Rolando Delgado is an American mixed martial artist. He has fought for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, and Bellator Fighting Championships. He was a cast member on The Ultimate Fighter 8. After departing from the UFC, Delgado dropped back down to his original weight class and won twice in Arkansas MMA promotions and later at an undercard fight by unanimous decision.
Delgado opened a gym in Little Rock called Westside MMA and works there as a coach along with others such as Matt Hamilton, Borris Washington and T.J. Brown. The gym is an 8,000 square foot facility located minutes from Downtown Little Rock and houses Brazilian Jiu Jitsu World Champion Hillary Williams and UFC / Bellator veteran Mike Wessel and is open to aspiring athletes of all levels.
He and guest host R.J. Martino will discuss the in’s and out’s of opening a gym or other exercise or fitness related business.
What are Mixed martial arts (MMA)? MMA is a full-contact combat sport that allows the use of both striking and grappling techniques, both standing and on the ground, from a variety of other combat sports and martial arts. Various mixed-style contests took place throughout Europe, Japan and the Pacific Rim during the early 1900s. Up In Your Business is a Radio Show by FlagandBanner.com
[0:00:03.2] TB: Welcome to Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy. Be sure to stay tuned till the end of the show to hear how you can get a copy of this program and other helpful documents.
Now, it's time for Kerry McCoy to get all up in your business.
[INTERVIEW]
[0:00:19.9] RJM: This is RJ Martino, special guest host for up in your business with Kerry McCoy where Arkansas best entrepreneurs give advice on your business and your problems. You guys who are listening know that Kerry’s on here every week from two to three on Friday’s and you probably have heard of Kerry’s business but if not, Kerry started her business going door to door, selling flags and has built it into a four million dollar business selling both online and through her showroom floor found right here in Little Rock Arkansas.
One of the things she likes to tell me about is there’s no such thing as an overnight success, the advice that you’ll hear today is far and wide but even better, it’s free. We bring business owners here who have real world experience that can help answer any of your questions, whether you’re a business owner or just a professional.
I’m the special guest host, RJ Martino, owner of iProv, we are a Digital Marketing and IT Company and I want to introduce the people that are with me. To my left, you just heard from Tim. Say hi Tim.
[0:01:19.8] TB: Hey Tim.
[0:01:20.9] RJM: Next to Tim, we have G Love in the house.
[0:01:25.0] GLOVE: What’s up, from the Ambush Lounge live Tuesday night.
[0:01:27.3] RJM: What time?
[0:01:28.7] GLOVE: 7:00 every Tuesday, KBF 88.3, the voice of the people.
[0:01:32.5] RJM: The voice of the people. I’ve got with me a special guest, we’ve got Roli Delgado. Roli is a close friend of mine, has been for a long time but before we were friends, he was a coach of mine at a local gym. He’s a father, a husband and owner of Westside Kickboxing and MMA. Roli’s a former MMA fighter turned business owner whose gym is located just downtown right here in Little Rock Arkansas. Roli man, good to see you.
[0:01:59.1] RD: Yeah, I’m happy to be here man, this is awesome.
[0:02:01.2] RJM: Well I gave a little short introduction but let’s let the listeners hear a little bit about you, tell me about yourself.
[0:02:06.6] RD: Yeah, from a professional standpoint, local business owner, I have been in business with Matt Hamilton at Westside MMA for just over 10 years now, had a great 10 year anniversary party this year and –
[0:02:18.1] RJM: Man, I can’t believe it’s been 10 years.
[0:02:19.7] RD: Yeah, time does fly by man.
[0:02:21.0] RJM: It’s terrible. It’s almost depressing how fast time goes.
[0:02:25.1] RD: It can be, yeah. that’s my main gig man, I just do little things on the side but that gym has been like my main success story for sure.
[0:02:34.9] RJM: This show is really a question and answer show and if callers don’t call in, it’s a whole lot harder for us to kind of get through the full hour. I want all of you listeners out there that have anything that they want to ask Roli about whether it’s his professional UFC career, whether it’s his gym and owning a gym, whether it’s how he built the courage to actually jump out and do this on his own because one thing you don’t hear about Roli’s store is he had a successful professional career before he became a professional UFC fighter before he opened up his gym.
At some point, that takes a little bit of guts too. If you’re interested in calling us, give us a shout, I want to kind of kick it off, before we get into the business and kind of running your own business, how did you go and kind of go from mixed martial arts and jiu jitsu boxing to actually becoming a gym owner?
[0:03:21.1] RD: I actually did it in like the reverse order. I was just a teenager training in the pioneer days of MMA and so I was already fighting professionally when I decided to open the gym and so I kind of opened it from a fighter’s perspective, not knowing squat about business but I just knew that I wanted more out of my training and if I wanted it a certain way, I was going to have the build it and so luckily I was able to partner up with Matt Hamilton, still my business partner, we created something really special and it’s luckily, what we do is so - we were so passionate about it.
