Latest / Glovisor Podcast / VALUE UP, RISK DOWN: The Simple Formula for Growing Any Business | Dave Cozzens [Ep 72]
Transcript
- Dave: value up, risk down, That's gonna be for gyms, it's gonna be for any service based business, that's gonna be for products. That's basically universal across the board for any business. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Welcome to the Glovisor Podcast, where we explore business growth, communication, and personal development through real conversations with people that make an impact. Our guest is the founder of Train With Dave, a multi-location personal training company, where he's built a highly systemized coaching business around great trainers, strong operations, and measurable results, showing gym owners how to scale faster. Glovisor welcomes Dave Cousins. Dave: Hey, appreciate you having me. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: pleasure. Looking forward to the conversation. Dave: Yeah, me too. It'd be fun. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: So share with us a little bit more about what specific problems does your business solve and who do you help the most? Dave: So with us, we help specifically gym owners. for me specifically, I'm in personal training, but I help any gyms, small business or small smaller group training, personal training, gym memberships, full nine yards on how to scale. issue with gyms right now is I mean, it's literally the second hardest industry in the country to actually build. I think restaurants are the hardest, then gyms are number two. so it's already incredibly hard industry. Most gyms make thirty K a year net per year, which is really tough. And so I help them get out of that. I start making actual decent money because they again they open a gym to not be a slave over it. They want to, you know, have their passion but still make a decent living. And yeah, just start getting a point where you're not struggling, you're making really good money, you can actually scale multiple locations and really enjoy what you wanted to build in the first place. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: what's the the one top thing that most gym owners get wrong? Dave: I think they followed the herd. I mean, there's so many gyms out there and everyone's doing pretty much the exact same thing. And no one really differentiates themselves in a way where people actually want to go to I'll give you an example. I have next my Irvine location, we have thirteen gyms in a quarter mile radius. All basically the same offer, same gym, same persona, and you know, yeah, that there's just no reason for people to actually want to go to So I think they gotta try to find a way to make themselves different. so people want to stay and actually yes, stay and go to that gym compared to other places 'cause there's so many other options out there. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Now what's the one thing that really attracts clients or customers? Dave: So obviously it's I mean, I could say it's value compared to the cost. That's the biggest one. But again, that's I think that's pretty vague. it's it's giving possi every it's giving as much value as possible can with the lowest amount of price. But in reality, you want to do that in a way where it costs you not as not as much either. Like for us, for example, I'm able to give people for personal training, personal training plus nutrition plus an app, plus twenty four seven access. Plus like their own nutrition PDF and all that's gonna be essentially cost me almost nothing, but gives them so much extra value without them actually having to pay a la carte for all these other things, like what other gyms, you know, force them to do. So it's finding something that's gonna help them wanna come and stay long term. That's not gonna cost you an arm and a leg to actually offer. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Now, over the years I've heard people say that being a gym owner, what's awesome about it is that you can sell a thousand memberships and only a hundred people will show up and actually use the gym. Is that true? Dave: Yeah, that's actually the plan fitness model. a lot Plan Fitness, EOS, Esporta, all these are fifteen dollar, ten dollar a month budget gyms. That's their whole plan. We're gonna sell ten thousand members and we're gonna just get a bank that you're not gonna show up. which those were really good in the past. they're actually starting to struggle a little bit. some of these actually closing down. And so in reality now it's more so customization. it's more personalization towards that person and Yeah, making it for them, not just for mass volume. That's actually what's coming out more. It's longevity, wellness, and yeah, health, not so much. Fifteen bucks, get pizza on Fridays and think that you're not going to show up. those are a model that's still around. those two you also it's a pretty high cost to actually enter. usually those cost a million dollars plus. so it's really hard for average gyms to actually create that. and yeah, it's just not really something that most people are going towards anymore because they're getting sick of the crowds and the trash and the busyness and that sort that sort of stuff. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: what's interesting for us as a community is to see that quarter mile and to see those what seven or twelve gyms in that in that small area. what made all of those individuals think that it was a great idea to put those gyms in that i in a r already saturated market? Dave: 'Cause all those can it's pretty easy to put a gym in there. it's a massive basic quarter mile business center. And yeah, it's just plug and play cheap and use and they all just go. And I think they don't look they're not looking at the demand, the saturation. And like I think a lot of gym owners out there are people that aren't really business for forward. They're more so I like to work out, I'm a personal trainer, I'm into fitness, I want to open a gym, let's open a gym. And they don't look at all the other stuff, which is like I said, like hey, there's 12 other gyms here within a quarter mile. Maybe this is not the best idea to do this. Maybe we should find somewhere else that's gonna be high demand, not so saturated. Right. And so I think that's one thing that people are missing too. Cause I mean a of them are more passion projects, not so much, you know, investors or no VCs or no sophisticated money that's I can actually gonna go in and open these gyms. