I was unfortunate enough to have worked with this group of people at a time in my life in which getting ripped off was the last thing I needed. Definitely NOT my first choice of employers as I heard about their poor business practices from more than one person long before I considered employment with them, but with the job market being as bad as it is and them being so close to where I live, I figured why not.
I was hired in as a Sales Manager and asked to run their Howell Location, which after being in business for about fifteen years still only managed to have about 900 members. Right off the bat, this suggested to me that they have absolutely no clue how to run a business. Their goals were to take this club from doing less than 40 new memberships per month to a little over 100 and I was to be the one to be chosen to help them achieve this.
I suggested a few changes to their systems, which included some different marketing strategies, possibly hiring another sales person or two in order to target some corporations for larger group membership sales and also suggested that they take their price down to a respectable amount as they were priced THREE TIMES higher than any of their competitors within a five mile radius. Being that this was the way the community viewed them as a company, nobody was coming in to see their club.
Countless emails were to their General Manager and decision maker, Jared Yoder without a response to any of my suggestions. The word was that "Jared is just a busy guy" but we had a job to do, so I tried relentlessly regardless. When I finally did get a response from Jared it was to set up a meeting that he never even showed up to.
After about a month of being thrown into a situation where I had absolutely zero help from upper management Jared finally walked in and decided that "they expected to get more out of me in the one month I had taken the helm" and fired me 4 weeks before a new baby was to be born into my family. No rhyme or reason to speak of... No warning whatsoever, I was just fired like that. Now, I happen to be pretty talented at what it is that I do. Anyone with a half of a brain cell will tell you that it takes a little longer than a month to change an entire communities perception of any given healthclub. For me, finding another job took me about a week so please let me assure you that this is not where my sour grapes is coming from...
When I asked about picking up my last paycheck I was told I could do so that upcoming Friday. The only problem was that when I got there I realized that I was not paid a single dime of the commissions (which is a HUGE percentage of my income) I earned for the entire month that I was there. When I asked for a reason, Jared said "Well, commissions aren't payable until after four months incase someone cancels?" These are ONE YEAR CONTRACTS we're selling mind you, so noone is just going to walk in and cancel and he knows that. Especially at this place! They make it just about impossible for anyone to cancel and anyone who has tried to cancel with them can and will attest to this.
The bottom line is that this company stole money from an employee that they knew was only weeks away from adding a new baby to the family! It's one thing to part ways, but something completely different to work an entire month on a project and not be paid for it... Let me say this... There isn't a person on this PLANET who can get that overpriced DUMP to 100 new members per month.
My advice to anyone checking into joining the Golds Gym in Howell New Jersey would be DON'T. Retro Fitness or the Workout World down the street is 1/3 of the price and offers the same amenities and would be MUCH better choices. Besides that, I'm sure that Retro Fitness or WOW doesn't lure unsuspecting people in to work for them and then decide not to pay them specifically because their business can't afford to. This particular franchisee of Golds Gym (Steinfeld Management) is not only absolutely CLASSLESS, but they're also way overpriced and IMO will probably end up folding within the year.
Geneticfreak77
Old Bridge, New Jersey
U.S.A.
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