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I've been a gym rat for almost 20 years now, and I'm probably the worst customer for gyms. I only workout at 24*7 gyms and being an early bird I get there at 43

by nelblu 3y ago

I've been a gym rat for almost 20 years now, and I'm probably the worst customer for gyms. I only workout at 24*7 gyms and being an early bird I get there at 430 and I have pretty much the whole gym for myself. I am there 6 days a week and I always shower at the gym. Further, I use the corporate discounts available to join the memberships. With all that, it comes down to approx. $50 a month for membership and I used to think that it was on the higher side (to be fair post covid it increased from $40 to $50). But reading this article was an eye opener, I guess I need to thank all those people who subsidize my gym fees, and I am now more accepting of the membership fees. Finally I must add, all the friends (more like acquaintances) you make at the gym are absolutely crucial to motivate oneself and also just have a positive social interaction. I guess that perk of the gym membership is not even quantifiable. I feel really thankful and privileged to have gyms around now, I will never take them for granted going forward.

nonameiguess 3y ago
I'd be dubious of sweeping claims about what is "crucial" to motivate people in general. I would also consider myself a gymrat in the sense you probably mean. I've been fairly consistent about lifting six days a week for roughly three years now. Time missed isn't down to motivation so much as travel, injury, and illness. I'm more than willing to accept that as a form of loosely principled periodization anyway. Cardio has been somewhat less consistent, but that has been far more down to what I imagined I was capable of than motivation. Now that I know I can do it, I've gotten pretty good about running from 20-40 miles a week or so with variance coming down to injury and illness. This is all at home. My motivation is I'm an animal in a body that needs to be used and regularly stressed in ways it can adapt to in order to remain closer to peak functionality than degraded, and I don't want to degrade. I had very bad degenerative spine issues in my 30s and my experience living in a less degraded body has been far better than living in a degraded body. I don't feel any need for other people to push me. I work out completely alone in my own garage or on the street. I comment about it here when it comes up as a topic but don't try to be a part of any other web communities devoted to fitness. I don't publicly post progress photos or stats. I keep logs but only as feedback for my own planning. This isn't down to trying to avoid other people, either. This is largely down to convenience. When I had gym memberships in the past, sometimes I would go and sometimes I would not and quite often the thing keeping me from going was the simple friction of needing to leave the house and get in a car for 20 minutes. As it stands, I didn't have a car for a few years and still very rarely drive thanks to the continuing spinal stiffness in the wake of multiple lumbar fusions. There is quite a bit less friction involved in walking downstairs whenever I happen to have a spare 40 minutes in the day. I say all of this understanding not everybody works in the same way. Some may need a hard schedule. Some may need a coach or social factor. Some may do better with strict separation of home as a place to relax and somewhere else as a place to push bodily function. Some may need their garage for cars. Many are not going to have thousands of dollars to blow on equipment but can easily afford a monthly subscription to use equipment shared with others. I'm only intending to point out there are many ways to make this work and to push language on the web away from saying things are "absolutely crucial to motivate oneself" because they worked for you personally. It was absolutely crucial to you. Something entirely different was absolutely crucial to me. What is absolutely crucial to some randomly selected other person who is neither of us I will not claim to know. If this is something you care about, try everything. Find what works for you.
Avshalom 3y ago
>I'm probably the worst customer for gyms [...] I get there at 430 no that's the best customer for gyms. The ACTUAL way gyms make money is by heavily over subscribing a fixed amount of resources (machines/benches/space). You finding some random time to go to the gym instead of just canceling has barely any marginal cost over some one just not going and you'll talk positively about having a membership.
- klipt 3y ago
  I guess the most economically efficient model would be for gyms to charge per use with surge pricing. 4-5am? $2. 5-6pm? $10!
  - tanseydavid 3y ago
    From the article: "There are many commercial gyms that won’t let you in on a ‘pay-as- you-go’ basis at all, even if you beg."
    - Gigachad 3y ago