We’re both pretty good coaches that it got us through the learning curve of business you know? Any mistakes that we made along the way, we were able to get through them just because we were providing a pretty good service. That’s how I did it, almost every other fighter, you think you done fighting and now what? You know, they’re qualified to coach, they haven’t really picked up any other skills from fighting.
I have a gym while I was fighting and it served me really well to transition from fighting to just doing that full time.
[0:04:24.2] RJM: It’s got to be kind of a constant balance of getting new clients or members versus creating an atmosphere and investing in the existing atmosphere. I mean, how do you go about balancing those things?
[0:04:36.7] RD: Yeah, you have to pay attention you know? We’ve ran some really great specials recently and they were so well, we had to shut them down, that’s how we do it, we don’t get greedy, slow quality growth is so under rated, everybody, like you were saying, wants to be an overnight success and in this industry, the retention’s a lot higher than the typical fitness gym, we get quality people in the doors and we want to keep them.
We basically try to be a really reasonably priced option for people and create long lasting memberships and I think that keeps our work load down, makes our jobs more enjoyable and it helps us maintain that balance so for sure, we’re not doing everything perfectly right now.
We’re constantly trying to make it better but we’re not really trying to reinvent ourselves, we’ve been in business 10 years now, we haven’t killed each other yet. I think we have something special and I’m always walking the line between trying not to ruin a good thing, trying to make it great, you know, there’s a line there.
I think we’re doing a pretty good job of it but we are definitely trying to do better.
[0:05:41.8] RJM: Yeah, you know, we always talk about it in our office, the business owners are constantly digging for diamonds and a lot of times, you don’t even realize that you are on the diamond mine right now. You have something special already but it’s often the mindset of owners that want to continue to go out and develop and keep digging and find something new and for most of my career, I’ve gotten the most success out of complete focus as supposed to digging for diamond somewhere else.
It’s that focus that really has turned into success. Roli, have you ever thought about a different career? Is there something that you might have imagined you were doing when you were younger?
[0:06:19.0] RD: You know, when I was a kid, I always thought I was going to be a police officer and one day I just realized, they don’t really get to do what they want to do every day, they get bogged down in the administrative stuff and unfortunately, lot of the cops have their hands tied and it just kind of hit me one day, I was leaving outside and it was raining.
The guy was working off duty but you know, he was out there directing traffic in the rain with a poncho on and I thought, “man, they’re not really getting to just chase bad guys all the time.” Kind of the same thing with attorneys, you think they’re always in core but they’re normally piled up with paper work.
Really, I love being an entrepreneur, I love working for myself, I take the good with the bad and I just won’t work with somebody else, I mean, I won’t work for somebody else. Everything I do is going to be out of partnership level with people and so, if it’s not this, I think I could have fun building anything, I always make the joke, if I lost everything, I just go do roost for six months and then I’d have a roofing company you know?
[0:07:14.7] RJM: This is something unique about business owners, the fear of having one job is greater than the fear of having no job. A lot of entrepreneurs see themselves as the most risky thing I can do is work for one company. The most risky thing I can do is go and have just one client whereas a lot of people out there, a lot of professional see themselves as “I need a security in that one job.”
Often, entrepreneurs see that as almost a risk so –
[0:07:43.3] RD: I agree. The thing is, you know, we’re all wired different, we’re all born with you know, certain hardware and we develop our software through our life and our experiences and so a lot of people, you hear them say like “I’d like to own my own business one day” but that’s as far as it goes and ideally, I think everybody kind of likes the idea of having their own thing. This is definitely not for everybody, some people are much better off being able to clock out of five, and you know, and relax and enjoy the other side of their life and some people, they cannot do that.
They cannot clock out at five and shut it off. I think recognizing your own personal desires and your own makeup, what makes you, you. That can really help you make the right decisions on what you want to do. I have some great employees that work for me and I don’t think they have the desire to deal with a different stressors that people like you may deal with and that’s okay.
I think people, as long as you’re honest with yourself, if you’re miserable working for other people and you're always thinking about what you would do different and what you would like to do and how you could do it better, well then, you need to take that leap, life’s too short you know?
Because you could get laid off next year, your company, you got the best boss in the world, he decides to sell out or God forbid, something happens to him, that company gets sold. Your whole world is flipped outside down. You know, security is such an illusion.
Yeah, if you have it in you, then take that leap because like I said, life’s too short, make it happen.
[0:09:00.3] RJM: Yeah, you know, those are great points and again, I want to give out the phone number because I want you guys calling in with questions, comments or just thoughts, a lot of you guys have lived the life of a professional and want to hear about how people go off and start their own business.
One of the things that happens whenever you start a business, you have this concept that “God, you know what would be great? Is if I could train all day, if I just was a professional fighter, but nobody’s going to pay me to do that so what I’m going to do is I’m going to start my own gym.” In your head, you eluded to this before with the police officer, you think you’re going to be policing all day, attorneys, you think you’re going to be in court all day.
