Case Files: How Long Should You Chase a Dream Before You Quit?

Six years to break even sounds like failure on paper, but it can also be the moment your business finally tells the truth. We dig into one of the hardest questions in gym ownership and entrepreneurship: when is it worth staying in the fight, and when is it time to change course? We talk candidly about money goals versus mission goals, how burnout creeps in, and why ego is often the real reason a fitness business stalls.

From there, we get practical about leadership and growth. If you love the craft but hate the job of running the company, you might not need to quit, you might need to change seats. We unpack the idea of hiring the right operator so the founder can focus on what they do best, plus why investing in education, mentorship, and high-level workshops can compress years of trial-and-error into a few focused hours. Your business can change vehicles, but the skills you build as a leader do not disappear.

We also break down hiring through a simple skill vs will framework that helps gym owners protect culture and performance. You will hear why high-skill low-will team members can quietly drain clients and morale, how to develop high-will low-skill people into stars, and when it is best to make a clean cut. Finally, we tackle a classic pricing problem: a competitor opens across the street and undercuts you. We explain why price wars destroy margins and how brand, value, and positioning help you win long-term in the local fitness market.

If you got value from this, subscribe, share it with a gym owner friend, and leave a quick review. What would you do in these scenarios?

Transcript

Cold Open And Case Files Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's up, everybody? I'm Anthony Eamon, owner of Redefined Fitness Feet. We got another awesome episode for you. Case Files, breaking down specific questions, ideas that Yao has for me. Just a little note. Uh, this is not prepped whatsoever, so I don't even know what these questions are. Excited to hear, take it alive.

Six Years To Break Even

SPEAKER_02 0:15

That was an awkward look. All right, ready? Case files. Here we go. Anthony, you open a gym and after six months, you're barely open, you break even. Six years, sorry. I opened a gym and six years I break even. It takes you six years to break even. Okay. Is it worth it? Is there is there is it worth you just broke even after six years.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

You barely broke even, pretty much. It depends what you want out of your life and what your ultimate goal is, right? If money is your goal, no. But if you have a mission beyond that, absolutely. And you're six years. Six years. That's literally the time frame this took.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Six years. So when do you tell someone to give up? I don't want to use that word. He said it. When do you tell someone, try something else? What if it took you 10 years? It takes me 10 years. So so you're not saying that because you so if it takes you 10 years.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

It depends on the situation. Okay. I'll elaborate to break out the depends. Money? Holding on to something six, 10 years, not worth it. You have financial obligations, you're gonna burn out, you're gonna disappear. I 100% agree. Maybe it's time to move on. If you cannot learn those things that need to be learned, if you beyond that, if there's something, you know what? I'm making enough, I'm comfortable, I'm not looking to get rich. I had this mission, I really want to change the world. That's what I'm going for. And I see an impact towards that, I'm still going. I'm still trying. I'm still learning how to adapt. And it kind of ties into the thing we talked about in a previous episode, which was what's the one person that shouldn't open a business is those that are arrogant. Yeah, correct. Yeah. So if I'm six years in, why am I six years in air breaking even? It's a it's my arrogance. Okay, uh right. If it's my arrogance, get the hell out of business. You don't belong to it. You're just not the right guy. You're not the right person. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If it's something else, maybe you're just in the wrong business.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

But that's what Warren Buffett said. That's what I'm asking you. That's what I meant by give up. Warren Buffett said, if I forgot the time frame he put, guys, figure it out. Put it in the comments below. He said something about if your business doesn't work in this many years, sometimes the problem is not the business, you you're in the wrong business. You maybe you excel in something else.

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Gyms, right? I know gym very well. We've talked about these stats a little bit. I want people to understand it.

SPEAKER_02 2:26

Yeah, tell them, dude. Here we go.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

From the first year, 82% of gyms go out of business.

SPEAKER_02 2:31

Nine and let me say the second one because I remember it. 95?

SPEAKER_00 2:34

95 go out in five years. The average salary. 40,000. Average 40,000 a year. It's a gym owner salary. Why? Because people get into gyms for passion. Right? And then you have two different types of personalities in the gym world. Same as every industry. If those that are arrogant, those that are not arrogant, those that just strictly want to focus on one thing and don't want to learn and evolve as the business learns to devolve. You have to level up, meet the business where it's at. Another fix outside the box thinking that some people have done. Who did this? It was the guy who owned Minecraft. Okay. Yes, Minecraft. He is a developer and he developed Minecraft as a whole. He didn't want to run a business. He wanted to develop. That was his passion. But he wanted Minecraft to be successful. So he hired a CEO. And he stayed down as a developer. Wow. So maybe he's just in the wrong vehicle.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Did you hear that? Do you know? Oh wow. That's so altruistic. Dude, that the amount of um that guy has no pride at all. Unbelievable to start something and say, hey, you take control of this vehicle. I'm gonna do what I'm good at and go down. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure he still's equity. No, of course, right? I mean, not an idiot, he knew for the business to grow. I cannot do this. Someone else has to do this position.

