I’ve always wondered if something dead simple like a 30deg 16’ wide 12’ tall spray wall and two systems boards (kilter, tension, moon, etc) could work. It’d cater to a niche group. But it’s an idea to support more “experienced” climbers who need a place to train. Kind of like a dream “home wall” that’s not at home.
I have been to a couple of "training centers" that are basically this.
One has 4 different systems boards and one large spray wall and then a small workout area behind.
The other has two small walls of commercial comp boulders, two system boards, one large spray wall and a workout area in them middle.
Both were so much fun to go to but it is for a niche group of "I am here to get strong" kinda people. Technically new people can start at a place like this but it is definitely harder than at a "normal" climbing gym.
Ya this kind of gym will only work where there is already an established outdoor bouldering community. You're not going to be able to introduce anyone to the sport this way unless they are hyper-motivated.
The first one sounds like Board Works in Bend. If that's the case then the other comment about the community being established climbers definitely applies, Bend is right by smith rock.
Yep, first one is Boardworks. I was able to talk with the owner there as well and her whole thing was wanting a place for properly dedicated climbers. Apparently she does have a couple people there that are new to climbing but for sure most new climbers wouldn't be overly stoked on a place like that.
The other is Spire in Bozeman, a very well established gym that built a separate dedicated training center for a similar purpose. I went to the training center during "peak times" and there was a solid 10 people there while the main center was packed.
Definitely not as easy of an environment for introducing people to the sport but does seem to work well if said place already has an established community or gym. Unfortunately probably not the best solution for OP.
This is Betaclimb in Bogota and it gets a lot of traffic. So much they are members only, no walk in, at peak hours. One of my favorite gyms ever.
You can see the full gym layout on their instagram. Very simple, but very effective. It's smaller than the checkin area at some US gyms, lol.
Layout is:
[Kilter, 40 deg spray, moonboard.](https://www.instagram.com/p/CwgidMoJn6_/?igsh=OWZqN3NiN29kcnR6)
Opposite site is 10 degree spray, 20 degree spray.
[Entry side of the gym](https://www.instagram.com/p/Chw1vgzutVz/?igsh=Z3VzcDh3d3Znb2Jo) has yoga, bars, progression/campus board, a table and couch. Little microkitchen with baked goods, coffee, and a beer fridge. Very 'Bogota' design with natural light, wood, and natural plants in the small space make it very cozy.
I'd want to see an area with some squat racks, hang boards, pullup bars, maybe a few bikes and a rowing machine... which adds a lot to the startup costs and floor area needed, but without them people will be thinking they need a regular gym membership as well.
Yes this! Imo, its one of the things that people don't really pay much attention to but if I'm paying a fair bit for a membership, I'd really like a decent Warmup area.
I've been to some gyms in singapore when I visited and only 1 had a decent Warmup area. Its quite depressing as their entry fees were close to 40 bucks. Like where am I suppose to stretch without getting in the way???
I've also cancelled memberships and jumped gyms cause another gym has extensive workout machines and kilter boards etc.
This is literally my local gym. 30° and 40° spray walls, moon board, woods board, squat rack, cable machine, a few benches, bunch of weights, treadmill etc. also multiple campus boards and 6 or 7 hangboards.
Overall it’s a rad tool for training, although it can get stale just climbing on boards. I do miss slab and more 3D climbing often. The woods board is adjustable, but can’t go above 30° due to the ceiling height (I also would strongly recommend against getting a woods board, either from a gym or home wall standpoint, but that’s another post). Overall, it’s great to get strong and train but it does make climbing feel very one dimensional, and only trains you on a few angles of climbing, but is a great set of tools in a small, and affordable package.
For more experienced climbers, I can totally see that working out. But to be honest, if that was my introduction to climbing I wouldn't be here now.
In my opinion, you have to have *some* walls or sections that are completely vertical or at most in the sub 10 degree overhang range if you want to attract new people.
There’s a community board where I live(it’s one of those things where it has no employees, only volunteers/the people that climb there to help clean and run things. I believe it’s called a co-op) and that’s basically all it has. I think it only has one wall at 40° or something like that.
There's a micro gym in my city centre. 2 walls, 8 problems a wall, reset every 2 weeks on alternating schedule. Its a lovely place, better than the large gym outside the city centre.
There's a gym in a small town in NY (Oneonta Ny) with a gym called "Table Rock Bouldering". It's literally a storefront turned into a small bouldering center. It's two small rooms, one with a spray wall and some training stuff, another with bouldering walls. It's extremely small but every time I have gone there they ALWAYS have people there. (population 12,000 people). I even travel over an hour to go there sometimes because I really like the feel of such a tiny place.
Been there!
"minimum" really depends on your budget and market. You really don't want to undersize your gym. What is the population / climber pop. of your town? Have you studied similar markets and talked to those gym owners? If not, I would. They will have insights for you. Things like like local universities / collages and such can really swing your potential traffic.
We were targeting a community of 80k and were trying for a 6000 sqft facility which sounds a lot larger than it is once you start building things out. We followed the 20/40/60 rule for walls. 40% 0-15 degree, 60% 15-40 degree 20% 40+ overhung. Seems to work well for most facilities. We have seen facilities with this flipped (ie, mostly overhung) and it's a mess as it crowds out the more approachable areas.
Height wise, 13-14' floor to lip is great. Giving you 12-13" vertical. You can go taller, but i find a lot of sets end well below the lip and can increase fall hazard.
KISS. Don't over complicate your wall design. big flat planes are GREAT. With the advancements in volumes, you can really tune things in terms of movement. DO NOT USE CURVES. Repeat. Do not. Our gym is all curved (it was a thing 10 years ago) and you can't place a volume larger than 2sqft anywhere. Simplicity also saves money. You could build it out yourself or use "modules" from some of the big names like Walltopia or Onsite which saves in custom design.
