Losing Money to Become a Tycoon: Starting with Games
Chapter 506: It's About Time to Open Another Branch
Saturday, April 30
After lunch, Pei Qian took a leisurely walk toward Managed Fitness.
He had already told Zhang Yuan that they needed to find a coach for the esports club—but where exactly was he supposed to find one?
He honestly had no idea.
A professional esports coach was definitely out of the question.
After all, GOG was still a new game. Pei Qian had heard that some established esports organizations were planning to create GOG divisions, but overall the game's popularity and competitive scene were still in their infancy.
In other words, everyone was starting from roughly the same level.
Before an esports organization invests in a new game, it naturally wants to determine whether that game has long-term potential.
If they spent resources building a team, only for the game to die a few months later and the division to be shut down, all that effort would have been wasted.
Right now, GOG and IOI were competing fiercely for dominance. Most clubs were thinking the same thing:
We'll wait and see which of these two MOBA games comes out on top. We only need to support one division anyway.
As a result, even the teams that had already established GOG rosters were basically just amateurs battling other amateurs.
At this stage, even an average professional coach could dramatically transform a team.
Although Zhang Yuan didn't know much about esports, he certainly wasn't stupid. Any coach he found would probably be at least decent.
And if, combined with his inexplicable luck, an SSR-level talent accidentally appeared among either the players or the coaching staff...
The consequences would be disastrous.
So Pei Qian had to personally find a coach who satisfied his own requirements while leaving Zhang Yuan with no grounds to object.
...What a headache.
Fortunately, he had already agreed with Zhang Yuan that he had two weeks to find someone, so there was no need to panic just yet.
When Pei Qian arrived at the entrance of Managed Fitness, he stepped inside.
Although it was another weekend, there were noticeably fewer people than the last time he had visited.
He paused for a moment before realizing why.
His eyes immediately lit up with delight.
Many of last week's customers had already been filtered out.
Because of Managed Fitness's unique membership system, many people signed up without much hesitation—the unused balance could always be refunded.
However, that didn't mean they could faithfully stick to the personalized training plans.
Once they failed to follow the plan, they would be automatically refunded and temporarily barred from joining again.
As a result, a considerable number of customers had already been weeded out.
Sure, that promotional sign had attracted plenty of people, and many of them had indeed purchased memberships.
But what was the point if they couldn't stick to the program?
Pei Qian couldn't help feeling a little proud of his own brilliance.
Besides that, Managed Fitness had undergone a few subtle changes compared to last week.
The gym now had three full-time service staff.
Originally, there had only been one receptionist responsible for handing out wristbands and greeting customers. When the trainers had nothing else to do, they would occasionally help with reception and customer guidance.
Now the support staff has been expanded. Three employees were on duty at all times, rotating shifts.
Receptionist — responsible for welcoming customers, registering member information, and distributing towels, wristbands, drinking water, and other necessities.
Administrator — handled the gym's daily operations, including trainer scheduling and coordinating with Moyu Delivery.
Planner — responsible for arranging schedules, designing training programs, and analyzing customer data and overall gym performance.
Naturally, the division of labor wasn't completely rigid. They often helped one another whenever necessary.
"President Pei."
The receptionist was the first to notice him.
"Good afternoon, President Pei."
It was around noon, and the administrator was discussing today's fitness meals with two trainers.
"President Pei."
The planner, who had been typing seriously on a laptop in the lounge area, stood up and nodded respectfully after seeing him.
Pei Qian smiled faintly and nodded in return.
The reason he showed a bit more warmth toward the planner was because the planner's true identity was that of an undercover agent—one of the eighteen Management Training Program trainees that Pei Qian had secretly placed throughout the company.
Privately, the trainees addressed Pei Qian as "Senior."
But in public, they still had to call him "President Pei."
Otherwise, they might expose themselves and inadvertently reveal the existence of this mysterious internal department.
Since all positions at the gym operated on rotating shifts, this Management Training Program trainee was able to handle the planner role despite still being a university student. His course load wasn't heavy, and Handong University was only a short walk from Managed Fitness, so the arrangement worked well.
The position of planner didn't exist in ordinary gyms. That was because Managed Fitness operated under a completely different system.
To reduce overcrowding during peak hours, Guo Licheng had suggested to Pei Qian that they develop a mobile app allowing customers to reserve workout times in advance. The app would limit the number of people in the gym at any given time while also assigning each new member an initial training schedule.
For example, if Thursdays were already fully booked, any new customer who wanted to train on Thursdays would have to choose another time slot instead.
The app was still some time away from being completed, so for now all of this scheduling had to be handled manually by the planner.
