Every month, Two-Brain compiles a leaderboard of the top-performing gyms so we can find out what the best gyms are doing—and tell you.
In December 2023, we focused on average revenue per member (ARM) at more than 1,000 gyms worldwide. ARM measures what clients are paying in return for the value a gym provides, and the businesses on our leaderboard provide a ton of value.
The No. 1 gym earned just shy of US$800 per client per month—and that’s a rolling three-month average, not just a one-hit wonder.
In today’s episode, Chris Cooper presents the Top 10 ARM leaders for December 2023 and shares the tactics behind the numbers, from Affinity Marketing (referrals) to adding new programs.
If you want to hear more from these ARM leaders, our full episode with Kelly Lorenz will air Feb. 1, and Michaela Munsterman’s episode airs on Feb. 8.
Links
Gym Owners United
Book a Call
0:55 - The Top 10
4:48 - How’d they get those ARMs?
7:20 - Creating new programs
8:53 - Building value
12:47 - What stops gym owners
Every month, Two-Brain compiles a leaderboard of the top-performing gyms so we can find out what the best gyms are doing—and tell you.
In December 2023, we focused on average revenue per member (ARM) at more than 1,000 gyms worldwide. ARM measures what clients are paying in return for the value a gym provides, and the businesses on our leaderboard provide a ton of value.
The No. 1 gym earned just shy of US$800 per client per month—and that’s a rolling three-month average, not just a one-hit wonder.
In today’s episode, Chris Cooper presents the Top 10 ARM leaders for December 2023 and shares the tactics behind the numbers, from Affinity Marketing (referrals) to adding new programs.
If you want to hear more from these ARM leaders, our full episode with Kelly Lorenz will air Feb. 1, and Michaela Munsterman’s episode airs on Feb. 8.
Links
Gym Owners United
Book a Call
0:55 - The Top 10
4:48 - How’d they get those ARMs?
7:20 - Creating new programs
8:53 - Building value
12:47 - What stops gym owners
Most gyms don't have a marketing problem. They have a retention problem, and they have a value problem. I'm Chris Cooper. This is Run a Profitable Gym, and today I'm so fired up to share our leaderboard of the gym's providing the most value. We measure value provided by a RM average revenue per member, what people are paying in reciprocation for the value they receive at a gym. That's what a RM is. If you want to earn more money per client, you provide more value and then you charge appropriately. Obviously, a lot of gyms are providing more value than they charge, and this is something that we help them work out in our mentorship program and correct that problem. So they are charging what they're worth. These gyms are the gyms that are worth the most to their clients worldwide. Let's start from number 10. Now, average revenue per member per month is the average across all of their members divided into their revenue. So if you're making a thousand bucks a month in revenue and you've got 10 members, then your a RM is a hundred. These gyms are doing a lot more than a hundred dollars per member per month. While the industry average is still low, it's still around 1 45, maybe even slightly less in some places in the us These gyms are all over $400 per member per month. Now these are US dollars and , uh, these are all people who are providing great value to their clients. Their clients are happy to pay that much, and they're keeping those clients around too. Let's start at number 10. This gym is from the uk and their a RM average revenue per member per month from the last three months. This is a three month average, is $427 and 6 cents. Amazing a mem . Imagine if every member at your gym was paying half of that, okay, 214 bucks per month, what kind of impact would that have on your business? Incredible number nine, coming in ninth . This is a US-based gym and their a RM is $432 and 12 cents per month. Congratulations. You are obviously providing a ton of value and you're worth the value that you receive in return in eighth place, an a RM over the last three months of $440 and 45 cents. This is also a US-based gym. So again, all these numbers are in US dollars. They're an average of the last three months. We don't wanna just like take an average from the last single month. So, you know, these are consistent that this gym is operating well and there are things that we can learn from these gyms. I'm gonna share those in a moment, in six place. Oh, this one's great because I've been watching this gym for a long time and I just realized who it is. Their a RM $523 and 87 cents. Congratulations. That is so amazing. This gym's in Colorado, by the way, in fifth place, an a RM of $528 and 88 cents. Imagine having an a RM of over $500 per client. Incredible. You'd have to deliver so much value, so well to earn that. Uh, I'm, I'm so impressed this one. The next one in fourth place, $548 29 cents. This one is really, really interesting because these guys work primarily , uh, with medical practitioners as a referral source. Uh , next in third place, also from the us an a RM of $556 94 cents per month. Now, just remember that when we've had a gym on this leaderboard and they're not inside the us , we still calculate their a RM and US dollars so that we're comparing apples to apples. And of course, by reading the blog post, you can see this, you don't have to stop your car and pull over. There are two gyms left on our leaderboard, second place and first place. The second place, Jim , for