      Pay as you go in general is not popular. It creates an incentive to not use the product or service and makes people feel bad about using it. Meanwhile upfront payments make you feel good about using the service. You already paid for it, using it is getting your monies worth. And if you can’t build a habit around using their service, you won’t stay a customer for long. The ideal customer is someone who pays but doesn’t use it. But these people tend to not renew their subscriptions. So realistically you want someone who habitually uses it and will remain a customer forever.
      - al_borland 3y ago
        I think the Planet Fitness model is to appeal to non-gym-goers, and to also be cheap enough where people carry the membership year to year, because it’s not a big enough charge to hurt, while making the customer feel like they have some good intentions by having the membership.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
talldatethrow 3y ago
The worst customer is similar to you, but doing it at peak times, while also taking up resources of staff somehow (even if just chatting them up). Doing it at 430am is their second favorite customer other than someone that doesn't come at all.
- wisty 3y ago
  Just look at the signs in the gym to see what they hate. Leaving equipment out, and messing up the toilets (apparently someone spits gum in the urinals?) is what annoys the staff at the gym I go to.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > (apparently someone spits gum in the urinals?) Former janitor here: people do this all the time, everywhere. On the scale of terrible things people do in the restrooms, this one is pretty mild -- but don't do it. Have a thought for the person who cleans up your mess.
- randomdata 3y ago
  The 4:30am customer is the top favourite as they are much more likely to stick around for the long haul. The customer who never comes sounds nice, but they are likely to be a short-lived customer.
NikolaNovak 3y ago
>>Finally I must add, all the friends (more like acquaintances) you make at the gym are absolutely crucial to motivate oneself Yes, but it's personality specific; the absolute worst part of the gym, to me, is "other people". The sweaty, macho, over-enthusiastic bros with specific kind of humour (you can tell me that's not all or even most of them; doesn't matter, my subconsciousness doesn't believe you! :). The stinky changing rooms and people who don't want to cover anything up. The noise and the loudness and the boisterousness and just... people. So many people. Way too many people. Some of them even try to engage me! Make eye contact or talk to me! I think I'll stay home and try my elliptical again. SO I guess, you're right, people at the gym ARE motivational :-) (don't get me wrong - I'm mostly a people person otherwise; I'm an introvert but nobody believes me as I'm fairly outgoing, make small talk easily, smile and listen and engage people. But gym is where I'm at my most vulnerable, least-confident, and I suppose I have my share of traumatic memories of gyms as a scrawny dorky asthmatic nerdy boy. So I definitely, absolutely, completely, positively, desire no social interaction at the gym right now :)
- opportune 3y ago
  Not to point out the obvious, but most of this is I think just anxiety. I remember when I first started exercising, I was a fat alcoholic that was usually the youngest person there and had no idea what he was doing. I was very anxious about potentially doing something wrong, or being taunted or judged. I didn’t know how to use a lot of equipment and it took a long time before I even realized kind of “obvious” stuff like you being able to swap out attachments on cable systems. I knew my body language was glaringly displaying low self confidence and anxiety, and was further psyched out by knowing that it was obvious and I couldn’t do anything about it. As I went to the gym more I became more self confident and also assured through experience that I wasn’t doing anything wrong and nobody would be a dick to me. I mean, people are dicks sometimes, but usually only out of their own selfishness (like wanting to use something you are, or hogging something they’re not use because of fucking supersets), not malice. There’s always a small chance of a bad interaction along those lines every time you go but the anxiety definitely greatly subsides over time.
  - 3y ago
legerdemain 3y ago
> Finally I must add, all the friends (more like acquaintances) you make > at the gym are absolutely crucial to motivate oneself and also just have > a positive social interaction. Eh, been going to a gym weight room for 10 years and it's damn lonely and demoralizing. I'm sure it's different in tiny one-room Olympic weightlifting gyms or whatever. I'm not in my 20s anymore and I'm not actually that athletic, so 10 years of looking for a gym buddy have yielded nothing for me. Otherwise, the people I recognize at the gym are either the ones who camp out a piece of equipment or just walk around chatting others up and apparently never lifting anything.
- kylebenzle 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - legerdemain 3y ago
    Help me read this as something other than a slur on my character.
  - cwillu 3y ago
