Good Sweat
Should yoga and fitness class cards have expiration dates?
Physique 57 matches expiration dates with length of package—5 classes in 3 months, 10 in 6, and 20 in 12.
Most fitness-class packages come with expiration dates, and losing money from unused classes can be seriously frustrating—especially when you’re fitting yoga, barre, and boot camp classes into any given week.
While the workout trend has been towards hopping between boutique studios, and the benefits of cross training and muscle confusion, studios continue to expect you to swear allegiance to them, and them alone, by setting a stopwatch after they swipe your credit card.
Lynda Lippin, a celebrity Pilates instructor who has worked at many big-name studios, cited cash flow as a main reason for expiration dates. Just like in other industries, lots of businesses (like Groupon) bank on “breakage,” or the money made from unused deals, gift cards, and classes.
But when asked, most studios claimed their motivation was not financial at all. Schulyer Grant, owner of Kula Yoga, said that the studio was trying to avoid an accounting nightmare.
“If there were no expiration date, someone could come to us three years down the line, and we may have changed our computing system (or prices), and they could claim they had a class card,” she said. “These things happen!”
And the majority of studios said this: They do it for you.
“When purchasing a package, you are a making a commitment to yourself. You are paying the studio for a service. Incentive, encouragement and accountability are part of that service,” said Flannery Foster, the owner of GoodYoga in Greenpoint. Studio owners at Bend & Bloom and YogaMaya offered the same reasoning.
Physique 57′s founder and CEO Jennifer Maanavi acknowledged that sticking to regular classes at one place is not just good for you, it helps the studio, too. In other words, if you say you’re a Physique gal, it’s better if you look the part.
“If you’re taking class and want to see results, the expiration dates are what we think will guide you to the best results,” she explained. “We’re backing up the brand promise with the logistics of the packages.”
But should a studio be the keeper of your fitness goals, or should you?
“We’re not here to put a time table on people’s personal resolutions,” says Joey Gonzalez, the owner of Barry’s Bootcamp NYC, one of the only studios in the city without expiration dates.”We’ve focused on building a community that makes people feel welcomed and encouraged.” As a result, says Gonzalez, most clients use up their packages quickly anyway. –Lisa Elaine Held
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Yes studios should have expirations on their class cards, but they also have to be flexible. Unrealistic expectations such as 10 classes in 30 days is a bummer especially if you’re trying to cross train or have to travel for business. I’ve found if you commit to a studio and are open about your personal life and commitments, then the studio will find a way to work with you and keep you as a client.
[...] Should yoga and fitness class cards have expiration dates? | Well+Good NYC. Like this:LikeBe the first to like this post. Leave a Comment by Flannery Foster on January 12, 2012 • Permalink Posted in goodfolks [...]
Its a reasonable, sound business practice to put expiration dates on pre-purchased, discounted services. The smaller studios especially cannot afford to fill classes with people who have purchased services and then not used them for months (even years) on end. I WANT my students to use their packages, and so I discount the class rates. This discount is for a FREQUENT customer…not the once in a while customer who comes and goes. They are all welcomed, however the steady customer is offered a discount, so that they may attend classes often and pay a lower price. If you give people a “frequent student” discount, and there is no expiration, then its a lop sided deal…no advantage for the studio. Would you buy a couch on sale, and expect the store to “hold it” for you and deliver it for free 2 years later after you’ve moved? We need a cash flow for sure, but not from unused classes, those people never come back..we need a cash flow from purchases made by students who are consistent AND frequent, who in return get a nice discount on the rates.
Jodie, who commented at 2:08pm, is exactly right. The packages offer a frequency discount to the student. The trade off for that is an expiration date on the packages. The frequency discount is a reward and incentive for practicing regularly. If you spread a 10-class package out over 3 years then the discount, in effect, becomes the per-class price and renders the incentive/reward pricing meaningless.
I agree that they should have an expiration date but some are ridiculous. I went regularly to one yoga studio once a week which with a new baby is what I can handle. For me, that is frequent but with their ten pack expiring in two months, I can’t make it work. So, I stopped going there bc the discount made a difference. I’m not asking for a year, but seriously, is three months too much to ask? And I asked for a 1 month extension and they said no, so i stopped going.