SPEAKER_00 4:07

I don't want to get involved in this. This is what's what's make me happy, even that 20% happiness. What makes me happy is developing. Hey, would Anthony Eamon do that?

SPEAKER_02 4:15

No, I love being a CEO. Just because you love something, don't mean you're good at it. Somebody out there may be way better, though.

Pay To Learn And Level Up

SPEAKER_00 4:20

Correct. So there's option two. Pay to learn. Now let's take it to an extreme. Okay. Which I love this. People, there's free information, right? I'm never gonna go to free. It's like working out. People, people are like, I want a journey. You can work outside for free. You can check GPT or workout and get like 80% there and you'll be good. No, no, they need to pay. They need to make pay makes you do, right? Now, when you look at how to become a CEO, you look at workshops and learn. And if am I gonna do the workshop that cost me a hundred bucks or the workshop that cost me 10,000 bucks? 10,000 bucks. So I'm gonna get more out of it. I'm gonna learn and I'm gonna grow. And people are so worried about dropping that kind of money to go learn, even when they don't have it. But this is truly how you're gonna level up. You have to get in the room with the people that know. And if I'm up here, I'm not charging a hundred bucks to have you come meet me and see me, right? You want to really get deep dive? I'm charging$10,000 so I can have only a couple of people in the room and really work with them, not dilute over tens of thousands of people. Correct. But people are getting so afraid of dropping that kind of money to spend an hour with somebody. But that's that hour is gonna be the most viable hour of your life. You're gonna learn so much information. A$10,000 investment in your education will now maybe double your business. Or let's say you close your business, right? Doesn't work out, you get into a different vehicle, your education never goes away. So you can now get back to where you were so much quicker because you learned how to get there. So just how you look at things.

Skill Versus Will In Hiring

SPEAKER_02 5:56

Okay, that's a good one. All right, let's see what other case file we got for them, guys. You have a great trainer, but they're terrible with clients. Do you keep them for the skill or let them go for the culture? You and I spoke about this privately. Yeah. Remember that?

SPEAKER_00 6:11

Been in this bucket and arguing just like that sometimes. So this is a theory. And I'm really learning this is the proper theory. Skill, will put another graph. Right? So you have quadrants inside of that graph. So you have high skill, low will, high skill, high will, high will, low skill, low and low. Your employees are you and are the ultimately responsibility for driving the business, moving the business forward. So therefore, you need to make sure you have the right people on your team. Correct. I used to think high skill, low will, you can teach will, build the culture inside of them, and grow. You know how many times that shot me in the foot? Me too. I swear, I'm telling you, no, it's cost me an absorbent amount of money. Wow. So you're payrolling those people, right? And getting them learning, growing, and then you have to fire it, and then you lose clients. It's a whole big issue. And they drag people like one cancer can bring down 10 people. Oh, yes. So now I've learned recently, full disclosure, yet again, always learning, always trying to learn and grow. Low skill, low will, immediately out the door. Not even worth keeping involved. Those people you don't want in your company. Those that are high skill, low will, you might think that you need to keep them, get them out. No, okay, go ahead. They're gonna be the cancers inside of it. Um we get there. Okay. Take it to the other quadrants, high will, low skill. Those people are what you put them in this really nice cocoon and you train them. Everything is trainable. Train these people to be absolutely amazing individuals and nurture them like you would nurture a lead, right? Then there's high skill, high will, your unicorns and they exist. Right? Okay, do you think you have unicorns in this company? Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 8:14

Okay, good.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

Those people, not only should you keep on staff, not only should you work with what's gonna end up happening is the ones we dropped that are these high skill, low will, they can take that work and do it so much better and double the amount of output. Now I could take these people that are doubling this output and I could pay them more. Hey, I actually did that.

SPEAKER_02 8:38

I don't want to say that. Do you know what I'm talking about?

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Yeah, I just thought about that. So now take your high skill, high will pull players, you're right, pay them more. They should be getting the most, right? You're right. And then they're gonna take the work away from those other people.

SPEAKER_02 8:52

The guys that want to do yeah, yeah, you got a good point there. They're happy, you're happy. Only thing I disagree with you with is the high skill people low will terminate immediately. No, man.

SPEAKER_00 9:02

Well, because you had them and you're just realizing this was a stipulation.

SPEAKER_02 9:05

Okay, okay, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_00 9:06

The second you realize they're low will, bye. Well, it cannot be taught. We've tried for years. It does not see what you're saying. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. You're listening to this episode, you hear this right now. Those people out the door. Like they're just gonna bring your business. Absolutely.

