Many martial arts school owners hear the same advice: if you want a big school, quit everything else and go all in. Josh Frye is evidence that you don't have to. Frye has taught high school for about 24 years and currently runs an engineering lab with 3D printers and laser cutters. He also owns Training Grounds MMA, an 8,000-square-foot gym in a strip mall that has around 500 members and brings in close to $1 million a year.
He says he no longer needs the teaching paycheck. He keeps the job because he likes it. Having it also made him build a gym that doesn't depend on him being there. "It wasn't dependent on my personality," Frye says. "It was about what we created as a team." In his conversation with Red Belt Podcast host Brian "Barn Cat" Debes, he explains how the team is set up, how the week runs, and why full-time staff were behind his biggest growth.
Full-Time Staff Were the Turning Point
Frye has had part-time helpers since his first year, and he got to around 250–300 members with that setup. The gym really took off when he hired full-time staff and had to organize his systems around them. The school has roughly tripled since COVID, which had cost him about 60% of his business. It has stayed around 500 members for a year and a half, and it has averaged 30 or more new members a month for three years. During one holiday sale, the gym brought in $108,000 in a single month, which was more than its whole first year.
The team is small for a school that size: two full-time employees and two part-timers, one working about 20–24 hours a week and the other about 12. Frye keeps headcount and overhead low so he can pay well. His full-time staff get health and dental benefits, paid leave, and vacation, and his two senior people earn well over $40,000 a year. As Debes pointed out, that is more than most school owners take home.
Frye's view is that a part-time role paying $50 a week for a couple of classes is not a professional position. Good instructors will eventually leave for a real living or open a school down the street. He would rather give them a future inside his own organization, including a goal of opening more locations together.
A Defined Career Ladder for Instructors
Almost all of Frye's staff came up through his own students. The two outside hires he made in ten years both ended badly. People who want to help start on a clear ladder:
- ✓Assistant Instructor Levels 1–3 (hourly, part-time): They learn the basics of running the gym, from mopping mats and cleaning bathrooms to reading lesson plans from the curriculum books for each program and leading warm-ups. Promotion is reviewed every quarter.
- ✓Senior Instructor (full-time): Can run a class independently. This level comes with benefits.
- ✓Two branches after that: "Front of the house" work in acquisitions and program direction, or the curriculum track toward head instructor.
Frye also has every staff member learn every role. He remembers instructors from his 1990s taekwondo years who thought the school would collapse without their advanced class. He doesn't want that attitude, so everyone gets experience calling leads, making missing-in-action calls, cleaning, and teaching. Each person is still accountable for their own area. His program director, who doubles as general manager, owns the core numbers: leads, appointments set, new members, and cancellations.
Frye and Debes agreed on a point that many coaches don't like to hear. Teaching is the easiest part of running a school. The phone calls, cancellation conversations, goal talks, and community marketing are what keep the business healthy.
The Weekly Rhythm That Holds It Together
Frye's own week shows how a part-time owner can still run things:
- ✓Monday: A staff meeting from 4:00 to 5:00 p.m., which Frye joins by Zoom from home. The team reviews the weekly numbers, wins and problems, and goals for the month or quarter. Then he has a half-hour one-on-one with his program director.
- ✓Tuesday: An hour after the last class when the whole staff trains together behind closed doors: rolling, sparring, kickboxing, or lifting.
- ✓Wednesday: A required one-hour education session. Depending on what needs work that week, it might be a book discussion, a training video, or a skill like closing an enrollment.
Frye teaches about five classes a week, mostly advanced Jiu-Jitsu and kickboxing. His program director works about 36 hours a week, checks a standard operating procedure (SOP) book that front-desk staff sign off on each day, and assigns tasks to the team every Monday. Staff were time-blocked hour by hour at first. Now that they're experienced, Frye only looks closer when the numbers slip.
High-Tech Systems, Human Touch
Frye teaches engineering and loves technology, yet he chose paper check-in cards over key fobs. Each student takes a card from a box and hands it to the instructor. That guarantees a fist bump, a greeting, or a "haven't seen you in a while" for every student in classes that average around 45 people. The back of each card holds the student's goals, such as an upcoming tournament or weight they want to lose, for staff to bring up in goal talks. Retention follow-up includes MIA calls and handwritten postcards, especially for the gym's roughly 200 active kids.
He also put a commercial espresso machine in the lobby so members stay and talk before and after class. Debes, who builds Red Belt's CRM, agreed. Software should take care of reminders, lead follow-up, inventory, and reporting so staff have more time for personal contact, not replace that contact.
Key Takeaways
- ✓You don't have to quit your job to build a big school, but you do have to build systems that don't need you there.
- ✓Full-time staff can fuel growth. Frye's growth jumped once he hired full-time people and organized around them.
- ✓Offer careers, not side gigs. A clear ladder, real pay, and benefits keep good instructors from leaving.
- ✓Cross-train everyone, assign clear ownership. Every staff member can do every job, but each one owns specific numbers.
- ✓Run a weekly cadence: a numbers meeting, physical training together, and professional education.
- ✓Use tech to make personal contact easier. Small touchpoints like check-in cards and a lobby espresso machine help retention.
Listen to the Full Episode
Hear Josh Frye explain his staffing ladder and weekly routine in his own words on Spotify or YouTube.
If you want your gym to run without you on every shift, the right tools help. Red Belt Software gives martial arts school owners automations, staff reminders, and communication tools that improve student retention and support growth.