personal training

[abstrack]

If any of you have worked in a Pure Fitness, LA Fitness, 24HR Fitness or a large size health club, PM me I have a few questions for you on your employment there. The reason I ask is because I recently just became employed by one of these companys and i was wondering what your thoughts were on the company.


Thanks!!


~Abstrack~

[abstrack]

alright now, one of you punks has had to work in this area??? Dont make me get violent, i will have nathan sodamize you all!!

[BIG TEXAN]

Empty threats will get you nowhere ya biatch!!! I'll bump ya cause I've never stepped foot inside any of those places.

[mammoth]

A friend of my sister has a aunt whose niece dated a guy who worked with a woman whose son was married to a woman who talked to a guy who used to work for LA Fitness! Maybe I can get ahold of him and ask him a few questions for ya. Whatcha wanna know?

[poppapump58]

I worked at 24hr fitness and I thought it sucked. There is way to much competetiveness between you and the other PT's. If your just starting out (which you are) you have to go out and get clients before the PT'S that have worked there for awhile get them. Your basically at the bottom of the totum pole for at least 3 or 4 months before you start to get any clients. You might like it but I hated it. I know a few guys that have done it for awhile and make a pretty good living off of it. They also do PT on the side which is where they make most of their money. The guys I worked with were all cocky and thought they were the best PT's out there which they werent.

[PTbyJason]

PM me bro. Worked at various small clubs for about 5 years and then the busiest 24 hour fitness on the planet for a year (according to sales).

The experience with 24 hour fitness was that most trainers were not into it. There were like I was the first few years personal training. It was a part time job and I never gave it my all. Suddenly I found myself in a position where I was training full time and it was the only income I had. I didn't have school, homework or anything else. This was everything.

poppapump mentioned that it took "3 - 4 months before you start to get clients." When you are working full time and it is your only job, you don't have 3 or 4 months. I filled up my schedule, every single spot, in 2 months. Now on a side note, like I mentioned earlier, we were the busiest club in the company which made it easier for me. There was a lot to choose from. You had to do a lot of calling at the beginning to get people in there. Here's how I did it.

My specialty has always been back pain. I have been researching it for 15 years at that time in my life because my dad was disabled due to back pain. I researched, went to physical therapy with him, etc... So I knew my stuff. I also had a degree in Kinesiology (degrees are rare at corporation type gyms) and had also been to physical therapy school. Didn't finish PT school, but had a lot to work with from the 200 hours of observation before I entered pt school plus the classes in school. Back pain was my niche. It affected 80 - 90 % of the population, I was interested in it, loved to help people with it, knew rehab very well, and best of all none of the other trainers knew anything about rehab. This is how I got clients at a rapid pace.

I spoke with all of the sales counselors, let them know my background and camped out at that place. I didn't leave. I was there morning, noon, and night. If there was a membership sale or a personal trainer sale, I was there to be set up with right away. It worked. I will promise you that over the year that I was there I gave away approximately 150 clients to other trainers not including the ones I gave away when I finally quit my job. I was one of 3 trainers that were recommended for all new members because we cared, we gave it our all, paid attention to clients, did research for them if we had to, and got them results. I would call the physicians of clients if I had to in order to get more information about them. I called the physical therapist office to find out what exercises they were doing in order to further help them.

I'm not trying to brag or say I was better than anyone else. I wasn't. But I will tell you this. If you go into this job and give it everything you got, you can be successful as a trainer at those types of places. You have to pick a good gym though and work your ass off. Do I think they take too much money from the trainer? Absolutely. If I had continued personal training I would have moved on to an independent personal training location so I would be the one benefitting instead of the corporation. But you really do have to work hard in order to get your client base up. Once it is up, keep taking care of your clients, stay on the good side of the sales people, and you should have a steady income. By the way, you have to sell Apex supplements at 24 hour fitness. I hate that shit. I sent them down the road to a discount nutrition store so they could save money on supplements in order to be able to pay for more personal training.

[Nathan]

alright now, one of you punks has had to work in this area??? Dont make me get violent, i will have nathan sodamize you all!!

What the...