We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful AUSTYN AFFRONTI. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with AUSTYN below.
AUSTYN, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?
Here are my top 5 keys to success:
Become spiritually fit and give everything to a higher source, whatever that may look like for you. For me, it’s God. The closer you draw to something bigger than you, the more you learn about yourself, the more you start trusting your own intuition and the more you will lead with integrity, love, and Grace.
Surround yourself with the right people, both in and outside of work. The company you keep should reflect your standards. Always look for opportunities to surround yourself with people that force you to raise them. Having the right people on your team should add value to your business, your customers and you.
Believe in yourself – confidence is key. And if you don’t, fake it until you make it! Constantly tell yourself that you’re going to succeed. As an entrepreneur, you have to be willing to bet on yourself, to risk it al. This may require you to go against the advice of those closest to you because they may understand your vision or have the same mindset, drive, or ambition. Don’t compare yourself to others and instead, compare yourself to where you were last month, last year, two years ago. If you are not evolving, take a step back and figure out what adjustments need to be made.
Use adversity and failure as opportunities for growth. As opportunities to strengthen your mind, learn from past mistakes and evolve. When situations or circumstances arise that bring adversity, pain, discomfort, stress, anxiety, etc. learn to fully sit in those emotions as part of the process. Once you’ve allowed yourself time to digest what’s happening, focus on an outcome based solution.
Take ownership and accountability for everything in your life that you can control and make the necessary changes instead of blaming outside circumstances (people, places and things).
AUSTYN, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is Austyn Affronti and I’m the founder and CEO of Affronti Fitness, a personal training studio in Rochester, NY.
Never in a million years did I think I’d ever become a personal trainer, let alone own a studio. Despite growing up in an athletically gifted family, I unfortunately was not blessed with the same abilities. I was the typical insecure uncoordinated skinny kid, who couldn’t run fast or catch and throw to save my life. I have ADHD and was always getting into trouble. When I was 14, I started lifting weights with my friends in their garage. We would all do the exact same workouts with the exact same weights, yet their bodies would change and mine would remain the same. I used to get so frustrated because I was putting in the work yet not seeing results. I eventually gave up and bought into the idea that maybe I wasn’t meant to have a muscular body and to just accept myself the way I am. Another year would pass, I would give it another try and to no surprise, the same thing would happen all over again and I’d end up quitting. This cycle continued to happen every year for the next 6 years. It was one random day that I was sitting in my kitchen looking at a magazine when I had a sudden lightbulb moment. On the magazine cover was a shirtless guy in his late 20s who had the exact body I’ve always wanted. I took one hard look and I said, enough is enough! He’s a man, I’m a man. He has 24 hours in a day, I have 24 hours in a day. I told myself that if he’s capable of achieving these results, then so am I. At that moment, I decided that I was going to give this fitness thing one last try, except this time was going to be different. I was going to go all in. Not only was I going to work out, I was also going to study the science behind exercise and learn about nutrition. I told myself that if I gave this absolutely everything I had and still failed, then all of my excuses were justified. But if I succeed then I’d finally have the body I dreamed of having my entire life.
I learned early on in the process how difficult this journey was going to be because it forced me to completely change my lifestyle. Back then with zero ambition or drive, I was a heavy partier and drank alcohol 4-5 nights per week. This suddenly turned into spending 2 hours at the gym each day and following a regimented nutrition plan. Thinking I could still maintain a social life during this transition, I began showing up to parties with protein shakes instead of a 12-pack. My friends would mock me and try to get me to swap out my protein shakes for a beer but I didn’t let that bother me because I knew they didn’t understand what I was doing. I had to stay focused and keep pushing toward my goals, which wasn’t easy. As a 20 year-old, there were times I felt like I was wasting my prime years sitting in my house watching fitness videos and drinking chicken and broccoli out of a blender because I was so sick of eating it, while everyone else was out partying. During these moments when I felt like calling it quits I watched fitness videos of my idol at the time, Greg Plitt, because they reminded me of what I was doing, why I started this journey, and why I had to follow through.