Business owners, it’s the worst, business owners, it is. I thought I was going to be training and now, I’m actually having to build memberships, having to convince people to continue to pay their membership. Tell me a little bit about that because in my head, I think you go to the gym, eight to five and just hit a punching bag all day.
[0:09:54.0] RD: Yeah. That’s the best part is getting to get those sessions in in the middle of the day and workout and man, when we were younger, we actually got away with doing it more often but now that the business has grown, it’s just, you know, you have – in the business like our gym, you know, we don’t really need somebody there 10 hours a day, 12 hours a day. There’s a lot of spots where you didn’t expect that person to walk in or the phone rang or something’s come up.
We’re just constantly pulled in other directions. Sometimes I actually envy my customers, my clients, my students, whatever you want to call them, most of them are my friends but I really envy them because when they get in the gym, nobody bothers them. They’re there and they’re there to train and a lot of times, I’ll be working out with them and then somebody comes and they ask me a question.
You know, that’s my job, I’m the coach but in that moment, I was just another jiu jitsu player or another MMA guy. It is tough.
[0:10:51.3] RJM: I cut you off a little bit earlier and I just want to make sure we cover what we talked about which is, in my head, I think you are training from 8 to 5 and often, it could be an attorney, you think you’re going to be in court from 8 to 5 but in your head, you really are doing very – just a small amount of training versus everything else.
How much time from let’s say a normal eight to five day do you actually get – are you training?
[0:11:14.1] RD: For me, like time that I’m actually training, it really just depends on like what cycle I’m on in my year you know? I’ve got a match that I took that’s coming up so it’s going to go up to where probably 60% of the time, I’m in the gym, I’m actually training and that gets down really low.
Other times, a good rule of thumb would be like maybe 25% of the time, I’m actually working out and the other 75% of the time, I’m doing some form of sales man and you know, everything’s sales so when I’m cleaning the gym which we can always do a better job of, that’s part of creating a good first impression to help us out with our sales and when I’m answering the call, it’s about sales and when I’m following up on a payment transaction that didn’t go through, you know, we’re in the business of sales.
So are attorneys, you know, cops aren’t, taking it back to what we’re talking about before but you know, a big part of the job is just getting your message across and really articulating to people what you do and closing the deal.
[0:12:10.3] RJM: Roli, whenever you guys open the gym, what was the reaction from the local community and tell me about the growth over whenever you got started?
[0:12:19.1] RD: We went out into West Little Rock when we first started in 2006 and there was just nothing going on at the time. There was a small gym in Sherwood and another small gym in Benton and there just was nothing in Little Rock or West Little Rock and so there were a lot of people that were just like great, they were exposed to it a little bit on TV and so we actually really kind of hit the ground running just because there was a gap in the market and we filled that gap.
Then the reality show really started to take off, The Ultimate Fighter and that, we were running commercials on that local commercials. At that time, it was really affordable and that really brought in a lot of people as well so we actually didn’t have like those struggling years, I felt we also did a really good job of not just – like the facility we have now – our first facility was nothing like it, it was about the size of our lobby and we were really conservative with our expenses, I wasn’t on full time yet, it was just Matt, Matt was taking a highly reduced salary you know?
We didn’t really have too bad a struggle in years, we worked really hard but I do credit a lot of luck to the good star, you know, just it was 2006, the sport was emerging, there wasn’t anybody else in the market and so that was what it was like in 06 and so we spent one year in that facility and we went form 1,800 square feet to 8,000 square feet and created a monster gym and we thought we’d never fill this place up.
Now there’s not room for any other pieces of equipment. We actually own – we own more equipment and it’s either, disassembled or stored in friends of ours gyms because you know, we filled up 8,000 square feet with mats, bags, a boxing ring, a full sized cage, it’s just – we could use more.
[0:14:01.1] RJM: Wow, that’s great. You referenced The Ultimate Fighter, for the listeners out there who have watched The Ultimate Fighter, it is kind of the – it’s kind of preliminary for – it’s a reality show. Roli spent some time on The Ultimate Fighter, although you didn’t win, you actually were – you fought on the finale and one in the finale man.
[0:14:18.9] RD: Yeah, I won that fight, that was the – if I was going to win one, that was the one that matter because they don’t pay you for the fights on the show, so luckily, that was the best payday I ever had was winning that fight. Yeah, I was really fortunate that they brought everybody back that season and then that got me that fight and then two more fights in the UFC and then I spring boarded that into a fight with Belator and a couple of other organizations and then I retired and I retired well.
That’s something that not many people can do in this sport, a lot of people stay in too long and –
[0:14:51.9] RJM: You say that – you’ve actually – don’t you have matches coming up?
[0:14:54.9] RD: Well yeah, Jiu jitsu matches, you know, that’s totally different from MMA. Jiu Jitsu is something that guys like us can still keep our competitive fire going, we can still set goals for tournaments and get in shape for them. It’s tough and it’s hard and someone’s trying to choke me but no one’s punching me in the face, it is definitely, I consider it a match not a fight you know?