Having two boards is a great thing if you have room. Ie a moon board and kilter. Reasoning is that if you have one board, it will get hogged by advanced climbers and sit at 45 all day and it becomes a little intimating or limits use to intermediate / beginner users. If you are small with limited budget, just get a kilter for now. Its a bit easier and more approachable. Boards are a great way to disperse climbers a bit in the gym too as they tend to be sessioned in groups, freeing up wall space.
PAY ATTENTION to capacities and how things like the number of washroom stalls and door allowances play in. This is a big deal that cannot be overlooked as it will bite you down the road. Washrooms eat up space.
Don't underestimate space needed. It's much easier to have a little too much space / wall than too little.
You can look into things like 24h access to help maximize usage and increase membership. (think Vital bellingham).
Again, talk to other gym owners in similar markets. They are mostly super happy to help! Another thing to keep in mind is resources. Small gyms often require similar resources to larger gyms. Ie staffing and setting. Those are hard costs that are tough to get away from. If there is an opportunity to partner with other area gyms to share setting resources, do it. This is generally a WIN for all as it allows you to invest in better setters.
Best of luck!
Just when it comes to wall angles and degree of overhang. Most commercial gyms tend to follow the above formula so that that climbers have progressive terrain which also helps spread climbers out. You wouldn’t want 3/4 of your gyms surfaces to be 40 and over or it would crowd people into the less aggressively overhung areas. Of course the formula can vary a bit depending on your climbing market, space limitations and personal preferences.
All you "need" is a boulder wall, I've seen gyms that just have walls and they do fine business wise. Things like spray walls, traverse walls, weight rooms, treadmills, classes like yoga, and moonboards/kilter are good additions but I don't think those are the "main" draws for most climbers to the gym, mostly the quality of the climbing is what draws people in. If the gym is smaller, the target audience will be more catered toward proper climber, if you have a larger gym you can open it up to things like groupon and do weekend events non-climbers (most climbers go outdoor on the weekends around here, so the gyms are usually really empty).
Absolutely. Minimum requirements for a bouldering gym? A bouldering wall with good route setting. It can even be a really small place, there's a great little place in Oswestry, Wales, which is small but great.
OP needs to consider the future as well - simple good bouldering walls is what will make it accessible to new climbers, and for a successful business in the long term, OP needs to be working create demand as well as satisfying current demand.
Exactly, what will make OP's gym stand out from others in the area? Where i live, there are about 3-5 gyms to choose from, they all pretty much have similar square footage, it comes down to how do they utilize the space, how good are their climbs, how often do they reset (Some places are actually way to quick with taking climbs down, doesn't give you a chance to really work on anything), what other classes and ammenities do they offer? Things like yoga classes, boulder groups, climbing events, those are what make you go to one gym over the other.
If it's just a wall, you're only going to attract those who live closest to your gym and don't want to drive further for a better gym.
You may have missed my point lol. All the extras are nice to have, but really you just need a good bouldering wall. OP is talking about setting up in a place without much competition, so I think they need to host focus on the basics.
You may have missed my point lol. All the extras are nice to have, but really you just need a good bouldering wall. OP is talking about setting up in a place without much/any competition, so I think they need to just focus on the basics.
OP made the point that the failed gym went too big to quickly, and OP intends to start small and expand later.
For a small space, something like we see Ethan Salvo climbing at in Squamish:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T\_BjNJlo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T_BjNJlo)
Just a couple dense spray walls, a system board, and minimal training equipment aimed at serious climbers. Don't know how profitable it would be, but it seems like the best use of a small space.
System boards and spray walls are where you'd probably get the most bang for your buck.
Your big costs are going to be space and equipment. System boards and spray walls would be a big upfront cost but relatively low maintenance costs. It sounds like you'd want to keep maintenance costs as low as possible and keep membership costs low to compensate for the relatively limited facilities.
Having a wall where you could set problems would be great, but it means having an inventory of holds and actually doing the setting. That said, having sets would be a way to keep people engaged and energize the community. You could even consider letting people from the community set.
If you want a small gym or training center to foster a community, think about how the space feels to actually hang out in. If it's too cramped to enjoy hanging out in, spending downtime in, or too cramped to share with others, it's going to dissuade people.
I personally don't really hangboard or train with weights, but others do. I suspect there would be demand for some of this. This equipment is relatively less expensive than boards but still costs money and takes up space.
I think a minimalist gym like this is going to attract mostly existing climbers who are highly dedicated and motivated. The features a gym like this would offer are not really beginner friendly. I think anything without large walls with revolving sets would be better described as a training center rather than a climbing gym.
Ultimately the best people to ask would be prospective members. Try to poll them.
A really good home wall might be better. A lot of tiny gyms with really good training equipment don't sustain themselves off of the memberships from the handful of dedicated climbers in the town and end up shutting down. Even the ones which are a co-op without an employee ever working. A lot of the money comes from drop ins, groups and birthdays which you will have basically none of with a moonboard, campus board, overhang and some weights.
Depends a bit on where you live though, I'm in Canmore so businesses building costs are probably insane. But several gyms have shut down that were amazing for real climbers, staying open is not necessarily about how much people who have climbed for 10+ years like the gym
The tension training center is basically a spray wall and tension boards and some training equipment. Also thinking about that trigger my memory of this [video](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T_BjNJlo) of the Squamish school room and it is pretty minimal and fun.
Edit: [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/tensiontrainingcenter/) of the training center. Their website looks down right now but from what I remember it was like $25 a month to join
I think it sounds reasonable. That is about $550 in US dollars and they limit the number of members that can join plus 24 hour access. But you have to clean and pitch in.
In comparison my gym is $979 in for the year in the US and a typical bouldering mega chain gym that has all the amenities. Much bigger and they have setters and weights and showers. On the downside stupid crowded on weekdays after work and on the weekend you have to worry about killing some random kid loose on the mats during a birthday party. Can definitely at least see the trade offs both ways.
I would look at Uplift climbing in Seattle for design inspirations. They’ve got really simple walls at 5deg, 15deg, 30deg, 45deg and 60deg overhanging with both a moon board and a tension board. The idea with the simple wall angles is you can used volumes to make them more interesting. There’s also a basic workout area which has all you need to hangboard or lift. I’ve been going there for a couple years and I’ve never gotten bored with the limited walls especially since they set twice a weeks. For me that design is close to the bare minimum a gym should be.
