In this episode of “Run a Profitable Gym,” host John Franklin is joined by Two-Brain founder and CEO Chris Cooper.
They provide a glimpse into the upcoming Two-Brain Summit, happening June 8 and 9 in Chicago. Some of the incredible speakers for this year’s event include Jonathan Goodman, Jason Khalipa, Brian Chontosh and coaches from Mayhem Nation.
Attendees will also get to grill a panel of experts from Kilo, PushPress, WodBoard and Wodify with questions such as “why aren’t gyms keeping clients longer?” and “what’s most important for gym owners right now?”
Finally, John and Chris dive into Chris’ latest book, “Millionaire Gym Owner,” which shares the personal paths over a dozen gym owners used to reach $1 million net worth.
Chris is handing out 60 copies of “Millionaire Gym Owner” for free right now—first come, first served. Get yours by joining the Gym Owners United group and DMing him.
Links
Two-Brain Summit tickets
Book a Call
1:29 - Events aren’t losses, they’re investments
11:28 - 2024 workout and coaching partners
20:51 - Tinkers at the 2024 summit
33:31 - Don’t feel guilty about money
35:52 - Abundance mindset
In this episode of “Run a Profitable Gym,” host John Franklin is joined by Two-Brain founder and CEO Chris Cooper.
They provide a glimpse into the upcoming Two-Brain Summit, happening June 8 and 9 in Chicago. Some of the incredible speakers for this year’s event include Jonathan Goodman, Jason Khalipa, Brian Chontosh and coaches from Mayhem Nation.
Attendees will also get to grill a panel of experts from Kilo, PushPress, WodBoard and Wodify with questions such as “why aren’t gyms keeping clients longer?” and “what’s most important for gym owners right now?”
Finally, John and Chris dive into Chris’ latest book, “Millionaire Gym Owner,” which shares the personal paths over a dozen gym owners used to reach $1 million net worth.
Chris is handing out 60 copies of “Millionaire Gym Owner” for free right now—first come, first served. Get yours by joining the Gym Owners United group and DMing him.
Links
Two-Brain Summit tickets
Book a Call
1:29 - Events aren’t losses, they’re investments
11:28 - 2024 workout and coaching partners
20:51 - Tinkers at the 2024 summit
33:31 - Don’t feel guilty about money
35:52 - Abundance mindset
Welcome to this week's episode of Run a Profitable Gym. I am John Franklin , the CMO of two Brain business, and with me this week is a very special guest coming on his own show, the Man, the Myth, the legend himself, the Millionaire Gym owner, Chris Cooper. How are you, sir?
Speaker 2:Good. Yeah, nobody would've expected me to be on this show. I know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was tough to schedule 'em , but we got 'em nailed down and we're glad you are here because we got a lot of things to talk about. The most important , uh, which we'll be talking about this whole week is our once a year event called the Two Brain Summit. I have called it the Woodstock for Fitness Business Owners. You talk a lot about it, you make some content around it, but , uh, you know, I know you, I spend a lot of time around you. I got the inside track, so maybe I'll ask you some questions that other people may not know about so they can get a deeper understanding on why this event is so important to you and our community. So my first question, what is it? What is, what is the Two Brain Summit aside from just a , an event where people congregate?
Speaker 2:Well, the most important thing is it's an event where we bring people together so that they can kind of feel the momentum and support and connection of other gym owners. And it, everything that we do is always to answer the question, what do gym owners need the most right now? And once a year, at least at minimum, we think that they need to get together with their other peers and just let them know they're not alone and that they're on the right track, and that the industry is changing for the better, and that they are the tip of that spear.
Speaker 1:Every year when we are planning this event, our plan is to break even, and the exec team will set these goals and we'll put our head down and we'll do what we need to do. But somehow we always end up losing tons of money on this event because , uh, you just add more and more and more and more and more and more stuff that you think is very important and adds value to the community. Maybe you can talk about why you would throw an event that just incinerates your own money. Well,
Speaker 2:It's an investment and I mean, you know, a couple years ago when the summit got really, really big, and I think for the first time ever we were going to like show a loss of a hundred thousand dollars on the summit, I really had to think about like , what is this? And honestly, I think it's just the best investment that I can make. We try to do a lot for charity, but the reality is the people that I wanna help the most are gym owners. And so, while this is not a free or charitable event, like it does cost us a significant investment to put it on, but I think it's worthwhile because I think it's really important. And if, you know, we think that like a , a given speaker, like Jocko Willick is exactly who the people need to hear from right now, or Seth Godin or Lisa Nichols or Todd Herman or Dan Martel. Those are the people that I'm gonna bring in. And you know this John already, but like a lot of these speakers cost 60, $70,000 an hour. And what's important to me though, is like, this is what gym owners need, and this is a place where we have the leverage, you know, we can afford to do this that nobody else can. And , um, you know, if if that's the leverage that gym owners need to get through something or need to grow, then that's, you know, the investment that we wanna make.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about some of these investments that we are making this year. So one of the speakers is someone I've met who reminds me a lot of you, he's your , uh, Canadian brethren. It is , uh, John Goodman <laugh> . Why, why are we having John Goodman there?