a RM this month or or December, 2023, is from Canada. Awesome. And their US dollar a RM average was $673 and 94 cents. Can you even imagine your clients paying that much? How did they get to an a RM of almost $700 per month? We're gonna tell you in a moment, the last gym, the top of our leaderboard worldwide, out of 1,002 brain gyms around the world, the top a RM last month was $797 and 99 cents. This was a US-based gym. This was in , uh, a locale where a lot of people say, I can't charge more. My local local market won't support it. These guys just obliterate that feeling, that sense, that myth that you're telling yourself that you can't charge more. Their a RM is almost $800. They might be the first gym to crack that three month 800 a RM average. And I, I can't wait till they do, I can't wait till somebody beats that. So the top a RM last month in two brain was $797 and 99 cents. That's what they get per client per month at one location. That's their average over the last three months. So they've been doing this for a while . They're keeping their clients, their clients love it, and nobody is fighting them over the price because they produce so much value. Now, the part you've been waiting for is how in the heck did they do that? Let me get to that. So the reason that we compiled these leaderboards is so that I can identify who is doing the best at something and then ask their advice and then share that with you. You have to start with measurement. You have to know who's actually doing the best, because if not, you know what happens. You're in the micro gym industry, you start getting people who really aren't doing that well, giving you advice. You got gyms who are doing $15,000 in revenue a month telling you how to get more clients. They don't even know that's their biggest problem. And you can't even figure out what your biggest problem is until you look at your metrics and you don't even know if you've got a problem until you look at the best in the world and say, how do I compare? That's why we prepare these leaderboards every month. But my favorite part of this process, even though I love the math, my favorite part is talking to these top 10 gyms and saying, what are you doing? How are you delivering that much value? How is your a RM that high? And then telling you their answers. So here they are. First , uh, Mikala Musterman is on the leaderboard, and she's doing this amazing, amazing marketing with cinnamon rolls. I know you heard me, right? Okay, so here's what she does. She bakes cinnamon rolls and she takes them to medical professionals in her town, and she introduces herself, have a cinnamon roll. Let's talk about what I do. And of course, nobody slams the door in her face. Nobody says, you're crazy. Get outta here. Stop soliciting me with these delicious cinnamon rolls. I mean, if you've ever visited me at the two brain workshop, you know, like Tuesday is cinnamon roll day here, and the cafe is baking, and the whole place just smells like cinnamon rolls, and I really have to fight that. The temptation to have one. If you're a medical professional and somebody shows up and you've got this nice warm homemade cinnamon roll, you are going to sit and listen to what they have to say. And even if you decide I'm not gonna refer people to you, you're still gonna love them, right? Because you've got this cinnamon roll and probably a coffee to go with it. It's not just cinnamon rolls. McKayla does this with a variety of food and , and coffee. And what she's basically doing is just showing up with a coffee and some curiosity and saying, tell me about your practice. What do you do? How do you help people? And then of course, they ask her the same question and she says, here's what I do. You can hear our full interview with Mikayla on the podcast. I'll link to that below. Um , Kelly Lorenz is now using paid ads to drive her a RM. She did a rate increase last year, which drove her a RM up $10 across the board. She added kids classes, she added more personal training and small group personal training. And she does amazing with her kids program. She said, we created a group called Mini Roadrunners. We're mothers and their kids, usually mothers and daughters basically go out running with us. So we do a loop around town, and of course that generates more business as well as getting kids moving through the pandemic. We had a lot of contacts because we were the ones who were really talking about that. And we went all in on building up our kids programs. We became renowned as the local expert. A lot of our parents, she said , uh, a lot of our members, our parents who had kids, and with the right affinity marketing that two brand encourages us to do, we go to our clients and say, who else in your family can benefit from this? Who else do you know that can benefit from moving their bodies regularly? And so I had , uh, parents calling me or texting me or emailing me and asking me, because right now in our area, there's a break for organized sports. So end quote , Kelly is really, really smart at identifying opportunities and aligning those with her passions. Obviously, she's not running a kids program just because it makes a lot of money or boosts her a RM. She's doing it because she loves kids and sees a real opportunity to help kids in her community. She started it during Covid . Then she said, what if I could get moms and daughters running together and , and started their roadrunners club? And as those kids traveled around town, they started bringing