Business vs Art

Discussion in 'General Martial Arts Discussion' started by Indie12, Mar 3, 2015.

  1. Indie12

    Indie12 Valued Member

    Most of us know that there's a find line between Martial Arts (the business) and Martial Arts (the art). I mean if you're gonna run and own a school you have to make money at it! (Bills don't pay themselves). But where is that fine line between making money and teaching the art? When it comes to prices, do you think it's ok to set a standard for the amount and then adjust it according to students needs or financial situations? Do you set the price and don't adjust it at all? Where's the fine line between Martial Arts the Art and Martial Arts the business?

    -Debate Away!! :cool:
     
  2. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    It totally depends on the type of class you are running
    For example - an instructor who runs 2 classes a week at the local town hall or sports centre won't have as many overheads, so could adjust the price and should be cheap
    The instructor who opens his own centre with all the equipment will have more overheads so the price will reflect.

    However I'm sure that any decent instructor will make the odd concession if you were to approach them and explain your situation

    Price shouldn't reflect standard of tuition.
    the fine line is between dojo and mc dojo
     
  3. Thomas

    Thomas Combat Hapkido/Taekwondo

    A lot depends on what you are doing it for.

    Some people wish to make a career out of teaching people martial arts - and are willing to teach long hours, have a nice permanent school with all of the best equipment, and so on. There is no reason why a person shouldn't make a healthy living doing something they love. Making money off the martial arts does not necessarily make you a McDojo either. You can run a high quality professional program and charge enough to earn a good living. You just have to make sure you can attract students at that price and provide training worth it.

    That said, I think most martial arts schools are a labor of love, where people run a school to pass on the art, keep training, and to enjoy it. Most of the people in this type have day jobs to pay the bills and hope they can generate enough from the school to pay for itself. Often they still end up paying in during certain times (especially winter, it seems).

    My instructor has been teaching for many years (I've been with him for 20 years now). His goal has been to 'pay the bills'. Anything extra gets rolled into savings for months when we are short.

    Our basic method of determining monthly tuition is to take the yearly cost (rent + utilities + charter fees, etc) and divide it by the rough number of students we expect to maintain. Then compare that number to the local average to keep us competitive (which may mean we need to recruit more people). Tuition, membership fee, and test fees have to be teased out as well - if you include everything, then everyone pays for everything every month. If you tease out the test fees to only test months, then your tuition will have to bump up to cover the leaner months. It all works out about the same.

    We've had cases where people have wanted to train, but couldn't afford our rates. We take care of them either with a sponsor (who pays the tuition) or by having them help with cleaning, set up, or whatever.
     
  4. blindside

    blindside Valued Member

    I am a "pay the rent and hope the proceeds defray my own training costs so my wife doesn't yell" instructor. :D

    I don't make this a career, I have a great day job, I don't have to teach cardio kickboxing or kiddie karate to make rent. This allows me to be picky about my classes, I only teach 18 and up and I get to cater the training of the group to my interests.

    I have given out "scholarships" or defrayed tuition in the past, but quite frankly my rates are among the lowest in the area and most of the time the people I offer these to don't stick for the long term.
     
  5. armanox

    armanox Kick this Ginger...

    Venue makes a huge difference here. Most schools that I deal with the instructors do not make money from teaching there. The money collected pays the rent, goes towards school equipment, and sometimes that's about it. Most schools that I deal with the instructors have other jobs (or are retired at this point) - they are doctors, engineers, truck drivers, law enforcement - and teach martial arts because they want to.

    What I've noticed is that schools that you find in rec centers, community centers, churches, etc; tend to low to no cost. Stand alone schools in shopping malls and shopping centers, or that have enough $$ to have their own building tend to be very expensive - and usually how you can tell between who's in it as a business and who is in it for fun.
     
  6. aaradia

    aaradia Choy Li Fut and Yang Tai Chi Chuan Student Moderator Supporter

    To me the line to be drwan is that one doesn't compromise the quality of the art taught to make cash.

    For example: you have crossed the line if you let someone test who isn't ready, because they threaten to quit if they don't advance soon.
     
  7. Indie12

    Indie12 Valued Member

    I like your Instructors idea!! That's me too, just enough to pay the bills, but anything extra goes towards the school for such expenses.

    With your sponsor, who do you usually use and what do they get out it? Meaning how do they retain their investment?
     
  8. LemonSloth

    LemonSloth Laugh and grow fat!

    This might sound a little arbitrary but I tend to view it on two main (but not the only) principles:

    1) Covering overheads. As has already been stated, if you're in a village hall a couple of times a week, your overheads won't be so high - therefore you need to charge less to cover them. Which also means you don't have to charge as much in order to pay for yourself as if you had your own centre and bills. Where this becomes a problem for me is when the prices don't just cover your bills and a little something for you to live on, but if you start to earn enough you can pay for your own receptionists or accountants...yeah.

    2) The prices don't make training non-accessible for the average person. If your prices are high enough that the average household doesn't look at the bill for training at a place and cry to think about it. There's also things like hidden contract clauses that (for me) make it about the business rather than art, excessive fees and long term rolling contracts (because the drop out rate in MA is massive).

    Beyond that...it's a pretty fine line.
     
  9. Thomas

    Thomas Combat Hapkido/Taekwondo

    Ha! For us, a sponsor is just one of us willing to pay for someone's training. We've had kids join who were super talented but whose parents couldn't afford the cost - so we paid their fees so long as they came and trained. All we get is the pleasure of having good dedicated students. There is no monetary return for sure.
     
  10. Indie12

    Indie12 Valued Member

    Getting good dedicated students is hard these days!
     

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