JohnOvManc

I don't know much really mate, but:

Getting 3 months rent free is about normal, normally gives you time to do fittings etc... not standered you have to ask but it's not like they are doing anything out of the normal practice overly generous for you.

Make sure you have the right to sub-let for the full term.

Get a get out clause where you can just walk away at 12 months if the business fails.

You can also negotiate the rent down a bit on maintenence agreements, you can agree to take on more or less.

Nothing stopping you fom walking away and if they don't give in... just go back.
How long has the unit been empty not supplying any revenue for the landlord?

See if you can speak to him face to face, say you'd really appreciate being given a break and you'll owe him one or something... try to apeal to his human side (landlords don't normally have human sides though!!!)

Nine Pack

Thanks John. I was hoping you'd have some advice there. The 3 month rent free period is great, it was just the guarantee they wanted the directors to give on the lease that bothered me. After speaking to the estate agent, it turns out that I was not really sure exactly what this guarantee meant.

I thought it meant we were putting our own personal property up as security, but all it means is that we have the responsibility of appointing an agent & getting the lease assigned to another tennant. Normally, as a Ltd company, we could just walk away with no comebacks, but this is a clause to protect the landlord in the early stages of tenancy when a business is more likely to fold. If we prove to them that we are profitable & secure as a business, they can review the lease & may lift this clause after 2-3 years. Obviously, there is an element of risk involved if it took us several months to reassign the lease, but we must accept this risk to get the success in the future. With there being more than one director, the liabilty is not just on one person, or household, so it spreads the load if it did happen.
We have no intention of things going belly up and we know it's going to be a huge success, but at this stage the landlord can't possibly be expected to merely take this as gospel as he does'nt know us from Adam.

We do have a little ace up our sleeve that I am not at liberty to divulge at this point but it will go a long way to ensure even greater success to the venture. Don't ask me what it is though as I cannot say. All in good time folks.........

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JohnOvManc

The only other thing I can think of, is make your rent reveiw as far away as possible.

The landlord will probably guess how well your business is doing and put the rent up by the biggest increase he thinks he can get away with.
There is a law to stop this being an unreasonable amount but you know how it goes, he will make as much as he can... so the longer you can keep it at the agree'd amount for the better IMO.

Agree with your positive outlook.
I didn't plan to fail with my salon, I would have had to sell my house if I did so it was not an option. Literally couldn't happen.
I didn't bother making a contengensy plan incase I had to sub-let... but I suppose t would be wise.

I'm sure it will work out for you... we've said before location is everything and while you are not on the front of a main road, you are in a place that is crying out for a good gym.
I know girls that traveled to "the villege" I think it's called that... in hyde?
And I think some people were hoping that bredbury hall was going to have a better gym or something along those lines I remember being said.

If I was you I would grind all your suppliers and landlords and everybody else down as far as you can (financially) and then take a deep breath and jump in with both feet.
You have to take a risk to get where you want to be and not everyone has it in them but you HAVE.
You can only do your best and I think in this case it's a good plan, your not talking bollocks or dreaming, you have a proper well thought out plan and all you really need to do is implament it.

Bet your feeling nervous eh?
I remember the butterflys building and I only have a small place LOL

Nine Pack

Thanks John. You have clearly been through the same experiences as we are doing now. As for how I/we feel, 'nervous' doesn't quite say it. We're excited and bricking it all at once!

We have a second meeting with Hammer Strength tonight so we will see what kind of deal they can offer. I am still more than happy to use Gym80, so Hammer Strength/Life fitness will need to make it a very attractive offer indeed. The rep is very keen to have a showcase Hammer Strength gym in the area, and with our little 'ace' up the sleeve, he will do everything in his power to accomodate us I reckon.

This week is going to be a pivotal one.

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leeston

good luck paul. stay focused mate!

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Marsbar

good luck paul

Nine Pack

We had the meeting with Hammer Strength & it went well. We have now increased the size of the cardio section considerably & opted for the life fitness CPO (certified pre owned) ones. They are completely rebuilt with new motors, bearings, belts, external casings etc. The only original bit is the chassis so it's as good as new & unless you were told you'd not know. The hammer strength machines are all new though. The rep is a great guy, no hard sell & very helpful. I ended the meeting by saying that the numbers were all too big, and that he should go away & make them smaller! He wants this deal badly as it will be one of the biggest private Hammer strength showcase gyms in the north, and certainly the only one in manchester with exclusively hammer strength stuff. I'm sure he can do us a deal to make the total monthly lease figure smaller.