[0:15:17.3] RJM: Sure. Talk about some of the misconceptions that you have for people that don’t maybe we’ve got listeners who know a lot about business but might not understand what the UFC or MMA is, talk about some of those misconceptions that you confront?
[0:15:30.0] RD: Yeah, there still are people like Meryl Streep made a comment recently, it was all over the internet, everybody was reacting to it and you know, that it’s barbaric or what not but just like for a guy like me, Nascar is really boring, you got people just racing in a circle, making left turns, that’s obviously an over simplification of what’s going on, I’m just ignorant to you know, what it takes to get a good pit crew going or the right driver or whatever technology they’re doing with the vehicles.
There’s so much more to it than I know at first glance. A lot of people see MMA as just like barbaric, there’s not any technique to it, you know, you still have some boxers that kind of like have an elitist mentality to the striking they see in MMA and but man, it’s the hardest sport in the world bar none, there’s no doubt about it in my mind, they have to wear so many hats to compete at the level these days and unlike a lot of other sports.
Man, these fighters you know, they have a whole camp getting ready for a fight and when that fight doesn’t work out the way they hoped, they have to sit on that loss for months, sometimes six months before they have another fight and that’s really mental, I mean it’s really draining on somebody and a lot of sports, the Razorback’s lose a football game, well next week, they have another game.
They have to get over that loss and then they win the next game and then that’s over, now they’re on to the next match. Team sports are a lot easier on the psychological side, fighting, you’re really out there on your own, of course you’re in there with your team in some regards but it is a mental sport and that’s the thing that breaks a lot of people down and gets them out of the sport.
It’s just exhausting you know? All the cutting weight, the training is unbelievable what these guys have to do. They’re working a ton on their boxing, their strength and conditioning is going well and they realize, “crap, I’m not doing enough jiu jitsu,” you know, they start doing the jiujitsu and it’s like, “I got to do my wrestling. My body’s breaking down” and they got to start swimming just so they’re doing something and not tearing up their body.
It’s just a constant revolving door of changing of exercises and just keeping those guys motivated and sharp, it’s – the good gyms know to look out for burnout and fatigue and pay attention to those things but a lot of these fighters in these big gyms, they fall through the cracks.
You know, it just breaks them down so it’s a tough sport, you know, at 35 now, I’m a softy, I’ll see fights and I’m like, “Stop the fight.” I’m not like, “Let it go.” When I was younger, I might go, “Well let them go, he’s a professional you know? Give him every opportunity possible” and now I’m like, “No, that’s enough, safety first,” I really feel for these guys.
[0:15:30.0] RJM: You're a competitor and you’re still competing, you’re a coach, which means that guys are relying on you to coach them but you’re a business owner, let’s talk a little bit about the business itself. Gym and your gyms, are they all the same as one healthcare, one of the clubs different than another, is owning an MMA gym different than say, owning a team fitness.
[0:18:18.3] RD: Yeah, absolutely. Well, we’re just so much more of a niche market. You could cast a really broad net when you have a basic fitness gym, if there’s a hundred people out there, there’s 85 of them, 90 of them are going to be potential customers for an actual gym.
Almost everybody needs some form of a gym to go to and work out but then when you break it down to like adult kickboxing or adult Brazilian jiu jitsu, the number of potential clients drops down drastically, there’s just a lot of people where they’re just going to go, “Nope, that’s not for me.”
That’s okay. Targeting your market, it’s a lot more specific and in today’s day and age, I think we were talking about earlier you know, with social media that the ability to target your demographic, it’s a lot easier now than it ever was.
The old days when we would do post card campaigns, things of that nature, you’re doing your best to hit the households with the right income levels. Kids of certain age groups, man, that was so expensive and the return sometimes, you’d be into things for thousands of dollars and it would take you two months to realize it was a dud and now, you know, you can run a campaign for a week and you know immediately how it worked out.
Normally it works out pretty well and if it didn’t work out, you’re not out thousands of dollars. It’s definitely a different market than just – we’re in more than just the fitness market that’s for sure.
[0:19:38.0] RJM: Alongside Roli Delgado, I’ve also got my buddy G Love.
[0:19:40.7] GLOVE: Hey, what’s going on?
[0:19:41.8] RJM: G Love is a UFC fan and both he and I both are big MMA fans and we were actually talking about what you just mentioned which is how much of it is in your head with Ronda Rousey coming back for anyone out there who is an MMA fan, so much of it seem like it was in her head.
Tell us how, what you do in the gym, translates as a business owner, I think a lot of times I do is psyche myself out of doing certain things because my head’s not – tell us about that mental game that you talked about.
[0:20:10.5] RD: Man, that’s a great question. Not just MMA but like jiu jitsu, kickboxing, any combat sport, wrestling, you know, there’s a lot of times in a match or in a fight that you just get put in horrible positions or situations so that we’re not part of the plan and you’re just faced with like three options.