their friends and other people started seeing them. And that is the best type of marketing there is. It's identifying a place where you can clearly help solve a problem, then solving that problem. And that's what attracts new people. But that's also what builds value. You don't build value by telling people, I'm gonna correct your squat technique. You build value by solving the problem that they want to solve. And so their problem is probably not. I want to move better. Their problem is probably not. I want to get better at CrossFit. Their problem is, I'm bored with my current workout and I want to try something new. Or their problem is, my friend's been coming here three nights a week and I don't see them anymore. Or their problem is, I don't feel good about my body. I don't wanna take my shirt off at the beach. If you are the one who can solve that problem, you will not have a problem establishing value with your clients, and they will not have a problem paying for that value either. Kelly added, we decided to do a 10 week program for seventh and eighth graders, and then for ninth graders, and we charged $408 for the 10 weeks, and then those kids come twice a week. And that just really helped boost our a RM and quote . There's , there's another great lesson here, and that is we can do an amazing service for kids that a lot of us are overlooking. If you think about, if you have kids and you think about them in sports, and you think about what you pay to put them in sports, think about the reasons that you're willing to pay that. You know, why am I willing to pay $600 a month for cheer lessons, gymnastics music lessons , uh, why am I willing to pay $7,000 a year to put them on a traveling basketball team or to put them in the off season baseball academy? Well, it's because your kid loves it and you wanna encourage them, and if there is a small chance that this goes on to become their career, like you don't wanna be the barrier to that. And so you'll do anything to support your kids. But the reality is that only the tiny, tiny minority of kids are involved in sport. And so the best thing that you can do is help parents help their kids find something they love. I remember a couple years ago, a phys ed teacher had this real epiphany and he was telling me about it, and he said, coop , like, I don't need to teach these kids how to play dodge ball . I don't need to teach them how to play volleyball. They will never do those things after they graduate high school, but if I can help 'em find one thing they love enough to continue it on their own, I've changed their life. And so now he teaches CrossFit and he , he has them doing weightlifting meets, and he teaches them power lifting and running and rowing and all kinds of different things. And a lot of these kids go on to join gyms or they go on to pursue their passion on their own. I, I can name probably a dozen of these kids who have bought a rig and stuck it in their garage after high school. That's amazing. And that's what I mean by value. What we're really trying to do, if you wanna boost up a RM, is hone in on your clients and find places where you can improve your value to them. For example, nutrition programs work the exact same way. If a client is working out really, really hard, but she's not losing any weight, the best value you can provide her is a very clear nutrition program with accountability to do the work. Even if that comes down to like writing up a sample meal plan or something, that is how you provide value. And of course, you should be open to receiving Bob Bergen, his book, the Go-Giver talked about, there's a yin and a yang to giving. If you wanna be good at giving, you have to also be good at receiving. That means you have to open up yourself to the possibility that your gift is worth something and be willing to receive it, right? Nobody likes a bad receiver who, who will just say no to your gift, who won't accept your gift, won't accept your help. Nobody likes that person, and nobody also likes to feel indebted. And so when you offer something of enormous value, people are usually willing to pay it. What stops? Most gym owners, it's right here. It's in between their heads. They look at their budget, they look at their empty wallet and they say, I'm broke. I couldn't pay more for nutrition coaching so nobody can, or I already know all that stuff. Everybody knows that stuff. Nobody will pay for that. And of course they will. The key to building great a RM is identifying the problem that your client is trying to solve. Determining which of those problems you can solve 'cause you can't solve 'em all offering to solve those problems for them and then doing it, getting them the result, solving the problem. When you do that, not only will they pay more, they'll be happy to do it. I'm Chris Cooper. This is Run a Profitable Gym and this is our leaderboard show. If you were one of the top 10 gyms in the world for average revenue per member, congratulations, you're an inspiration to the rest of us. And thank you for sharing your lessons with everybody else. If you wanna talk more about these leaderboards, or what these stats mean or how to improve your a RM, the best bet is to go to gym owners united.com. That's our free group where I'm in there. My mentor team is in there. We're answering questions, we're sharing free information, we're giving out guides, we're giving you tactical advice every single day for free because it is our mission to help your gym succeed. Thank you for your service.