8 months into my program, I decided to take a progress picture. After looking at it, I became extremely frustrated because I felt like I made no progress since starting this program. Soon after, I laid down in my bed feeling defeated and began scrolling through my phone when I came across a picture of me from right before I started my program. I uploaded the pictures side by side and I was in complete shock! Considering the fact that I look at myself every day, I didn’t notice the changes that were happening. Comparing the side-by-side pictures was visual proof that I did in fact reach my goal! It was such an eye-opener for me and completely changed my mindset going forward. Most importantly, it changed my life. Something that I made excuses for over the last 6 years, I was able to accomplish in just 8 months by staying dedicated, ignoring the naysayers, and doing my due diligence by researching the proper way to get in shape. I learned that the reason I wasn’t progressing before was because my body type was so much different than my friends. I have a very fast metabolism so I was burning off all the calories I was eating, instead of building muscle.
Shortly after, I was in between jobs and struggling to figure out what I wanted to do with my life in the long term. My old boxing coach reached out to me and asked if I wanted to start a group boxing class together. I loved that idea since I had taken a class before and after crunching the numbers, I realized that it was a pretty lucrative business. I told my coach that I was going to get my personal training certification and train a few people in order to save some money and then we could start the boxing program together. Upon getting my certification, I wanted to get in a little bit better shape before making the announcement that I was taking on new clients. As a trainer, I felt my body should be my resume. It only made sense that I earn my results before having people pay me to help them earn theirs. So that’s what I did and started my own personal training business, Affronti Fitness.
To be completely transparent, when I started my business I was broke and living on my own with no income streams. I had zero experience in personal training, marketing, selling fitness packages, or running a business. I took a leap of faith because I believed in myself. I started with one client and had to drive 25 minutes out to her gym to train her for $20.00. I trained her two times per week which gave me a $40.00 paycheck. From there, I slowly started building my clientele by being persistent and taking advantage of every opportunity, no matter how big or small. I trained people at their houses, at my local gym, drove to other gyms that were in different towns, hosted Lunch & Learns at local businesses, and even went door to door to hand out brochures. I also held bootcamp classes at the park and set up equipment for a large group only to have one or two people show up. I taught the class with a friend of mine, so we had to split the money 50/50. Some days we would only leave there with $5 each. $5 is about what it cost me in gas to get there, I never gave up.
In 2014 I was given the opportunity to run my personal training business at a brand new studio that was still under construction. Given that this new space was in a different town than where I currently operated, I was at risk of losing 50% of my clientele. Moving to this new space also meant no existing clients, no established reputation on top of the amount rent I had to pay as a subcontractor was going to quadruple. My close friends and family members urged me to stay where I was because it was the safer option. But deep down I felt that if I didn’t grab ahold of this opportunity I would never truly know what I was capable of. The owner of the new studio happened to be my mentor and I knew that if I put myself in a position where I would be around him on a daily basis, it would force me to raise my personal standards. Ultimately, I decided to take the risk and make the move in March, 2014 and I have been stationed there since.
When I started training clients in this new space, I was making what I thought was a significant amount of money, much more than I was used to, which caused me to become complacent. Working for 4-5 hours a day, training the clients I had but doing nothing extra to grow my business. I soon realized that the owner of the gym, who was working side by side with me, was making 4x’s what I was making. I made every excuse and justification as to why he was doing so well and I wasn’t. He was older than me, his friends made more money than mine, his network was larger, he owned the gym, and so forth. I would constantly ask for his advice, but wouldn’t apply what he told me. Finally one day, I had another lightbulb moment and realized that I simply wasn’t working hard enough to achieve my goals. So I changed everything. I started investing more into building my brand like creating a website, designing apparel, creating a Facebook business page, and paid advertising. 6 months later, I secured 30 clients and put in 50+ of training hours per week. This was significant because most independent trainers in Rochester train an average 20 hours per week on a consistent basis as the industry is extremely competitive.
