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Post by iwishicoulddoitover on Oct 12, 2017 20:38:29 GMT
I know this is a long shot, but anyone hear of what was talked about/sold/forced down our throats at convention this year? I haven't gone in quite a while and it seems that each time they have convention, my bank account gets drained a little more...$30 here, $199 there etc.
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Post by firecrackergirl on Oct 13, 2017 15:53:34 GMT
I heard there was some "HUGE" announcement being made. Any ideas?
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Post by cheryl on Oct 13, 2017 16:00:56 GMT
New $30 newer technology fee. This upgrade will resolve one or two of the major flaws with the current system and introduce 10 or 20 new ones. (just kidding - I have no idea)
You should have another option:
4: I've gone in previous years and am now sick of being told to sit down, shut up, do what we say and pay us more money.
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Post by swtexan on Oct 13, 2017 16:36:05 GMT
Just got back from Convention- not my first time. I had tampered my expectations down simply due to what I've heard in the past, however.... it seems like the folks who make the decisions are listening to the people in the trenches on what we need. First, the direction and focus of Snap has seemed to be diluted in recent years, just my two cents, now the direction is much simpler and more focused to what we do well- the small boutique type club that focuses on changing lives in our immediate area. Second, big changes to Fitware- Larry Johnson's club audit is being tied directly into Fitware and I have to say it is awesome and will save so much time going from report to report and allows you to track each group of members (delinquents, SS, Silver and Fit, Prime) to see how much you're making with each group, who's using, not using- etc all on one page. It's supposed to go live shortly- November, if I remember correctly. They have also hired a CTO- I think his name is Vikram and his only job is to help integrate Fitware and all software and hardware so it actually works. I'm hearing good things about him. There are also changes coming to the I-pad and they were talking about an app that we can download and take out into the community to get leads electronically that integrates into Fitware. Also, regarding the I-pad, the consensus was that it was rolled out too soon without thorough testing, which I agreed. Third, MyZone- as it should be- will become mandatory for all zees. If you look at Orange Theory and now Anytime, they have both embraced Heart Rate training. You have to utilize this in order to bring about the most change in the shortest period of time. The main stage on the first day was a motivational speaker, Brian Burrows who was very good. The first day there was an owner's meeting where everyone asked questions directly to Peter in a small group setting. The breakout sessions were led by the different BPS folks, who actually know what they are talking about, which was much different from the past. As a fellow owner of a historically underperforming existing location, I know that there is no "one size fits all when it comes to what works and what doesn't for us. For the first time, I didn't leave wondering why I'm being charged more for something that I don't want/need and probably would not work anyway. All in all, this is the best convention that I've attended. I've been in the fitness industry since the mid- 90's and like to think that I know what needs to be done regarding my business. For the first time since I purchased my location, I feel like Corporate has truly drilled down on what and who we are as a brand and has implemented changes and allowed the BPS's to bring their own area of expertise into play to finally help us succeed. Sorry for the rambling nature, I just wanted to get this out- I just got back at 2am on the redeye. Let me know if you have question- I'll answer the best I can.
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Post by swtexan on Oct 13, 2017 17:00:18 GMT
I forgot to add that Snap has partnered with a marketing company called Listen360 who are going to somehow integrate our positive reviews from the portal directly into Google when someone does a google search on our location.
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Post by beatendown on Oct 13, 2017 19:36:19 GMT
I appreciate SWTEXAN for the candid and honest feedback about convention. I too attended and was very impressed with the breakouts and discussions around the current company direction. As wonderful as it was to see that there is pro-active movement to keep the brand relevant and alive, I was also discouraged because my locations simply no longer have the capital to change to the new brand image and objective.
It makes me sad, but I also understand that this is another part of the life cycle of business. Take for instance about 10 years ago several businesses took the idea of $1.00 DVD rental kiosks and began to build a thriving industry around them. There were "Red Box" "InstaFlix" and "DVD express" you could hardly find a corner that did not have some sort of DVD vending machine with a line of people waiting to pick up a new release. This industry was driven by entrepreneurs willing to invest tens of thousands of dollars into a business that required an owner only to provide a location, re-stocking, and maintenance of the unit. This was semi-absentee ownership at its best!! It as exactly what consumers wanted... and the vending "Franchisors" were able to aggressively sell hundreds of thousands of units.