Speaker 2:John's an expert that's been coaching fitness businesses for well over a decade. He's got a, a great company that does that mostly with online trainers, and he's got this fantastic new book. Last year, you know, we shared some stuff that we had learned from John around Instagram, and it was a massive hit. Like a lot of people said that your talk , uh, paid for their entire trip to summit this year. His book is called The Obvious Choice, and he shared a couple of passages of it with me. That's what he's gonna be talking about. I love it so much because it really, it brings together , uh, like a lot of the principles of affinity marketing, social media help first . But he's so good at making things concise. And you know, like a lot of the speakers out there, they possess this unique genius where they can take things that are very complex and make them simple and actionable and like, oh, I get it now and, and I can do it with you. And , um, I like to surround myself with people like that Greg Glassman's like that, you're like, that John Goodman is definitely like that. And you're gonna hear the same thing about a lot of the speakers. So I love it because, you know, John is gonna deliver a talk that people can act on as they sit there with him and do the work and grow their business like on the spot.
Speaker 1:And I've developed a network outside of just CrossFit over the last few years. And one of the things that I hear from those people when they're evaluating whether they've come to the summit or not, is, is this event just for CrossFit gyms and headlining a guy like Goodman is a very clear stance that , you know, the first time John did CrossFit was this year. So he is a , he is an online training expert, and before that he has a , a great reputation in the strength and conditioning small group training community. And what he talks about , uh, is relevant to you regardless of what corner of the fitness industry you are in. His whole thing is basically how to stand out in your local market, how to stand out on and , and how to stand out online if that's your thing. But it is relevant to literally anybody , um, in the fitness industry, no matter what corner you are in, as are a lot of the talks we're going in. But one of the second speakers is not, he's a little more CrossFit specific, but he's not gonna be speaking on a CrossFit specific topic. And that is , uh, none other than the man, the myth, the legend. Jason Khalifa , why, why are we putting Jason Khalifa on stage?
Speaker 2:Well , he is actually going first, and because Jason Khalifa is a fireball of energy, and not only has he had some amazing experiences outside of the CrossFit games, but like he's had these amazing life experiences that you don't always hear about his daughter's cancer. You know, his gym's massive expansion and then contraction, and now it's growing again, starting an online business, starting 10 other businesses that he later shut down, you know, building a personal brand, switching to Jiujitsu. And when somebody is like this prolific with starting businesses, you do wanna hear from them, but you also want to know like, how do they do it all? And so Jason's gonna talk about that. He's gonna talk about virtuosity, he's gonna talk about balance priorities, working in sprints, the AMRAP mentality, and he's gonna do it with a lot of firepower from the stage. He was one of the favorite speakers last year. People lined up to talk to him, you know, they fought over who got to sit next to him at dinner, and you know, if you just get to meet Jason one time in your life, it's worth the trip.
Speaker 1:And he's famous in like BJJ now, right? Yeah . Like, he's like got a, he's built a brand up over there. So he's a , he's hit escape velocity as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that's interesting too. Like the , the guy started out as literally nobody even in CrossFit knew who he was. And when he won the CrossFit games, like they didn't even have the cameras on him . And now he's become so big that he is actually like superseded CrossFit. And, and you know, again, like we're, we're method agnostic. You wanna do CrossFit, that's great. You wanna, do you wanna run a FitBody bootcamp? That's fine. We're model agnostic. I don't care if you want big group personal training, semi-private, small group, it doesn't matter. Like this is gonna help you. But Jason is a great example of like pulling all of that together and coming out with like a coherent, virtuous package.
Speaker 1:And for those that don't know, he didn't start in CrossFit, he was global gym guy. He did like the backroom sales . So this is , this is a guy who's literally worked every corner of the fitness industry and , and has kind of scraped the bottom of the barrel , uh, uh, like yourself. And so why don't we talk about what , uh, your talk is gonna be on this year, Mr. Chris Cooper.
Speaker 2:Well, I want to talk about starting at that bottom and , and getting to a hundred KA year , uh, as quickly as as possible, you know, and we're gonna , we're gonna briefly show like three or four very clear paths. We're gonna share some data, like here's what two brain gyms do, the ones that grow the fastest. And then I'm gonna hand it over to you to talk about how to go from income to investment and getting to be like Millionaire Gym owner.
Speaker 1:Last year I taught you how to pay for your trip to the Two Brain Summit this year I'm gonna teach you how to pay for your kids' college. It's gonna be great. But I've been to a lot of these events. I've been to other groups. I think one of the things that's worth mentioning here is that when you are the size of Two Brain and you've worked with as many gyms as Two Brain Has, it allows you to be a lot more prescriptive. One of the things that I see just as an industry observer is that a lot of people in the information space will say, here is the thing that worked for me. And that is great when you are starting out a type of business like that because you don't have that information. But when we are talking , um, when we are talking as Two Brain , this is the path that has worked for the largest number of gyms in every single market. So you're learning something that didn't work for some guy who started a , a gym at the front end of the trend and has been riding that wave for a while . You are, you are , you have those people, of course, but you have newer gyms, you have CrossFits, you have non CrossFits. These are things that universally work. So you know, you're getting something that you'll be able to implement and will be relevant to your business at that day. Speaking of data, we will be having a panel with some of the large gym management companies to talk about data. So maybe, maybe give a quick overview of what the state of the industry is and , and why we're we're gonna have this platform and this panel discussion.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, two Brainin is not about just giving my opinion on things. Two , Brainin is all about like, what is proven to work? What is , what do the numbers prove out? Um , because there's a lot of BS out there, you know, people hyping their thing and maybe they've been successful in time or whatever, but when you're working with 2000 gyms around the world, you can't do that anymore. And so every year we publish something that's called the state of the industry, where we work with partners to get actual data, like real metrics. So revenue, how many clients do they have? How many classes do they run? What do they pay their coaches, like the real numbers from 15,000 gyms worldwide. And we couldn't do this without our partners like Kilo wa Push Press . And so what's interesting is when we get this data from them, there's always a discussion about what does it all mean? And while two Brainin hires an independent analyst, of course they have their own opinions too. Um, so this time we're gonna bring them on the stage and just have a panel where we talk about what do you think is the most important thing for Jim orders right now? Where do you see the industry going? Like, what does, what does this mean to you If clients generally fall off at the eight month mark? Like how, how do you see Jims improving that? And, you know, we've got three really brilliant minds on this panel. It's gonna be really interesting to hear their perspective. And we're gonna let people in the audience submit their questions in advance to , so this isn't like a , what feature is coming on Push Press next forum. This is, what do you think it means that gyms aren't keeping clients as long as they used to forum ? Very interesting.
