Successfully Overcoming the Odds

When Nikki Layton and her partner Barry Duncan founded Momentum Fitness and Volo Innovations in Vancouver, Canada, they were short on cash flow. In order to bypass expensive marketing schemes, Layton teamed with local pharmaceutical sales representatives. The reps were giving educational events to doctors in their area.

Layton allowed the reps to lease their space for the events — allowing the co-owners to discuss their training business with doctors. “We got doctors in the area to meet us, and even if they weren’t interested in our services, they were open to telling their patients about us,” Layton said. “Additionally, we called the businesses that were close to our location and offered to come and do a free lunch and learn.”

Momentum Fitness and Volo Innovations just held its 10th anniversary. “Our specialty is general fitness and post rehab,” Layton said. “We don’t work with a lot of athletes. Our clients are regular people that have very busy lives and work long hours.”

Momentum doesn’t employ trainers that could be perceived as “hardcore.” Instead, they hire the best trainers they’ve found to attend to their clientele and help them enjoy exercise. “We created a facility where they could walk in the door and not have to think about anything,” Layton said. “Our trainers would make sure they got a great workout in the limited time they had and they could have someone else worry about them for a change.”

Aside from employing amazing trainers, Momentum also provides clients with quarterly client challenges, extra cardio options, spa-like changing rooms with local bath and hair products, excellent customer service, a “Better than Bootcamp” program and birthday massages.

“On a day-to-day basis we are all focused on making sure that from the moment the client walks in the door to when they leave, that they are getting everything they need,” Layton said. Layton and her trainers use special events to keep clients engaged in their routines. “This month is a Poker Challenge,” Layton said. “We have decks of cards, and depending on what you are dealt, will determine what sets and reps you will be doing during your workout. You can discard the cards you don’t want and then draw new ones. The player with the highest hand at the end of the week wins a prize.”

Over the 10 years Momentum has been operating, they have changed their systems to better their business. “As soon as we opened we implemented systems to help us run our business,” Layton explained “In the beginning, these systems were on paper, but after a couple of years as our business grew, we realized that we needed to streamline these processes.

“We looked at the software programs on the market and we felt that at the time, none of them met our needs, so we teamed up with a development company and created Volo. After a few months, we realized that our software was saving us 10 to 20 hours per month on administration and had improved our cash flow. We had found a bunch of human tracking errors. It was the creation of Volo Innovations that really allowed our business to prosper.”

The strengths that allowed them to take their business to the next level also came on the differences of Layton and Duncan. “Having a partner can be challenging at times,” Layton said. “But, knowing that you have support at every step is an amazing thing. The biggest thing that made our club successful was hard work, careful management of the cash flow and excellent customer service so that our clients were telling all their friends about us.”

Layton and Duncan had spent several years working as personal trainers at a few different locations. “We really like the training studios, but we felt that we had something to offer that the studios around town at the time weren’t focused on — exceptional customer service,” Layton said. “We started planning and 10 months later we were opening our doors.”

Like many small training companies, Momentum has overcome many hurdles. From the beginning when they dealt with receiving a bank loan, to finding cheap ways to market, the partners have continued to discover new ways to prosper. Persistence has been the key to making Momentum speed ahead. -CS