The three Moms who run Wheel Power Studio; Stephanie Rubinstein, Tracy Chutnow and Donnie Stutland
Here's a fun studio pre-launch story you'll enjoy hearing – especially if you're planning a new studio yourself.
Former Flywheel Sports Instructor Tracy Chutnow partnered with former participants Donnie Stutland and Stephanie Rubinstein to launch Wheel Power Studio in Deerfield, IL.
During our interview, Tracy and Donnie explain how exciting it was to pre-sell class packages – generating profits long before their Zingfit website was completed or studio was open. These early purchases helped to reinforce their commitment to opening an Indoor Cycling studio + resulted in full classes from day one!
They both credited Charlie Green website design for creating an effective website landing page, that they promoted on social media. You can click the image below to request information.
You can hear their story below – or – you'll find this Podcast in our iTunes feed. You can subscribe for free .
Here's an excellent chance for you to help shape the future of Indoor Cycling – as a member of the new Studio Owner's Advisory Group we're forming as a part of AFS – the Association of Fitness Studios.
After receiving some favorable responses from our Studio Owner's Facebook Group to this question, Josh Leve (founder of AFS) and I came up with a basic criteria for inclusion to this advisory group:
You have over two years experience in the business of fitness – as an owner or manager of a studio.
You own a cycling studio that has solid, demonstrable growth
You excel in a variety of areas including: business ethics, community involvement, and making an impact on your members/clients
You will commit to participating in the group for one year.
You're an AFS member – advisory group members will receive a free one year premium subscription.
You may have business related education and/or experience in; accounting, legal, HR, finance, real estate, construction, etc… any would be helpful, but not mandatory.
I feel it's important for you to understand that this will be a group made up exclusively of 6 – 10 Cycling Studio Owners – we're not including anyone else.
My role will be to act as the liaison between the group's leadership and AFS, where I have an advisory position.
What are you committing to?
We're anticipating that group members will meet via Skype or Google Hangouts 3-4 times a year and communicate via Facebook and email as needed. The group might decide to form a private group on Facebook… or possibly hold meetup at a fitness conference like IDEA 🙂
Group Leadership
Every group needs a leader, in this case we feel there should be two to share the load + someone who can act as Secretary to take minutes of the meetings.
For the first year we're looking for volunteers for these three roles. Once the group is firmly established, it would probably make sense for there to be elections to select the leaders.
You're a bunch of really smart, passionate people. AFS would like to tap your collective knowledge on important issues and solicit your help and direction; in the types of educational content they (AFS) develop and distribute to benefit others, forms of advocacy they should pursue and other ideas/needs as they arise.
Beyond that we're thinking it's your group and hopefully the group's mission/scope will develop organically over time.
Question asked by a member of our Studio Owner's Facebook Group; “Where should I post listings to find quality Instructors for my new studio?
Which is a great question… where will prospective Instructors know where to look for job listings in their area?
Why here of course – check out our new website where Instructors will know where to look for studios who need help, because we are promoting these job listings everywhere that matters.
When I'm at IHRSA (which I was last week) I spend a bunch of time searching for the next “Big Thing” that I can share with you. What I found is a rather small and yet indispensable component of the bikes we ride – Keiser has developed a new Indoor Cycling pedal that looks awesome!
As the major point of contact, Indoor Cycle pedals take a lot of abuse in our classes. They're kicked, torqued, sweated on, rotated millions of times and rarely maintained. I can't say for certain if this is universally true, but I've gotten the impression that the OEM pedals shipped with many bikes are a bit of an afterthought = manufactures don't invest much development into the two sided (SPD/Basket) pedals they supply. They end up failing after a year or two and need to be replace, requiring a reasonably large investment – 50 bikes x ~$80.00 = $4000.00 – way too much and too soon IMO 🙁
Feel free to correct me if there are specific instances where you feel I'm wrong about this.
Clubs and studios in the past would often replace the OEM pedals with the Schwinn Triple Link – I call them Red Pedals – that offered two sided cleat engagement for riders with either SPD or LOOK Delta equipped cycling shoes + the option for plain old tennis shoes. If you are currently using these pedals and don't have one of my Red Pedal Tools to safely and easily remove those $%^& shoe baskets, you can order one from my distributor Sportsmith.
Later Spinning® began manufacturing & selling their version of the Triple Link – the TRIO. FYI: The TRIO is an enormous improvement over the Schwinn pedal. The primary reason being the TRIO has much larger bearings and should offer much longer service life. Unfortunately my Red Pedal tool doesn't work with these, so I recommend purchasing the TRIO QR which includes a clever little red lever to simplify removing the shoe basket.
NOTE #2: The LOOK Delta cycling shoe cleats found on both the Schwinn Red Pedal and Spinning TRIO pedals are pretty much obsolete – very few cyclists continue to use them. LOOK no longer manufactures pedals using the the Delta cleat – the new version is the KEO. KEO's look similar to Delta's and appear to work, however they do not interchange and attempting to use KEO cleats with either the Schwinn or Spinning pedals creates a real safety issue.
NOTE #3: Hard-soled cycling shoes with exposed cleats of any type are dangerously slippery on smooth/polished floors. I've personally gone down a few times at Life Time on their bamboo floors = they really don't belong in many cycling studios. For that reason I always encourage studios to only offer two sided pedals – SPD on one side and shoe basket/toeclip on the other.