    This doesn't belong on this site.
- 6510 3y ago
  Work on your war cry! Seriousness aside, I ask fitness folk online what the point is of a gym. If you are serious about it (they are) surely you buy your own equipment and train in the comfort of your own home? One said he does have his own equipment and that [while people would deny it] the gym is entirely for social interaction. I suggest watching, broScienceLife, most of his videos are bad, actually they are all bad. https://www.youtube.com/@BroScienceLife/videos https://www.youtube.com/@BroScienceLife/videos
  - legerdemain 3y ago
    What should I suggest to my downstairs neighbors when I do deadlifts?
cko 3y ago
I lived out of my Toyota 4runner for 5 months. I would go to the Planet Fitness in the morning, take a long shower using their soap and hot water, do some exercise, and leave. Membership was $5 a month (for a 3-year contract. Now I live in Romania and gym memberships are $50-70 a month but people actually go there
- grudg3 3y ago
  Why would you shower before exercising and not after?
  - brabel 3y ago
    Oh my, this thread is wild... someone else takes 30 minutes or longer showers at the gym and thinks that's totally normal :D
  - cko 3y ago
    I showered to also wash my hair. Can't work out looking all messy, what would others think?
    - bmicraft 3y ago
      Bad hair in the gym is a no-go but being at least some amount of sweaty all day isn't?
      - cko 3y ago
        Fortunately my workouts were short and of the anaerobic nature so I didn't really break into a sweat.
fatmans 3y ago
We have 2, one all you can eat 100 euro/month: Packed like a japanese metro. One on a cinema model where you must pick one of their training programs, each with a different trainer and different times ranging from 300 to 550 euro per month. Only sqash is on an hourly rate and never sold out. Its easy to squeeze out a few extra reps at home by thinking of what it costs. It really helps how expensive they are. Lol
bobsmooth 3y ago
Do you lack the space for a home gym or are you an advanced lifter that would benefit from the specialized machines?
- bennyelv 3y ago
  Generally the more advanced you are as a lifter the less specialised machines are going to benefit you. Machines are there for people who don’t know what lifts to do and how to do them with proper technique. If you glimpse inside the gym of a professional athlete you’ll generally find a comprehensive set of dumbbells, some Olympic bars + plates and a bench and not much else!
  - carom 3y ago
    On the other hand, barbells are great until you realize you're missing some critical stabilizer and that is why your shoulder or glute has been hurting for years. Then you would kill for a cable machine.
  - opportune 3y ago
    Personally I think smith machines and cable systems are pretty handy for bodybuilding - mostly because they help you isolate certain muscles in a way you can’t do with barbells and dumbbells. Or they allow you to do things like weighted lunges or shrugs or tricep exercises at high weights with much less risk of injury vs doing them with free weights. Plenty of examples of elite bodybuilders training with them.
  - AA-BA-94-2A-56 3y ago
    Sorry but this is not completely correct. Many expert bodybuilders use a variety of machines to train each muscle group. Power lifters, however, tend to focus on the compound movements and therefore probably need less equipment.
  - criddell 3y ago
    > Machines are there for people who don’t know what lifts to do and how to do them That’s an overly broad generalization. If you look up pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s home gym, it’s mostly machines.
mnky9800n 3y ago
How do you make friends at the gym? I've been going for years and the only gym friends I have are those from outside the gym that learn that I go to the gym.
- doublerabbit 3y ago
  It's a tricky one, one which you do need to be very patience for. Most folk will have headphones, most folk are focusing on their routine / program; themselves. Being a regular is kind of a must, know that the person you wish to strike conversation with is a regular. Find a time when they're not plugged in to their zone and then start with a compliment. Keep it small and lite, everyone likes to be complimented now on their workout now and then. Further it on if you've noticed that they've completed a set on new weights, extra speeds et cetera. Then the next time you see them at the gym, make a friendly hello. Over the periods of small talk and rapport you can make larger gestures such as sharing sets, running next to them if it's a treadmill.
- thrixton 3y ago
  Go sit in the sauna or steam room if your gym has one, that’s where I make a lot of friends (or acquaintances really).
cardiffspaceman 3y ago
100% on the impact of other people. The first gym I used had lots of big muscular men running around saying things like “I wanna do something ignorant [1]”. But when they saw a normy like me doing crunches incorrectly, they might stop to inform me on proper form. And this was a big gym chain. [1] Ignorant meant painful.