None of you have to imagine what those owners would feel like as the consumer preferences began to change around 5 years ago. Suddenly with the improvement of Movie Streaming services, and the convenience of simply downloading the new releases, there was no longer a need to go to the local corner DVD kiosk no matter how close it was, and besides, they might not have the title you want anyway! Thus began the rapid decline of those DVD kiosks once so prominent at every corner store. Now you can only find the one final hold out "Redbox" and it has survived solely because of its video game rentals. It too will disappear as the reliability of streaming full video games becomes more prevalent. This is the natural product/service life cycle that you learn about in Marketing 101.
Why I bring this up, is because Snap is also at curve in the product/service life cycle. We have to adapt to survive because consumers no longer care about the "Fast,affordable,convenient". I am sure that some of those DVD kiosks could have survived if they were told that they needed to no longer have a kiosk, but needed a to build a small theater, and show first run movies with the latest in digital sound, with leather recliners, and serve craft beer and wine. To top it off they are going to get Superstar David Hasselhoff to launch his own line of premier theaters with their own brand name! These all sound like great ideas (except one), and are indeed what the consumer wants, but the owners didn't want to buy that, they wanted a semi-absentee ownership at it's best. They certainly didn't want to have to create an entirely new business. Which is where we are now and what we are being told to do.
Adapt to survive, I fear that there is an even bumpier road ahead for those clubs that don't (this includes Anytime). Competition is much larger than just your local $10.00 month club, and at home online training. I live in an area with no less than 5 giant housing communities under construction. These will comprise over 3000 houses full of affluent wonderful folks that I will have almost ZERO chance of attracting to my club. The reason is because the newest trend for developers is to create 10-20 thousand square foot centrally located, fully loaded, fitness facilities within the community. Each resident has full 24hr access and their monthly dues are included in the monthly HOA dues. That is a hard competitor to deal with. Whatever markets you may be in I am sure there are similar planned communities in the works.
I agree the convention was much better than previous ones, I simply went this year to find out what new fees I was going to be paying for, but walked out understanding that our corporate office fully aware of which part of the product/service life cycle we sit. They know we need to adapt to survive. They actually have some great plans, most of which involve creating a completely new company to compete and thrive in the boutique market. I however do not have the capital, nor the desire to try to re-grow my moderately successful clubs from scratch. I can only hope that I can find someone who loves my locations enough and has the financial means necessary to completely re-create Snap fitness in my area. I am tired.
I went in thinking the constant new fees and requirements were some greedy act by our corporate office to squeeze every dime out of us. I came out knowing that those are just unintended consequences from a company that grew too fast to meet a consumer demand that changed quickly. There is now a definite direction Snap is wanting to go, its just going to cost each and every once of us substantial investment, and if it is not done each location will slowly disappear. I am sure I could find several storage units filled to the gills with Instaflix kiosks and BAD BOYS II DVD's to prove my point.
Just venting folks.
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Post by swtexan on Oct 14, 2017 11:56:49 GMT
beatendown,
I am in the same boat regarding the gigantic development with the fitness facility. I live 2 miles from my club and a new development of about 1200 homes is about halfway from completion with a very nice fitness facility. I looked at it and while nice, it is minimally- if ever staffed and they don't have PT or MyZone, so it's basically a nice apartment fitness facility on a much larger scale. Since the first home was completed, I've been getting those people in my location because of what I offer. Upon completion of the fitness facility, I've lost exactly one member who simply wanted a treadmill closer to her house. I just wanted to say don't overlook the difference between your location and the development facility.
Best of luck with your locations with whatever decision you reach.
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Post by cheryl on Oct 14, 2017 12:13:41 GMT
My experience with snap is that they talk well and act poorly. How many years was it talked about that checkfree would be replace? I believe it was talked about at 3 conventions in a row. Then what did we get? Garbage. I'll believe it when I see it.
When are they getting rid of the shitpass? This is basically their knife in the side of owners. Is it offered at 9Round? Yogafit? No, because the owners would revolt and there aren't enough of them to make $$$.
Also, there was a hint of the auto credit card updating. Any word on that?