You know, one is to quit, the other is to freak out, and then the third option is to just work yourself out of it. Whenever I’m in a bad situation, whether it be everything’s coming at me at once, you know, business wise and in my personal life or if I lose control of my vehicle on an icy road, quitting’s never an option and freaking out, I know from fighting, when I freak out in a bad position, I normally get submitted because I leave something behind you know?
If I’m on an icy road and I lose control, I just try to stay off the brake and point the tires in the direction I hope the car goes you know? You just tackle it with the best that you have at your disposal. It’s not always what you want you know? I forget who it was, somebody says you don’t go to war with what you want, you go to war with what you have.
Sometimes you’re in a bad situation and you don’t have much but you know, you just try to solve the problem with what you have, you come through a lot of that stuff, you come out of it. Then when you come out of it, you come out of it really well.
I talked to fighters about you know, when you see a fighter in the UFC get really fatigued, you see desperation shots, spinning back firsts, flying knees, tons of head kicks and that’s a tired fighter and what we always tell our guys is when things are getting bad, get basic.
Collect yourself, start going back to that jab and when that jab starts landing, all of a sudden your lungs come back because you're finding success and then you put something behind the jab and then all of a sudden you’re putting more than just a jab, you're throwing more than just two punches and you’re throwing combinations again and you came out of the round you know?
Maybe you were getting your butt kicked for four minutes but the last minute, you came back alive. Now that guy’s tired, you got the round, the judges just remember the last 60 seconds and you’re back in the fight you know?
[0:22:07.8] RJM: That’s good business advice too.
[0:22:10.7] RD: Man, I think just life in general, whether it’s your marriage or whatever man, things get crazy but it’s just like jiu jitsu, I’ll be training, my coach is in town right now and he is as close to a God on the mat as you can be, he’s a little guy and he’s amazing. He always smashes me but I’m a specialist in one move right?
There’s just this one move that pretty much, if I get this move on you, I can tap you out. Even when he’s smashing me and which is every time we roll, I’m always in the fight because I know that I’m probably not going to get there but if I can, I can get him. That keeps me mannerly like in the game, it stops me from breaking in kind of like an ace in the hole kind of thing and you don’t always get it, you don’t get to pull it but –
It at least keeps you in the fight because once you give up, you have 0% chance of winning. So, if not giving up gives me a very small percent chance of coming out of it, by giving up takes it all away well then I am just going to play the odds. I treat it like a blackjack table. You just play the odds, you know go for motion.
[0:23:12.3] RJM: What do you think people get out of MMA, jujitsu when they come in the first time? They have never done it before, what do you think they get, what do they maybe not expecting it?
[0:23:21.5] RD: You’re asking about specifically the first time or?
[0:23:24.7] RJM: Or just like when they are new to it and they’re coming in the gym, what do you think they’re coming in for? We talked a little earlier like people get a little bit more than they expected.
[0:23:32.2] RD: Yeah, exactly. People come in and they’re like, “Oh I’m going to learn how to fight. I’ve always wanted to learn how to fight or defend myself. I am going to get in shape” and they do. You do that for sure but what keeps people is the relationships they develop in the gym. You know your job or your office it’s not always contusive for those types of relationships. You may not need to have close relationships with your co-workers in certain professions.
It may not be an option and in the gym, you end up making – you are 35, 40 years old and you find yourself like never talking to your old high school friends or college buddies again. Everybody is married and they have their own lives and one day you just walk into the gym out of shape to get back into shape and you make these friends and that’s what keeps you coming back because it’s like, “Oh I’m off work and I’ll go hang out with my friends”.
And then the jujitsu or kick boxing, that becomes a byproduct of that. So if all of my buddies were at the bar, I’m going to the bar and I am going to hang out with my buddies at the bar. So it really works out well and I think that that was something that we talked about earlier like trying not to grow too fast or losing sight of your current members and trying to get 50 new members because it’s January and everybody is looking for something new.
We have something really special in my gym where everybody and the community is amazing and that’s what’s keep them coming back. I have so many members that have been members for five, six, seven years. I have some people that have been there for 10 years since we opened and it’s awesome and it’s because it’s a great place to be and you go there. There’s no drama, there’s no stress, we don’t nickel and dime our customers. We just keep it about the training and then it’s just a natural thing, everybody gets really close.
[0:25:09.5] RJM: You talked about being busy. You talked about you don’t have enough time to do all the things that you need to do and one of the first things people say is, why don’t you just hire people? Why don’t you start hiring people to do all of these stuff you don’t want to do?
[0:25:23.2] RD: Man, it’s amazing that I know just like yourself so many business owners, so many of my clients run amazing businesses and if we could just hire the right people, our businesses would be huge you know? And it’s really hard to find good employees these days. I promise you, I have a couple of rental properties and you hear about like landlord laws and this and that. I could promise you this, you give me a good tenant and I will break my back for that tenant.
