What Can Businesses Learn from The Fitness “Cult”, CrossFit? Invest in Phamily
From a business standpoint, CrossFit Inc. has become a worldwide phenomenon. Founded in the year 2000, CrossFit Inc. has only been established for 19 years but already boasts 15,000 affiliate gyms across 162 countries and potentially adding 1,000 per year according to sources.
This growth is exponential and the envy of many in the fitness and business world. Given this fast growth, it has attracted much attention with people describing it as a “cult” and a “religion” because of the highly loyal fan base it has developed. Those who attend CrossFit seemingly defend the fitness movement with veracity. This is truly the envy of all business out there isn’t it? A great business model with loyal customers.
So, what can other businesses learn from CrossFit?
I believe the most important factor,amongst many factors, for the business success of CrossFit is one key ingredient:
“The Power of Community”
I have known people who have been asked to attend CrossFit and promised that it would change their lives. People religiously get up at unholy hours of the morning to attend a 5:30 AM CrossFit class daily as if it was the most important time of the day. It is a movement but yet a business and the one factor I believe for its success is the power of their community. One person has described the characteristics of the community as follows:
1. A friendly and welcoming atmosphere where everyone high fives, fist bumps each other, and share weights together
2. Leave no man or woman behind mentality, when you finish a workout, you encourage others to finish
3. Celebrate the success of others and every personal best that is achieved, whenever a person reaches a personal best e.g. lift 100kg deadlift,
People simply love it because the community is so empowering, transforming and encouraging – they feel apart of a family.The results of their clients and their business speak for itself.
So how do businesses learn from this principle of the community? I believe the answer lies with the idea of mutual respect, mutual gain, and mutual values all surrounded by the idea of “phamily”.
Here at MGA, we believe that creating a business phamily is the key to business success. What does this mean to create a business phamily? We see it like this
Welcome to the Phamily Farm
If you see the business community as a farm, you will get my point. Every piece of a farm plays its part in the operation of the whole community. The farm dog protects the sheep and the animals from harm – like an insurance company. The tractor and the harvester are tools used to help farm the produce – like our computers. The lemon stand around the corner road sells lemon drinks to the farm staff – like our entrepreneurs.The chickens produce eggs so we can eat – like our cafés and restaurants.
The Phamily is our vision here at MGA wherewe aim to bring together like-minded people to help establish a strong community where we can leverage off each other’s skills while benefiting each individual business:
1. Mutually encouraging – If one business wins in our phamily, all businesses win. The principle here is that complementary business helps each other out when it comes to product, services and referrals. We help each other out in terms of services and we keep the money in the phamily.
2. Mutually respectful – Everyone in the phamily community plays their part, however, big or small every person. Every business, every product and every service plays an important part in operating the phamily farm.
3. Mutually aligned values – Everyone has similar values that see community, respect and business the same way. This ensures that all our networks, business associates and “pharm” members coexist peacefully and respectfully.
In the same way, CrossFit’s success is based on their community, I believe that the Phamily will lead to your business success, so why not be a part of the phamily today?