Some advice for doing private lessons please

[bignog23]

Hello all,

I've trained BJJ for a little over 4 years and I'm currently a Purple belt. I'm recently married and was hoping to make a little money on the side teaching private lessons.
Obviously I would be teaching beginners white-blue, for cheap.

Has anybody else here done that? If so, what is the best method to do it? I thought about a Craigslist ad for my area but didn't know if there is a much more effective way I'm not thinking of. Any tips or info is appreciated. Thanks!

 

[lechien]

It is a hard one because you are planning to teach private classes to students outside your club.

Where do you plan to teach? at home?

 

[bignog23]

Yep, for sure. Most of the people in my club are upper belts with a handful of whites who already have a place to train. I would be offering to teach people at their homes, or at a park, really anywhere we can throw down some mats.

 

[lechien]

How far do you live for your BJJ club?

Have you thought of running an "affiliate" program?

 

[Spazzmaster]

At a park? You gotta be kidding!

 

[bignog23]

I actually hadn't thought about that. Where would I even start? Talking to my instructor I guess. Anybody have any ideas on how to start up outside of the gym?

 

[lechien]

I actually hadn't thought about that. Where would I even start? Talking to my instructor I guess. Anybody have any ideas on how to start up outside of the gym?

Do you have any gyms, TMA, Martial arts club near your house that could be interested with you teaching once per week?

It has to be far from your current gym.

You go and ask the club owner if you could start 1 BJJ class per week.

Offer to go 50/50 on the profit. no minimum.

So basically if you do not have a client, you don't pay him rent.

 

[bignog23]

Oh, that makes sense. Do you think that places would be interested in me teaching there even though I am only a purple belt? If so, I'm gonna try that.

 

[lechien]

Oh, that makes sense. Do you think that places would be interested in me teaching there even though I am only a purple belt? If so, I'm gonna try that.

Yeah, there is market for it.

But that is why you need to run it as affiliation because customers want to be able to say that they train under a BB (affiliate etc..)

The main thing is to have a place where you will not lose money.

No point reinventing the wheel.

Just go and visit local martial school that have mats (even the thin martials marts) would do, talk to the owner and see how open he is to having a BJJ classes.

 

[KikoJones]

I approached a Black Belt from another academy for private lessons and because of his schedule he recommended one of his Purple belts. I pay $40/hr and I decide what I want to work on. The Purple belt was promoted at last year's world when he won Silver.

I go to a small academy and my instructor just doesn't have the time for privates. He doesn't have a problem with me going outside as long as I don't share our "secret sauce".

Why the litany? You can approach your instructor and he might advertise for you as well.

 

[Impulsive]

a lot of purple belts give lessons

 

[TSO]

Im a purple belt and just give private lessons at the school I train at. Luckily the owner gives me free reign to do whatever I want.

 

[Dirty Holt]

I make a living off of doing private lessons, and real coaching. I can tell you there are a few things that are needed to actually make some money.

You have to offer something that they cannot get in their normal class. If you are a purple belt, you need to have a black belt level something. Mine is wrestling, top positioning, scrambling technique, and arm in chokes. I rarely, if ever, do private lessons with people on shit that their instructor is better than me at. If I am doing privates with my own students, I will do what they want. If I am doing privates with people from other places, its on the shit that I usually kill their instructors with.

If you do not do things better than their instructors, you have to offer something else. That might be very low prices. It might be a very nice place of instruction that is more professional than where they normally work out. I have the luxury of both of those things. Where I do my privates is at a fucking NICE gym with everything you can think of, and a one piece mat that is 40'X40. I also keep my prices low so that I can get repeat business. I see teammates and even coaches of mine who fail miserably with their private lessons because they dont do anything better than anyone else, and they charge $60 an hour for that. This is why they get 1 private lesson a month and I get 2 a day.

My advice to you (unless you are an absolute killer with some kind of technique and position) would be to start with obscenely low prices and build up a base of people who will come back because of your coaching ability. If your coaching ability sucks, well, then getting one hitter quitters at $60 an hour might be the way to go. You seem willing to be convenient so it might go your way fairly easily.

 

[MadSquabbles500]

Are you going to have to kick back some money to your black belt master and his alliance?

You could go to your local fitness gym, try and do some networking there and find out if anyone there is interested. If your gym has a large area that has the padding on the floor, you can probably just teach right there. Just make sure the gym thinks you are doing it for free.

Or you can sell yourself as a sparring partner to blue and white belts. In NYC I know of at least two instructors of TMA or something other than BJJ who are bringing BJJ to their school, but they are only blue belts. If they want to advance they will need competition wins. And to get those wins, they are going to need sparring partners to train with.

I have noticed what private tennis instructors do. They hang out at the tennis section of major sporting goods retailers, and try to answer the questions of customers. The customers think they are the retail employees. From there they bring up that they do lessons.