Pool and Gym Membership: Cheaper Now Or In New Year?

whassupp2

Im getting membership but im just wondering should i wait until the new year?

under normal circumstances i think it would be cheaper now as prices have tended to increase year on year.

however, mr. recession might change the minds of the pool and gym people.

what do ye think?

thanks

Fatloss08

im waiting till jan myself

gym membership is €350

gonna offer €275 in jan see what happens

golfpaul

I would have thought the New Year is the worst time for membership prices as that is the time when there is a surge of people joining for new year resolutions etc. So on this logic why would they drop prices when they will have a steady influx of clients. Actually I do recall seeing membership specials around mid terms.

BossArky

Ring the gym and ask them if they offer corporate rates for company x. If they do.. then turn up the next day and say that you work for company x and are here to join up and claim your corporate discount, usually something like 10-25%.

They will more than likely not ask you for company id or any sort of proof.

I will leave it to your imagination to figure out which company you insert as company x. This will also work for car rental and various other bits and pieces.

Cpaw

Fatloss08 wrote: »

im waiting till jan myself

gym membership is €350

gonna offer €275 in jan see what happens

You can't just make an offer, It's not a market stall for fook sake, It's a fixed rate. If you do that then you should be asked ro leave, a scrounger like you :rolleyes:

Generally if people are losing their jobs with this recession then how are they going to afford gym memberships? Gyms may consider a price drop in 2009, I would say.

Gillo

I'd either the price to drop or a decent introductory in the new year, since a lot of people will be looking at joining the gym surely it'd be in various gyms interest to compete against each other.

And all going well people will use the sticky and not flood the forum with "Will you hold my hand as we join the gym" threads.

flogen

It seems to me that Ben Dunne's gyms have their best offers in January.

Yes that's when demand for gyms is at its highest but it's also the only reliable time of year for gyms to make good money and they don't want to blow it by being too expensive.

I assume that just like any industry gyms make better long-term returns on low price and high volume than high price and low volume - €300 fee might give a big margin on a single sale but you'll only get half as many interested as a €200 fee would, so the €200 is the more profitable overall.

And for many gyms the up-front membership is just the start of the revenue stream. Getting customers in the door can mean income from vending, supplements, classes, personal trainers etc. depending on their business model.

It also increases you potential for word-of-mouth sales... if 10% of your membership manages to talk a friend into joining you're better off having 1000 members rather than 500 etc.

Long story short, gym management would be idiots to jack up their prices in January because the customer won't wait for it to go back down before they join, they'll just go somewhere else and the gym will have lost them for the year (or even lifetime).

(edit - sorry for the waffle - just my assumption on the matter!)