Speaker 1:And this is a gym owner conference, right? But Two Brain at its core is a gym mentorship company. We don't teach people how to be great coaches. We don't sell equipment. We're just singularly focused on how to run an excellent business. That said, we acknowledge that the class experience is very important. And so we decided to partner with some of the best people in the world to provide that expertise. So maybe talk about our , uh, workout and coaching partners for this year at the summit. Yeah,
Speaker 2:Man, super jacked about this. So , um, mayhem is gonna be at the summit this year, and they're gonna run our morning workouts for us. They'll have probably two classes in the morning, Saturday and Sunday. You can sign up in advance, you can do a workout with Mayhem , try out their programming, and then they're gonna be speaking on the coaches stage about some common mistakes or common challenges that you see with clients in a class setting. We're super stoked to have mayhem here. Very popular. And I know, you know, my coaches tell me that like, they're excited to go on a trip with me. They're excited to meet Mayhem and Khalifa , you know, and these guys. So I, I think it's like a thrill for the coaches and it can be viewed as a perk. But you know, the reality is that if your coaches are better at business, they're gonna grow your business too. There are a lot of places out there like CrossFit, like, you know, N-S-C-A-A-C-S-M who are gonna teach them how to be beginner coaches. But we know that if we can elevate their game and elevate their career, you're gonna keep 'em longer. They're gonna be really excited and they're gonna grow the business for you. So we started using this coaches stage back in 2017 and bringing in experts on coaching, experts on building specialty programs like legends programs and kids. Uh , we brought in industry experts this year, like Bill Parisi from Parisi Speed School . Sue Duper stoked about that. Yeah. And, and they're gonna help your coaches. Coach tickets are super cheap. Like I think the best thing that you can do is bring your coaches to Chicago with you, make it a bit of a weekend, take 'em out for dinner Saturday night. Not only will they leave there with ideas and examples and templates that will grow your business, they'll be excited about it. And you,
Speaker 1:So just to clarify, 'cause I don't think we did that , uh, yet. There are two tracks going on throughout the weekend. So there are two separate conference rooms and conference room number one, that is the owner stage, that's where the likes of Goodman Kpa , the two brain mentors will be presenting on topics that are focused around getting your gym to a hundred thousand net owner benefit and then scaling to that million dollar net worth mark. A lot of gym owners find it very valuable to bring their staff or staff development. And so on the other side, we have a coaches room. And what are the topics on the coaches room? Is it business specific? Is it coaching specific? Is it all the above? Like what, what is the focus in that room?
Speaker 2:It's both, there's a good balance there. Like some of it is they're gonna get up and move and, and coach each other and stuff, but some of it is like how to make a career. You know, man, I got , I don't know if I've even told you this story, but I had a guy apply at my gym this week named Felipe , and he works at another gym in town and he wasn't really attracted to the Catalyst brand as much as he was attracted to the two brain brand. And he is like, I read all the two brain stuff. I know that I can make a real living , uh, for myself and my family at a two Brainin gym. I wanna work at your two brain gym Catalyst. And it's interesting because like, this is a guy who's in Canada from Brazil, and he has to make a living or go home and, you know, he , he, he really wants to do that attitude. Brian , Jim , he's more confident about that. So there's a couple things here and and what that means is like, first of all, Peter Brasov is going to do a career planning exercise with your coaches, and they're gonna be able to actually see their future at your gym. So most of us started our gym because we couldn't see a future where we were. And we thought, well, the only way to make any money in fitness is to go start my own gym. And that's what what we did, and we became like the competitor of our previous gym. Well, there's actually a better way. And so , uh, Peter's gonna help them map that out for themselves. Then , um, they're gonna learn like, you know, how to, how to do a better job for your clients, like how to build habits in your clients. This is what Alex is gonna be , um, teaching. There's going to be specialty groups like the Prime group that I mentioned before. There's going to be speakers on different demographics like Bill Parisi , you know, I mentioned before. And honestly, like a lot of these speakers, they're engaging, they wanna get your coaches up and moving. They're gonna get your coaches excited about the business, but they're not gonna teach them like, here's how to read a spreadsheet. Okay. So Matt Tenby is actually gonna teach them sales too, which is amazing. Uh, Chris Planas is gonna teach them unreasonable hospitality in the micro gym industry, like going above and beyond. Just like you, the owner would , uh, Brian Bot's gonna teach 'em how to program for semi-private, which is super duper hot topic right now. Yeah, there's, there's just an amazing lineup. Like Oscar Joad , he's been on CrossFit Seminar staff forever. He's gonna speak about crafting world class coaches. So even if you're not a CrossFit gym, like you will benefit from this , uh, mayhem Nation is gonna be up there talking about handling some of the most difficult coaching challenges. And , um, Josh Martin is gonna talk about like finding and reigniting your passion for coaching.