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Post by snaplongtimer on Oct 14, 2017 14:22:27 GMT
Ahhhh the stressful checkfree years where you could barely sign someone new due to a mega delay with every click of the mouse. Usually on a Monday night. Sometimes in my dreams I can still hear the screams of frustration. This was the beginning of my frustrations and caused me to drink heavily. The talk of replacing checkfree was at least 5 years. I never understood why it took so long to change.
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Post by cheryl on Oct 14, 2017 16:25:53 GMT
The old saying, fool me once - shame on you. Fool me twice - shame on me. Fool me three, four and five times - I must be a f*ing fool, idiot or dreamer. (or some combination thereof)
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Post by cheryl on Oct 14, 2017 16:55:38 GMT
So here are a couple points...
If you were a company selling dvd kiosks to people don't you think they should have understood their market and realize that it would disappear as it currently exists? If so what were their plans to adapt to the new market? Is your point that they didn't understand the market conditions and had no plans to adapt? Is your point that snap also doesn't understand the market and has no clue on how to adapt? I remember them telling us that classes weren't part of the snap model. 6 months later they were telling everyone to section off a portion of their club and offer classes. Sorry, too late. By that time the space was gone.
So either the dvd kiosk people didn't understand their market or they saw a way to swindle people out of their money in the short term.
What are the numbers that are most important to owners? Those numbers should appear on the dashboard and you should be able to click on them for further details.
Members with $0 dues: 4 Members with INVALID billing: 2 SS members with no visits over the last 2 months: 6 etc
This sort of data is commonplace in other industries. Heck our software can't even see that a pre-pay has already renewed. Instead they email them and cause all sorts of confusion. A member is under 18? Well then send them a document to sign. Really? Is what state will the signature of a 17 year old hold up to anything? None of this is very difficult and it's common in all sorts of other industries and fitness billing/member management software.
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Post by Beatendown on Oct 14, 2017 21:16:41 GMT
My point is that the DVD rental market is an example of the hyperfast changing consumer behavior and it's effect on the product/service life cycle. I'm sure they all started with the same information based on previous similar examples. (Ex 30+ years of movie rental stores). It changed fast and as a result some people lost their asses, and it sucks, but it's reality. It would have been ridiculous to expect them to adapt by creating a completely different product from scratch.
I feel that is where Snap is now. Then product they are selling, and the product they will support is a completely different product than what I purchased. They are trying to survive, whether bit will work or not I don't know. I do know that those of us that are unable to change to what the brand wants us to be, need to cut the losses, and sell to someone who wants to "run the current play." It sucks... But "fast, convenient, affordable" model is dead, or at the very least a zombie.
I don't wanna sound like a corporate cheerleader, like I said I am tired. I enjoy reading this forum, and wish all of you the best. I am going to enjoy my Las day here in Vegas, who knows... If I hit the Jackpot maybe I'll be able to afford creating the club Snap wants.
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Post by cheryl on Oct 14, 2017 21:31:09 GMT
But you have to ask 1. Did they look to the future to where the industry was going? 2. Did they put together a plan to adapt?
Netflix was mailing out DVDs. Redbox came out with a lower cost model. However, you had to drive to get it. Netflix created a streaming service. Redbox made DVD availability information accessible to its members. It also enabled users to reserve titles at one of their boxes. Winners keep their finger on what's going on in their industry and adapts so they're ready when those changes happen. snap tends to look at what's happened and then makes changes. By the time they make those changes the market has changed again and they're in a constant state of playing catch up. I believe that's what the book "Who moved my Cheese" is about. I never read the book, though I did read "The Innovator's Dilemma". Classes should have been put into the model 2 to 3 years before they were. Those with their finger on the pulse of the market see what's coming and adapt before it hits them, or at least they have a plan for when it comes. We offered TRX classes 3 years before any club in our area. No one knew WTH TRX was. Same goes with HIIT. My instructor wanted to change the name because she wasn't getting people in the class. Wanna know where the industry is going? Step inside our club. When others are ready to incorporate what we have we'll be ready to move to the next thing. We no longer watch snap for direction. They don't understand the trends in the marketplace.
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Post by determined1 on Oct 15, 2017 18:51:39 GMT
So let me make sure I have this correct...
