We were lucky to catch up with Greg McCoy recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Greg, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?
I sold my former facility in January of 2018. I promised myself a 1 year break until I would return to Gym Ownership. After a decade in business I wanted 1 year with no long term leases or loans and 1 year with no employees. 11 months into this time an opportunity to purchase a distressed facility in Allen, Tx, just 5 miles from my previous location in Plano, presented itself. I made many visits to the location as I considered the purchase. My wife and I went several times, and I took friends and advisors by as well. The area the facility was located was very good however the visibility within the shopping center was very poor. Driving into the parking lot it was hard to see and the only evidence of the gym was two glass double doors. From the parking lot you wouldn’t be surprised if upon entry it was a 1500 square foot gym. In reality it was a 17k square foot space that had a ton of potential! As we assessed all aspect of the business my wife and I got to work on brainstorming names and branding ideas. We both really enjoy branding and believe it is one of the most important aspects of any business. After one visit we described the facility as a hidden gem. Something special that know one really new about. Driving away from the facility we asked ourselves – would that be a good name? We could make it a play on words and call it Hidden “Gym” pronounced the same as Hidden “Gem”. We debated among ourselves if that was cool or cheesy. The more we talked about it the more we liked it, and determined that with the write branding and presentation we could make it a very cool brand! In that short conversation in the car with just my wife and I, the name was born! It is intriguing, naturally baiting the question: “Where is Hidden Gym?!” and creating fun moments for people who know where it is to brag that they’ve found the coolest spot, one of the best facilities in the state, but you have to find it first.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
My dream for Gym Ownership started in high school. I got into fitness and training at the age of 13 and had always looked up to role models like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, and Jean Claude Van Dam as a kid, and of course was drawn to the idea of being a real life super hero. I spent my youngest year in the kid’s center while my Mom did her workouts and my Dad lied about my age and signed me up at the local rec center before I was technically eligible for a gym membership. We knew nothing about training, but we would go consistently and try to figure our routines to get stronger and build muscle. I became obsessed with learning about training from that point. I was constantly reading books and magazine, creating elaborate workout schemes, and trying new things in the gym. That experimental phase lasted from 13 until probably 17 when I had gotten a nice pay check from being featured in a supplement ad for my transformation that I was able to hire a professional bodybuilder to train me. During that time I became equally as devoted to the dream of owning a gym. My Dad was a business owner and I had always had the mindset that I would work for myself in my career, just like him. He had several of his clients that were in the fitness industry and he used to arrange for me to spend time talking to them and working on plans. When I graduated high school I went to Oklahoma State University on an academic scholarship and I used my time there to plan my gym business for when I graduated. At OSU each spring I would train and compete in bodybuilding competitions and for any business class projects I would use them as an opportunity to sharpen my plans and test new ideas. I had always assumed I would need to begin as a personal trainer before I entered the business as an owner but in my 3rd year at OSU I came into an opportunity to open a gym. I loaded up my final semester with as many hours as I could, and signed up for summer school so that I could graduate early and pursue this dream. On January 1st of 2009, at the age of 22 I successfully opened my first gym!
Fast forward to 2022 and I’m on my 3rd brand and 4th location. Are main location is located in Allen, Tx and we just recently opened a corporate facility in the medical district of downtown Dallas. It took over 10 years to arrive at this point where my wife and I own our own brand, and have no partners outside of ourselves. This is significant because my two previous concepts hit road blocks for those two reasons. The first one was a licensed gym and we eventually needed to depart from that brand. The second gym was a home run but we entered into a partnership that was a bad decision on my part. I learned the hardest lessons of my career through that failed partnership.
Since 2009 our concept has evolved a ton. We started as a very niche facility, aiming to serve the most dedicated gym goers. It was a training dungeon more or less, with no climate control, loud music, and a very intense atmosphere. Our second facility broadened our reach much more but was still too tight of a niche. Now at Hidden Gym, we are still targeted enough that we aren’t a commodity gym like 24 Hour Fitness or LA Fitness, but we have a broad enough audience that we build a big enough member base to really thrive. There are many segments of the fitness industry. We have chosen to create a space for gym members who put fitness in their top 5 life priorities. These people are into several different disciplines within the industry, and many of them require special training environments. Take a member that is interested in Power lifting. To be good at power lifting there are many specialty training tools needed to be the best you can be. You also need an atmosphere where hard training isn’t frowned up my management. These type members usually end up in small specialty facilities or building garage gyms. We offer all the tools they need, the right environment and a huge array of other tools that make them a great fit in our gym. You can take that same example and use it for all kinds of different member segments. Cross Fit or Functional Fitness enthusiasts, Boxers and Fighters, Bodybuilders, Football Players, and many more. We’ve created a space that houses a wide variety of members who don’t feel at home at a big box gym. Add to that the welcoming and authentic culture and we are an attractive option for a wide group of people. While our target members may intimidate someone new to fitness, we are able to create an environment through culture and processes that makes even the newest gym goer feel welcome and encouraged.
