How Clients Buy

Chapter 5Obstacle #2: But I Don't Want to SellMoving Past Willy Loman

A fire hydrant of a man, Chuck Alpine stood square, brimming with the kind of red-faced passion you'd expect from a former TV star and bodybuilder-cum-fitness club entrepreneur.

I could sell a ketchup popsicle to a lady wearing white gloves in the middle of July. You can be goddamn sure I can sell gym memberships.

The room grew quiet.

Chuck sat at the head of a heavy boardroom table in a small windowless room. Behind him, a two-foot, all-gold screaming eagle rested on a counter. To his right hung a poster, featuring an elephant on its feet reaching for tree leaves; underneath was the phrase: “Goals: The difference between try and triumph is a little umph.”

Chuck owns a chain of fitness clubs spread across the industrial Midwest. He was born in Texas, so it's not surprising that his clubs are big, mostly retrofits of old supermarkets, full of dozens of treadmills, TRX-friendly superstructures, even wind tunnels for cooling off.

He's explaining his successful twenty-seven-club chain to investors, a pair of thirty-somethings scribbling notes.

“I grew up in the fitness business. Started in Texas out of high school. Then moved to southern California. This is a sales business. Don't let anyone tell you differently. MBAs'll tell you clubs are about retention, that we lose half our customers a year, but that's bull crap. The only way this business works is if you get out on the floor and sell.”

A slim man wearing ...