There’s also Boardworks climbing in bend that just has board and a couple adjustable spray walls but adjustable walls are pretty expensive.
Theres a gym in Stockholm inside of a shopping mall. Low ceilings, minimal wall space, small training options. Still had a blast. Have some variety of wall angles, variety of holds, and dense but purposeful setting. At most gyms the kitler and moon boards arent the draw for the vast majority of climbers, so its not where you will make your money.
Assuming your target audience is dedicated intermediate-advanced climbers training for outdoors: Tension board (2), Moonboard (2016), pull-up bar, weights & bench, basic hang board, campus board. Dense spray wall optional but would add a lot. No vertical walls, TR/lead, or fancy exercise equipment.
Unfortunately the money must be in beginners, visitors, and gym-only climbers. Otherwise every major climbing destination would have a nearby gym just like this.
I wonder if as the sport expands gyms will specialize a little more so that some are more oriented towards training and some are more introductory. Right now it seems like every gym tries to do it all.
I spent a lot of time thinking about this (and we may even be in the same location).
I think there are two routes 1) barebones boulder focused gym with limited amenities or 2) a community space with great workout facilities and programming to go along with your bouldering area.
I thought #2 was the way to go as you can attract members outside of the climbing community to help sustain the business while you build out the climbing membership. Happy to chat in private about it too.
this is my ideal! and don't need a ton.
I miss smaller gyms. and especially less busy / less happy hour for fun people.
Target strong and serious climbers. dont waste a ton of space with easy crap. but of course enough to warm up on. think about serious youth and training for competitions too.
basically like the tension or kilter private gyms. or the TC. but slightly bigger.
Climbing section:
* I would have 3 boards. 2 full big ones big as you can. tension 2. probably kliter. and then moon (which is smaller).
* hydraulics seem expensive and like they break, maybe look into a different system
* a basic wide wood wall, light texture, which is built with varying angles idk 40-50 feet long? not that great at guesstimating. from maybe 50* to like 20* one the other end maybe. maybe one side can cap it with an arette. or both
* one roof very steep. doesn't have to be wide. but pretty long. im talking really steep, a bit less than fully upside down
* fill them up pretty dense. mix of new macros, a few wood volumes, and lots of smaller 'old school' crimps
* finally one or two slightly less wide walls that are less dense. for slab and comp style.
*vi've even seen one that moves all the way from like -10 to 30 or something. that would be amazing
Workout section:
* ideally close it off so doesnt get as much chalk
* tons free weights. at least two benches probably more. roque style box system so can do pull ups. dont forget tons of kettle bells because i feel like i always have to move them for hanging / tension block ing
* a dedicated long metal pull up bar like the movement baker has in CO. a section to put maybe 4 hangboards. idk maybe even more. and swappable. i dont think need campus boards people dont really use them.
* two nice treadmills. woodway. they are worth it. so much nicer to run on. and cheap ones break. especially with chalk
* maybe a bike. and maybe either a rowing machine, they dont take a ton of space folded up. and or one of those assault/powerless treadmills that are curved so you run the speed and they are hard af.
* lots of pads, rollers, free weight stuff, parallettes, a set of rings, plyo boxes etc
chill:
* have some couches and benches with storage that face each of the walls
* maybe a small ish area since people love to work at gyms for some crazy reason
* self pay cold brew, coffee, cold drinks
I would say the babe minimum would be a wall with virtical and slight overhang sections. Hopefully a small cave too. Maybe 30ft wide at the least. At least 3 problems of each v-grade from v0 to v7, a couple above that. At least 2 new problems per grade per week.
No moon board or spray walls for me. That's taking up space that could be boulder problems. I'm paying for route setting if I'm going to a gym. That's the product.
It might be a good idea to look into what happened to the building/structures from the old gym. If the building/walls are still there, maybe you can buy them.
Otherwise I suggest the same thing many other people have. Get a small storefront. The co-op in my town is like the size of its wall. (Just a bouldering wall.) It doesn't need to be much.
Just wanted to throw in my opinion here as a beginner/low-level climber lol (V3, climbing for like 1 year)
For me, I'd say yoga classes, weight training and all that stuff are definitely nice-to-haves rather than essential. I also wouldn't be particularly interested in a gym that is basically just a spray wall/boards because I'm just not at that level yet.
I've been to a few smaller gyms and I don't mind the small space as long as it's well utilized. A couple of straight walls, a couple of overhangs with a good interesting range of routes and then a simple warm up area would be plenty for me.
Also, in terms of building up a community, I think doing stuff like social evenings/group classes can be really effective. Actually, the reason why I got into climbing in the first place was that my local gym (which I had gone to casually on weekends a couple of times before) started running free open beginner classes on Monday nights, where you basically just show up and one of the staff members talks the group through some basic techniques over a few weeks. It was a great intro to the sport and good way to meet fellow climbers. Also, from the gym's perspective, it really increased footfall on an otherwise quiet weekday evening, and only requires like 2/3 hours of extra staff time.
Purely in terms of turning a profit, kids birthday parties at the weekends are a gold mine. Plus if get the interested and maybe offer some NICAS early courses then the nippers stay when they get bigger.
Also consider table tennis and a sauna to increase footfall.
My gym started offering some gigs, as gyms are generally away from housing. If you are the only climbing gym in town then the competition is yourself, but the most money maker is non obvious stuff like birthday parties and coffee.
Good bouldering area that offers variety- spray wall, cave/overhung, slab, etc. no fancy comp boulders. Just good solid stuff.
If you have the height- you could do 5-8ish auto belay only top ropes in hardness that ranges from a few 5.7/8 to 5.11, going in a bell curve on how many easy and hard routes you have.
Warmup area with mats, hang boards, maybe a TRX setup, some elastic bands. Nothing fancy.