Speaker 1:And this is a situation where, you know, you still have a , a teenager, Chris, when your kids get a of a certain age, they won't listen to what you say. But if someone , uh, else tells 'em the exact same thing, it may hit in a different way because it's not coming from you. And the coaches stage is kind of like that, you know, you're just , they're hearing, they're hearing the things that they need to hear, the things that are in their best interest, but they're hearing it from a , uh, third party. So we've seen a lot of situations where , uh, Jim members will bring their coaches , uh, they will say something that the gym owner has been saying to them for five years, but for whatever reason it just clicks in a different way and it leads to transformations within the business. So , um, yeah, I would what percentage of gym owners actually bring some coaches? I , it's pretty, it's really growing pretty high amount. Looking at the, the tickets so far, yes,
Speaker 2:Some people bring 12. So I would say a a third of Jim owners bring coaches, most bring multiple people who've been to the summit before are way more likely to bring their coaches because they're there by themself , maybe with their, their spouse. And they're like, this is amazing. And then they hear there's a riot going on next door. There's lots of laughing coaches are having a great time, and they're like, man, I just, I need to get my coaches to this. They would love it. And a lot of people actually buy their coaches tickets before they even leave like the, the summit after the weekend's over.
Speaker 1:And there are probably some coaches out there who maybe don't have a long-term oriented gym that they're working for and may want to attend something like this. Can they buy tickets without having a gym owner attend?
Speaker 2:They can now. Yeah. It used to be limited just to coaches who , uh, were attending with their gym owner. But now absolutely, you know, that, that's been really fulfilling to me too. Last year I met a lot of coaches who had just taken the initiative on their own to show up and be there. And the gym owner who hires these people is holding the golden ticket. I mean, they already know how to make a living for themself . They, they don't wanna open their own business, but they wanna be entrepreneurial up to that point. And I mean, there, there's no better credential you could hold, honestly, in my mind, than having attended the two Brain Summit when you go to apply for a job at a gym.
Speaker 1:And if you're someone who's unhappy in your current position and wants to see upside, putting yourself in a room with a thousand gym owners that are looking to hire and grow their business , uh, yeah. Uh , it creates a very nice networking opportunity. So , uh, you're, you're , you're gonna be hard pressed to find a better room that that can open doors and create stuff for you if you show up well and participate and get involved. So if you're a coach who maybe is unhappy or, or doesn't have an owner who, who sees you as someone who is , uh, who can build a career within that current gym, we welcome you to come and learn and meet some of the other two brain gym owners.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we could probably have like a coach Bachelor and Bachelorette auction on Saturday night and there'd be a bidding war for people who took that much initiative to better themselves
Speaker 1:Speed dating. Yeah. And one of the things we noticed in previous years was, you know, coaches and gym owners like to move around a little bit. Yeah. The hotel gyms were just kind of like swamped. And so , uh, you know, we're not the brightest tools in the shed, but we took the feedback and we started offering workouts. And then this year you announced a pretty large partnership, long-term partnership with Rogue Fitness. So talk a little bit about , uh, what they're doing at the summit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Rogue is like us, you know , very, very invested in the success of micro gyms , and there's a practical reason, of course, you know, that's our business. But more than that rogue's deep commitment to the success of the micro gyms and the future micro gym owners, man, like, it's, it's unmatched. You know, I went down to the Rogue Invitational last fall, and what I saw there was it was really affirming, like, you know, of course Rogue is is heavily tied in with the CrossFit community, but there's always this fear that when CrossFit sells to the next private equity company in a couple years, like, oh man, that's gonna throw cold water on the community. And I'm here to tell you like, it's not that there are partners like us and Rogue who are so invested in this community that like, it's gonna carry on no matter who owns the CrossFit baseball card. That said, rogue is also very heavily involved in strongman power lifting , strength and conditioning, you know, like every, every facet of the industry now. And that's why we really wanted to partner with them. So they're showing up, they're bringing rigs , um, hopefully Bill and Katie will be there, but they'll have their crew there too . They're bringing a ton of equipment and they just wanna be part of it, and they , they wanna support gym owners. And , um, we're , we're gonna be taking a cohort of our highest level gym owners to Rogue later on , uh, this year and, and , uh, continue to support them like they're supporting gym owners. So
Speaker 1:Let's talk about that Tinker Group and the Tinker Meetup. To be clear, if you are not in Two Brain , this is not something that you can attend or be a part of. This is something that you have to come through the two brain system to take advantage of. But for the goal of the first year of mentorship with Tube Brainin is to get a gym owner to the point where they're doing a hundred thousand in net owner benefit. And then once they get to that point, we have a special group with the explicit goal of getting to a million plus net worth. And so maybe talk about that group and , and what they're gonna be doing at the summit. Yeah,
