Fitness operations, measured in real-world decisions.
Fitness Business Asia Podcast examines the operating side of modern fitness businesses, from hiring and finance to member experience and equipment choice. Jack Thomas keeps the conversations grounded in numbers, process, and lessons from real studios.
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Fitness Business Asia Podcast looks at the fitness industry through the eyes of people who have to make the business work. Jack Thomas keeps the focus on gym owners, studio operators, fitness managers, and coaches who need practical judgment, not vague inspiration. The show often starts with a concrete operating problem. How should a gym buy equipment? What does a five-star member experience actually require? Why does ClassPass create such strong reactions among studio owners? What makes a coach worth hiring? From there, the conversation usually moves through examples, numbers, hiring filters, service standards, pricing models, and the messy details behind a stronger business. The pacing is steady. It is more working session than polished keynote. Recent episodes show that range clearly. Benny Price discusses equipment design and the integrity behind a new award process, including how council members are kept separate from brand incentives. Linda Tang of Webar in Singapore talks about hiring for front-of-house roles, brand energy, and welcoming new clients as if they were entering a home. Jeff from ClassPass is pressed on why some studios are unhappy with the platform while others quietly value the relationship. A solo ClassPass episode puts that debate into context through panels, interviews, online discussions, and Thomas's own experience as a studio owner. Another solo episode lays out BASE's 13-step process for hiring trainers, including the funnel that filters most applicants out before a job offer. Albert Ramos brings attention to pro formas, budgets, forecasts, and the financial mistakes that slow gym growth. Kathleen Ferguson connects coaching quality to listening, education, and business basics. The Singapore boutique fitness episode turns Fit Guide evaluations into a discussion of closures, class experience, hospitality, and which categories are performing well. Across the show, the recurring pattern is clear: ask the simple question, test the assumptions, and pull the answer back to what an operator can use.
Made for: For gym owners, boutique studio operators, fitness managers, investors, and coaches moving into the business side of fitness. It also suits industry people who want sharper context on Asia-Pacific fitness trends and operator-level tradeoffs.
What sets it apart: The show stands out by combining operator experience, Fit Guide data, and direct industry interviews with a willingness to pressure-test popular assumptions. It keeps returning to budgets, hiring, service, equipment, and platform economics instead of staying at the level of broad wellness talk.
Welcome to the Fitness Business Asia podcast, hosted by BASE founder and CEO Jack Thomas - a show with a strong and powerful mission to raise the standards of Asia's fitness industry.If you're an ambitious gym owner, fitness manager, investor in the wellness industry or a coach that wants to get into the business side of fitness, this weekly resource will help you raise your game.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Clear questioning turns gym finances, service standards and platform tensions into practical intelligence for people responsible for fitness businesses.
Jack Thomas treats fitness as an operating business, where member experience, pricing and financial discipline matter as much as the equipment on the floor.
An empty class slot looks different when you're the one deciding whether ClassPass is helping.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
At WeBar, five-star service starts with values, hiring, and a welcome that feels like home.
Five-star service culture, as this PlayNext review frames it, begins well before anyone steps onto the floor. Jack's conversation with Linda Tang of WeBar in Singapore centers on the energy and values behind the brand, the second-layer interview questions she uses to understand…
A practical episode on budgets, usage, and the hidden costs inside gym growth.
Financial discipline anchors this Fitness Business Asia Podcast episode, which looks at why gyms can grow expensively when owners let the business run them.
Jack Thomas finds strong classes in Singapore's boutique fitness clubs and asks whether the rest of the visit keeps up.
Jack Thomas returns to Singapore's boutique fitness clubs for a second year of evaluations, comparing visits from 2023-24 with visits made mostly in 2025 and a few in 2026. Cycling, yoga, and strength clubs earn high marks, but the workout is only part of his assessment.
A practical, data-led look at how staffing choices and operating systems shape fitness-studio profitability.
Fitness Business Asia uses Julian Barnes's discussion of BFS Network's 2024 State of the Industry report to examine what studio profitability often depends on in practice.
Jack Thomas explains why an opening gym discount can be hard to unwind.
Jack Thomas opened his first studio with a discount that brought in clients but left him short of the membership price in his projections. Some paid 20% below market rate. When he cut the discount to 15%, many resisted. The same thing happened at 10%.
Rob Walling on bootstrapped SaaS growth, plateaus, and exits — with founders who lived them.
Abbey Ashley's playbook for turning your job skills into a virtual assistant business.
Naval Ravikant on epistemology, startups, and crypto, from David Deutsch to Vitalik Buterin.
Alex Theuma interviews SaaS founders and investors on scaling to $10M-plus ARR.
Guy Raz traces founders' origin stories and fields live advice-line calls from entrepreneurs.
Alex Blumberg interviews guests like Megan Phelps-Roper and Shane McAnally about failure and reinvention.
Jack Thomas, founder of BASE, shares four major mistakes from his 10+ years in fitness management.
Mark Fisher shares his journey into the fitness industry, starting from being a skinny, insecure young man who wanted to build muscle for acting and dating.
Jennifer Vaughan Maanavi, founder and CEO of Physique 57, discusses her journey in creating one of the first boutique fitness brands and expanding it globally.
Jack Thomas interviews Julian Barnes of BFS Network about their 2024 State of the Industry report, which analyzes data from hundreds of studios globally.
Richard Cowley, APAC Director for HYROX, discusses the rapid global expansion of the fitness race, including new markets in Asia and a 100% year-on-year athlete growth.
Jack Thomas frames this Fitness Business Asia Podcast episode around gym equipment design for fitness managers and gym owners, then brings on Benny Price to explain why he is building gymequipmentdesign.com.
Linda Tang says Webar in Singapore was built around an Asian consumer bar program, and she and co-founder Annabelle launched it after leaving corporate work in 2015-2016.
Jack Thomas brings Jeff Bladt from ClassPass back on the Fitness Business Asia Podcast after a prior panel with Lyft’s Matthew Janacek and Mo Iqbal, and after Jack’s solo episode “The Truth About ClassPass” in episode 321.
Jack Thomas shares his comprehensive perspective on ClassPass, drawing from eight years as a studio owner and interviews with key figures in the boycott movements.
Jack Thomas shares BASE's 13-step hiring process for world-class trainers, emphasizing a rigorous filter that admits only 2% of applicants.
Albert Ramos Jr., founder of Stratego and AI-powered FP&A platform ValSites, joins host Jack Thomas to identify the financial mistakes that most often kill gym and studio growth.
Jack Thomas, host of the Fitness Business Asia Podcast, presents the Fit Guide's second annual evaluation of Singapore's boutique fitness industry, covering visits spanning 2025 and early 2026.
Jack Thomas interviews Kathleen Ferguson, founder of Coach360, about the essential business skills and qualities that make a great fitness coach.
Jack Thomas and Ross Campbell discuss the 2024 fitness industry year in review, including Beyond Activ's expansion into Saudi Arabia and New York.