by nelblu 3y ago

nonameiguess 3y ago

I'd be dubious of sweeping claims about what is "crucial" to motivate people in general. I would also consider myself a gymrat in the sense you probably mean. I've been fairly consistent about lifting six days a week for roughly three years now. Time missed isn't down to motivation so much as travel, injury, and illness. I'm more than willing to accept that as a form of loosely principled periodization anyway. Cardio has been somewhat less consistent, but that has been far more down to what I imagined I was capable of than motivation. Now that I know I can do it, I've gotten pretty good about running from 20-40 miles a week or so with variance coming down to injury and illness. This is all at home. My motivation is I'm an animal in a body that needs to be used and regularly stressed in ways it can adapt to in order to remain closer to peak functionality than degraded, and I don't want to degrade. I had very bad degenerative spine issues in my 30s and my experience living in a less degraded body has been far better than living in a degraded body. I don't feel any need for other people to push me. I work out completely alone in my own garage or on the street. I comment about it here when it comes up as a topic but don't try to be a part of any other web communities devoted to fitness. I don't publicly post progress photos or stats. I keep logs but only as feedback for my own planning. This isn't down to trying to avoid other people, either. This is largely down to convenience. When I had gym memberships in the past, sometimes I would go and sometimes I would not and quite often the thing keeping me from going was the simple friction of needing to leave the house and get in a car for 20 minutes. As it stands, I didn't have a car for a few years and still very rarely drive thanks to the continuing spinal stiffness in the wake of multiple lumbar fusions. There is quite a bit less friction involved in walking downstairs whenever I happen to have a spare 40 minutes in the day. I say all of this understanding not everybody works in the same way. Some may need a hard schedule. Some may need a coach or social factor. Some may do better with strict separation of home as a place to relax and somewhere else as a place to push bodily function. Some may need their garage for cars. Many are not going to have thousands of dollars to blow on equipment but can easily afford a monthly subscription to use equipment shared with others. I'm only intending to point out there are many ways to make this work and to push language on the web away from saying things are "absolutely crucial to motivate oneself" because they worked for you personally. It was absolutely crucial to you. Something entirely different was absolutely crucial to me. What is absolutely crucial to some randomly selected other person who is neither of us I will not claim to know. If this is something you care about, try everything. Find what works for you.

Avshalom 3y ago

>I'm probably the worst customer for gyms [...] I get there at 430 no that's the best customer for gyms. The ACTUAL way gyms make money is by heavily over subscribing a fixed amount of resources (machines/benches/space). You finding some random time to go to the gym instead of just canceling has barely any marginal cost over some one just not going and you'll talk positively about having a membership.

klipt 3y ago
I guess the most economically efficient model would be for gyms to charge per use with surge pricing. 4-5am? $2. 5-6pm? $10!
- tanseydavid 3y ago
  From the article: "There are many commercial gyms that won’t let you in on a ‘pay-as- you-go’ basis at all, even if you beg."
  - Gigachad 3y ago
    Pay as you go in general is not popular. It creates an incentive to not use the product or service and makes people feel bad about using it. Meanwhile upfront payments make you feel good about using the service. You already paid for it, using it is getting your monies worth. And if you can’t build a habit around using their service, you won’t stay a customer for long. The ideal customer is someone who pays but doesn’t use it. But these people tend to not renew their subscriptions. So realistically you want someone who habitually uses it and will remain a customer forever.
    - al_borland 3y ago
      I think the Planet Fitness model is to appeal to non-gym-goers, and to also be cheap enough where people carry the membership year to year, because it’s not a big enough charge to hurt, while making the customer feel like they have some good intentions by having the membership.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

talldatethrow 3y ago

The worst customer is similar to you, but doing it at peak times, while also taking up resources of staff somehow (even if just chatting them up). Doing it at 430am is their second favorite customer other than someone that doesn't come at all.