Speaker 2:So Tinker is the, the third tier of mentorship. So these are people with a steady income, and now they're working on investment. And what they're trying to do is scale to 2, 3, 4 gyms, or they could be like me, they're trying to buy their building or maybe they're making another investment. They're buying Airbnb's stocks, bonds, you know , Bitcoin, whatever that is. They're trying to figure out the next steps for themselves and build wealth. And the wealth is, the conversation is really like what led to the new book, the Millionaire Gym Owner. And so they, the Tinkers get together four times a year and they work on their own plans for themselves, but they work in a group and we bring in speakers just about every month on different topics like tax strategy and wealth building, owning multiple locations, building personal brands, stuff like that. When they get together in person , uh, we bring in a couple of speakers to talk to 'em. And at Summit it'll be the same. We'll bring in two outdoor speakers just for the tinkers. They'll be there a day early. They get together in their groups. They, they chat about like, here's what John did, here's how John bought his building. You know, here's how Brian leveraged an SBA loan. Here's how Ashley is going from four locations to five. And Chris is going, you know, from two to three, or Nick is going from two to one or whatever, right? They work together in groups like that. They have coaches there with them, they build up plans for the next 90 days and, and then they go out to dinner together. And I think that's one of the, their favorite things about the group is that, like anybody listening to this already knows, the CEO life is very lonely. It's very hard to find people who are going through the same struggle as you are. Most of your friends don't understand it. They only have the experience of business through the eyes of the consumer. If you're unsuccessful, they think you're rich anyway. If you are successful, they wonder what you did, like, who you tricked to get there. And so it really helps to be in a room , um, around your peers. That's what the sum was for the Tinker Group is kind of the next level group where these are successful gym owners and they're dealing with, how do I get work life balance now, you know, I had to sacrifice so much to get here. How do I re reconnect with my family or my faith or, or even get my fitness back? So yeah, at Summit they'll be there a day early and talking to a couple of speakers and building out their next 90 day plan and then going for dinner.
Speaker 1:And these aren't guys , a lot of times these aren't people from within the industry, though we will have very high level people, people with 2030 locations, people who've sold their businesses for large sums of money. But we also have like the mindset coach of professional athletes and a hundred billion dollar CEOs. And we have, like, if we wanna do public speaking, we're gonna find the best public speaking coach and get them out there. And so this is Chris drawing on his network of mentors and inviting them into the group. And , uh, you know, Chris has disclosed that what you spend about a quarter million dollar a year on , uh, mentorship. So the Rolodex is deep and he's got a , he is got a pretty decent Rolodex. So , uh, there's some, there's some good , uh, speakers in there. It's a lot higher level. And , uh, something I've always said, and something I'll be speaking on is this idea of like, once you've gotten your gym to a good point and you've gotten yourself removed from all the parts of the business that you don't wanna be working in, that is typically where gym owners make their biggest, most expensive, most irreversible mistakes <laugh> . And so having a group like that to kinda shepherd you through that journey and avoid the landmines is worth many times what you would pay to be in a room like that. So , uh, excited, I, I go and , and , and , and listen on it and just blown away how much the conversation has evolved from when I was a member of that group in 20 17, 20 18 versus today. So where do people go if they want to sign up
Speaker 2:Two brain summit.com and , uh, I believe there's still a hundred bucks off the tickets. You know, right now the ticket tickets escalate in price because you , we do sell out and this year we have a cap of a thousand and we're already well over 700. So this isn't one of those fake marketing tricks where I tell you limited time offer. And seriously, if you want to come, you should get your ticket today because I don't want you to miss it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, I have booked , I booked my hotel room because last year I almost didn't get one. So, you know, I <laugh> if you are, if you are intending on going, at least make the commitment of booking a hotel room now because , uh, they will sell out. They sold out last year and it's gonna be probably 50% bigger than it was , uh, the year before. You can always cancel it, but don't do that. You're, you're , you're going to get an investment, you're gonna get a return on this investment is one of the best events. I look forward to it every single year, and I go to tons of gym events every year, but this is far and away my favorite one. So
Speaker 2:I think I should mention this, man. So the speakers that go on stage at this event, they're not just like random people who are willing to pay $5,000 to get on stage and lecture to you. There's a competition to get up there. And so people pitch to make our stage, and then if they're successful, they have to go through like, professional speaker training. Like they have to have a good presentation. Their presentation gets audited by the media team. This year there were so many good pitches that John and I barely made the stage and <laugh> , we have to share, we have to share a , a speaking spot, you know, and we're like the CEO and CMO, like that's how good these presentations are. I'm so stoked for them .
Speaker 1:And, and he's not lying. He actually removed himself from a speaking spot. He wasn't going to speak at the summit until it kind of shook him a little bit and was like, Hey, you should probably, you know, I think some people are going to hear you speak. So , uh, yes, he chose a full roster of people before his own talk. And , and that is a true story until , uh, the rest of the executive team talked a little sense into him . <laugh> . So yeah, go, go , uh, go buy some tickets on. Uh , the second thing I wanna talk about today, you have a new book out . It's behind you there, and I, I saw you waving around a copy. Yep . It's called , uh, millionaire Gym Owner. How, how is it going? What , what's that book about? How are sales going?