Competitors Undercutting Your Prices

SPEAKER_02 9:20

Cancers. Hmm. Okay, all right. Well, there it is, folks. Anthony aiming themselves. All right, so all right, so Anthony, a competitor opens across the street from redefined fitness and undercuts your prices. What does Anthony do? Anthony seven years ago or Anthony today.

SPEAKER_00 9:39

Anthony seven years ago. Let me give me Anthony seven years ago. I'm cutting my prices way down. I'm stressing the hell out. I'm throwing a hissy fit. I'm probably like undercover hopping, throwing eggs at the building. No, I'm not really. But Anthony today's doing what? Yeah, bring it on, open up as many as you want. They're undercutting their prices. I don't care. What are you gonna do? Go meet them, introduce them, welcome to the area, excited to have them aboard. You stand firm.

SPEAKER_02 10:06

Oh, hell yeah. But you're gonna lose. No, the prices are going down, they're offering the same kind of things you're offering, and they're undercutting it.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

No, they're not. They're not us, they're not a brand, they don't have what we have, they're not gonna be able to offer identical experience to what we're having, and then I'm gonna take it a step further. What do car dealerships do?

SPEAKER_01 10:24

In terms of what, like what?

SPEAKER_00 10:25

I'm opening a car dealership. What do I look for? What's the one thing I look for when I open a car dealership?

SPEAKER_02 10:29

I don't know. What do you look for?

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Where are the other car dealerships?

SPEAKER_02 10:32

Oh, yeah, okay, competitors. That's every business. You have the competitors. Where do I open? Near the competitors.

SPEAKER_00 10:38

Next door. Yeah, near the competitors. So you go to like for those in the local area of Smithtown, there's 20 car dealerships on one road. Why didn't they open up away from each other? Why do they open up all next to each other? Yeah, I don't know. I wouldn't I don't know why. Two reasons. Yeah. In Smithtown, there's an area space now that becomes a destination. Okay. People are gonna travel to them. So let's say I'm looking for an Acura and I'm at the Acura dealership. I'm like, you know what? We're right next to Mercedes. Let's just go check it out. I just came to customer. Oh Mercedes is never undercutting Acura. But now I'm there and now I'm getting them in the door to show right there.

SPEAKER_02 11:22

Right there.

SPEAKER_00 11:22

Did you do that when you opened a gym? Did you try to look for anything close? No, this was seven years ago. This was panic stereo. But you would have. I I would definitely open up next to someone hundred percent. Really? I don't know. No problem with it.

SPEAKER_02 11:33

So you're looking for new locations in the near future. You are literally specifically looking for location. That's so smart.

unknown 11:38

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 11:39

Because I could offer something none of them can offer, and I could do it better than no one else can. That's uh that's trusting your brand at the end of the day. But it's also proximity, it's just smarter. People are going to go, what about them? And then I then what else happens? I look for a big boy, right? So a big company, some of 120. I know they're there and I know they're a high brand. Take Equinox, for example. Right? I didn't want to say no names. He's he said it. It's okay. Take Equinox. They have a full team they're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on to find a place to open based upon demographics. I'm a little guy. I don't I can't hire all these people to find demographics to find out what open. What am I gonna do? Open Equinoxes. I know they do all the legwork for me. Obviously, check some proof, but like that's I know that area works. I know that area has a demand. Equinox has been there for 15 years. That's genius, dude. I'm I'm thinking, wow, huh? And then what happens if you take the other extreme to undercut them, right? What does your competitor do then if you're in that input? They undercut you. You undercut them. You both end up going out of business.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Yeah, because you keep going lower and over lower because margins will just disappear. There's no margins, there's no margins anymore.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

So why are we cutting each other and going in? I I actually take it to the other extreme and look at my competitors, but guys, keep raise your prices, really, or if they want, if I'm for your benefit, yeah. Yeah, it's gonna benefit me in the long, but whatever. They could do what they want, it's their business. I'm not dropping my price, dropping my prices because I actually want to be the most expensive place out there by none. Yeah, value.

SPEAKER_02 13:00

Same thing you just said with the other question, like ten hundred dollars or ten thousand dollar class. You're right, value.

SPEAKER_00 13:05

Because I can have less people and offer more, more, and then those people that come here, I can give the best experience bar none that I can get anywhere else. Damn, he got it.

Comments Debate And Subscribe

SPEAKER_02 13:13

Hey, all right, that would, that was, that was it. Leave your comments below on what you guys think. What would you do? But that was that was a good answer. What can you say? That was a good one, all right. Um, Anthony, that was a case for us, dude. I thought the last one we would stump them. We'll try again next time, but good job. Very good job. Anthony, thank you for having me on the show. And until next time.

SPEAKER_00 13:30

If you guys disagree, let's have you on, let's do some debates. Would love to see you then. Until next time, don't forget to like, subscribe, and share. Catch next time, guys.