Anon Privates - Gym’s cut

[Anonymous Post]

I recently learned that when coaches at our gym do a private, they only get 50% of the total cost. For example, if they do an hour private and the parent pays $60 then $30 goes to the coach and the gym keeps the other $30. I understand the gym is providing the coach with the necessary space and equipment, but 50% seems steep to me. This made me wonder how other gyms handle this issue. (I should add our gym is run as a non-profit organization.)

 

[Anonymous Post]

50% does seem like a lot for the gym to take... but $30 is still probably more than the coach would make in a typical hour of coaching.

 

[JBS]

We no longer allow private lessons as the negatives far outweighed the positives for our gym.

 

[Coach Kate]

That's a lot! For an hour private, it costs $60 and the gym takes $5 so $55 goes to the coach.

At the other gym I worked at, each coach could set whatever rate they wanted and the gym would take $10.

 

[JBS]

I guess I didn't really answer that. The last time we were doing privates was 2019. A one hour private lesson was $60. Coaches pay was determined by the level they were in our employment system. Depending on that level the coach would get anywhere from $30 to all $60.

The customers did not pay different prices for different coaches.

 

[Aussie_coach]

50% to the coach seems very fair to me.

We charge $110 per hour for privates, the majority goes to the gym, the coach who coaches the private will get their usual hourly rate, the same as they would for coaching group lessons.

The gym is generally doing a lot more than just providing the space. But as it is the space itself is VERY expensive. Gyms need to be in very large buildings, with very high ceilings, great location, lots of parking the cost of rent is very high. If the gym was to hire the venue out to an outside
person it would cost a lot more than the cost of the lesson.

The equipment is also incredibly expensive and needs constant upkeep. There are so many other facility costs too such as cleaning, electricity, rates etc. All of which would be included in a usual hire fee.

The gym is also providing the insurance, and taking the risks if something was to happen.

The cost of running privates will be high for a gym too, there is a great deal more profit in running group classes. Having a private means space in the gym and staff who could be on group classes are otherwise engaged and the gym can not run lessons at the same time.

The gym is also usually the one to arrange and schedule and privates, advertise for the students, build the programs that keep them in the gym year in, year out etc.

 

[JPC13]

We no longer allow private lessons as the negatives far outweighed the positives for our gym.

I think that makes sense. If you're doing 20-30+ hours of practice you should be able to get people where they need to go without needing more time, and if you do need more time you should just add more practice time. I'd be interested in hearing what negatives you've experienced as a coach/owner.

As a parent, I've seen many:
- kids who do privates with a particular coach clearly getting better/more coaching by that coach during team practice
- kids doing privates to get skills marginally sooner than the team being treated (and acting) like they're much more talented than kids who got the skill a week later without privates
- kids who do privates getting moved up with marginal skills under the premise that the skills will improve through future privates, when kids who don't do privates with similar skills get held back
- parents keeping track of how many privates other parents are paying for and then doing more to show their "commitment."
- coaches who bask in the glow of parents fighting to get their kid a private with that coach

I don't think privates are inherently bad, and my daughter has definitely done a bunch. However, I think they have a lot of scope to poison the vibe of a gym if you're not careful.

The idea of privates as a signal of commitment to gymnastics or as a backdoor to fast tracking seems to be where the problems lie.

 

[JBS]

I'd be interested in hearing what negatives you've experienced as a coach/owner.

I was hoping someone would ask this... I'll type up some of what we saw later when I have some time.

 

[JBS]

I'd be interested in hearing what negatives you've experienced as a coach/owner.

This is just in my opinion... and a disclaimer that my wife and I paid for our entire wedding with money from private lessons.

When reading the below two items #2 had nothing to do with us cancelling privates at our gym. #1 was 100% responsible for us cancelling privates (coaches working too much and getting burnt out). In hindsight... #2 was a much bigger issue than we though and we couldn't see it until after privates were gone. #2 was creating it's own form of pressure and it was hitting all of our groups (managers... coaches... parents... athletes).

