South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club Case Study
What Is South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club?  South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club is one of CoachMePlus’s most recent success stories. This gym has found that our program benefits them in ways that go above the traditional gym experience. Here is an overview of how CoachMePlus has made South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club more convenient and more beneficial for […]

What Is South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club? 

South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club is one of CoachMePlus’s most recent success stories. This gym has found that our program benefits them in ways that go above the traditional gym experience. Here is an overview of how CoachMePlus has made South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club more convenient and more beneficial for both athletes and staff members. Plus, here are helpful insights into how our program is helping make the club even better!

South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club (SBWC) opened in 2010 as a side project of owner Paulie Steinman. He started the gym so he and his friends would have a place dedicated to Powerlifting and Weightlifting. South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club prides itself on its commitment to presenting weight training in a nontraditional gym format. SBWC physically looks like a collegiate training center, but unlike a sports team, the members have more diverse goals and obstacles. In-person SBWC coaches are able to guide each athlete in a way that is appropriate to their own circumstances.

Although the club began as a powerlifting training center for a group of friends, it has expanded to one of the premier barbell sports, strength, and performance training facilities in Brooklyn and New York City. Working with members of various levels of experience and unique goals, SBWC began to consider an athlete management system. 

Why SBWC Chose CoachMePlus 

South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club wanted a program that provided a strong balance between affordability and components. With the goal of finding a program that offered a wide selection of features to fit the needs of all their athletes, the club began by researching other programs. Although other programs were potential fits based on the features they included, most cost more than the club wanted to spend. South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club ultimately decided that CoachMePlus’s lower cost and overall features made it the most attractive, as it hit the sweet spot for their needs. 

weightlifting gym
A barbell loaded with weights sits above an Olympic style platform.

CoachMePlus and South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club

South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club has seen a wide range of improvements in operations and in its members’ performance since implementing the use of CoachMePlus. Even after one week, SBWC staff and community were excited for their new system.  “The clean UI makes performance tracking a breeze with easy to use data entry right in the app. As part of our reopening protocols, we implemented a mandatory COVID questionnaire. Additionally, due to the functionality of the app, we were able to add both a daily wellness and an RPE questionnaire!” 

These changes have aided how the club works with new members and stays organized. In addition to tracing Covid, CoachMePlus allows members to identify pain and soreness and to track other factors that may affect their performance (like sleep or stress levels). Coaches access these responses to help members improve by keeping their subjective wellness in mind. Here is an overview of some of the most important CoachMePlus features South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club has implemented. Plus, here’s how they are helping members meet their goals!

Coach scheduling in CoachMePlus

Improved Onboarding Process

Knowing how to create a strong first impression is a must when it comes to attracting and keeping gym members. Thus, South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club has used CoachMePlus to improve its onboarding process to help new members get acclimated to and feel at home in its unique atmosphere faster. This has positively impacted its overall retention and new member satisfaction. The club has grown to over 200 members within a relatively short amount of time, crediting CoachMePlus to an improved onboarding process as being an integral part of its growth. 

Personalized Coaching in Person

With those more than 200 members comes the increased need for a strong organizational system. Training sessions – available throughout the day – have a cap of 16 members. While there is a team-like atmosphere, individuals are not necessarily all doing the same training at the same time. Workout plans must be appropriate for each person, taking into account different training loads and levels of experience. Therefore, it is important for every member to access and use a flexible system that the coaches can review with them and adjust in real time during the session.

Increased Independently Driven Learning

Although South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club workouts primarily take place in person, members also must take steps to improve on their own when they are not physically present in the club’s gym. CoachMePlus provides a wide range of exercises within their video library that can be executed with limited equipment. By taking advantage of CoachMePlus’s individual app assignments, members have experienced an overall higher level of growth. They also have the ability to remain accountable in their strength training no matter the circumstances. 

Added Opportunities to Work With Non-Local Athletes

For serious athletes and fitness enthusiasts, skipping the gym for the duration of a trip is simply not an option. As little as a week without a workout can be enough to delay or regress in different goals. Although many gyms offer some type of day pass or allow athletes to purchase a single class, they do not always offer a helpful way of making sure athletes continue to meet their goals if they only utilize an unfamiliar location. South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club could not keep accountability and tracking for traveling members until partnering with CoachMePlus. 

Although South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club functions primarily as a face-to-face environment, it is also open for remote athletes. Right now, only Paulie is offering fully remote training to athletes but CoachMePlus has made it easier for these non-local athletes to train. Through the app,  athletes get their own unique program through CoachMePlus. By using the Video Library athletes can upload videos to show their movement, or Paulie can share videos to instruct the athletes.

Increased Ability to Provide Data to Athletes

Serious athletes prioritize analyzing and tracking the factors that impact their performance and skills. By giving South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club more options for providing athletes with helpful data, CoachMePlus has increased the ability of the club’s members to take the initiative to dig deeper into the factors that are contributing to their performance and learning how to improve than their instructors have time to explicitly tell them.

Athletes are then able to combine their constant access to data with the information they learn from their instructors in person to have the most consistent and well-rounded picture of how they are doing at any given time. The data that CoachMePlus includes in the athletes’ dashboard provides insights and motivation. 

Implemented Wellness Tracking 

Athletes’ overall mood, whether they feel tired or stressed, and other aspects of how they are physically and mentally feeling on any given day can have a significant impact on their performance. Although athletes prefer to push through each workout, the reality is that their wellness can have a major effect on their ability to do so. Knowing what they are dealing with helps athletes go into the gym with a more accurate idea of what they can reasonably expect from themselves. Also, they know what the most likely cause of a less than stellar training session might be and how to fix it.

Athlete wellness survey.

CoachMePlus’s wellness tracking feature gives both athletes and instructors an idea of how various factors may affect performance. Then, it highlights key steps athletes should consider taking to improve their overall strength and health. It can also let athletes know if meeting with a trainer prior to a class might be beneficial. Since implementing CoachMePlus, South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club has seen athletes and instructors become more in tune with their overall health. 

What Are South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club Team Members Saying About CoachMePlus? 

When asked about why he would recommend CoachMePlus and plans to continue to use it, South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club founder Paulie explained that, “for me, it’s because it does a lot, and does almost everything we need. I haven’t seen anything better at this price point. It is a very balanced offering for a ‘sweet spot’. It is easy to budget when we know how much it will cost per athlete per month. I have to watch the budget so I can keep the price for my athletes fair.” Paulie’s prioritization of taking advantage of multiple angles parallels that of many of our clients. 

South Brooklyn Weightlifting Club is far from the only gym that has found success using CoachMePlus, and we are always interested in partnering with new gyms. If you are interested in improving your gym, team, or other fitness organization and are not sure where to start, we can’t wait to work with you. Contact us today to learn more about how CoachMePlus can improve the productivity of your athletes and business. Request a free demo!

Features that made a difference

Report Generator

Create a clear summary of athletic training, rehabilitation, and recovery trends with the click of a button. The reports are vivid, easy to create, and can be exported.

Athlete Questionnaires

Every athlete is automatically assigned our research-backed Wellness Questionnaire so that you can start monitoring your athletes on Day 1.

Assessment Monitor

Get a complete view of all your athletes and track their training compliance in real-time on one screen. Set up and customize the display to include any data of your choosing.

Paulie Steinman
Performance Tracking [is] a breeze
The clean UI makes performance tracking a breeze with easy to use data entry right in the app...Due to the functionality of the app, we were able to add both a daily wellness and an RPE questionnaire!