wisty 3y ago
Just look at the signs in the gym to see what they hate. Leaving equipment out, and messing up the toilets (apparently someone spits gum in the urinals?) is what annoys the staff at the gym I go to.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > (apparently someone spits gum in the urinals?) Former janitor here: people do this all the time, everywhere. On the scale of terrible things people do in the restrooms, this one is pretty mild -- but don't do it. Have a thought for the person who cleans up your mess.
randomdata 3y ago
The 4:30am customer is the top favourite as they are much more likely to stick around for the long haul. The customer who never comes sounds nice, but they are likely to be a short-lived customer.

NikolaNovak 3y ago

>>Finally I must add, all the friends (more like acquaintances) you make at the gym are absolutely crucial to motivate oneself Yes, but it's personality specific; the absolute worst part of the gym, to me, is "other people". The sweaty, macho, over-enthusiastic bros with specific kind of humour (you can tell me that's not all or even most of them; doesn't matter, my subconsciousness doesn't believe you! :). The stinky changing rooms and people who don't want to cover anything up. The noise and the loudness and the boisterousness and just... people. So many people. Way too many people. Some of them even try to engage me! Make eye contact or talk to me! I think I'll stay home and try my elliptical again. SO I guess, you're right, people at the gym ARE motivational :-) (don't get me wrong - I'm mostly a people person otherwise; I'm an introvert but nobody believes me as I'm fairly outgoing, make small talk easily, smile and listen and engage people. But gym is where I'm at my most vulnerable, least-confident, and I suppose I have my share of traumatic memories of gyms as a scrawny dorky asthmatic nerdy boy. So I definitely, absolutely, completely, positively, desire no social interaction at the gym right now :)

opportune 3y ago
Not to point out the obvious, but most of this is I think just anxiety. I remember when I first started exercising, I was a fat alcoholic that was usually the youngest person there and had no idea what he was doing. I was very anxious about potentially doing something wrong, or being taunted or judged. I didn’t know how to use a lot of equipment and it took a long time before I even realized kind of “obvious” stuff like you being able to swap out attachments on cable systems. I knew my body language was glaringly displaying low self confidence and anxiety, and was further psyched out by knowing that it was obvious and I couldn’t do anything about it. As I went to the gym more I became more self confident and also assured through experience that I wasn’t doing anything wrong and nobody would be a dick to me. I mean, people are dicks sometimes, but usually only out of their own selfishness (like wanting to use something you are, or hogging something they’re not use because of fucking supersets), not malice. There’s always a small chance of a bad interaction along those lines every time you go but the anxiety definitely greatly subsides over time.
- 3y ago

legerdemain 3y ago

> Finally I must add, all the friends (more like acquaintances) you make > at the gym are absolutely crucial to motivate oneself and also just have > a positive social interaction. Eh, been going to a gym weight room for 10 years and it's damn lonely and demoralizing. I'm sure it's different in tiny one-room Olympic weightlifting gyms or whatever. I'm not in my 20s anymore and I'm not actually that athletic, so 10 years of looking for a gym buddy have yielded nothing for me. Otherwise, the people I recognize at the gym are either the ones who camp out a piece of equipment or just walk around chatting others up and apparently never lifting anything.

kylebenzle 3y ago
[flagged]
- legerdemain 3y ago
  Help me read this as something other than a slur on my character.
- cwillu 3y ago
  This doesn't belong on this site.
6510 3y ago
Work on your war cry! Seriousness aside, I ask fitness folk online what the point is of a gym. If you are serious about it (they are) surely you buy your own equipment and train in the comfort of your own home? One said he does have his own equipment and that [while people would deny it] the gym is entirely for social interaction. I suggest watching, broScienceLife, most of his videos are bad, actually they are all bad. https://www.youtube.com/@BroScienceLife/videos https://www.youtube.com/@BroScienceLife/videos
- legerdemain 3y ago
  What should I suggest to my downstairs neighbors when I do deadlifts?

