One Set of Eyes on a Whole Climbing Gym: A NY Case Study
Most climbing gyms are run by people who are great at climbing, coaching or community and are also expected to be experts in pricing, facilities, data and staffing. Everyone is busy, and the habits that got the gym open often stay in place long after they stop fitting.
That's the best reason to bring in an outside consultant. You get someone with no stake in "how we've always done it" who has run a wall of their own.
I recently finished a multi-month engagement with an established climbing gym in New York. It began with a tightly defined scope. By the end, I was looking across the whole operation.
How it started
Youth programs. Ahead of fall registration, I wrote program policies and rewrote class descriptions. That included the gym's youngest kids' class, for ages 4 to 7. Parents of a 5-year-old want to know what happens in the first class, who's supervising and what the rules are. A clear description answers those questions before anyone has to ask.
Adult programs. I audited what the gym offered against what adult members actually needed, including pricing and scheduling. Programs tend to pile up over the years. Some of them still earn their spot on the schedule, and others are just there out of habit. The audit separated the two.
Training center and pathways. I also advised on a training center concept and on developmental pathways for climbers moving from beginner to team level. Many gyms have strong intro classes and a team, but not much clarity about the steps between them. A climber who can see the next step stays in the gym longer.
Business operations
On the business side, I reviewed staff pay rates and overall pricing, built out gear packages and looked at marketing performance data.
None of this is glamorous, but it's where a gym's day-to-day health is decided. Gear packages, for example, make a new climber's first month simpler. Marketing data shows where your effort is going and whether it's reaching the people you want.
Audit your programs against member needs, not habit. Look at what you offer, what it costs, when it runs and who actually uses it. Then ask whether it fits the members you have today.
Get your data in one place before making capital decisions. Big spending calls are easier when you can see the whole business at once.
Plan facility upgrades as a whole, not wall by wall. Walls, flooring, training areas and flow through the building all depend on each other.
Give climbers a visible path. Clear steps from beginner to team keep people engaged and make your programs easier to explain.
Build for handoff from day one. If your team can't run it without the consultant, it isn't done.
The piece I'm most glad we built was a custom interactive analytics dashboard. It gave leadership one place to see how the business was doing.
Before that, the numbers lived in separate systems, so getting a full picture meant stitching it together by hand. With everything in one view, the dashboard became the centerpiece of recurring leadership review meetings. The team could look at the same data together and talk about what to do, rather than debating whose numbers were right.
Facilities: planning the whole building
I helped scope a facility-wide capital improvement plan. A wall expansion was one piece of it, with new fundamentals terrain for newer climbers, adjustable training boards and new flooring.
The point was to plan the building as one project rather than a string of separate fixes. I also coordinated with a major wall manufacturer to gather pricing, so leadership could weigh the options with real numbers in hand.
I learned this approach while leading the buildout of the climbing wall at Pitt. Walls, flooring, training terrain and traffic flow all affect each other, and deciding them separately usually costs you later.
Tools and systems
I recommended routesetting management software based on my own experience with it at Pitt. Routesetting management software helps a setting team plan which climbs come down and which go up, track what's on the wall and keep the schedule organized. It's a tool I use myself, so I could say what works day to day.
Handing it off
As the in-person phase wound down, I built a handoff package so the gym's team could own the systems going forward. A consultant who leaves behind work that only they understand hasn't finished the job.
What I'd tell other gym owners
**Audit your programs against member needs, not habit.** Look at what you offer, what it costs, when it runs and who actually uses it. Then ask whether it fits the members you have today.
**Get your data in one place before making capital decisions.** Big spending calls are easier when you can see the whole business at once.
**Plan facility upgrades as a whole, not wall by wall.** Walls, flooring, training areas and flow through the building all depend on each other.
**Give climbers a visible path.** Clear steps from beginner to team keep people engaged and make your programs easier to explain.
**Build for handoff from day one.** If your team can't run it without the consultant, it isn't done.
Work with me
If you're a gym owner, a university or an organization planning a new wall or rethinking how your operation runs, I'd like to hear from you. You can reach me through samgotthelf.com.
If you want something useful in the meantime, my free hold inventory tracker is at samgotthelf.com/hold-tracker (link it to https://samgotthelf.com/hold-tracker).
Comments