Speaker 2:Well, this is the path from income to investment. So, you know, what we found was that when we would get people to a certain level of income, they would hit their target number with two Brain High five . Everybody's thrilled. Congratulations. It's almost like a graduation. They become almost like two brain alumni. They're proud, we're proud, see you . Eight months later, they're back. Oh man, I blew it. I, my gym has gone backward, or I got distracted and I opened a coffee shop, or, I took three months off and now I gotta like fix my gym again. And the problem that they were having is not that they're not hardworking anymore or , or dumb, no, the problem was they didn't have a next level to aim for. And so we started our tinker program way back in the day to give people that next level. And we've actually just launched in a separate Tinker Europe program for that exact reason too. The same thing was happening there. The goal now is you've got a good income. That's wonderful. How do you create enough wealth that you've got time and financial freedom? That's important because while you know now you've bought yourself a good job, you're not gonna be able to do that job forever. And for you to ever be able to retire, pay for your kids' college, you're gonna have to have a little bit more income. And you're going to have to have some kind of money set aside for life. Like we're entrepreneurs. Nobody's gonna pay us a pension. You have to set those things up for yourself. And if you don't have 'em set up for yourself, you're not gonna be able to stay in the industry very long. And if you can't stay in the industry very long, you can't help people. So it really is important that you get to the point where you're building wealth, you're planning for the future, and because you're successful, that you're successful enough to acquire or start more gyms and help more people. This, this is the way that like the, the gym market should go, that the best gym owners rise to the top. They create better opportunities for their staff, they create longer, better opportunities for their clients, and they just duplicate that over and over and over again. Sometimes that means that they're buying up other gyms or starting other locations or whatever. Sometimes it means like me that they're, they're buying , uh, buildings and, you know, giving lots of money away, whatever that is for them. We wanna help 'em get to that stage. You know, ultimately somebody is gonna win in business, and I want it to be the most passionate, dedicated artist working generous people out there. And that's gym owners.
Speaker 1:And there's a lot of talk on the internet about running a profitable gym, operational excellence, and those things matter. They , they , they matter a lot, but that's the foundation, right? That
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's
Speaker 1:Base I've spoken to, we, we've spoken to dozens of gym owners who've been operating amazing gyms, like brand name gyms that everybody listening to this podcast would know of for, you know, 10 plus years, but they're no better off financially than where they started. So they're kind of like, you , you pitch your members, Hey, you come here for an hour, but what you do in the other 23 hours of the day matter, the , the same goes for gym owners. Like you have your business, but there are all these other elements of your lifestyle and your financial strategy that, that matter and put over the course of 10, 20 years can separate you from never having to worry about money paying for your kids' college and being financially secure versus just like being on a treadmill and being in a situation where , uh, you gotta be 75 and being wheeled out to the floor to coach classes. And my understanding is this , uh, this book gives you the blueprint. You profiled, what was it, 13, 14 ? Yeah , tube Break . 14, 13. Yeah , the number always changes. I don't know what the
Speaker 2:14 Plus Me .
Speaker 1:Okay, 14. So 15, 15 gym owners who, who got to this point, and , and you're not just saying like, Hey, here's the plan. You do this one thing, right? Because once you get to that a hundred thousand dollars point, you get a lot of optionality. There are many things that you can do, and some are right, some are wrong for certain people. Uh, so you say, Hey, here's what a bunch of DA bunch of different people did. And allow people to kind of self-select based off of where they are. Correct?
Speaker 2:Yeah, man. Like, just like I have a gym , but two Brainin is not built around. What does Chris do at his gym? It's built on data and the best practices of the best gym owners . This book is, it's the same, right? I am a millionaire, I'm proud of that. And, but this book is not just like, here's what I did. Instead, what I wanted to do was take about 15 of the 50 millionaires that we have created at Tube Brain and keep in mind, like, these are people just like you. They started off with a $20,000 loan. They started off in a, maybe even in their garage in some cases. They had a business that looked like it was gonna fail for a while , and now three or four years later, they're actually a millionaire. And I wanted to share their paths , their stories, because they're all different, but there are things that, that are the same. They made a good income, they made a gym that could run without them and sustained itself for 30 years. They took the extra income and they invested it in another gym or, or themselves or, or, you know, other properties or buying their building or whatever, a church. And I wanted to share all their stories because I, I think that we're all raised with a poor conception of wealth. We're all raised to be suspicious of money. And I, it's my mission now to teach people like wealth is good in , in the right hands, money's a tool. And I think these are 14 great examples of people who are doing really good things because they're so successful.
Speaker 1:Let's talk more about that because it is more mindset than, than anything else. Yeah, right? It , it is similar to a gym in that when you are talking to a prospect, what they need to do is relatively simple and , and they know what they need to do. You can explain it in a couple sentences, right? Like, you need to eat whole Foods, you need to lift heavy, you need to sleep eight hours, you gotta drink some water. And it's easy to conceptualize that. But there are a lot of these mental barriers that, that stop them from doing that on a consistent basis. And I think there's a similar thing going on , uh, with gym owners when it comes to finances, right? There seems to be like, you can explain the blueprint in three or four sentences, but it seems like there's a lot of mental barriers. Some of the most common ones we see is that they project their finances onto their members. And then a second thing is this idea that like, charging what you're worth, raising prices is like a, a bad thing. So how do you coach gym owners through these , uh, these hurdles? And , and , and why should they think of money as like a good thing and not this evil thing that they should feel guilty about , uh, trying to pursue?