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Now what was the defining moment that pushed you into entrepreneurship? Dave: Good question. so for me, I I started off corporate. So actually it was military at the start. So I was you know going growing up, I wanted to go FBI, DEA, CIA, joined the military, deployed, got used to 90 hour weeks. And so I came back, sorry, we're going back to school. actually was getting a job as a bodyguard out in LA, believe it or not. And I was kind of homesick. So I'm like, I said, all you know what, let me get my degree first and then I'll I'll come back in a couple of years and I'll I'll join you guys. went the corporate route and realized you know, I like training. so I started training, became a manager, realized that the gym I was at was more about money over people, which I personally hated. And so I ended up starting my own business back in 2016, about a decade ago. And I was just like, hey, I'm gonna start training, and I'm just gonna I'm gonna figure this out, right? Move back to my parents' house in my mid-20s, early like late 20s. And yeah, like I said, okay, I can make 80 bucks an hour training, so let's just do this. Then I went to know working that full time to hey what if I double this up to 160 an hour. Then they went from two to three to four to five to six to seven at some hours. And I had a and so I was just doing that by myself at one point. I had a guy come by and say he wanted to be a mentee for me. we want to get mentorship. He became a ment mentee. He started hoping helping me out I hired him. COVID happened and I had about three or four trainers at the time working at me. And they said, hey, you know what? It's gonna be Only two weeks, don't worry about it. We'll you'll open back up in no time, right? Which as we know back during COVID, it wasn't two weeks, it would end up being three, four, five, six months, rolling over two years. And so I told these guys, okay, you know what, you guys take the clients, I'll just figure this out. Like I have some money saved up. I'm fine. And from there, yeah, it forced me out of training and I just started doing the back end stuff, started doing the marketing, the SEO, the legal, the HR. And yeah, here we are. six years after COVID and we're probably the one of the largest training companies in the nation. And we did thirty five thousand hours of sessions last year. And so I think I was kind of forced into it through COVID, which it's it was a silver lining, right? it was really tough at that time. But yeah, that's helped me get into this and get in the back end. And with this I was you know made a lot of failures, a lot of issues, a lot of mistakes and that helped me grow to where we are now. So now I can help people not make the same mistakes, not have it take a decade to get to where I am. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: And that's because you were in the trenches and you had the opportunity to grow with your business and see all of those pain points, which gives you a lot of experience to be able to help others. Now, as a coach, do you have a system or a process that you put your clients through or do you just answer to pain points Dave: Yeah, so I think with the clients that I talk to right now that are business owners specifically, I I just sit down with the first and start picking their brain, like, hey, what do you know? Like do you know your do you know your CAC? Do you know what CAC is? Like how much they cost you to actually get a customer, where you get them from? How many are you getting per month? What's the LTV of that? Okay, good how don't why don't you know these numbers? Let's figure these numbers out. Cause if you if you don't even know, like, do you know your net? Do you know your margins? Like how much they cost? Like, so we try to figure those numbers out and actually get a good roadmap of where they actually are. Then from there we can figure out, okay, do you have liquidity? Do you have net? Do you have stuff coming in? Are you even profitable? Two, it's like, hey, you're spending how much hours for the gym? What is your what's your time allocation? Like what are you putting towards? What what's the e then from there we can figure out okay, you have this money, let's figure out this marketing plan, it's gives you more money here. If you're spending fifteen hours a week on just regular admin stuff, do you just hire a VC for that? Or or a or sorry, VA or hire an assistant. Like that's gonna save up this time and helps you get with this. So I think a lot of it for specifically gym owners, they don't have these numbers top of their head. And so figuring out what the numbers are first, have them actually get a full-on plan idea, okay, this is what my business looks like on paper. And then being able to pick apart certain pieces and putting pieces different pieces in different places, it's gonna help them actually start scaling it more and actually save time and make money when reality they're mighty spending be spending twenty hours a week on stuff they shouldn't be doing anyways. So I think a of these guys too, they also just work just to work. They're not going anywhere with it. Like if I have you, you know, shovel dirt, move it twenty feet that way, pick it up, do it again. Okay, yeah, you're working all day, but you're not doing anything. So we want to make sure the time they do is actually productive and not just busy work. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Sure. Now you mentioned CAC, which is the customer acquisition cost. it have you seen the numbers increase, decrease, or or flat in the last few years? Dave: Increase exponentially. Increase exponentially. Yeah. So sad thing is, I mean, back in like 2016, 17, you could spend three hundred bucks on Yelp and that will get you ten clients. Like thirty bucks and you each client's worth $1,500. That's like a 50X of like your multiple, right? Or ROAS. now it's I know since 2021 with Google and Yelp and everything else, this it's doubled pretty much every year, just naturally. So it used to be a fifty dollar CAC to hundred to one hundred and fifty to two hundred. And it got really bad up until last year, where I think average gym was gyms that were essentially got twice as hard every year compounding to get a claim. but this year was the first year where it actually came back down and it's back to where it was in 2022. I think a lot of that was because inflation. and also it was because yeah, there's just a lot of competition down. Like I said in Irvine, there's thirteen gyms in quarter mile radius, all bidding on the same people and all competing. So again it it goes back to how much can you divers different yourself in a way where people actually want to go to you and click on your links, click on your ads and not click on the competitor next door. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Now, do are do you work with people that want to start a gym, people that currently have a gym? And if either one of those, how what would be the process of working with you? Dave: Yeah, so I think with that, I mean I mostly work with people that are already in the industry. So you're at least gonna be a trainer and making money. You want expand to a gym or you already have a gym and you're trying to expand. the easiest way is just email me, Dave at trainwithdaveoc dot com. that's gonna be my company email. And from there I pick and choose whether or not I want to work with you. And well, maybe do like a five ten minute phone call, see where you're at, see what you're trying to accomplish. And then from there we can build out a plan and a structure to help you out. