Consumers today want their fitness shaped around them – from the pedals up. Optimising your timetable to meet your customer needs can have a profound effect – reinvigorating your offer and giving you the competitive edge.

1. Give people more of what they want

Ensure your timetable provides opportunities for members to participate in a mix of the three main cycling experiences:

• Fitness – for people who want to build basic fitness, or anyone seeking a solid low impact cardio workout one to three times a week • Performance – for those seeking high intensity, shorter workouts that provide great results in a short time

• Exertainment – for those (usually young) people looking for a different type of experience.

The perfect mix for your club will depend on your demographic. For a younger membership, upweight your performance and exertainment classes.

2. Add shorter classes Double capacity at peak times by running 30-minute high intensity classes. These can be a real drawcard for millennials (18 to 34 years old).

3. Schedule for your customers – and use virtual workouts

Customers expect immediate satisfaction and want your schedule to adapt to theirs, not the opposite. Research shows that “convenient schedule times” are a major driver of group fitness attendance globally, and a primary reason for the success of boutique clubs.

On a typical day at a SoulCycle studio, members can choose between five classes before 10.30am. Clubs like this offer 80-100 cycling classes every week.

To compete with that frequency (and not drive up your instructor costs), consider using live workouts with virtual classes in off-peak slots.

Schedule virtual classes as often as you can to maximise studio use. The benchmark for excellence in a multi-activity club is 40 live and 40 virtual cycling workouts.

For these and more insights on how to maximise your cycle studio book your free space at a Les Mills Insight Series Seminar - Indoor Cycling: The Missed Opportunity today or for more information contact: [email protected]

References 1. IHRSA, CLUB INTEL REPORT 2015