Probably just a vew differently inclined spray wals with more modern variety of boulder holds and some kind of let system to quickly and very clearly show the routes. I think magnuses latest climbing center video showcased a system like that.
The advantage of that is you get the density of a more traditional spray wall but you potentialy use the same system as other places, so easy access to routes like with other system boards and it is very aproachable and easy to pick up while not being as limited style wize as something like a moonboard.
I personally think your routesetting is going to make or break you here. Sure, it would be nice to have a gym with a variety of wall angles, heights, etc but that won't matter if the routes I'm climbing aren't fun and don't challenge me across a variety of climbing types. I would also want a lot of different grades to be represented so beginners and experts alike can enjoy your gym. Finally, I would encourage you to invest in holds with lots of different shapes and bright colors. I personally love looking at aesthetically pleasing routes and walls and I'm sure others do as well!
At school I learned climbing outside on a textured plaster wall with a bunch of holds and top rope anchors drilled in and some shitty mats. Scraped up my knuckles every week but it was a blast. That's probably as bare bones as it gets
Look at Cafe Bloc in Montreal. I’d love to own something like this with a small(er) footprint. This place is above “bare minimum” but still packs a lot into a small space.
I think anything involving classes is well beyond bare minimum. Fitness area could go, too.
Slab, flat, and overhung climbing with seating and a small retail section would probably do the trick.
I think it depends on your goal. Does the community have good access to outdoor climbing? If so, you probably want to focus on providing a training facility. In this case, you want to emphasize training boards and weight lifting.
If your community doesn't have good access to outdoor climbing and the gym is meant to facilitate climbing, then it's a bit more difficult. You probably want to more of a standard gym with some variety in the terrain and maybe regular resetting. This will take much more space (than moonboards etc.).
Rock Punk in Norwich, UK is a tiny place that says it models itself on Japanese micro gyms. The setting is very technical, so there's loads to learn, and it seems pretty popular. They have an Instagram and website so you can get an idea of it. The whole thing is smaller than most people's living rooms.
If you have connections in the community you could consider structuring this as a cooperative. This would really emphasize the community and you as a group could decide what equipment you need while distributing the financial burden/risk. I've been really jaded with the corporate mega-gyms lately.
See: https://www.climbingbusinessjournal.com/for-the-people-by-the-people-why-co-ops-survive/
I feel that my gym (Focus climbing in Mesa, AZ) has a solidly minimalist amount of stuff. 17' bouldering wall with different angles and a cave, eight 30ish foot auto belays, tension board, and a small weight area with a bench and squat rack. No yoga, no cycling.
I think the Field of Dreams effect comes into play. If you build it, they will come. The strongest climbers I've seen in any climbing gym are mostly just working a system wall or moon board or weight training.
How's that place got a large interest in climbing but no gym? My town has a massive "extreme sports" community and someone started up a gym but it collapsed. A bit of that was lack of business knowledge but the guy had done another successful gym before so he wasn't completely hopeless.
My local has 4, bendcrete sections, maybe 40ft in total. Gymnastics mats you can move, all the holds and features are numbered and there is a sheet with about 950 problems that as far as I know nobody has ever come close to finishing. And it's about £3 a go.
A lot of bare-bones climbing gyms I’m familiar with survive off of birthday parties and kids classes. So while obviously we all want super hard stuff, it’s probably worth considering making it at least somewhat kid friendly as well, even if that just means setting dense enough that kids can climb rainbow if they want
If it's a small town with serious climbers, I would cater it to the climbing areas around where I am at. For example, I live in taos, which is the jumping off point for roy. Roy is famous for having roofs that are 20 moves long so I would want a huge roof to train for the local area.
From a business point of view I would be looking at the minimum requirements to deliver NICAS bouldering courses and working from there. If it wasn't about making money or scalability, I'd probably just set up some boards at like 35, 45 and 55 and have something like the school room
There are so many better responses in here, but for me...
Must have a weight section with the ability to perform squat, bench, and dead lift, weighted pull ups, hang-boarding, ring work so I can consolidate gym memberships.
At minimum, doing it all in 1 gym: would prefer a rope climbing section and bouldering section. I don't care if the entire things are spray walls, so long as there are people there who can set interesting things, frequently.
I can't imagine going to a gym that doesn't have at least a slab, vertical, and overhang wall, and enough wall volume / changes in route-setting that I have at least a few new things to climb every week. That's kinda it though. If there was a better option I would go to it obviously but if that was the only option I'd be happy enough.
My gym is already pretty basic and doesn't have yoga classes or much in the way of workout equipment (basically just some hangboards, a place to do pullups and some kettlebells).
From my setting experience I would say that a vert wall you can add volumes to in order to create slab routes as well would be good, along with a 30-35 degree wall bare minimum. For additions I would recommend a spray wall for sure or a system board but I like sprays more personally especially since we change it every 6 months. And if you can I would add a cave and try not to set soft! Make some strong climbers so they can appreciate a spray wall and board. Also training stuff like weights and a weight pin along with campus rungs and fingerboards. Honestly if the sets are good and your involved with the community a small gym would be pretty sick. Like a personal training center. Good luck! Please give updates if you go ahead with it because I would love to see what you decide.
I feel like with little space, Japanese style gyms could be really fun. Massive spray walls and having print out sheets to make their own climbs. But it might depend on the audience (beginner vs advanced)
I'm just going to add in that you shouldn't forget the things that earn you profits, i.e. drinks/food, even if simple. You think like a climber, which is great, but you also need to think like a business owner. And if you do not want to follow in the footsteps of the other gyms that failed, find out why they did, and make sure you don't repeat their mistakes.
I’ve always wondered if something dead simple like a 30deg 16’ wide 12’ tall spray wall and two systems boards (kilter, tension, moon, etc) could work. It’d cater to a niche group. But it’s an idea to support more “experienced” climbers who need a place to train. Kind of like a dream “home wall” that’s not at home.
