anyone wondered how about one would operate a badminton gym and not ended up bankrupting one self? i was chatting with a friend who's interested in opening a large badminton gym. the gym will have space for 10 courts. i am not sure how he plans to run it, but apparently, the rent per month runs in the region of US$10,000. that's an appreciable amount of money. by running a gym with 10 courts, how would one go about getting break even or perhaps profit on such an operation? eg. running open gyms. say, $4/person. opens 7 days a week, in order to break even, we will need attendence of: 10000/(4*30) = 83 so we need to have 83 players attend the gym to break even on the rent. on top of that, there is the cost for running the gym, electricity cost money, the floor cost money, water, garbage collection, etc. is that realistic?
Seems risky business indeed. I think you need to work with subscriptions with yearly / monthly payments to have a bit of overview of the cash coming in. To make it happen, marketing will be important, as the accomodation is there as a sudden. May be wise to do a questionaire first if people in the neighbourhoud are interested. Furthermore, maybe funds from goverment can be obtained when a plan is offered with training facilities for children. Also an possibility might be to re-rent the courts to a club on a specific evening. Nice idea though, to run your own badminton accomodation. First thing is to have loooootsss of cash to get the thing going, finally, you want to earn something yourself also, ahemm.
Is the gym built already? Just as a stand alone facility in badmitnon would be real tough unless the place was dedicated to be a centre of excellence for fulltime training. Probably would need to think about subcontracting time and parts of the facility to other sports and like Yong says, private clubs, children's classes. To make use of daytime off peak time, then perhaps think about renting out time for PE lesson for schools in badminton, soccer, volleyball, basketball, short tennis, martial arts etc.
Don't forget about insurance and security costs! How about offering local retailers advertising space, such as hanging banners? I don't think he should count strictly on collected fees to pay expenses.
there's one place i know of that does this, but they only have 5 courts. they do monthly membership and offer coaching and fitness too. if you ask me, i think you really have to look at supply and demand. The place i'm thinking of is in Toronto. Now, there are very few clubs in Toronto dedicated to badmintion. So the demand is there. There are tons of asians in Toronto. When one thinks of badminton and asks their friends where to train, its this place. I think reputation is important, and you really need to get a bunch of regulars there. Once you have that, it spreads by word of mouth. But then again, everyone knows this and i'm just babbling. This has no relevance to starting a business. lol.
kwun, i suggest starting small like booking the gym once or twice a week. When the words get around about your gym or your members like to play more often, then expand the playing days accordingly. Also, 10 court gym is nice but i suggest again to start off in a smaller scale like finding a 4 to 6 court gym. All these should lessen the burden of starting a badminton club.
this guy already have a 3 court gym running, a rented one. the 10 court one is just a large warehouse that he plans to convert to a gym. it will also be rented. the current 3 court gym has been around for less than 1 year, and it is already overly crowded. he coaches and i think he gets a lot of revenue from coaching. but as many have said, the gym will be mostly unoccupied during the day time. as far as i can tell, if one opens up a gym in the bay area, it will be completely occupied in a matter of months. regardless of the size.
then it would seem likethere is a good chance for success. does he plan to get matted floor's or just concrete? cuz some converted warehouses may be unsuited unless extensively modified, which would not be great because you are renting. If you did purchase, than you could afford to totally refurbish the whole thing. just a thought.
here in the phils, badminton courts are fast becoming profitable ventures because of the steady growth of popularity of the sport in the recent years. courts are sprouting one by one in the recent months. the usual thing done here is to scout for warehouses and convert them into badminton gyms to cut down on costs extensively. and since matted floors are expensive too, most courts here have cemented or rubberized floorings. anyways, badminton addicts would still play regardless of the type of floorings and for additional profits, the gyms also offer training courses by their in-house trainers. they also hold tournaments once in a while. about the court rate, it is usually higher at night.
That sounds a lot like what the San Gabriel/Pasadena Badminton Club did. Maybe he should contact Eric McMullin or somebody else there about what is involved in getting started.
Jennifer sure has the place booked solid. She's has it down to a science (membership, coaching/lessons, etc) to maximize the court usage. Wondered how much she pays for rent for the warehouse. Do you know whether the ceiling is high enough? (min. 28ft)
haha winex, you know what im talking about. yeah she's got everything pretty much down packed. its all on her website. as for the ceiling... i'm not too sure, but the last time i went there i couldn't hit the ceiling with a clear.. but i'm a lot better now so i could be wrong. and i was shorter back then. i think its been about 2 years since i've gone.take a look at the pics on her website, supposedly they moved to nearby, i'm not sure. i'm going there sometime soon so i could tell you then.
Well, first, if the gym's location is good (close to metro area, no other clubs close by), if think $4 entry fee is too low. In NY, the good club has about $100+ annual member fee, plus, every 3hr session will cost about $15+. I am not saying CA's price need to macth NY, but, if the price is slightly higher, I think it's still reasonable. Second, maybe ur friend can add some "bonus" features in his club to gain more profits: 1. re-string service (at least $10 profit per racket) 2. Racket renting 3. snack and sports drink 4. locker renting 5. shuttle selling 6. run coaching session
$100+ USD? Annually?? that sounds good lol! the place i am talking about charges aroun 400$ CDN and thats for students too!
Well, $100+ is just an average. The top ones charge USD$250+, I believe. The killing part is, u still have to pay about $15-20 / 3 hrs session there after. So, consider this: $250 + $20 * 75 (consider an relative active member. 1.5 times playing per week) = USD $1750, just for just renting of facilities. Well, according to my financial situation, I don't think it's cheap at all.
It looks very cheap here in Singapore to be able to play badminton in a club which entitles you to several other facilities free of charge like the gym for aerobics and weights workouts, swimming pool, about two club nights a week for squash, table-tennis, tennis and badminton. You can also play golf (18 holes) anytime you get a slot and all these for about US$700 a year! Not only that, your family, with children below the age of 21, can join in. Of course you provide your own shuttles but court fee is free on club evenings.
I dont remember for sure but i think the ceilings were rather low. maybe about 2 (max 3) storeys high. I doubt the ceiling is much higher than 25 ft at the lowest points. I havent been there in awhile and I didn't play there so don't quote me on this.
I'm sure you know of lots of solid places with membership fees in the 100-200$ range in TO. What's special about your place?
