fit20 franchise opportunities explained. Kieran Igwe of fit20 Leeds.

Hear from Kieran Igwe about his motivations to become a fit20 franchise owner. My background is in personal training. I’d successfully built a personal training business, was working with clients, and was running a small studio. I’d heard about fit20 from a business networking group and originally thought that doing something for 20 minutes a week didn’t sound like it could make a difference. I thought this must be another fad. However, I respected the person that made the introduction, and I’d heard of the UK franchise owner, I thought let me go and see. So, the appeal to me was a new concept. When I first saw fit20 and I saw the studio, it looked very professional, the branding was excellent and I thought this is a really serious company and something that was going to be a serious player in the market. So the cleanliness of the studio, the precision of the equipment, and the brand feel of fit20 appealed to me. I’d been running my own business and had a small team of personal trainers. The business had been doing okay but I realised it was very much limited to my capacity and really relied on having very specific people in the right places for it to go anywhere, so we maxed out how far we could grow. When I saw fit20, I realised this was a concept that, if it worked, would be something that would be really easy to scale. It would make a huge difference in terms of the number it could impact because the offer of doing 20 minutes once a week is so much more appealing. The typical fitness proposition was not very appealing for a lot of people, whereas fit20, I could see, could help so many people that I knew that just wouldn't want to or be able to commit that amount of time to exercise. In terms of support from fit20, it’s been great right from my initial scepticism and initial inquiries to seeing, what does this involve? As I went through my journey of finding out more about fit20, I wanted to try it and test it out and see how it worked, and I got full guidance and explanation of how everything worked so I could make a good decision about whether this was going to help me get to where I wanted to be. When it came to actually looking at the facility, going through the training of how to actually deliver the product, the hiring and recruiting; all of theses things had systems in place and support from Fit20 to really help me get the best start that I could, even though I already had experience there was an organisation that had 10 years experience extra so it was a winning combination. The journey has been good. Running any business can be challenging, but I enjoy the challenge and knowing that one of the challenges you’re not going to be facing is ‘what should my studio look like, what should the product be?’ - that is all taken care of and it’s the highest standard product that there is available. The journey has been great for what I wanted to do, which was to scale and grow a business to help more people, to give myself the freedom to be able to enjoy the time and things that I want to do. Knowing that there’s potential growth as well. Originally I started off with one studio in Leeds, and then just after a year and a half we managed to take on the second location. It’s got me thinking there really is no limit to what fit20 can achieve. If someone was considering taking out a fit20 franchise, I would say ‘absolutely! Go and have the initial conversation’, simply because if you’re curious and you align with what fit20 is in terms of the quality of the brand, the potential income it can offer you as a franchise owner, and doing something really rewarding, I’d say go and do those initial inquiries. It’s not for everyone, it does take effort and energy but if you want to create something and you want to be part of something as well, rather than trying it all on your own, just see what it’s about. Initially, when I started fit20, I wanted to have three studios within five years and, having set goals in the past, I very much knew that that didn’t mean it was going to become a reality. However, here we are three and a half years in, two studios up and running and into the future I certainly see a third studio, and who knows where to go from there? It is actually becoming an enjoyable game of being able to set up a studio, have it running, give people what they need in terms of training to improve and better their life, give my team what they need to be able to deliver and do a job that they love doing and getting satisfaction and reward myself in knowing that I’m growing a business, that I’m being successful; that’s what I get from this. To book a free training at your nearest fit20 studio click here: https://fit20.co.uk/free-training/ Are you interested in applying to open a fit20 franchise near you? Book an introductory meeting here: https://fit20franchise.co.uk/introduc...