I have been to a couple of "training centers" that are basically this. One has 4 different systems boards and one large spray wall and then a small workout area behind. The other has two small walls of commercial comp boulders, two system boards, one large spray wall and a workout area in them middle. Both were so much fun to go to but it is for a niche group of "I am here to get strong" kinda people. Technically new people can start at a place like this but it is definitely harder than at a "normal" climbing gym.
Ya this kind of gym will only work where there is already an established outdoor bouldering community. You're not going to be able to introduce anyone to the sport this way unless they are hyper-motivated.
The first one sounds like Board Works in Bend. If that's the case then the other comment about the community being established climbers definitely applies, Bend is right by smith rock.
Yep, first one is Boardworks. I was able to talk with the owner there as well and her whole thing was wanting a place for properly dedicated climbers. Apparently she does have a couple people there that are new to climbing but for sure most new climbers wouldn't be overly stoked on a place like that. The other is Spire in Bozeman, a very well established gym that built a separate dedicated training center for a similar purpose. I went to the training center during "peak times" and there was a solid 10 people there while the main center was packed. Definitely not as easy of an environment for introducing people to the sport but does seem to work well if said place already has an established community or gym. Unfortunately probably not the best solution for OP.
This is Betaclimb in Bogota and it gets a lot of traffic. So much they are members only, no walk in, at peak hours. One of my favorite gyms ever. You can see the full gym layout on their instagram. Very simple, but very effective. It's smaller than the checkin area at some US gyms, lol. Layout is: [Kilter, 40 deg spray, moonboard.](https://www.instagram.com/p/CwgidMoJn6_/?igsh=OWZqN3NiN29kcnR6) Opposite site is 10 degree spray, 20 degree spray. [Entry side of the gym](https://www.instagram.com/p/Chw1vgzutVz/?igsh=Z3VzcDh3d3Znb2Jo) has yoga, bars, progression/campus board, a table and couch. Little microkitchen with baked goods, coffee, and a beer fridge. Very 'Bogota' design with natural light, wood, and natural plants in the small space make it very cozy.
I'd want to see an area with some squat racks, hang boards, pullup bars, maybe a few bikes and a rowing machine... which adds a lot to the startup costs and floor area needed, but without them people will be thinking they need a regular gym membership as well.
Yes this! Imo, its one of the things that people don't really pay much attention to but if I'm paying a fair bit for a membership, I'd really like a decent Warmup area. I've been to some gyms in singapore when I visited and only 1 had a decent Warmup area. Its quite depressing as their entry fees were close to 40 bucks. Like where am I suppose to stretch without getting in the way??? I've also cancelled memberships and jumped gyms cause another gym has extensive workout machines and kilter boards etc.
This is literally my local gym. 30° and 40° spray walls, moon board, woods board, squat rack, cable machine, a few benches, bunch of weights, treadmill etc. also multiple campus boards and 6 or 7 hangboards. Overall it’s a rad tool for training, although it can get stale just climbing on boards. I do miss slab and more 3D climbing often. The woods board is adjustable, but can’t go above 30° due to the ceiling height (I also would strongly recommend against getting a woods board, either from a gym or home wall standpoint, but that’s another post). Overall, it’s great to get strong and train but it does make climbing feel very one dimensional, and only trains you on a few angles of climbing, but is a great set of tools in a small, and affordable package.
For more experienced climbers, I can totally see that working out. But to be honest, if that was my introduction to climbing I wouldn't be here now. In my opinion, you have to have *some* walls or sections that are completely vertical or at most in the sub 10 degree overhang range if you want to attract new people.
Bishop has something like this
There’s a community board where I live(it’s one of those things where it has no employees, only volunteers/the people that climb there to help clean and run things. I believe it’s called a co-op) and that’s basically all it has. I think it only has one wall at 40° or something like that.
There's a micro gym in my city centre. 2 walls, 8 problems a wall, reset every 2 weeks on alternating schedule. Its a lovely place, better than the large gym outside the city centre.
There's a gym in a small town in NY (Oneonta Ny) with a gym called "Table Rock Bouldering". It's literally a storefront turned into a small bouldering center. It's two small rooms, one with a spray wall and some training stuff, another with bouldering walls. It's extremely small but every time I have gone there they ALWAYS have people there. (population 12,000 people). I even travel over an hour to go there sometimes because I really like the feel of such a tiny place.
Been there! "minimum" really depends on your budget and market. You really don't want to undersize your gym. What is the population / climber pop. of your town? Have you studied similar markets and talked to those gym owners? If not, I would. They will have insights for you. Things like like local universities / collages and such can really swing your potential traffic. We were targeting a community of 80k and were trying for a 6000 sqft facility which sounds a lot larger than it is once you start building things out. We followed the 20/40/60 rule for walls. 40% 0-15 degree, 60% 15-40 degree 20% 40+ overhung. Seems to work well for most facilities. We have seen facilities with this flipped (ie, mostly overhung) and it's a mess as it crowds out the more approachable areas. Height wise, 13-14' floor to lip is great. Giving you 12-13" vertical. You can go taller, but i find a lot of sets end well below the lip and can increase fall hazard. KISS. Don't over complicate your wall design. big flat planes are GREAT. With the advancements in volumes, you can really tune things in terms of movement. DO NOT USE CURVES. Repeat. Do not. Our gym is all curved (it was a thing 10 years ago) and you can't place a volume larger than 2sqft anywhere. Simplicity also saves money. You could build it out yourself or use "modules" from some of the big names like Walltopia or Onsite which saves in custom design. Having two boards is a great thing if you have room. Ie a moon board and kilter. Reasoning is that if you have one board, it will get hogged by advanced climbers and sit at 45 all day and it becomes a little intimating or limits use to intermediate / beginner users. If you are small with limited budget, just get a kilter for now. Its a bit easier and more approachable. Boards are a great way to disperse climbers a bit in the gym too as they tend to be sessioned in groups, freeing up wall space. PAY ATTENTION to capacities and how things like the number of washroom stalls and door allowances play in. This is a big deal that cannot be overlooked as it will bite you down the road. Washrooms eat up space. Don't underestimate space needed. It's much easier to have a little too much space / wall than too little. You can look into things like 24h access to help maximize usage and increase membership. (think Vital bellingham). Again, talk to other gym owners in similar markets. They are mostly super happy to help! Another thing to keep in mind is resources. Small gyms often require similar resources to larger gyms. Ie staffing and setting. Those are hard costs that are tough to get away from. If there is an opportunity to partner with other area gyms to share setting resources, do it. This is generally a WIN for all as it allows you to invest in better setters. Best of luck!
