Effective gym membership pricing goes a long way in the profitability of fitness clubs. This is one of the crucial decisions you have to make when opening a new gym.Too low and you're missing out on profits and potentially overfilling your gym, making it feel crowded for your members. Too high, and you’re missing out on more members and increased profits.So what are the different factors to consider when determining your price structure? Here we take a look at how to effectively set your gym membership pricing.

Analyze Your Market

Take a look at the other gyms around town — even if they’re a different type of facility — and make a list of the gym membership pricing schemes of your competitors. Note specials and sales, especially if they’re frequent, but your focus is on their core pricing.

From this, you’ll be able to position your competitors between one of four categories: high-price/high-quality, high-price/low-quality, low-price/high-quality, low-price/low-quality.This lets you determine the value given by your competitors, which should help you decide on a general price range to remain competitive.

Positioning

Positioning aims to differentiate a brand from other ones. This applies quite heavily in the fitness world. Your gym can be positioned as a high-end gym — of course, this needs to be reflected in your equipment quality, decor, and membership perks — that charges larger membership and drop-in fees. This ensures the clientele is also high-end; they value the perks, the higher-end environment, as well as lower congestion levels than the less expensive gyms in the area. With a high-end gym, you’ll want to make sure you build that through your branding so your high-end clients feel like a membership is a status symbol and mark of quality.

Your gym membership pricing can also reflect a low-end positioning strategy, which is all about quantity over quality. The bigger your gym, the lower your price can be, as you’re getting more people through the door. Reduced pricing means members will have a higher tolerance for congestion and a lack of state-of-the-art machines and decor.

Balancing Traffic

Congestion can be a big issue for gym members. Many people want to come in, get their workout done efficiently and leave. This can be hard to do, when each machine and bench press has a lineup of people waiting their turn. Congestion is inversely related to gym membership pricing: the more your membership costs, the less congestion there will be and vice versa. A gym management software solution can help you manage this, as well other facets of operations, making your gym run smooth and efficient.

Packages and Add-ons

Some common gym membership pricing schemes include package offers. These packages can vary from discounts on long-term memberships, personal training sessions and/or VIP perks. You’ll want to take a look at your competitors’ incentives, bundle offers and add-ons to make sure you’re competitive. That being said, you’ll want to consider which features you want to be included in a basic membership versus a VIP membership. Some of these things can larger lockers, private showers, daily smoothies and more. A final thing to consider is having packages with personal training sessions. This is a great way to boost income!

Once you have your gym membership pricing down, you’ll want to find ways to keep your gym members motivated. Always remember that, no matter the size of your business, upgrading to web-based gym management software can save you a ton of time and money. Get efficient!

For gym owners out there, how did your pricing scheme evolve since you opened and why? Let us know on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and Google+, to stay up to date with all of your Xplor Recreation news.