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Now what do you think the single most important takeaway that you want people to take away from this conversation? Dave: I think in general, if you're looking at building your business, it's or even it's trying to make it better. You want to find a way to make yourself different. So with us, again, for example, we won best personal training past five years. our trainers are highest paying training company in the nation. They're the highest paying trainers in the nation. we give clients absolutely everything, just for free, one set price. And it's also a money back guarantee. And so I try to create as much value as possible, make myself as different as possible from everyone else in the herd and take away any sort of risk that you possibly have. So I can get the value super high, the risk super low, and make us look like we're as legit as possible because we are, gives you every incentive to hire us and not go a different route. So I think what the one thing that I would say is probably just to again value up, risk down, perceive likelihood of your accomplishment being the highest possible. And then yeah, just push that and you know, go for gold. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: what applies in the US for gym owners, does that also cut across to let's say Canada or the UK for those gym owners? Dave: It does, yeah. I mean, I think this is pretty universal across the board, even for outside of gyms. value up, risk down, make the cost down. That's gonna be for gyms, it's gonna be for any service based business, that's gonna be for products. That's basically universal across the board for any business. That's gonna be US, Canada, Mexico, wherever it is. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Interesting. 'cause you would think that, you know, different cultures have different requirements for different gyms, but it it's it's all the same thing, right? It's income and bottom line and the expenditures throughout. It all applies across the board. Dave: people want to avoid risk more than actually accomplish stuff. So if you can make the risk as minimal as possible, and like for us for like personal training, for example, if we don't do what we we want you to do, right? You don't get what we just tell you you're gonna get, you get a full money back guarantee. same thing too, like Okay, do I walk am I going to get results? Am I not going get results? Like I've tried 10 other trainers before. Okay, here's a case study of 150 different people just like you that lost lost the same out of weight you did, saw the results and maintained it. This is the before and after. This the reviews. This is everything like that. So I could front load the the idea that you're gonna get where you want to compete, get where you want to be, at the same time, make that risk as low as possible and make the price as low as possible. You're much more likely to actually buy that product. And same thing for us. I mean, if I can tell you, okay, I have this guy that I talked to four years ago that was making sixty grand a year between the two of them, working twelve hours a week for each one of them, had no idea, had no money to expand and no time to actually take on other stuff. I talked to them and then they double their business in a year. And then after two, three years, now they're working five hours a week for each one of them. Like, yeah, it's okay, there's proof that someone did it that's just like you. Right. So I can show that for, you know, my clients that are gym owners or personal trainers, or even my clients that are my personal training clients, you're much more likely to actually buy it. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: can you share a coaching client case study that shows the transformation your work creates? Dave: Yeah. So like a guy just talked talked about. So we I've known this guy for he's been my friend for probably about over a decade now. owns a gym in the area, was pr military, was successful trainer, tried to s start scaling a little bit, picked on some more clients, then realized he was working five AM to eight PM, had kids, same thing his business business partner, married kids, working five AM to eight, nine PM at night, no idea how to get out of it, stuck. And they were making, yeah, like 80 grand out the door for both of them. talked to them for a couple hours, figured out kid their like I said, they had no idea what their CAC was, no idea what their LTV was, no idea where their clients came from, no idea what their you know, however many people went to the website, how many actually booked consultation. And so we figured all those numbers out, figure out where they're where they're putting their time and energy into it, figured out where we could actually outsource their their time. and maximize how much they brought in. And so with that, they started working less hours. Like I said, they doubled their business within a year. And now it's four years later and they're basically working five hours a week and they're the largest training company in that city. And they went from basically struggling to that. And it's the same systems I'm talking about here is just more systematized towards them and customized towards them. And so with that the meeting that I'm talking about, I'd be able to see what you're actually trying to accomplish and see what your numbers are and see, you know, where everything's at. From there I could customize a program for you to get you out of that situation. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Yeah, that's a huge transformation. Now where can people connect with you? Dave: Yeah, so I mean my company right now is training with Dave is a personal training company. if you want to email me, Dave at trainingwithdaveoc.com is my email. that's where I would take business inquiries right now. And then I'm actually gonna start my website for consulting probably the next couple weeks. So it's email to me right now for that, then I'll be able to help you out going forward. Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Well, Dave, thank you so much for joining us, and we really appreciate your time and the value you've shared. Dave: Yeah, Napa, appreciate you having Joe Abreu - GLOVISOR.com: Thanks everyone for listening. If this episode inspired you, make sure you share it with someone who needs it. And don't forget to follow the Glovisor podcast where we explore more conversations that make an impact. Till the next time.