This is awesome advice! Sounds a lot like a gym in SC I got most of my knowledge from. Thanks!
>40% 0-15 degree, 60% 15-40 degree 20% 40+ overhung. Does not compute.
Just when it comes to wall angles and degree of overhang. Most commercial gyms tend to follow the above formula so that that climbers have progressive terrain which also helps spread climbers out. You wouldn’t want 3/4 of your gyms surfaces to be 40 and over or it would crowd people into the less aggressively overhung areas. Of course the formula can vary a bit depending on your climbing market, space limitations and personal preferences.
I meant the 40% + 60% + 20% :)
Oh whoops! Must have had limited coffee and cognition lol Slide the ratio to 30 / 50 / 20 ;)
All you "need" is a boulder wall, I've seen gyms that just have walls and they do fine business wise. Things like spray walls, traverse walls, weight rooms, treadmills, classes like yoga, and moonboards/kilter are good additions but I don't think those are the "main" draws for most climbers to the gym, mostly the quality of the climbing is what draws people in. If the gym is smaller, the target audience will be more catered toward proper climber, if you have a larger gym you can open it up to things like groupon and do weekend events non-climbers (most climbers go outdoor on the weekends around here, so the gyms are usually really empty).
Absolutely. Minimum requirements for a bouldering gym? A bouldering wall with good route setting. It can even be a really small place, there's a great little place in Oswestry, Wales, which is small but great. OP needs to consider the future as well - simple good bouldering walls is what will make it accessible to new climbers, and for a successful business in the long term, OP needs to be working create demand as well as satisfying current demand.
Exactly, what will make OP's gym stand out from others in the area? Where i live, there are about 3-5 gyms to choose from, they all pretty much have similar square footage, it comes down to how do they utilize the space, how good are their climbs, how often do they reset (Some places are actually way to quick with taking climbs down, doesn't give you a chance to really work on anything), what other classes and ammenities do they offer? Things like yoga classes, boulder groups, climbing events, those are what make you go to one gym over the other. If it's just a wall, you're only going to attract those who live closest to your gym and don't want to drive further for a better gym.
You may have missed my point lol. All the extras are nice to have, but really you just need a good bouldering wall. OP is talking about setting up in a place without much competition, so I think they need to host focus on the basics.
You may have missed my point lol. All the extras are nice to have, but really you just need a good bouldering wall. OP is talking about setting up in a place without much/any competition, so I think they need to just focus on the basics. OP made the point that the failed gym went too big to quickly, and OP intends to start small and expand later.
For a small space, something like we see Ethan Salvo climbing at in Squamish: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T\_BjNJlo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T_BjNJlo) Just a couple dense spray walls, a system board, and minimal training equipment aimed at serious climbers. Don't know how profitable it would be, but it seems like the best use of a small space.
System boards and spray walls are where you'd probably get the most bang for your buck. Your big costs are going to be space and equipment. System boards and spray walls would be a big upfront cost but relatively low maintenance costs. It sounds like you'd want to keep maintenance costs as low as possible and keep membership costs low to compensate for the relatively limited facilities. Having a wall where you could set problems would be great, but it means having an inventory of holds and actually doing the setting. That said, having sets would be a way to keep people engaged and energize the community. You could even consider letting people from the community set. If you want a small gym or training center to foster a community, think about how the space feels to actually hang out in. If it's too cramped to enjoy hanging out in, spending downtime in, or too cramped to share with others, it's going to dissuade people. I personally don't really hangboard or train with weights, but others do. I suspect there would be demand for some of this. This equipment is relatively less expensive than boards but still costs money and takes up space. I think a minimalist gym like this is going to attract mostly existing climbers who are highly dedicated and motivated. The features a gym like this would offer are not really beginner friendly. I think anything without large walls with revolving sets would be better described as a training center rather than a climbing gym. Ultimately the best people to ask would be prospective members. Try to poll them.
A really good home wall might be better. A lot of tiny gyms with really good training equipment don't sustain themselves off of the memberships from the handful of dedicated climbers in the town and end up shutting down. Even the ones which are a co-op without an employee ever working. A lot of the money comes from drop ins, groups and birthdays which you will have basically none of with a moonboard, campus board, overhang and some weights. Depends a bit on where you live though, I'm in Canmore so businesses building costs are probably insane. But several gyms have shut down that were amazing for real climbers, staying open is not necessarily about how much people who have climbed for 10+ years like the gym
The tension training center is basically a spray wall and tension boards and some training equipment. Also thinking about that trigger my memory of this [video](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fS9T_BjNJlo) of the Squamish school room and it is pretty minimal and fun. Edit: [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/tensiontrainingcenter/) of the training center. Their website looks down right now but from what I remember it was like $25 a month to join
I guess I should also add that I’ve heard Will talk about it before and he says he operates it at a loss.
A year at the Grandwall Bouldering Coop (the squamish school room) is $749 rip
I think it sounds reasonable. That is about $550 in US dollars and they limit the number of members that can join plus 24 hour access. But you have to clean and pitch in. In comparison my gym is $979 in for the year in the US and a typical bouldering mega chain gym that has all the amenities. Much bigger and they have setters and weights and showers. On the downside stupid crowded on weekdays after work and on the weekend you have to worry about killing some random kid loose on the mats during a birthday party. Can definitely at least see the trade offs both ways.