We have also evolved by making personal training a key component to our business model. Working with members in the highest level of fitness has helped us attract the top talent and most knowledgeable people in the area. Through many years of hard work we have been able to harness that and create a process-driven Personal Training model that creates amazing results in our growing client base. Every single member that joins the gym is told that they would benefit from personal training and coaching. The highest level athletes in our gym all have coaches, and so there’s no level of fitness that walks in that we can’t benefit through coaching. Every single member is given the opportunity to do a baseline test through our state of the art 3D Body Scanner. This gives them a great starting point and a reference for their progress over time. In addition to the baseline test each member is given the opportunity for complimentary workout plans via our Hidden Gym Training App. The complimentary programs are designed by our certified professional trainers but are not customized to the member. This is an excellent gateway to personalized coaching. As members see the benefits of having well design training we open the door to discussing how much faster and sustainable we can create results if we can get them on a custom training and diet program.
Proving our brand, concept and operational expertise we have started in a new space: Designing and Managing Corporate Fitness Centers. As commercial real state companies our all trying to compete for the best tenants that industry has begun to really prioritize amenities. One of the most important amenities a building or campus can have is an exciting and well run fitness center. We got into the space simply by consulting on these projects. That has now evolved to us taking these types of fitness centers all the way from concept to reality. And in the case with our newest gym, Hidden Gym at Pegasus Park, we even leveraged the power of our brand to really ensure that if the property invested in the amenity that it would exciting and utilized by everyone on campus.
Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?
Hidden Gym is a community of people first and foremost. There is nothing more important than people. I always say, it’s our belief that a great gym is created by the people in it. Of course these are many aspect of a great gym: the right equipment, the layout, the music, the amenities, etc. But nothing is more important than people. This is great news for a facility like us because we would never be able to compete with the budgets of these global gym companies. Luckily for us the nicest and most amenity heavy concept doesn’t automatically win. What matters is creating results in people, giving them what they came for, and giving them a place they feel at home. Our culture and community starts with us as owners and our team. This is the core of the whole community and the most important piece. We spend a high percentage of our time coaching and building our team. A great team starts with trust, and we make sure that we are constantly working in a way that builds and enhances trust. A great team must also spend time together and share adversity together. We make sure we are working together on common goals and challenges.
We also invest in this growth and development. We make it a priority to bring in development coaches for all areas of our team’s growth. We host events, workshops, and coaching sessions from everything from sales training, to personal finance. Just like we hope to take on members on a journey of personal growth, we pride ourselves in being an employer that is dedicated to growing our people.
Can you talk to us about your experience with buying businesses?
Our first location of Hidden Gym was our first time to purchase a facility. In our past facilities we had started from scratch. There are definitely pros and cons to both paths, but we learned some very hard lessons on what it take to buy a business. In a new startup there are some key advantages: lease negotiation, permitting processes and funding opportunities being the two that went much smoother for us than in an acquisition scenario. In this acquisition we did an asset purchase. The business was not worth anything, but the assets were. Once we purchased the assets and took over the lease it was like jumping on a treadmill that was running full blast. The land lord did not offer any ramp up period since the lease was in the middle of it’s term. In a start up, you can generally negotiate for 1-6 months of abated rent as you ramp up the business. This allows for heavy spending on marketing and give you time to build the member base. Not having that opportunity made our first 6 months extremely expensive. To further add to our challenges the lead times for equipment was far beyond industry norm. The facility we purchased had a very little equipment and we needed to invest heavily in new machines. That was fine and all part of the plan. What wasn’t part of the plan was it taking over 6 months for it all to arrive. We were creating tons of demand, but the gym looked unfinished for nearly 6 months and really slowed down what we would’ve been able to do with new sales had we been fully equipped sooner. We also learned some hard lessons in obtaining financing for a distressed business. Despite our years of proven success and this being an asset purchase all of the lenders we talked to still wanted to review the financial performance of the previous owners. Seeing the gravity of their losses made them all nervous. To make matters worse my wife and I were both taking a 1 year period of downtime after spending 10 years growing our previous facilities. We were both doing some side projects for fun and for some income but not having a stable income at the time we were looking for funding was another red flag for lenders that we couldn’t work around. In the end we had to 100% self finance. Which was very risky and unsettling.
Another big lesson learned was that I was not diligent enough in assessing the facility for being up to code. I wrongly assumed since they had been operating for several years that obtaining new permits from the city would be easy. I couldn’t have been more wrong. There was tons of unpermitted work that had been done since the original permits were obtained and every inspector we invited into the gym gave us long and expensive lists about what it would take to pass permits .There was an even a point about 3 months into taking over the gym that the city had decided to shut us down until we got several of these issues corrected. Thankfully through many trips to our city council meetings and working closely with the planning and zoning department we were able to keep our doors open and work through these challenges without a temporary closure. Had that happened, I don’t think I would be hear to tell a success story today.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.hiddengym.net
- Instagram: instagram.com/hidden_gym
- Facebook: facebook.com/hiddengymtx
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/26204179
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/hiddengym09
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzBWIXjGxdXoMZboqDFzuow
Image Credits
Images Provided By: Mike Lam Photography