In 2015, I was given the opportunity to take over this gym which to me was another huge risk, especially with the added overhead and no additional income to start. Once again, I was urged by friends and family that it was too much of a risk considering I had no prior experience owning a gym or managing a staff. I also had no capital or investors to lean on. Against everyone’s advice, I went through with the deal and took over the lease. I wanted to take control of my destiny as opposed to putting it in the hands of someone else. I turned the gym into Affronti Fitness, which came with an ever bigger vision that ecompasses everything I’ve learned along my own personal journey. Since I had success in building my own personal training clientele, now it was time to see if I could help others achieve the same level of success.
More than 10 years later, Affronti Fitness has evolved into one of the highest-rated Personal Training studios in the Rochester area and continues to be a leader in the fitness community. We currently have over 100+ 5-star reviews and hundreds of transformations. What sets us apart from other personal training studios is our approach. For the most part, a personal trainer’s primary focus is centered on the exercises and training program performed inside the gym. At Affronti Fitness, our philosophy is founded on the four elements of a healthy lifestyle both in and out of the gym and involves making small, sustainable changes to the way you Think, Move, Eat and Connect. We don’t aim for perfection, or an overnight weight loss transformation, but for gradual, sustainable change that leads to the health and fitness lifestyle that everyone richly deserves.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
When I think about my career as a personal trainer, one of the biggest lessons I had to unlearn was believing that success meant putting a client’s goal above their journey when it’s actually the journey that should always be at the forefront of their experience with a personal trainer. Oftentimes, a client will come in with unrealistic expectations and goals, prior to entering into a contract with you.Your initial response is to jump right into a program with those goals in mind as you want to earn the clients’ business. I learned the hard way that if you jump right in without first helping them identify their true needs, level-setting their expectations and being transparent about the level of commitment needed to achieve them, you’re actually setting yourself and the client up for failure.
About 7 years ago I began training a 49-year-old gentleman whose goal was to lose 20 pounds. He wanted to lean out for a more aesthetic physique and used me and my body composition as an example of what he wanted to achieve as the end result. Knowing the level of training it took for me to get there, I began training him the exact same way that I trained even though it was at a much higher intensity level than he was used to. In order to target his goals, I incorporated heavier weights and increased the volume of his workouts.
After a few challenging sessions, he mentioned that I might be pushing him a little too hard. At that time, it was early into my personal training career – I was young, arrogant, and thought he was just making excuses. Ultimately, I ignored his request to scale back the workouts and firmly explained to him that this is what it was going to take if he wants to achieve his goals. About a month later, a friend of mine reached out to let me know that my client was not happy with the way I was training him and was in the process of looking for a new trainer. I was shocked, to say the least. Although he had mentioned on a few occasions that I was pushing him too hard, he didn’t seem to make a big deal out of it so I simply brushed it off. We had great conversations during each training session so I assumed everything was going well. Little did I know, he told his cleaning lady who just so happened to be my friend’s cleaning lady, that he was looking for a new trainer because I was training him like a 25-year-old bodybuilder. After hearing these words, I was extremely disappointed in myself. Not only was it a blow to my ego but also my confidence as a personal trainer. When I first started this career, I genuinely wanted to help people. Fitness has had such a positive impact on so many aspects of my life and I wanted to be able to share that with as many people as I could. But with this particular client, I wasn’t helping him at all by ignoring his needs. I had complete tunnel vision. In my mind, I thought that I was doing the right thing. If he wanted to look like me then he had to train exactly the way I did. These are the sacrifices that need to be made.