They're going to upgrade the software so that it gets closer to being able to do what other software packages do, but still nowhere near as good as existing software packages developed by companies that do nothing but develop those software packages with 24/7 support. And for an upgraded software package which is still lacking functionality we'll be paying 2 to 3 times the cost of going with an off the shelf product. Then you have to ask yourself what forces those other companies to continue adding new features to their products? Competition. snap uses nothing but brute force to make you purchase their substandard product.
We're supposed to be excited by this? What would be exciting is for them to admit they don't have a clue as to what they're doing and are switching to an off the shelf solution with 24/7 support. What's next them deciding to manufacture their own line of equipment?
Oh, BTW PF tried developing their own software and abandoned that plan because they also had no clue what they were doing. Stick to your core competency. (Here's a hint: It's not programming or software development)
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Post by frustratedbadger on Oct 17, 2017 17:15:01 GMT
I have to admit. I was convinced to go to convention by another Snap owner. I thought I was going against my better judgment. But maybe at least that I'd have a good time in Vegas and I'd get to vent some frustrations at the corporate staff. I was stunned by the changes and quality of this convention versus previous conventions.
My background is this...I have a struggling (sometimes profitable, sometimes not profitable) club in rural Wisconsin. An old stripe club that I haven't been able to modernize. I don't have the money to modernize and have fought with corporate at times over modernizing. Usually my background with corporate just involves fighting and arguing. I just can't afford all of the crap they try to sell me! My club doesn't make near enough money to do it. Other times I have tried screaming at corporate over the FitPass and different shit they rolled out that I felt like was screwing me. I had been to conventions in 2013 and 2014. But was so fed up that I skipped 2015 and 2016. Not wanting to deal with corporate trying to give me a salespitch and squeeze money of out my pockets for crap I didn’t feel my club needed or wanted.
The owners meeting Q&A with Peter was first. I thought this was a good chance to go and throw some fiery questions at Peter and the corporate kool aid drinkers. I was stunned by the level of honesty Peter gave us. Not a direct quote but close was when Peter said "You guys that are here are 300-400 of my best owners. I have hundreds disengaged owners that I need to get out of our system." Every time I was expecting to be let down by some sunshiny, corporate kool aid drinking BS I was instead given a dose of cold honesty. Peter was very aware of where the company is and where we need to go. He had no illusions about the past. I even got a chance to talk to him for a few minutes about my frustrations and experiences and he was candid and actually made me believe that he knew the way forward.
Then Wednesday and Thursday was the real eye opener. I kept expecting the sales pitches to come. They didn't. What were corporate's big rollouts? Automated fitware audits from Larry which will be a GODSEND!!! A net promoter system so we can actually see what our members want us to improve. I have a primary business outside of owning my club and these were the kinds of things I never would have expected to see from them. The biggest ipmrovement was the Brand Performance team's breakouts. They actually coached us on things we could do that didn't cost us money that will improve our clubs. Larry's fitware audit presentation will save my club some money and make my club some money too! The membership sales breakout on business partnerships was really well done. The personal training breakout was amazing--Mike and Joe really knew their stuff. Mike Vott's discussion on using a document we already have (the roadmap thing) to sell more personal training was great, and Mike presented with crazy passion. The other breakout was a club engagement breakout led by 2 BPS and a few international owners. Which I appreciated because it is about time that corporate started looking to the international people that are having so much success and start copying them. The 2 BPS in the engagement breakout Doug and Ryan gave us stuff that we could actually use right away to avoid and save cancellations. The international owners were awesome because they were funny and they actually showed us how to run events our members would want to attend.
The best conversations I had without exception were with other owners, many who have been as pissed off as we have been and the chats I had with BPS guys. Then it all dawned on me. The best conversations I had were with people who were either mad at corporate for years or by the BPS team who is basically made up of people from other companies that have beaten Snap Fitness. All of the BPS team were people that used to work at either Gold's Gym, Anytime Fitness, and Lifetime Fitness. All companies that kill Snap.
I didn't leave ready to drink the kool aid or thinking that everything was fixed. But it was nice to see that there are people at corporate that actually know how things really are and are at least trying to fix them. Also nice to see the brand performance guys actually coaching stuff that we could use and not trying to sell us something.
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