1. Coaching should be treated like a real career... this means coaches should be paid well and not be working 7 days per week. Some coaches already work many days in a row during meet season. Many times the hardest working coaches end up working 7 days per week to provide very unnecessary private lessons to make an extra buck.
2. Private lessons create a toxic and dramatic culture. We saw this in both the workplace and competitive team environments. We dealt with issues in the following ways...
   • coaches vs. managers
     • I can't work...but I can come in to do privates
     • Issues with the minimum of 2 coaches in the gym at all times rule
   • coaches vs. coaches
     • camp coaching vs. progressive coaching*** (this is a big one... see below)
     • that's my kid... you're coaching them wrong
     • coaches telling parents that other coaches are less experienced
     • coaches competing over who can make the most in a week
   • parents vs. parents
     • rumors that "privates are required if you want to be any good"
   • parents vs. athletes
     • expectation vs. actual talent mismatches between parents and their kids
   • athletes vs. athletes
     • Issues that migrated from the "parents vs. parents" and "parents vs athletes" sections above... basically kids repeating things that their parents were saying to them or that they had overheard their parents talking about
   • coaches vs. parents
     • Not really any issues here

***Camp Coaching = At most gymnastics camps you are instructed to make sure the athletes leave happy and knowing what they learned so they will register for camp again in the future. Make sure you cover exactly what they learned on pick up day so they will run out to their parents and tell them everything they learned at camp. This is just a marketing tactic and it works very well... even with basically no real progress.

***Progressive Coaching = Doing what is best for the athlete in the long run to provide slow and steady progress. Sometimes this includes telling the parent that there is no real purpose for private lessons at the current time.

 

[JBS]

The solution that we used was the following... and this is real...

1. Raised prices aggressively
2. Raised wages aggressively
3. Lowered class ratios & increased team coaches
4. Provided full-time salaried bonus system (managers)
5. Raised prices
6. Raised wages
7. Raised prices
8. Raised low end starting wages aggressively

Planned steps...

1. Raise prices
2. Raise high end wages aggressively

By paying our coaches more... they are less burnt out and they get more done with the kids in the regular workouts. The coaches have time to have fun outside of work instead of doing private lessons all weekend long.

 

[Anonymous Post]

This is just in my opinion... and a disclaimer that my wife and I paid for our entire wedding with money from private lessons.

When reading the below two items #2 had nothing to do with us cancelling privates at our gym. #1 was 100% responsible for us cancelling privates (coaches working too much and getting burnt out). In hindsight... #2 was a much bigger issue than we though and we couldn't see it until after privates were gone. #2 was creating it's own form of pressure and it was hitting all of our groups (managers... coaches... parents... athletes).

1. Coaching should be treated like a real career... this means coaches should be paid well and not be working 7 days per week. Some coaches already work many days in a row during meet season. Many times the hardest working coaches end up working 7 days per week to provide very unnecessary private lessons to make an extra buck.
2. Private lessons create a toxic and dramatic culture. We saw this in both the workplace and competitive team environments. We dealt with issues in the following ways...
   • coaches vs. managers
     • I can't work...but I can come in to do privates
     • Issues with the minimum of 2 coaches in the gym at all times rule
   • coaches vs. coaches
     • camp coaching vs. progressive coaching*** (this is a big one... see below)
     • that's my kid... you're coaching them wrong
     • coaches telling parents that other coaches are less experienced
     • coaches competing over who can make the most in a week
   • parents vs. parents
     • rumors that "privates are required if you want to be any good"
   • parents vs. athletes
     • expectation vs. actual talent mismatches between parents and their kids
   • athletes vs. athletes
     • Issues that migrated from the "parents vs. parents" and "parents vs athletes" sections above... basically kids repeating things that their parents were saying to them or that they had overheard their parents talking about
   • coaches vs. parents
     • Not really any issues here

***Camp Coaching = At most gymnastics camps you are instructed to make sure the athletes leave happy and knowing what they learned so they will register for camp again in the future. Make sure you cover exactly what they learned on pick up day so they will run out to their parents and tell them everything they learned at camp. This is just a marketing tactic and it works very well... even with basically no real progress.

***Progressive Coaching = Doing what is best for the athlete in the long run to provide slow and steady progress. Sometimes this includes telling the parent that there is no real purpose for private lessons at the current time.