This was definitely an eye-opening moment for me and completely changed the way I approached the client experience going forward. After getting down on myself, I took this situation as an invitation to take a step back and reevaluate my processes and get some perspective. I soon realized that these are paying customers and regardless of what their goals are, it’s my job as a trainer to provide them with the knowledge and transparency necessary to help them navigate and identify a fitness journey that is aligned with the level of commitment they were willing to put in. This has since been built into our initial consultation and is required for all new clients. As much as I kick myself for the way I handled the situation, it’s inspired me to continue furthering my education surrounding health, fitness and personal development which is also mandatory for the trainers that I employ so that we can better serve our clients to their fullest potential.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Like many small business owners, I’d have to say my resilience was tested during the ongoing pandemic but I’d go back even further when I decided to completely change my business model, not knowing a pandemic was in the foreseeable future. At this point, my business had been operating for 6 years and I was still struggling financially. I knew I needed to get creative and explore new ways to generate more revenue to keep my business operating. Most private training studios use a traditional business model where they engage subcontractors to train at their facility and pay rent. This is the most common way for studios to make money with the least amount of effort and risk. After many years of operating this way, I decided to take a chance in the opposite direction and only have W2 employees working at my facility because ultimately, this was the only way I could turn a profit to be able to invest back into the gym and achieve financial freedom in the future. Once I transitioned into this model, I quickly learned that managing employees brought a whole new set of responsibilities and challenges that I wasn’t necessarily prepared for.
One major obstacle that I didn’t anticipate was how this new way of operating was actually setting me up for failure. I would spend upwards of 6-8 months training employees one on one, teaching them the ins and outs of the personal training business, and providing them with a full roster of clients that I personally secured from all of my extensive marketing efforts. Only then for them to take the full client base I built for them, and train them at another facility as a subcontractor so they could keep 100% of the profit. Every time my gym was on the verge of turning a profit an employee would quit and take 15 clients with them resulting in a $7k monthly loss for me. Then I would have to start over again with the hiring process and months of training only to have another employee leave. This cycle repeated itself about a dozen times, I knew I had to do something different.
When the pandemic hit, this business model created even more financial challenges. I personally took a paycut so that my employees wouldn’t be financially impacted. I paid them their regular rates and had them train virtually while reducing monthly membership costs for all clients. I also had my hands tied with one of my employees who I’ve had multiple ongoing issues with but couldn’t afford to terminate while trying to operate a business in the middle of a pandemic. Against my better judgment, I continued to pay this employee weekly for training clients virtually while the gym was shut down, even though I knew he wasn’t working at all. I had learned that he spent a few days creating a 6 week plan and then sent it out to his clients to follow instead of spending 2 hours one on one each week with them. Since his clients weren’t complaining, I didn’t say anything and still paid him because I wanted to keep the peace, especially during such a trying time for all of us. At this point, employee turnover, loss of clients and reduced membership costs ultimately resulted in a 50% decrease in revenue month over month.
When we were finally able to reopen our doors I was so excited because I was finally going to be able to breathe some life back into my business. However, my employee asked to meet with me and during this meeting he let me know that he appreciates everything I’ve done for him but wants to try and succeed on his own. It’s always difficult being down one team member but I support anyone who wants to make it on their own. But to my dismay, during quarantine while I was paying him for essentially not working, he engaged and solicited all the clients that I secured for him to end their contracts with Affronti Fitness and train with him at a facility down the street by offering a discounted rate. He basically used the paid time off to negotiate a deal with another gym as a subcontractor and make deals with all of my clients so he could reap the profits. This drained the revenue I had left by 75% as he had the biggest client list in the gym. My business went from making over $18,000 per month pre-covid, down to $3,000 per month the day we opened back up.
This was a major learning moment and turning point for me as a manager and as a business owner. Going forward I became more selective during the interview process, revamped onboarding and training, and addressed problematic employees in real time. Most importantly, I invested more in building relationships with my staff to foster a high performing but fun workplace culture. I currently have all new employees working for me with little to no retention issues. Our client base has grown so much that we’re about to create a waiting list for new members. The atmosphere in the gym is better than it’s ever been and I have a team of dedicated employees that believe in my new vision for Affronti Fitness. We are reaching levels of success beyond what I ever imagined.
Contact Info:
- Website: affrontifitness.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/affronti_fitness
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AFFRONTIFIT
- Youtube: YouTube.com/affrontifitness
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/affronti-fitness-rochester