Speaker 2:Well, it's a massive question. The reality is that, you know, we're all raised with this cons to be suspicious of money, right? Like your, your parents probably had a good nine to five job and anybody that was rising up the ladder faster than them or suddenly had a new car they looked at with suspicion. Like how they get that? Who did they trick? What game were they playing? And even popular media, like the , the rich person is always the bad guy, but that's not real. And and if you think about like the wealthiest people in your gym, if you follow them around, you'll probably find there's some of the most generous people, you know , uh, with their time and their money. And I think putting money into the hands of a Jim or is a guarantee that you're going to get generous application of those funds, they're gonna use it for leverage. They're gonna create good in the world. That said, the biggest obstacle to that happening is often between our own ears. And so what we found when we went back through all these millionaires and we said, what do they have in common? It wasn't geography, you know, it , it wasn't the size of their gym or how many staff they had, or whether it was staff were full-time. It wasn't even their prices or whether they sold a high ticket or whatever it was mindset. Do they have these skills? Were they able to focus that? Like, that's a key one, right? Do they have an abundance mindset? A lot of people talk about that, but very few people actually understand what it means. You know, were they able to deal with overwhelm? Did they have some reps at hard leadership? Were they good communicators? And what's interesting about these skills is that like, they're very hard to acquire. You need a coach to help you get them. And, but once you've got 'em, you can't get taxed on them. Nobody can take them away from you, you know , bankruptcy filing or a divorce, like you have 'em forever. And these are the skills that you need to get you to that next level. There's a whole section of the book written by Bonnie Skinner from Level Up Coaching , uh, who's really helped me with, with a lot of these skills where she tells you like, here, here is how you develop them, and here's where you notice opportunities, where these skills are being tested and where you can grow.
Speaker 1:You mentioned an abundance mindset, which is something I hear people talk about all the time. You said most people don't understand what that means. So, so what does it mean? Because , man , I , I don't think I understand.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I mean, a a scarcity mindset means that you think, okay , there are 5,000 people in my town, and if there are two gyms, then we're splitting those 500 down the middle. And if there's three gyms, then that divides up the number of people who wanna go in my gym . Like when I opened up my gym, I thought , uh, in this city there's maybe a hundred personal training clients. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna open up, I'm gonna charge $5 less per hour. I'm gonna get all those clients, put the other gyms outta business, and then I'll raise my prices. And I literally told my partners that. And they're like, why would you wanna do that? Instead, what you want is an abundance mindset where you're growing the pie for everybody. You're increasing the number of clients available. So for example, an abundance mindset means that when a new gym opens up in your town, you're the first one there with a cup of coffee and an offer to help them. You know , um, some of the mentors on Two Brain are so good at this. Like Eric Connor , you know, a new gym opens up nearby, he's not suspicious of them. He's not trashing them on Instagram. He's showing up and offering to help them, because what he understands is that what they're doing is drawing more people to fitness. And even if he's CrossFit Gym, and they're CrossFit Gym, they're not competing with each other. What they're actually doing is like growing the pie, attracting more people to fitness, introducing more people to their method, which is CrossFit, and eventually like ascending them. And , um, you know, this is one of the skills that are very hard to come by. You know, when you start off, man, you're scared. Every client that leaves your gym and goes to that other place down the road, you feel that that's coming right outta your grocery bill. And so it's hard to have this abundance mindset, but eventually what you figure out is like, Hey, all I gotta do here is be the best and the best clients are gonna find their way to meet the clients who are not great for my gym are gonna find their way over there and we can copy each other on what's working. So now in my town, I love doing this. I get some other gym owners together once a month for lunch. I show them all my Facebook ads, here's what's working, you know, copy them. And they do that. And guess what? They don't take clients away from me. They attract people to fitness. And that that's what it's all about. And like, again, you , you don't get that skill without raps. You don't get that skill in high school. You have to go through it and you need a coach that's helping you reflect on it and actually grow, or you'll just stay in that scarcity mindset for your whole life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I used to do this in New York. I would have a, a a five person dinner and I'd try to do it every quarter. And some of those relationships, some of those people have gone on to become like very big names in the fitness industry and , and that just like paid off really well. Another example that comes to mind is , uh, there's actually a group of gym owners of two brain gym owners who like are all across the street from each other in Atlanta, right? Yeah . And they just like have, like a, they get together once a month and do exactly what you're saying, rotate . And , and we've kind of tracked on how it's working. Seems like that cohort is just outpacing other two brain gyms because the information spreads faster. It's easier to tell the signal from the noise. Like, and one of the things that I, I hear sometimes being said, but doesn't get said enough, is this, you know, this idea that you brought up that like most of the people in your town don't belong to a gym. Yeah . So the , the biggest opportunity is not the, the people at the CrossFit gym across the street or at the good life, it's the people who are on their couch and doing nothing. And so , um, that's also something in sales, right? Like I think sales indecision , uh, is one of those things. Like people feel that selling is slimy. That's a common mindset error that I hear in fitness all the time. And a lot of people think like, oh, I'm selling, I'm selling against the gym across the street. Like, I gotta beat out the gym across the street, so maybe I'll lower my prices. So I have an edge over that. But in reality, for most of the people that you are talking to, you are not selling against the gym across the street. What you're selling against is indecision. Because most of the people that come in for a consultation and don't buy don't buy across the street. They just don't buy it all. They just go back to sitting on the couch. And so , um, yeah, it's just a different flavor, a different metaphor of this idea that there , there's plenty of fish in the sea. And CrossFit cross town is not your real competition.
