On the fitness industry… | Is yoga a sustainable career?

By Corey Loftus

Co-founder & Chief of People, Programming, and Philosophy

---

Back in 2009 when I started teaching yoga, I had a dream of becoming a full time fitness teacher. It seemed so desirable: constantly in motion, having classes all over the city, knowing so many people in different places (everyone takes group classes sometime), managing my own schedule, and reminding people how to move and breathe for a living. As I built my connections and jobs up, I enjoyed, more and more, all of these things. Being a (mostly) single person in NYC with roommates, this was no problem. Things changed when I met my future wife and got engaged.
​
When you’re young and single, benefits don’t really matter to you.

Who cares about health care? I was young and healthy. But then we wanted kids, and although you CAN go through a full pregnancy and delivery without healthcare (the body is designed to do it), we didn’t want the risks that come with it. And then you probably want healthcare for your kids.. Or for you if you ever get hurt or sick because you have dependents.

Who cares about savings for retirement? I’m never going to retire! Which is still my plan, but the nature of your work must change as you grow wiser. You CAN still teach 20 classes per week, but when will you see your family?

Who cares about regular, predictable income? I didn’t, until it came time to do taxes every year. And when we wanted to move to another apartment for more space, it’s pretty frustrating to always need a guarantor because you can’t prove any regular income from your taxes. Nevermind the dream of talking with a bank about getting a mortgage to buy an apartment.

The business model for teachers in the group fitness industry as it currently exists is completely broken.

Every studio (with few exceptions) hires teachers as independent contractors, giving them no benefits or true status in the place in which they work.

This works if you think of the teachers and the costs to pay them, the students and what they pay, the studio’s rent, insurance, and everything in the entire fitness exchange as only numbers, with everyone as a digit on a big balance sheet in Quickbooks.

It’s a rather depressing, inhuman way to do things, and it isn’t profitable, either. It’s a quick internet search to see the dismal economics of running a studio these days. 

That’s why, after 7 years of teaching public classes at a variety of studios, I left and founded hOM.

​We decided to do things a bit differently.

We believe that employing teachers, paying them a regular, fair salary, and giving them benefits including healthcare, PTO, Vacation & Sick Days, and paying for Continuing Education is the right way to treat a fellow human being.

It makes sense and cents.

Our turnover rate (employees/contractors who leave us) is far below the industry average, and our reliability rate (classes taught divided by classes missed) is far above the industry average.

It seems simple to say -- when you give people stability and regularity in their lives, they’ll create the same in your company.
Loyalty begets loyalty. Trust begets trust.

And I’m not even properly mentioning how much our hOMies love to work with each other and for the company.

As far as we know, hOM is the only company, industry-wide, to offer this kind of employment.

Below is a brief snapshot of the difference between the two types of living. I hope you’ll take something from this and consider what you can do in your industry to make the lives of your co-workers, employees, and friends one notch more human.

---

The regular fitness teacher perspective…

What’s your typical work week like?
As a full time teacher, I run 12-20 classes per week at 5 different studios, which is usually 2-3 classes every day. I try to take one day a week off, but sometimes if a studio needs a sub, I’d rather make the money and teach it instead of doing my laundry.

How’s the pay?
Each studio has a different pay scale. Sometimes I make a flat rate no matter what (usually $25-50), sometimes it’s a per head rate ($3-5), or it’s a combination of the two ($20-40, +X for every person over 5-10). Having regular private clients is amazing — I get to negotiate my own rates, class times, and go directly to their apartment for work. I started charging $150 per session, and have moved it up a little every year. Clients usually pay in personal check or cash, so .... ^_^

How are the benefits?
I get paid to teach, move, and touch people for a living! I plan and lead my own retreats to amazing locations around the world and charge a premium for them. Probs the best benefit is wearing stretchy pants all the time for everything. I can take classes at the studios I teach and get a discount on workshops and trainings my fellow teachers at those studios are leading.
Okay, so what’s the challenging stuff people don’t know about?

• Sick days, PTO, and planned non-working vacations are something only my 9-5 friends in suits get.
• Commuting to studios across 3 different boroughs eats up my day. I usually calculate 60 minutes travel time between classes.​
• There’s constant pressure to put out material on social media.
• Filing taxes as a yoga teacher is miserable. Every studio has me on as an Independent Contractor, which makes it pretty complicated because it’s basically like I have 5 different sources of income. That also means taxes aren’t automatically taken out of my paycheck, so either I’ve got to figure that out on my own and save 25% of what I get paid, assuming I’m paying it back in taxes at the end of the year, or always end up owing money to the IRS (and probably repaying it on a payment plan over the year).​

​The hOMie perspective…

What’s your typical work week like?
I teach 8 scheduled classes per week. They stay the same every month, and most of the buildings I teach in are near my apartment.  All of my administrative work is mobile, so I either work at home if I can focus, or the office when I know I need solid Wi-Fi. There’s only one weekly team meeting at the office that I’m required to be at in-person. I’ve got 2 days off a week, sometimes 3.

How’s the pay?
Great, and regular! I have a salary. To be honest, I didn’t know how that felt before working for hOM. It’s the relief of knowing that as long as I’m fulfilling my work responsibilities every week, the same amount of money comes in every single week. Being an employee makes taxes at the end of the year super easy, because everything is taken out with every paycheck. Also, hOM lets me keep teaching wherever I want as long as I’m meeting my hOMwork responsibilities.

How are the benefits?
The atmosphere.
Working with my other hOMies is the biggest benefit — everyone cares about everyone else. The founders have this saying, “the company must be a patron of its employees”. I truly feel that here. When I want to do something, the company supports me. We’re all building this company together, creating tangible change by creating an interest in the mind:body connection in people that wouldn’t normally make time to do it.

I’m an employee and I get all the adult things that come with it: health care, dental, vision, 401K, PTO, sick days, parental leave (with pay!), a company laptop, company-paid cell phone plan, free Citi-bike membership, and can do my work whenever I want during the week! The team is super supportive of me subbing classes out so I can take long weekends here and there to be with family, or for vacation. Sometimes I don’t even have to use PTO to do it. There are regular continuing education workshops, and hOM will even pay up front for trainings that I want to go do (I repay it by taking on more classes for a short amount of time).

I get feedback on my work.

Not only the administrative side, but teaching, too. I can’t remember the last time, other than in Teacher Training, when I had a friend or mentor come take my class to give me honest, constructive feedback with their only interest being my personal growth and development. hOM does that.
There’s upward mobility.
​
I have regularly scheduled success meetings where I get raises, and I know there’s opportunity to get promoted to leadership positions. Best of all, I’m supported by a whole team of hOMies who I can go to for anything I need: questions or feedback about work, teaching, life.

Okay, so what’s the challenging stuff people don’t know about?

• hOM is a start-up, still evolving, so sometimes I’ve got to pick up new responsibilities in my role.
• We talk a bit about having confusion endurance, because even though I’ll be doing the same things in 6 months, the systems I use to do them will be constantly evolving.

If you’re interested to talk more about the differences that make hOM stand out, email me!

corey