Welcome to CorePower, Dan. Let's fix your studios.
Welcome to your new role. I’ve spent over a decade leading and teaching out of your Southern California market, I know your brand inside and out. I’m reaching out directly because you are inheriting a culture of deep frustration. If you read what your instructors and students are actually saying online (since 2020, with Nikki), you will see your community is at a breaking point.
We need to have a very real conversation about your pay structure. It is devastating to read threads where your instructors are admitting they have to rely on food stamps and low-income government assistance just to survive while working for your company. Your teachers are the entire foundation of your business, yet they are bringing home less than fast food workers after spending hours off the clock building your sequences and curating your playlists. It is completely unacceptable that your monthly memberships are pushing $200, while the people delivering your classes are living BELOW the poverty line. Your community is actively asking for a MINIMUM livable hourly base pay. We just want to get off FOOD STAMPS. If you want to keep your top talent, you have to start paying your people enough so they don't have to rely on state aid... or leave for one of the numerous competitors zoning in on your talent/community.
Before her departure/step-down/fired/retiring (we don't know because only some studios received an email from her and some studios had a teacher letter, BUT MOST STUDIOS ARE JUST BEING WIERD AF AND HIDING IT, lol), Niki promised your teaching staff that the class count incentive ($1 more per hour for teaching 5 to 9 classes, $3 more per hour for teaching 10-20 classes) would be updated and improved. Instead, she lied and just left. Now you are here, so what are you going to do?
Then there is your studio hygiene. Your students are paying a premium rate, but they are walking into your heated rooms only to find grimy floors, unwashed props, and dusty mirrors. When your practitioners come in to practice and root their hands into their mat, they shouldn't be distracted by the layer of old sweat on your floors. You even stopped giving SET 50% off to take Teacher Trainings... it's 30% off now.... that's wrong on so many levels. Shame on TSG, and shame on you if you don't fix it.
Dan, you have a massive opportunity right now to rewrite this part of your story as CEO. Stop squeezing your most valuable assets. Pay your teachers a wage that keeps them off section8 and food stamps, and give your students the clean sanctuary they are actually paying for.
Sincerely,
Everyone