Issue #453 – Wednesday, February 26, 2025
Beyond the Studio: Expanding Your Pilates Career Flexibility and Profitability
– Part 2 –
Match your Work Ethic to your Pilates Profits
by Anne Bishop
The work ethic it took for you to become an exceptional teacher is not what is required to become a profitable business or sought-after educator.
I know it’s a hard truth.
And this is precisely why so many studios without good movement education make so much money, expand their market share, and keep growing and growing.
Please remember that if you are smart enough to teach your clients spinal articulation, you are also smart enough to create a profitable business.
And… what does it require to do that?
It requires you to shed the strategies and work ethic that made you a highly educated and nuanced body whisperer. It also requires you to stretch your identity to strengthen your brain power and be as flexible in your business thinking as you are in your spine.
If you are still running your Pilates business like they did in the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s, selling a la carte 5, 10, or 20-session package. It’s like you are teaching Pilates without knowing anatomy. And this is precisely why the little studios are NOT spreading their good teaching of Pilates.
It is my absolute fire and passion that more expert studios with exceptional teaching have huge profits. Imagine if your studio had enough profits to
- have a scholarship program for up-and-coming teachers to learn your teaching methodology.
- hire career Pilates instructors with 401K options
- employ career teachers and have enough work that they can work full-time at your studio and receive health benefits
- offer mentorships to marginalized communities
Let’s stop thinking so small. You think so expansively about the possibilities of the body and mind connecting, so why not think abundantly about the profits your small studio can make?
From 2002 to 2018, I ran a studio and sold packages year after year. Because I specialized in supporting clients with chronic pain, I had few cancellations, and I charged my clients if they gave me less than 24 hours notice. I thought I was checking all the boxes and doing everything right according to making money in the Pilates studio industry.
And despite all that, I didn’t make enough money once I had children to justify childcare and coming into the studio. So, in 2018, I switched my private and semi-private-based studio to a recurring revenue model. Without a single new client, I made 20% more revenue. Why? Because my clients canceled less or just rescheduled. Even though my story was that my clients never canceled.
Recurring Revenue Models for Nerdy Studios
First, let me clarify. A recurring revenue model means recurring payments are automatically charged to the client’s credit, debit, or bank account monthly or weekly instead of selling a la carte 5,10, or 20 packages with expiration dates. Recurring revenue payments are not sneaky or mean, as you agree on these terms with the client’s full knowledge.
This is a subtle shift in how you collect payments, and like subtle shifts in the body, it can make all the difference in the world.
Let me share some other recurring revenue models for studios that value the teaching of Pilates:
Pilates Clients attending 4-12 sessions per month
- Private Pilates Appointments with postural intake and/or gait analysis
- Semi-private Pilates Appointments
- Pilates Mat Classes
Teacher Training Programs on an annual payment program
- Teachers in Training Core Membership: pay a monthly fee for studio training plus access to the studio at specific hours for observation, practice teaching hours, and self-practice
- Teachers in Training Reformer Membership: pay a monthly fee for studio training plus access to the studio at specific hours for observation, practice teaching hours, and self-practice, plus access to ongoing mat classes and semi-privates
- Teachers in Training Cadillac Membership: pay a monthly fee for studio training plus access to the studio at specific hours for observation, practice teaching hours, and self-practice, plus access to ongoing mat classes and semi-privates and up to 4 privates per month
Recurring Revenue can also take other forms for your students who love to geek out with you.
Quarterly workshops on an annual payment plan
- Anatomy workshops super nerdy students
- Nervous System workshops to support your clients regulate
- Complimentary practitioners in your network so you can support your body holistically
Programming
- 6 weeks to reduce your persistent pain
- Pregnancy and Postpartum programs
- Menopause Masterclasses
Clients who travel extensively
- Retainers so that clients with second homes and financial resources can hold their favorite 9 am Thursday appointment time even when they are gone ⅓ of the year.
The power of the above business models is the stable foundation that recurring revenue provides for you and your staff a real career salary in Pilates. Recurring revenue also supports the consistency in Pilates practice your clients need.
Recurring revenue allows you to become a more profitable studio business. I have yet to meet a Pilates studio that pays its owner a living wage and makes a 30% profit by selling packages.
If your business is that unicorn, respond to this email, and Brett will connect us. Because honestly, I would love to be proven wrong.
Meanwhile, for those of us starting on the profitable journey, I invite you to download my Free Profit Habit Tracker where you begin the pre-profit practice. You can think of it like pre-Pilates.
Because we all started at the beginning.
The next step is to expand beyond your expert Pilates teaching and become a profit expert.
Anne C Bishop is co-founder of the Embodied Business Institute with Chantill Lopez. Anne is a licensed Pricing Overhaul® Coach, has owned a profitable Pilates Studio for 20 years, worked for Cast.org a curriculum design firm, and received her Master’s at Harvard University.