Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Angie Vogel. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Angie, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Do you think folks should manage their own social media or hire a professional? What do you do?

Here at The Jiu Jitsu company, I manage all of our socials. It certainly adds to my day to day work load, but I do feel it’s important to share our own specific point of view.

When you have a vision that’s different from what others in your field offer, it’s crucial to have that come across in the most organic way possible. Describing your vision to someone, and then having them interpret that vision, there’s a lot that can be lost in translation.

We strive to live up to everything that we share. Culture, organized instruction, cleanliness and fun are all core focuses on socials, but more importantly our main focus in day to day operations.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My husband and I own and operate a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Academy in Old City, Philadelphia. Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) is a combat sport, with techniques applicable to self defense, mma, sport Jiu Jitsu, and of course, health and wellness.

Our differentiators in the fitness, specifically BJJ, industry are our core values:

CULTURE FORWARD: a direct correlation between a constructive and communicative culture and team performance.

ACCESSIBILITY: Clear and organized instruction for reachable goals. Approachable leadership.

INCLUSION: Jiu Jitsu is for everybody.

How we maintain those standards is by setting the best example we can, and making sure the decisions we make all fortify those goals. This includes who we hire, and even who we funnel our marketing to. Not everyone will be a customer for us, and that’s ok!

After 3 plus years open, I feel at this point we can genuinely say we’ve developed standards that allow us to set ourselves apart from others in our field. We are proud of the fact that we have above industry standard retention, and our student have shown real results, and most importantly can see the improvements for themselves.

We want a space where our members can learn, reach fitness goals, or simply just enjoy the social aspects of training Jiu Jitsu, hence our motto: Good Training in Good Company.

How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.

Our merchandise brand started with just two logo t shirts we sold in our gym. We had some previous experience in E-Commerce, having had some small success with novelty gift items in the same BJJ space. The issue with novelty items, in our case BJJ candles with “punny” labels, is the revenue is sporadic, and repeat buys are hard to come by. We definitely learned a lot about marketing and selling online with that small business, so I’m grateful for the experience.

We slowly expanded the in-store options at the gym to include more t shirts, sweatshirts, water bottles etc. adopting a different sales model by creating different designs in the hopes of selling multiple designs to individual members. Previously the industry norm would be buying one item in bulk, for the best per item cost, but then only selling one to each member. What I have found, is that over time, having multiple designs and items that appeal to your members can create a decent revenue stream on its own.

The popularity of the merchandise slowly increased, mainly through social media, I began to receive messages asking to ship particular items all over the US. So initially expanded the Academy’s website to include our merchandise, via our wix platform, and using drop shipping companies like printful, so I wouldn’t have to hold inventory in large amounts. The upside is generally low effort revenue. The downsides are no quality control, limited inventory, and limited SEO for the merchandise aspects, given the attachment to the academy.

Recently we have had a great opportunity to have a very popular athlete in our field wear one of our designs on her social media. Obviously the design became popular and we were able to come to an agreement with the athlete to help promote the item. This really helped with brand recognition outside of the academy items, and truly gave me the confidence to pursue the merchandising outside of just school specific items, and expanding into more designs and products.

We are now in the process of building the brand into a larger online sales platform. We will be offering BJJ uniforms, athleisure, and novelty items. We also recently secured some commission work for one of the top BJJ resellers. I’m very much looking forward to what next year brings for the brand!

Alright – let’s talk about marketing or sales – do you have any fun stories about a risk you’ve taken or something else exciting on the sales and marketing side?

When we first opened our school, the only “marketing strategy” we knew was to sell BJJ as a street self defense/women’s self defense martial art. While it’s true that Jiu Jitsu does have some application there in certain scenarios, it just wasn’t the kind of Jiu Jitsu we were interested in teaching. Additionally these were the classes that were the emptiest during the week.

We were nervous at first to pull them completely from the schedule and change our marketing strategy. While the marketing has grown, we still fundamentally “sell” the academy as fun fitness, with an emphasis on the cerebral side of learning the art, and the community in which you learn it.

We find that while this still attracts a niche audience, we get the right people who are interested in not only self defense, but also the sport aspects, the problem solving, and the social interaction that Jiu Jitsu offers.

We also expanded the offerings to include many different activities that benefit Jiu Jitsu, but also add additional value to our memberships like weight lifting and yoga.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.jiujitsuphilly.com www.jiujitsumerch.com
• Instagram: @thejiujitsucompany @thejiujitsucofightwear

Image Credits

TSimPhotography