The Fitness Industry today is ever changing. Clubs are big and getting bigger, with each trying to “out spend” and “out offer” the competition. One thing that can definitely set a club ahead of the rest is an efficient, exciting smoothie bar.
People today are looking for a connection or a place where they feel welcome, where everyone knows their name, in an energized environment. What members want is a great experience! Smoothie bars offer that experience! And done the right way, an awesome juice bar will do wonders for the club’s bottom line.
A professional smoothie bar can serve as an additional profit center for a health club. It can generate somewhere around $.80 per workout per day. If a club averages 500 visits per day that could add $500 extra per day with no real increase in labor.
In most cases, a full juice bar requires no more space than a normal front desk uses and can cost only about as much as a high-end treadmill! Every club owner is looking for the greatest return per square foot in their facility, and a juice bar is a perfect solution. The front desk is a very under-utilized area, with its typical function being to greet and check-in members, and maybe sell a bottle of water or an energy bar from time to time. Do the math and you can see that in a short time, a good juice bar can add significant numbers to your bottom line.
Some other returns are not as visible but may be just as important. With the people we serve today looking for a social connection, the juice bar can be the heart of the club. It makes sense to give your members an area to slow down and interact with others. Without a smoothie bar, they can go straight to the locker room, workout and leave immediately when done. Think of it as a zone where a member can relax before or after a workout, visit with a trainer or learn about new products and services the club offers.
Your professional juice bar can help your club in many more ways, including:
1. Competition Proofing – Say that you have an amazing café/juice bar that the members love and utilize. A new club opens in the area with no juice bar. They have the same equipment, just a little newer, but no juice bar. Members may be less likely to change because of the social and emotional connection to your facility.
2. More Memberships – If a potential member visits the club for a tour and you have a smoothie bar and the other club does not, who wins? You do!
3. Marketing or Promotional Tool – Every guest that tours the club is given a free smoothie during the tour. What you have just done is given something without asking for anything in return (yet).
4. Closing Tool – When you have finished the tour, what a great place to present the club’s benefits to the guest and ask for the sale. It is a much softer, less threatening environment than sitting in a sales room. If you are thinking about adding a juice bar in your club, there are some issues to forsee with trying to do a fresh fruit or an “oldfashioned style” bar. Here are three reasons why you need to look at a turnkey system:
1. PORTION CONTROL – most recipes call for a variety of ingredients and the right amount. Well there is no consistency in the fruit’s size and no guarantee that the person making it will add the right amount every time…which leads to….
2. COST AND CALORIE CONTROL – What should have cost you about $1.50 to make, now just cost you $1.55 – $1.60. Now that may not sound like much but when you look at every blend, every day, every week, every month, that adds up. In addition, if what should have been 380 calories is now 450 to 500 calories due to over-scooping or pouring, your members wouldn’t be too happy…which leads to….
3. CUSTOMER SERVICE – It is nice to have a system that gives a consistent product every time and is not reliant on the employee to deliver a smoothie that is the same every time.
So in developing your juice bar look for a system that is cost-effective, simple to use, and consistent. You want a program that is easy for you to train your employees, and tastes great for your customers!
Lastly, you want to offer a branded product that carries name recognition. Homemade systems rarely work. You want and need a system that looks professional and has the marketing and support to back it up. There are several smoothie options out there, so consider only those that offer this!
Stephanie Suddarth is the President of City Blends, Ltd. She can be contacted at 877.525.3637, or by email atstephanie@cityblends.com, or visit www.cityblends.com.