If you are paying your rent on time and you’re taking care of my place, if that air conditioner is not working, you’d better bet the first thing that I am doing when I get the text from your call is that I’m getting your air conditioner fixed and it’s the same thing with employees. Guys, if you are listening to this and you’re an employee somewhere, be a producer. I promise you, no matter how tough times get the producers never get cut.
And I am not saying like it’s tough if you are in HR position or if you are stuck in middle management somewhere, it’s hard to quantify your roles like that but I mean if you are in a shop or if you’re in service industry or if you are in sales, if you are manufacturing, if you are a producer be a squeaky wheel. Let them know you’re producing. Make sure that “hey, just so you know I am not bragging but everybody over here is they are running 80% and I just want you to know I’m doing 95%.I am putting in the work,” you won’t lose your job and you’ll be so valuable, you’ll be able to create your own races.
[0:26:50.5] RJM: Yeah.
[0:26:51.0] RD: And I promise you, I want an employee. I want a sales person that’s so good, somebody that can manage the gym, he doesn’t mind taking out the trash when somebody else missed it but he is also doing the sales. I want someone that’s so good that they’re coming to me and they’re making me give them raises and I’m like, “Gosh dang it, I’ve got to do it, give me that guy.” That’s what I want but these people are hard to find and I understand developing that in people is important.
But that’s a full time job in it of itself and I’m not great at managing people but you get it, that’s the whole why don’t I just hire somebody because quite frankly your average American is lazy and I hate to put it out that way. That’s the reality of it right there, you see? The average person needs to be told what to do and then they need to be followed up with and it’s so frustrating but that’s not me, you know?
[0:27:38.6] RJM: I always in my head it was, “I’m going to start this business because I can do this task. I’m going to get a customer. I’m going to get an employee to do the work and then I’m going to get another customer and I’m going to get that employee to keep doing this work” and in your head, you were actually doing IT work, marketing work and training and what you don’t realize and what no one ever told me is that the biggest time suck in my day and I say time suck not in a negative way.
But the thing that takes the most time is HR. It’s finding people and I never thought that would be hard. I thought if I had a bucket of money saying I need you to do work, that the people would just come.
[0:28:15.8] RD: It would be that simple right? It’s like there’s a joke on Facebook, you guys might have seen it. I don’t know who the comedian was but it’s like I bought a donut, they gave me a donut and they gave me a receipt. I don’t need a receipt.
[0:28:27.5] GLOVE: That’s Mitch Hepburn.
[0:28:28.8] RD: It’s good stuff you know? Right, yeah I am glad somebody else has seen it. There’s no need for a receipt. This is a simple transaction, I give you money you give me donut and as business owners, we see it like that. “Hey I am going to pay you this money and you’re going to do these tasks” and somehow, there’s just so much more to it than that, that time it takes to train somebody and then developing the trust where you can actually leave that person alone and let them do their job.
And trust them to do it right and have your business in their best interest. That is the hardest part. I bet we could have ten callers and all ten if they’re all business owners they would all agree that’s the toughest part.
[0:29:09.6] RJM: And starting off that is something that you just don’t even think of. You don’t think that that’s going to be the struggle.
[0:29:14.9] GLOVE: So a quick question, if you could fight anyone living or dead, you know the fight club question, who would you fight?
[0:29:22.8] RD: That’s a good one man. I am so passive nowadays. I have to really dig down deep and try to think who would be a fun person to fight. To be honest and this is going to sound egotistical but any professional fighter will agree, I can’t just say Hitler because that is not a fight. I would get no gratification just beating up somebody that is a 140 pounds that was never trained to fight. So I’ve got to think of a really mean guy that’s also pretty tough, you know what I mean?
So I can get gratification from breaking that person who’s just beating somebody up that you’re better than that is like six months of jujitsu and you’re that guy. If you have never trained before but you’ve done six months of consistent training every day in jujitsu, then you will have no trouble with somebody that has never trained before assuming we’re in a wrestler in college or an amateur boxing champion or something.
[0:29:22.8] RJM: Roli, it’s got to be – you should be at the office closing deals right now because I know at the beginning of the year this year, one of my goals and one of everybody’s goal in here is something regarding health, fitness, losing weight, something like that. Am I making that up, am I wrong, is it crazy right now?
[0:30:39.8] RD: Yeah, no we are definitely getting more calls right now and business is good. It’s a great time of the year. So we actually had a very promising fight. He is going to be competing and defending his belt in Memphis this weekend. So my business partner, I knew I might be on the radio so he has the phones forwarded to his cellphone. We don’t have any classes between the hours of one and five. So the gym is actually closed right now but the phone is getting answered and we’re still making appointments. So yeah, it’s a great time.
[0:31:05.5] RJM: Since we’re on the topic, you’ve got a number for anyone that’s listening that’s been dying for a number?
