all the additional costs other than just tuition. Yep. Know your numbers and throw in there the energy and emotional.

SPEAKER_02 20:30

Yeah, look at your calendar. How many hours did you spend in in team parent meetings?

SPEAKER_00 20:34

Yeah, be aware of that as well. And then finally, are you positive that you are utilizing your space to be as efficient as possible between both your rec and your competitive program? And is there some way for you to increase your efficiency by adding additional rotations or making sure no equipment is being left unused at any point in the evening? Things like that.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

So yeah, fundamentals. Fun or not, they need to be done. Right. So, so yeah. Yeah. That's it for today. All right. Well, we hope that that was helpful. Um, if you have any questions, feel free to message us. Um, we'd be happy to share what we can share to help you make sure that your program is thriving and that you don't end up burnout, that you end up at the end of the season feeling like, wow, that was awesome. And you're really glad you did it. So keep on thriving, everybody.