I think it is really reasonable to have an expiration date to those discount cards. Incentives and discounts are given as the incentives. And it is right, by any how, the payment might change. I think it if just fair for others.
Love Joey’s quote at the end of the article. That’s why Barry’s is rocking. Because he makes it no fuss. IN. WORK. OUT. That’s how it should be EVERYWHERE. Fighting with front desk check-in staff sucks big time and happens all too often at fitness studios. Less of that would make fitness enthusiasts happier and more loyal clientele.
Backing up the brand promise with the logistics of an expiration date is bolonga. It’s backing up the brands company’s checking account and that good for only the club. Of course they should expire but 30 days, even 60 days, is totally unreasonable. When I have constantly be reminded my classes expired and get a week’s extenstion I lose interest and they lose loyalty. My life is too busy to worry about expiring fitness classes.
Adventure Fitness Boot Camps is a four week outdoor fitness program that offers fitness instruction, nutritional counseling and motivational training – packed with fun and energizing activities designed to help you reach your fitness goals.
At Karma Kids Yoga, we do not expire classes. I find that because we do this, people are more likely to purchase a package of classes. And more importantly, our clients really appreciate it. Families CAN come back after 3 years and find that they still have classes.
They already paid for it, and I couldn’t sleep at night knowing that my clients threw their money away. Life happens. We can’t always do what we planned within a studios expiration date. And it would be wonderful if all of our favorite teachers were at the same studio, but that’s just not a reality for most practitioners.
It is not a logistical or accounting nightmare to set your database up for no expiration. Or to reactivate a clients account if it had expired. Takes minutes. And I think it’s worth it to keep your clients happy and it’s just good business. Good karma, too.
Instead of this concept being “understandable” to expire classes, we should change the thought process of acceptance for it. Don’t you hate to pay for something and then because of ‘life’, we don’t get what we paid for? It’s so frustrating!
When opening Karma Kids Yoga 9 years ago, I did not follow the norm (the kids world of classes where you have 10 weeks/ specified dates for make ups, and other nonsense, or the yoga world of expiration dates). I attribute this policy to the reason that we are still in business and flourishing, while other kids yoga programs have come and gone. Karma Kids Yoga opened our second space last month.
Things are good when you care about your clients.
While the discount is nice, I purchase class packs to make my class check-in easy. Unfortunately, at the time of purchase, I never know if I’ll be able to use them all up.
It would be nice to be able to purchase a pack without a discount or an expiration date. It would also be interesting if studios would let students pay a sum to extend the expiration date of a discounted pack so that they can take advantage of the classes that purchased, but did not get to use.
If I have a pack expire, depending on how much money I lost, I may not return to that studio. I don’t want to be reminded of the fact that I lost that money, nor do I want to be reminded that I did not meet the class attendance goal.
Not having an expiration date works if you don’t also want a discount and you are willing to pay any increase in rates should you return a year or 2 later…and the class price has increased.
Life indeed does happen, however if you can only make class once a week, or once every 10 days, its not reasonable to expect that you should be getting the same discounted rate a frequent student gets (for instance a person who uses 10 classes in 3 weeks as opposed to 3 months). I give my employees raises..make improvements to the facilities, offer people samples from the cafe, loan mats for no charge, and care DEEPLY about my clients and students. Rates at my studio are much less expensive than any other studio in the area, the discount is built in. As a business in a small suburb, I do not have the luxury of thousands of people passing by my studio daily. Different businesses have to operate differently depending on their location clientele, etc. No one at my studio ever argues with anyone, we always try to accommodate customers and make them happy. I do not have a computer system to run my business, its all done on paper, so for me, its indeed extra work to keep track of long term unused classes. We always explain to people when they purchase a discounted package, that they have expiration dates, and we ask people to consider this before their purchase. I do allow people who’s life circumstances “get in the way” to transfer their packages one time to another individual, while keeping the original expiration date. In the case of an injury or serious illness, of course we make exceptions. As for me making money off of people who pay for services they do not end up using, I have not yet taken a single pay check from my business..I suppose if I charged more for the products and services we provide, I might have a better chance of collecting monetary compensation some time soon. In the meantime, my “salary” is the satisfaction I feel in providing people with a positive yoga experience in a clean, safe, friendly environment, and building a yoga community where there was not one.
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[...] Should yoga and fitness class cards have expiration dates? [...]