[0:31:09.7] RD: Absolutely, yeah. It’s 501-663-3850 and the thing I like to tell people and this is my spiel for the gym for anybody that is listening, yes we have some professional fighters at the gym but you know we have – I should know how many members we have but somewhere between 250 and 300 members. There is only six or seven fighters. I would go broke if it was a real intimidating place. I promise you we are beginner friendly. That’s the only way I can stay in business.
And a lot of these folks that have done big things in our gym, they started with us from absolute scratch, no wrestling backgrounds, no boxing backgrounds and so it’s a place where you can go not in the perfect shape and not know anything and you can start learning in a positive environment that’s actually going to give you the feedback and encouragement you need. So don’t feel like, “Oh this guy fought in the UFC” if all I was doing was training fighters I would literary just have a three car garage.
And I would just work fighters out of my garage, I wouldn’t even have a phone number you know? But that’s not my business. That’s just a byproduct of what we do. I love doing that but that is not my business.
[0:32:20.2] RJM: So what is your business and who is your target market?
[0:32:24.3] RD: Anybody that doesn’t want a boring workout. That’s really it, to put it right there and if somebody’s in and they hit the bag and they do well and afterwards they’re like, “It was fun but…” I tell them don’t worry about it. If you didn’t love that, if you didn’t love hitting that bag and learning how to pivot on that hook and see the punch get stronger, no problem. Go try racket ball, join a men’s basketball league.
Do something that’s fun because if you are not having fun you’re not going to stick with it. So if you are looking for something that’s not boring and then some of the ancillary benefits like learning how to defend yourself or the confidence that you get from knowing how to finish off those things, you’re going to get those things from our gym that you can’t necessarily get from mountain biking or running or whatever else you are doing.
[0:33:11.1] RJM: And there’s so much to learn right? Like you could learn for years and years and never come close to really scratching the surface.
[0:33:16.9] RD: Man it’s been about 19 years I’ve been doing Brazilian Jujitsu and you know I am bringing my coach in two or three times a year and I’m still – there’s so much I know I don’t know. It’s scary how much I don’t know what I don’t know and I’m open minded. When it comes down to being a student, I consider myself a very good student. I don’t assume I know everything but I still find myself learning things where I am like, “I didn’t even know that I didn’t know that”. So yeah, it’s definitely infinite.
[0:33:44.6] RJM: You know one of the things business owners are always thinking about is long term. Actually let me take that back. Often business owners are thinking about right now and ignore long term thinking. I was talking the other day with someone else about long term investments. Employees often have a 401(k) that they can invest in kind of suck money away. As owners we’re usually fighting today’s fight and worrying about tomorrow, tomorrow because there’s always another fire. It seems like your business isn’t really made for 60 year old men or is it? What does the long term look like for you?
[0:34:21.6] RD: Yeah, I mean as far as coaching is concerned, I may reduce my coaching load but I’ll be able to coach. I’ve seen it done, assuming I stay healthy into my 70’s I’ll be able to be around. Now once you hit your 70’s you’re not holding pads for everybody, you know what I mean? You may not be even holding pads anymore, somebody else will do that but you know what makes a business, a successful business successful and what makes a successful gym successful is always leadership.
And so you can continue to be there and be a leader. As far as coaching is concerned, I don’t worry about getting too old to coach. Now, right now I’m in a place where I’m 35. I can’t keep up with all the 20 something year olds but I can still work with them and be hands on with them and I know that that isn’t going to last forever but that’s okay. That happens, you know Freddie Roach is not sparing with Manny Pacquiao, you know?
And then he’s got plenty of physical illness right now that he is suffering from and he’s still coaching people. So that side of it, yeah we’ll be able to do that for a long time.
[0:35:19.7] RJM: It is what? January 11th I think they say by the time it’s January 15th most people are going to quit on their New Year’s Resolution and we are just around the corner. If you can make it to day 21 they say it’s become a habit. What would you say to someone that is struggling with that they started out on fire, they started out well but they’re starting to feel that “I’m ready to quit process?” Is there any helping or is it just?
[0:35:45.4] RD: Well it’s like a relationship. You cannot maintain the newlywed phase forever and so you have to accept that that the newness is going to wear off. I encourage people to not look at, to not just keep focusing on the distance between their goal and where they’re at then but look at how far they’ve come in just three weeks. They are already not or two weeks or three weeks, they’ve already cut back a ton on their sodas.
And even if you don’t see an immediate result from it like five more pounds didn’t drop off right away, you know for a fact that you just spent two weeks not putting all of that corn syrup in your body, right? That’s positive you know? So a lot of times, you just have to remind people and I have to do this to my jujitsu students a lot because the room is so competitive and I always have to remind them. Everybody else is getting better at the same time but look at how much better you are than you were six months ago or a year ago.
So sometimes we keep focused on the gap between what we were looking to do or trying to get and we need to look at how far we’ve come and when we look at that that gives us the encouragement that we need to stay the course. So that’s the advice I would give. If you’re working out now obviously not in my gym and you’re anywhere and you have done it for two weeks now and you are starting to hit that wall, A, it’s normal so don’t beat yourself up and B, look you’re just on two weeks.