cko 3y ago

I lived out of my Toyota 4runner for 5 months. I would go to the Planet Fitness in the morning, take a long shower using their soap and hot water, do some exercise, and leave. Membership was $5 a month (for a 3-year contract. Now I live in Romania and gym memberships are $50-70 a month but people actually go there

grudg3 3y ago
Why would you shower before exercising and not after?
- brabel 3y ago
  Oh my, this thread is wild... someone else takes 30 minutes or longer showers at the gym and thinks that's totally normal :D
- cko 3y ago
  I showered to also wash my hair. Can't work out looking all messy, what would others think?
  - bmicraft 3y ago
    Bad hair in the gym is a no-go but being at least some amount of sweaty all day isn't?
    - cko 3y ago
      Fortunately my workouts were short and of the anaerobic nature so I didn't really break into a sweat.

fatmans 3y ago

We have 2, one all you can eat 100 euro/month: Packed like a japanese metro. One on a cinema model where you must pick one of their training programs, each with a different trainer and different times ranging from 300 to 550 euro per month. Only sqash is on an hourly rate and never sold out. Its easy to squeeze out a few extra reps at home by thinking of what it costs. It really helps how expensive they are. Lol

bobsmooth 3y ago

Do you lack the space for a home gym or are you an advanced lifter that would benefit from the specialized machines?

bennyelv 3y ago
Generally the more advanced you are as a lifter the less specialised machines are going to benefit you. Machines are there for people who don’t know what lifts to do and how to do them with proper technique. If you glimpse inside the gym of a professional athlete you’ll generally find a comprehensive set of dumbbells, some Olympic bars + plates and a bench and not much else!
- carom 3y ago
  On the other hand, barbells are great until you realize you're missing some critical stabilizer and that is why your shoulder or glute has been hurting for years. Then you would kill for a cable machine.
- opportune 3y ago
  Personally I think smith machines and cable systems are pretty handy for bodybuilding - mostly because they help you isolate certain muscles in a way you can’t do with barbells and dumbbells. Or they allow you to do things like weighted lunges or shrugs or tricep exercises at high weights with much less risk of injury vs doing them with free weights. Plenty of examples of elite bodybuilders training with them.
- AA-BA-94-2A-56 3y ago
  Sorry but this is not completely correct. Many expert bodybuilders use a variety of machines to train each muscle group. Power lifters, however, tend to focus on the compound movements and therefore probably need less equipment.
- criddell 3y ago
  > Machines are there for people who don’t know what lifts to do and how to do them That’s an overly broad generalization. If you look up pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s home gym, it’s mostly machines.

mnky9800n 3y ago

How do you make friends at the gym? I've been going for years and the only gym friends I have are those from outside the gym that learn that I go to the gym.

doublerabbit 3y ago
It's a tricky one, one which you do need to be very patience for. Most folk will have headphones, most folk are focusing on their routine / program; themselves. Being a regular is kind of a must, know that the person you wish to strike conversation with is a regular. Find a time when they're not plugged in to their zone and then start with a compliment. Keep it small and lite, everyone likes to be complimented now on their workout now and then. Further it on if you've noticed that they've completed a set on new weights, extra speeds et cetera. Then the next time you see them at the gym, make a friendly hello. Over the periods of small talk and rapport you can make larger gestures such as sharing sets, running next to them if it's a treadmill.
thrixton 3y ago
Go sit in the sauna or steam room if your gym has one, that’s where I make a lot of friends (or acquaintances really).

cardiffspaceman 3y ago

100% on the impact of other people. The first gym I used had lots of big muscular men running around saying things like “I wanna do something ignorant [1]”. But when they saw a normy like me doing crunches incorrectly, they might stop to inform me on proper form. And this was a big gym chain. [1] Ignorant meant painful.