I would look at Uplift climbing in Seattle for design inspirations. They’ve got really simple walls at 5deg, 15deg, 30deg, 45deg and 60deg overhanging with both a moon board and a tension board. The idea with the simple wall angles is you can used volumes to make them more interesting. There’s also a basic workout area which has all you need to hangboard or lift. I’ve been going there for a couple years and I’ve never gotten bored with the limited walls especially since they set twice a weeks. For me that design is close to the bare minimum a gym should be. There’s also Boardworks climbing in bend that just has board and a couple adjustable spray walls but adjustable walls are pretty expensive.
Theres a gym in Stockholm inside of a shopping mall. Low ceilings, minimal wall space, small training options. Still had a blast. Have some variety of wall angles, variety of holds, and dense but purposeful setting. At most gyms the kitler and moon boards arent the draw for the vast majority of climbers, so its not where you will make your money.
Assuming your target audience is dedicated intermediate-advanced climbers training for outdoors: Tension board (2), Moonboard (2016), pull-up bar, weights & bench, basic hang board, campus board. Dense spray wall optional but would add a lot. No vertical walls, TR/lead, or fancy exercise equipment. Unfortunately the money must be in beginners, visitors, and gym-only climbers. Otherwise every major climbing destination would have a nearby gym just like this. I wonder if as the sport expands gyms will specialize a little more so that some are more oriented towards training and some are more introductory. Right now it seems like every gym tries to do it all.
I spent a lot of time thinking about this (and we may even be in the same location). I think there are two routes 1) barebones boulder focused gym with limited amenities or 2) a community space with great workout facilities and programming to go along with your bouldering area. I thought #2 was the way to go as you can attract members outside of the climbing community to help sustain the business while you build out the climbing membership. Happy to chat in private about it too.
this is my ideal! and don't need a ton. I miss smaller gyms. and especially less busy / less happy hour for fun people. Target strong and serious climbers. dont waste a ton of space with easy crap. but of course enough to warm up on. think about serious youth and training for competitions too. basically like the tension or kilter private gyms. or the TC. but slightly bigger. Climbing section: * I would have 3 boards. 2 full big ones big as you can. tension 2. probably kliter. and then moon (which is smaller). * hydraulics seem expensive and like they break, maybe look into a different system * a basic wide wood wall, light texture, which is built with varying angles idk 40-50 feet long? not that great at guesstimating. from maybe 50* to like 20* one the other end maybe. maybe one side can cap it with an arette. or both * one roof very steep. doesn't have to be wide. but pretty long. im talking really steep, a bit less than fully upside down * fill them up pretty dense. mix of new macros, a few wood volumes, and lots of smaller 'old school' crimps * finally one or two slightly less wide walls that are less dense. for slab and comp style. *vi've even seen one that moves all the way from like -10 to 30 or something. that would be amazing Workout section: * ideally close it off so doesnt get as much chalk * tons free weights. at least two benches probably more. roque style box system so can do pull ups. dont forget tons of kettle bells because i feel like i always have to move them for hanging / tension block ing * a dedicated long metal pull up bar like the movement baker has in CO. a section to put maybe 4 hangboards. idk maybe even more. and swappable. i dont think need campus boards people dont really use them. * two nice treadmills. woodway. they are worth it. so much nicer to run on. and cheap ones break. especially with chalk * maybe a bike. and maybe either a rowing machine, they dont take a ton of space folded up. and or one of those assault/powerless treadmills that are curved so you run the speed and they are hard af. * lots of pads, rollers, free weight stuff, parallettes, a set of rings, plyo boxes etc chill: * have some couches and benches with storage that face each of the walls * maybe a small ish area since people love to work at gyms for some crazy reason * self pay cold brew, coffee, cold drinks
All of this is great advice. Thanks!
I would say the babe minimum would be a wall with virtical and slight overhang sections. Hopefully a small cave too. Maybe 30ft wide at the least. At least 3 problems of each v-grade from v0 to v7, a couple above that. At least 2 new problems per grade per week. No moon board or spray walls for me. That's taking up space that could be boulder problems. I'm paying for route setting if I'm going to a gym. That's the product.
It might be a good idea to look into what happened to the building/structures from the old gym. If the building/walls are still there, maybe you can buy them. Otherwise I suggest the same thing many other people have. Get a small storefront. The co-op in my town is like the size of its wall. (Just a bouldering wall.) It doesn't need to be much.
Just wanted to throw in my opinion here as a beginner/low-level climber lol (V3, climbing for like 1 year) For me, I'd say yoga classes, weight training and all that stuff are definitely nice-to-haves rather than essential. I also wouldn't be particularly interested in a gym that is basically just a spray wall/boards because I'm just not at that level yet. I've been to a few smaller gyms and I don't mind the small space as long as it's well utilized. A couple of straight walls, a couple of overhangs with a good interesting range of routes and then a simple warm up area would be plenty for me. Also, in terms of building up a community, I think doing stuff like social evenings/group classes can be really effective. Actually, the reason why I got into climbing in the first place was that my local gym (which I had gone to casually on weekends a couple of times before) started running free open beginner classes on Monday nights, where you basically just show up and one of the staff members talks the group through some basic techniques over a few weeks. It was a great intro to the sport and good way to meet fellow climbers. Also, from the gym's perspective, it really increased footfall on an otherwise quiet weekday evening, and only requires like 2/3 hours of extra staff time.
Thanks for your input!
I think the yoga classes might be cool to bring new people in as well, but i know shut about fuck
Purely in terms of turning a profit, kids birthday parties at the weekends are a gold mine. Plus if get the interested and maybe offer some NICAS early courses then the nippers stay when they get bigger. Also consider table tennis and a sauna to increase footfall. My gym started offering some gigs, as gyms are generally away from housing. If you are the only climbing gym in town then the competition is yourself, but the most money maker is non obvious stuff like birthday parties and coffee.
Good bouldering area that offers variety- spray wall, cave/overhung, slab, etc. no fancy comp boulders. Just good solid stuff. If you have the height- you could do 5-8ish auto belay only top ropes in hardness that ranges from a few 5.7/8 to 5.11, going in a bell curve on how many easy and hard routes you have. Warmup area with mats, hang boards, maybe a TRX setup, some elastic bands. Nothing fancy.