Things are moving on with the property lease. The estate agent has asked us to fill in reference forms & then our solicitor & thiers can sort out the draft of the lease & if it's all ok, we should be on our way inside of a few weeks max. I'll be glad when all the initial negotiations are over & we can get on with fitting the place out. I'll be posting progress pics of the unit right from day 1 through each aspect of the work till it is finally a gym.

I am in a final meeting with the graphic designer on monday so will be able to announce the name & show you the logo he has designed for us. I did have an initial concept, which has evolved over time & I think it's going to look brilliant on everything from T shirts to car stickers.

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JohnOvManc

How are you planning on marketing the launch?
I don't mean launch as in a big house warming type launch or opening night... I mean how are you going to raise awareness in the local area?

T-shrits and car stickers are great for on-going promotion but you want people in from the word go.

I know Rightyho on MT uses a promo company, can not think of a the name from the top of my head but I can find out... him and others have said they do well for getting members signed up.

Apart from proffesional marketing you can do some yourself very cheaply and faily affectivly IMHO.
You can get 5000 A5 flyers, full colour printed both sides for £89
You can get about that amount distributed for about £20 (+vat) per thousand.
So for about £300 you can reach 5000 people.
On flyers about 3% return is average I think so that's 150 members could be generated from that.
I don't know how that stacks up for a gym but for my salon it's all good, each of those 150 people all tell there friends we are good and that basically doubles the effect, then word of mouth is our self propelled marketing machine LOL.
I delivered all 5000 on foot as I am a tight tw@t LOL

Probably totally differant plan for a gym - I don't know mate, maybe worth a quick thought.

Got to admit, I'm hooked on this thread... seeing it develop is really interesting.

Nine Pack

John,
We had considered a marketing company specialising in generating fitness facility memberships but after careful consideration we decided the £20K it would cost was not worth the return. We are using a leaflet distribution company and have a printers in mind but I must say that price you mentioned sounds good so if you can PM me the details I'd be grateful. The marketing companies are no doubt good at what they do, but I simply cannot justify the cost. There seemed to be a few 'anomalies' in the projection they gave us that we are not comfortable with. My wife is a real spreadsheet expert & said something did not add up at all.

From what I can see, they only reason they can generate so many members is that they heavily discount the membership rates to attract people & I'm sorry but I could do that myself so why pay someone £20K for the privelidge? I have spent my entire working life in some kind of sales role (10 years of which selling used cars) and so has the rest of the team so we can sort this aspect out ourselves. There will be a 'Opening soon' website up very soon, once we have spoken to our web designer. We won't be using newspaper advertising as it is notorious for a poor return in this kind of business. I will do a mailshot of local businesses for the corporate memberships too.

We will be having a specific launch day too, but the exact details of what we will do are not yet decided upon. I am thinking of making the initial leaflet we send out into an invitation to the launch day. It's a good way of monitoring the leaflet response & effectiveness as we will ask people to bring thier leaflet as a 'ticket' for admission into the place. This will be followed up with two or three marketing drives in the following weeks. I will be announcing the location of the gym this coming week so keep checking in.

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C12AIG

Amazing thread, and a very interesting read.

Been reading this from day1 so I hope you the very best in the future

JohnOvManc

With your sales experiance you should have it made then, I don't know how to sell myself Ruth Badger has it down to a T though LOL
Sounds like a water tight project this.

We fell over with finding out the exact effectivness of our leaflet drops, basically as I am never on site at the salon and my GF got fed up of asking people how they heard abot us.
We have a basic idea it's mainly word of mouth on the back of the leaflets but given my process improvment background I wanted FIGURES!!!! arrggghhhh
Can not knock her though - she's the one with the skills and the one they come to see and chat with.


I've sent you the PM.

Meadowcroft

Hiya,

Read your post the other night, not sure if you have secured a place yet, and sure you have already seen it but there used to be a gym called outline right in the town centre three floors and they had some studios in there, looking at all the places you have seen you probably no about it but just wanted to say just incase. Theres an all you can eat chinese just next door so there will be plenty of fat people to join.

Oh and I will definatly have a butchers when you start up.

Nine Pack

Thanks bud. I think that gym was near the building we were originally looking at, Kingston House near the bus depot. We are now very close to completing the lease on this other one whos exact location I have not yet revealed. It's in Bredbury though, I can say that much.

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Meadowcroft

Well bredbury is the other side of stockport to me but as people from down south have said they will come and have a look I guess I can make the trip too. Good luck with it all mate.

Yeah sounds like the same area you were looking.

megatron

Very exiting dude, again - good luck.

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