Good stuff. Very interesting to see the negatives from the coaching side after observing so many on the parenting side.

Additionally, I do think coaching should be treated, and compensated as, a “real career.” It’s a very specialized skill set that interacts heavily with children. Parents shouldn’t want people doing that to either check out because it sucks, or leave the profession to unskilled teenagers.

 

[JPC13]

Good stuff. Very interesting to see the negatives from the coaching side after observing so many on the parenting side.

Additionally, I do think coaching should be treated, and compensated as, a “real career.” It’s a very specialized skill set that interacts heavily with children. Parents shouldn’t want people doing that to either check out because it sucks, or leave the profession to unskilled teenagers.

That was me BTW…

 

[Anonymous Post]

Our last gym did privates and some of the issues brought up here definetly came up:

1) privates to look more committed
2) privates to get your kid in good with the coach, especially compulsory kids doing privates with optional coaches so when they hit optionals, they’re a favorite because the coaches know them already
3) privates to get marginally ahead

It was a weird competitive environment with people who had standing weekly privates. One girls mom booked 3 privates a week to try to get her to get her Kip until the coach was like listen, the extra money is great for me but this is terrible for your kid, we’re making it worst not better.

Our current gym doesn’t generally do privates specifically because of the animosity it created. We do have “clinics” where 3 kids can come in to work on one event with one coach for 1.5 hours, first come first serve. Our location doesn’t do them much. My daughter did do one private for beam, not to learn anything new but to basically have time alone with the beam where she wasn’t stressing that she was holding up the whole group. When privates happen, they wanna keep it on the DL because parents get real crazy about it

 

[Anonymous Post]

It was a weird competitive environment with people who had standing weekly privates. One girls mom booked 3 privates a week to try to get her to get her Kip until the coach was like listen, the extra money is great for me but this is terrible for your kid, we’re making it worst not better.

One particularly egregious person at our last gym had her kid do three privates in a weekend to get her kip. When that didn't work out, they did a million more privates, and eventually blamed the coach for not "explaining it right." After that the kid got sent to IGC for two weeks and the girl came back able to get above the bar on probably 1/10 attempts and never did so with good form.

That girl was the clear favorite on the team (demonstrated everything, most hands on coaching, always in every picture, etc.) and had been dubbed a future "star."

Our current gym doesn’t generally do privates specifically because of the animosity it created. We do have “clinics” where 3 kids can come in to work on one event with one coach for 1.5 hours, first come first serve.

After leaving the aforementioned gym, our new one operates pretty much like this but the clinics seem to be for remediation of weak skills (e.g., a kid who had a decent BHS but lost it and isn't getting it back from regular team practice). Up training takes place via additional fast track practices (some are doing TOPS, others HOPES, others just pushing to get stronger or skip levels) which seem to be open to anyone with suitable focus and willingness to do hard conditioning.

That seems a much more healthy setup, but honestly the team practices are so much better coached and staffed that there's almost no need to do privates at all. Going forward I'm going to be extremely leery of any gym that has a culture of needing to do privates in order to do high level gymnastics. I think it's a sign of other structural issues.

 

[Anonymous Post]

So, when my daughter was young and in compulsories, she did a private once per week when the coach was available. I did that for several reasons. 1. she had a huge fear of backwards tumbling and her regular coaches could not deal with that issue during practice, 2. The coach charged me $30 per hour, 3. He was a different coach than her regular coach and was simply the best with dealing with fear issues, 4. we were at a low hour gym I think at level 4-5 maybe 10 - 12 hours per week? so I figured an extra hour was worth it, 5. He did not drill her endlessly on going backwards he worked on a lot of different things that she liked and then the last 10 minutes or so would spot her doing backwards tumbling and that helped build her confidence. After she got to level 7-8 or so we stopped since she increased her hours and she had figured out a backwards pass she could do. Now she does Adult Gymnastics class with that coach, and several others adult gymnasts and they are all good friends. I realize this is a very different situation than most gyms have, but it worked out for my daughter.

 

[Anonymous Post]

There's a level 9 at our gym who does three privates a week year-round, including missing school to do a private. Her parents will pay any amount of money to try and get her to the top.