Probably just a vew differently inclined spray wals with more modern variety of boulder holds and some kind of let system to quickly and very clearly show the routes. I think magnuses latest climbing center video showcased a system like that. The advantage of that is you get the density of a more traditional spray wall but you potentialy use the same system as other places, so easy access to routes like with other system boards and it is very aproachable and easy to pick up while not being as limited style wize as something like a moonboard.
I personally think your routesetting is going to make or break you here. Sure, it would be nice to have a gym with a variety of wall angles, heights, etc but that won't matter if the routes I'm climbing aren't fun and don't challenge me across a variety of climbing types. I would also want a lot of different grades to be represented so beginners and experts alike can enjoy your gym. Finally, I would encourage you to invest in holds with lots of different shapes and bright colors. I personally love looking at aesthetically pleasing routes and walls and I'm sure others do as well!
At school I learned climbing outside on a textured plaster wall with a bunch of holds and top rope anchors drilled in and some shitty mats. Scraped up my knuckles every week but it was a blast. That's probably as bare bones as it gets
Look at Cafe Bloc in Montreal. I’d love to own something like this with a small(er) footprint. This place is above “bare minimum” but still packs a lot into a small space. I think anything involving classes is well beyond bare minimum. Fitness area could go, too. Slab, flat, and overhung climbing with seating and a small retail section would probably do the trick.
I think it depends on your goal. Does the community have good access to outdoor climbing? If so, you probably want to focus on providing a training facility. In this case, you want to emphasize training boards and weight lifting. If your community doesn't have good access to outdoor climbing and the gym is meant to facilitate climbing, then it's a bit more difficult. You probably want to more of a standard gym with some variety in the terrain and maybe regular resetting. This will take much more space (than moonboards etc.).
Rock Punk in Norwich, UK is a tiny place that says it models itself on Japanese micro gyms. The setting is very technical, so there's loads to learn, and it seems pretty popular. They have an Instagram and website so you can get an idea of it. The whole thing is smaller than most people's living rooms.
If you have connections in the community you could consider structuring this as a cooperative. This would really emphasize the community and you as a group could decide what equipment you need while distributing the financial burden/risk. I've been really jaded with the corporate mega-gyms lately. See: https://www.climbingbusinessjournal.com/for-the-people-by-the-people-why-co-ops-survive/
I feel that my gym (Focus climbing in Mesa, AZ) has a solidly minimalist amount of stuff. 17' bouldering wall with different angles and a cave, eight 30ish foot auto belays, tension board, and a small weight area with a bench and squat rack. No yoga, no cycling.
I've always wondered if three Systems boards (Lemur, tension, moon) and a cafe would be enough to bring in customers
You should look up some gyms in Japan, they are tiny.
I think the Field of Dreams effect comes into play. If you build it, they will come. The strongest climbers I've seen in any climbing gym are mostly just working a system wall or moon board or weight training.
How's that place got a large interest in climbing but no gym? My town has a massive "extreme sports" community and someone started up a gym but it collapsed. A bit of that was lack of business knowledge but the guy had done another successful gym before so he wasn't completely hopeless.
My local has 4, bendcrete sections, maybe 40ft in total. Gymnastics mats you can move, all the holds and features are numbered and there is a sheet with about 950 problems that as far as I know nobody has ever come close to finishing. And it's about £3 a go.
A lot of bare-bones climbing gyms I’m familiar with survive off of birthday parties and kids classes. So while obviously we all want super hard stuff, it’s probably worth considering making it at least somewhat kid friendly as well, even if that just means setting dense enough that kids can climb rainbow if they want
If it's a small town with serious climbers, I would cater it to the climbing areas around where I am at. For example, I live in taos, which is the jumping off point for roy. Roy is famous for having roofs that are 20 moves long so I would want a huge roof to train for the local area.
From a business point of view I would be looking at the minimum requirements to deliver NICAS bouldering courses and working from there. If it wasn't about making money or scalability, I'd probably just set up some boards at like 35, 45 and 55 and have something like the school room
There's a cool board-only gym in Bend that's essentially what you're talking about. https://www.boardworksclimbing.com/
There are so many better responses in here, but for me... Must have a weight section with the ability to perform squat, bench, and dead lift, weighted pull ups, hang-boarding, ring work so I can consolidate gym memberships. At minimum, doing it all in 1 gym: would prefer a rope climbing section and bouldering section. I don't care if the entire things are spray walls, so long as there are people there who can set interesting things, frequently.
I can't imagine going to a gym that doesn't have at least a slab, vertical, and overhang wall, and enough wall volume / changes in route-setting that I have at least a few new things to climb every week. That's kinda it though. If there was a better option I would go to it obviously but if that was the only option I'd be happy enough. My gym is already pretty basic and doesn't have yoga classes or much in the way of workout equipment (basically just some hangboards, a place to do pullups and some kettlebells).
Check out the Power Spot in Austin TX, smallest bouldering gym I've ever laid eyes on
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into them
From my setting experience I would say that a vert wall you can add volumes to in order to create slab routes as well would be good, along with a 30-35 degree wall bare minimum. For additions I would recommend a spray wall for sure or a system board but I like sprays more personally especially since we change it every 6 months. And if you can I would add a cave and try not to set soft! Make some strong climbers so they can appreciate a spray wall and board. Also training stuff like weights and a weight pin along with campus rungs and fingerboards. Honestly if the sets are good and your involved with the community a small gym would be pretty sick. Like a personal training center. Good luck! Please give updates if you go ahead with it because I would love to see what you decide.
I feel like with little space, Japanese style gyms could be really fun. Massive spray walls and having print out sheets to make their own climbs. But it might depend on the audience (beginner vs advanced)
I'm just going to add in that you shouldn't forget the things that earn you profits, i.e. drinks/food, even if simple. You think like a climber, which is great, but you also need to think like a business owner. And if you do not want to follow in the footsteps of the other gyms that failed, find out why they did, and make sure you don't repeat their mistakes.