Has Keiser re-invented the Indoor Cycling pedal?
I've gotten to know Keiser's founder Dennis Keiser over the 7 years since I first interviewed him about the then new Keiser M3. Being a real gadget guy, I have have been continuously impressed by his commitment to manufacturing very high quality fitness equipment – the M3 has to be the one of the most reliable Indoor cycles ever built.
It was explained to me that this new double sided pedal was designed from scratch to be the most durable pedal ever made:
Completely rebuildable – notice the replaceable SPD parts held together with screws, not rivets
Corrosion resistant cast aluminum body
Stainless steel axle is specially heat treated
Quote from Dennis; “the best bearings we could find”
The small angled tabs on the platform make it easy to slide your show in, but not out = improved safety.
They even designed the pedal so replacing the strap is easy 🙂
If I had to bet, I'd wager that these replacement pedals will outlast the bike they're installed on. No pricing information yet – I'll be sure to pass it on once a hear.
It's that time of year again – IHRSA, the big fitness equipment show starts on Tuesday next week March 22nd and 23rd. This year the expo is in Orlando at the Orange County Convention Center. Sweet for me as it's an easy 90 minute drive from my new home in Tampa 🙂
Last year all the buzz was centered on the new Stages SC3 – which was a total surprise to me when I saw it. The buzz IMO was well deserved after I had the chance to ride it multiple times during the show. You can read my review here.
Monday afternoon I'm meeting with Josh Leve with AFS (Association of Fitness Studios) along with the other advisory board members. AFS is really catching on with studio owners and I'm looking forward to helping them become more beneficial to all of the new studios popping up across the USA.
Not having a crystal ball to peer into, I reached out to my friends at the various brands, asking for a heads-up on what I can look forward to seeing this year. Here's their responses:
RealRyder has added POWER!
Last year Adam Reid hinted that they were working at adding POWER indication to their Indoor Cycle. What they're calling WATTPRO1 is a pedal crank arm power meter – I can't tell if it's just one, or both arms… I'll let you know next week. Jackie Mendes who's a Director at RealRyder® International LLC added the following:
The same company that evolved the traditional stationary indoor cycle design by introducing the first and only multi-planar indoor riding experience now offers a new standard in indoor cycle power measurement–introducing the RealRyder® WattPRO1. This revolutionary direct power measurement technology provides our customers with the most accurate and reliable power data available on the market. The RealRyder WattPro1 is now available to elite athletes training indoors, or anyone seeking to gain a training advantage in their group cycling classes.
I can't wait to ride it + learn from Adam and Douglas Brooks what education they have planned. I'm also curious to find out if existing RealRyder cycles can be retrofitted with power?
Free Epic Planet Virtual Ride DVDs!
Be sure to stop by the Stages Booth when you're there at IHRSA. Allen Jones from Epic Planet supplied me with a few hundred DVDs that Dennis Mellon will be giving away during the show.
Join me Wednesday morning for a Stages early workout. You can reserve a bike here – I'm slotted for the 7:00 class. Stages will be demonstrating a display training system called VISMOX. I don't know anything more it, but plan to 🙂
I'm hearing more about Fitmetrix – the display training system that's also a complete backend solution for managing an Indoor Cycling Studio. Is it a worthy competitor to Mindbody? I plan to find out.
Core Health and Fitness AKA Star Trac and Schwinn Indoor Cycles
Core Health and Fitness will be featuring our Schwinn line up of bikes and the Echelon2 consoles. We will have Performance IQ in our booth demonstrating the connectivity with the Schwinn Echelon2. We're also excited to have Schwinn Master trainers Jeffrey Scott and Markus Mengert in our booth doing demo classes during the early morning workout and during the show.
Core Health and Fitness will also be showing our new line of Star Trac Studio bikes. The Studio Series bikes–built upon Star Trac’s heritage as one of the first and best manufacturers of indoor group cycling bikes–consists of three new models of bikes with improved looks, improved features, and a lower price point than our previous offerings in this space.
Performance IQ says:
At IHRSA, we’re introducing a new version of the PIQ software which is has additional modes, new functionalities and include different display theme options. We’ll also showcase our integration with different apps. You can find one of us in the Stages and Schwinn booth.
Not to forget my friends at Keiser – Darrin Pelkey supplied the following.
John
We are introducing some new accessories to our bikes. A new pedal, New Tablet holder and new stretch pads. I asked marketing and they would rather give detailed information and images after the show. I hope that works and I hope things are going well!!
My guess is that there will be other surprises and I'll be reporting on what I see/find/experience later next week.
There's a new option for prospective Indoor Cycling Studio Owners to consider – purchasing a franchise license from a proven & profitable studio vs. creating a new business from scratch.
Studio owner Paul Harmeling with Full Psycle Indoor Cycling joins me to discuss the details of their new cycling studio franchise offering. I've really enjoyed the classes I've taken at his studios in Los Angles and Chicago – primarily because of how effectively those classes combined a non-traditional format, with solid performance based metrics.
Listen as Paul explains both the costs and benefits of starting and owning a Full Psycle Indoor Cycling Studio franchise – or the option for you to possibly re-brand an underperforming studio.
Paul is hosting a “discovery day” on March 23rd and 24th at his studios in LA for prospective Full Psycle franchisees. They'll be presenting the business opportunity, touring two of their studios and answering all of your questions. Please use the form below to pre-register.
