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I did a quick post on this on Facebook last night, but wanted to elaborate.
I've been thinking about re-joining a gym for a while. The problem is, I wanted one that offered at least a few classes, and most of the ones that do that are way more expensive than I'm willing to pay.
A few weeks ago I was walking past the Bally's in the mall and noticed that they had a big banner up offering a year's membership for $99 and listing a bunch of different classes, including yoga and Pilate's, two of the ones I was especially interested in. I talked to the guy behind the counter, and was told that the $99 dollar membership didn't include the classes, but the next level of membership (on sale for $149) did. This price didn't seem unreasonable, so I said I'd think about it.
I asked around in case anybody I knew had bad experiences with Bally's. Tom and I stopped by on Sunday afternoon and got the 10 cent tour and spoke to a couple of people working out at the time.
It came down to this list of pluses and minuses:
+ location is reasonably convenient to both home and work
- location is in a mall
+ good price (it works out to $14.50 a month)
- there's an additional $25 due in March. This is not advertised.
+ They offer multiple classes, including the two I most want to take.
+ They're clean, with no funky smells or weird stains in the exercise area and a minimum of grime in the women's locker room.
+ (According to the members we talked to) all the exercise machines work. If something breaks, they fix it quickly
+ The membership level I was considering includes monthly personal training sessions, which would help me figure out what I should be doing to meet my goals.
Since that's 3 times as many pluses as minuses, I went with it. I signed up and paid my fees yesterday after work. My first training session should be some time on Sunday.
I've been thinking about re-joining a gym for a while. The problem is, I wanted one that offered at least a few classes, and most of the ones that do that are way more expensive than I'm willing to pay.
A few weeks ago I was walking past the Bally's in the mall and noticed that they had a big banner up offering a year's membership for $99 and listing a bunch of different classes, including yoga and Pilate's, two of the ones I was especially interested in. I talked to the guy behind the counter, and was told that the $99 dollar membership didn't include the classes, but the next level of membership (on sale for $149) did. This price didn't seem unreasonable, so I said I'd think about it.
I asked around in case anybody I knew had bad experiences with Bally's. Tom and I stopped by on Sunday afternoon and got the 10 cent tour and spoke to a couple of people working out at the time.
It came down to this list of pluses and minuses:
+ location is reasonably convenient to both home and work
- location is in a mall
+ good price (it works out to $14.50 a month)
- there's an additional $25 due in March. This is not advertised.
+ They offer multiple classes, including the two I most want to take.
+ They're clean, with no funky smells or weird stains in the exercise area and a minimum of grime in the women's locker room.
+ (According to the members we talked to) all the exercise machines work. If something breaks, they fix it quickly
+ The membership level I was considering includes monthly personal training sessions, which would help me figure out what I should be doing to meet my goals.
Since that's 3 times as many pluses as minuses, I went with it. I signed up and paid my fees yesterday after work. My first training session should be some time on Sunday.