Speaker 2:That's right, man. And you know what ? That, that is hard. I mean, and there's a lot of people in every gym business that, that think like another location is opening up two doors down. It's gonna compete with me. You know, a few of your clients might shift over to that gym, but ultimately you're introducing more people who are interested in the gym. Like they're teaching people to love CrossFit or Pilates or whatever kind of gym you have. That's good for you. <laugh> , you know, it's tough for me. And you know, it's hard to be on the other side of it too. Like, we have people who they wanna build their business coaching service off trashing Tube brain . Like, okay, what do you believe? Well, it's not that, it's not Tube Brain . We think something else . Okay. You know, and eventually, like, if you really want to hit the highest levels of success, you have to understand that they're still in that scarcity mindset, that they're not a threat to you. And eventually you might even be partners.
Speaker 1:I think it's easy to punch up, but , um, you know, and I don't blame some of those people because you wanna attack the largest person in the space. So if you are someone, if you're a gym owner , a large town who's been around the longest, like naturally people are gonna come after you. But you know, it's a worse look if you punch down, which is why , uh, it's rare to, it's rare to hear like you haven't engaged in a lot of these conversations, even though you, you do take, you take shots online a lot , and I think you do a good job of, of being very professional. And that's something we hear a lot from people who come on calls. So , uh, tip of the hat to you , uh, I'm still developing that skill, you know, <laugh> ,
Speaker 2:But that was learned through my gym, right? And like, that's one of the blessings of gym ownership. You can, you can start a gym for $3,000 and you can learn lessons that will help you run a $10 million a year business, right? Like, ask me how I know. And that's one of the gifts that gym ownership will give you is, I took shots from other gym owners, I didn't deal with them well, but I learned my lesson and now, you know, I'm better at this. So, and , and this, this is like really why we're a mentorship practice is because we want to not just impart here's the marketing funnel that you need to build. We also want to impart these skills because I know that if a gym owner has these skills and they can learn from our mistakes, they can keep 'em for life at very low cost. You know, like the, the mistakes that I made with my staff cost me probably $150,000 in two years. You don't have to make those mistakes. Like, you can just learn from my mistakes and save 150 grand.
Speaker 1:All right , well, let's, let's talk about , uh, making some of these listeners some money. 'cause we, we do have a , a reward, right? So if you've made it this far, thank you. Be sure you're subscribed and, and that you've liked the podcast and left a comment. We, we appreciate you. Um, but one of the things that we know about you, if you made it through this 45 minute podcast, is that you like listening to long form audio. And , uh, we have good news for you because Chris's book, millionaire Gym Owner, is now available as an audio book on Amazon, and we got something going on. So, so Chris, what , what do you got? What do you, what , what is the special? I don't, I don't understand how it works. Explain the, the special codes here.
Speaker 2:Well, so when you publish a lot of books, audible does this favor for you where they let you give away, usually about 50 for free. And because Millionaire Jim Order is such a popular book, like, thank you to everybody by the way. You know, a thousand copies gone in the first week. Um , incredible. Thank you. Because it's so popular. Audible recognizes like, oh, maybe, you know, this is something. And so what they've done is they've given me 30 codes for the US and 30 codes for Europe. And if you want to get a free copy of Millionaire Gym owner on audiobook, all you gotta do is DM me on Facebook and say, can I have a code? And if I've still got a code left, we'll just give it to you.
Speaker 1:And , uh, we'll post about this in our Facebook group. So we run a group with eight or 9,000 gym owners. It's called Gym owners united.com. You can just go there and sign up. Uh, it's one of the most value packed Facebook groups on the internet. Chris is in there all day every day. I don't know how, but , but not quite . But he is , um, yeah , has cultivated a very strong social media addiction, <laugh> , and it's worked well for him. So don't listen to anybody saying social media is bad. It is unequivocally good for two Brain business and Chris Cooper. So go to that group, sign up, there'll be a post in there, outline the details, and like Chris said , uh, DM them if you don't, and if we got a code, we'll give you the code and , and if not, we got some goodies we can give away for you as well. So , um, if you're listening now , uh, the faster you act, the more likely you are to get a code. So head over there or just blow up Chris's dms now, and , uh, you'll get to hear his , uh, silky smooth Canadian voice in your ear. For how , how long's the audio book ? Four , four hours, three
Speaker 2:Hours, two half hours. Yeah. Three,
Speaker 1:Three and a half hours. So the , the drive from Saskatchewan to, to Calgary, you'll just be able to hear Chris Cooper would be great.
Speaker 2:Okay. Yeah. Saskatchewan's a province. Calgary is a , a city in a different province, but like, you know, if you're driving from Northern Sask,
Speaker 1:Oh, what's the, what's the city in Saskatchewan? Oh , there's a few capital
Speaker 2:Saskatoon. Uh ,
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Okay . Tunde to Calgary. Yeah ,
Speaker 2:It has many cities.
Speaker 1:I , I've driven through the whole province and, and many cities is an exaggeration. That is a gross. Like, I get it, I get a d on geography for that one. But , uh, many cities is a horrible, yeah, many cities. If you are from Sault Saint Murray ,
Speaker 2:The Saskatchewan Tourism Board, we apologize.
Speaker 1:<laugh> . Yeah, we got one summit booth left. So if you wanna come and , uh, you know, fix the wrongs. John had two brain businesses. My email
Speaker 2:Bigger than one audio book . That's their license plate tagline Now
Speaker 1:We'll get outta your ears Now, gym owners, this has been a very special episode of Run a Profitable Gym. Uh, we thank you for your most valuable resource your time. Go to tub brain summit.com to get your summit ticket and go to gym owners united.com to get your free audio book of Millionaire Gym Owners. We will see you later this week with another episode. Over and out.