When you’re in a gym you weren’t at McDonalds, when you were at the gym you weren’t hitting the vending machine and so you are already making progress and if it becomes too much work to get you in the gym then it is time to change your workout. Don’t quit, just do something different. You can call my gym, there’s a ton of good gyms out there and it doesn’t have to be MMA. Of course I’d love everybody to come to a kick boxing class at my gym or do Brazilian Jujitsu.
But just change your workout, it’s not the end of the world. If you are having trouble getting to the gym, putting yourself through a workout and you can’t afford 50 bucks an hour for a personal trainer, there’s so many options out there. Just find something else and give it a try and just keep moving forward. I think maybe that’s a thing too, right? People do something and then they just quit. They don’t replace it, they just quit it and it’s like, “Well…” you know?
I think reframing things and having those paradigm shifts is a good way to do things but the problem is we’re humans so we act on emotion. We don’t always take a step back and take it objective or a view of what’s going on right? That’s what makes us human and not machines.
[0:38:08.4] RJM: Have you’ve been surprised by the explosive growth of MMA over the last five or 10 years and you feel that it’s only good for your business like the growth continues to explode?
[0:38:19.0] RD: Yeah, it is definitely good for my business. I think we are at a point now where it’s sustaining. I think it’s great, it’s where it’s going to be. You’ve been exposed to it, you’re into it. Of course people are going to come into it and come out of it but I don’t expect it to continue to grow bigger but it’s definitely here to stay. There is something about MMA that is very intriguing and really what sells it is the personal story.
So now you see like the buildup shows does for boxers and they do it behind the scene shows for the UFC, that’s what it takes. When I am personally invested in somebody even if I have never met him but I admire something about their background or something like that, I’m invested and I am really watching it and the UFC is a well-oiled machine now so they know what they are doing and so it’s definitely here to stay and there’s other organizations fighting for their position in the market place as well.
And things are looking better for them now because the UFC is so big that there’s just too many fighters and so they have to cut fighters. They lose fighters that still have some gas left in the tank and the other organizations pick them up and so then that fighter’s fan will come to the new organization and see them fight. So there is actually one that’s traded on NASDAQ now aligns MMA. I think the stock symbol is AMMA and I’ve been watching it.
They did an IPO or whatever it is recently and I decided not to invest in it but it’s a very interesting development. They consolidated a bunch of small organizations and I asked somebody that’s involved on it and I couldn’t get a real true unique sales position from them and so I decided not to invest in them but it’s neat and they are traded daily on NASDAQ. So you can get them for about five bucks a share now.
[0:40:02.9] RJM: Wow. Okay, let’s talk a little bit about the gym ownership too. A lot of times guys want this idea of just investing in a gym. Is absentee ownership, you see Ten Fitness I know is locally owned but you see a gym like that and you think that there is no owner there. I could just start a gym and walk away from it. Do you think that’s a viable business opportunity or is that passive?
[0:40:26.7] RD: Passive businesses for the most part tend to be pretty pie in the sky situations. You know there’s somebody, maybe you partnered with that guy and he’s running the boat. Now good for you, it’s your job as an investor to find those people. Not find the business but find the right people but the gym business is tough. That’s a business I don’t want to be in. You’re talking about equipment, role memberships, revolving door, tough business.
It looks good on paper but you see a lot of five year old gyms for sale and you think, “Oh this is a no-brainer. The rent is this, payroll is this” but that equipment is five years old now. It’s starting to break down and now you are trying to sell memberships to a gym that has five year old equipment and the gym up the street has all this paint fresh and it’s got a new equipment and it’s a constant revolving door of new. You’ve even got Planet Fitness, Ten Fitness.
How did Ten Fitness sell $10 memberships and have them all over the place and then LA Fitness comes in, they charge $35. They pop three new gyms and they’re blowing the doors off, you know what I mean? I mean how do you compete with those two people?
[0:41:35.3] RJM: Well everybody this is Up in your Business with Kerry McCoy. Thanks for having us. I’ll let Tim here close us out. If you want to get in touch with Roli, Roli real quick how can we get in touch with you?
[0:41:45.1] RD: Yeah, check out our website, westsidemma.com. It’s has a number which is 663-3850 there. Again it’s westsidemma.com. Check out our Google reviews, check out the Facebook reviews. People really enjoy our gym and if you are looking for something different, give us a shout.
[0:42:00.5] RJM: And I am RJ Martino, want to say thank you very much to Kerry McCoy for allowing me to guest host this.
[END OF INTERVIEW]
[0:42:08.0] TB: You’ve been listening to Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy. Want to hear today’s program again or want someone else to benefit from it? Jot this down. Within 48 hours the podcast will be available at flagandbanner.com. Click the tab labeled “Radio Show”, there you’ll find today’s segments with links to resources you heard discussed on this program. Kerry’s goal: to help you live the American Dream.