Fortunately, the gym's membership was still far below its maximum capacity, so this manual process wasn't causing any problems.
At present, the planner's work only involved broad scheduling rather than assigning customers to specific dates and time slots.
The main reason Pei Qian had assigned this trainee to the planner position was so he could keep track of the gym's most accurate operational data and always know exactly how far the business still was from becoming profitable.
The first official meeting of the Management Training Program trainees wouldn't be held until next Saturday, but Pei Qian was already too curious to wait.
Pretending to be casually making conversation, he greeted everyone before sitting down beside the trainee.
There were too many trainees for Pei Qian to remember all their names.
It didn't matter.
As long as he remembered which department each undercover trainee belonged to, that was enough.
"So," Pei Qian asked casually, "how far are we from turning a profit?"
The trainee answered seriously.
"President Pei, based on the gym's current daily operating expenses—and not counting any profit from Moyu Delivery—we would need roughly 200 customer visits per day just to break even."
"If we also factor in equipment depreciation, routine maintenance, and earning a reasonable profit to recover the initial investment in the gym equipment as quickly as possible, then 300 visits per day would be a healthier target."
"Our current number is just a little over twenty."
"Even during our busiest hours, the gym's utilization rate is still below 25%."
Pei Qian was extremely pleased with the report.
See? That's the quality of a trainee I personally trained.
Straight to the point. Clean and efficient. No unnecessary information whatsoever.
He nodded approvingly.
"Very good. Keep up the good work."
The gym was still a long, long way from becoming profitable.
That was excellent news.
As Pei Qian pondered the situation, he felt it was probably about time to consider opening another branch.
He continued strolling deeper into the gym and found Guo Licheng in the strength training area, frantically lifting weights.
Maybe it was just his imagination, but compared to last week, Guo Licheng looked like he'd grown another size larger.
Pei Qian was delighted.
This Guo Licheng is really obedient!
Previously, Pei Qian had instructed him to focus on training as hard as possible and become even bigger than all the other trainers.
That way, he'd have no time or energy to come up with fancy marketing ideas, and the gym would never make money.
Sure enough, Guo Licheng had been training diligently.
Muscles don't lie.
When he saw President Pei arrive, Guo Licheng hurriedly racked the barbell and stood up.
"President Pei! I was just—"
Before he could explain, Pei Qian raised a hand to stop him.
"You're doing an excellent job. As the gym's manager and its public face, you need to have the best physique of anyone here if you want to attract customers."
"So don't slack off. Keep training."
"I actually came today to ask you something."
"Do you know of any other gyms like this one? Places with good renovations and plenty of space—especially near Moyu Internet Café locations or the offices of various Tengda Group departments."
"Oh, and there should be one near Mingyun Villa as well."
Guo Licheng froze for a moment.
"President Pei... are you planning to visit them for research, or..."
Pei Qian smiled.
"Of course not."
"We're going to open another branch."
Guo Licheng was completely dumbfounded.
Huh?
This gym barely has any members at all. The revenue isn't even enough to cover a tiny fraction of its losses, and we're opening another branch already?
And judging from President Pei's tone...
He wasn't planning to open just one new branch.
Guo Licheng hurriedly said, "President Pei, please think this through!"
Pei Qian raised a hand, signaling him to stop.
"I already have."
"Just give me a list of suitable gyms. I'll have someone negotiate with them and see how many owners are willing to sell."
"After that, I'll have to trouble you with preparing the equipment and recruiting staff for the new branches."
Guo Licheng opened his mouth, wanting to persuade him further.
But seeing how resolute President Pei was, he could only nod.
"...Understood, President Pei."
"Um... President Pei, could you repeat the location requirements?"
Pei Qian replied,
"For this batch, we're opening three to five branches."
"Not every gym will be willing to sell, so give me around ten candidate locations."
"One of them must be near Mingyun Villa."
"The rest should all be near Moyu Internet Café locations or the offices of other Tengda Group business divisions."
There were two reasons for choosing locations this way.
First, it would make it easier to supply the gyms with fitness meals.
Second, it would provide convenient benefits for company employees.
Pei Qian had never forgotten that both Managed Fitness and Sloth Apartments served two purposes.
One was to lose money.
The other was to improve employee benefits.
The businesses were already unprofitable to begin with.
Now he could also use them to lavish benefits on employees at the company's expense.
It was double the happiness.
The observation period for this flagship gym had essentially come to an end.
So far, the outlook was encouraging.
Although it had attracted some customers, it was still nowhere near becoming profitable.
Since that was the case, it was about time to gradually start allowing the company's own employees to use the facilities.
But why introduce them gradually, in multiple phases?
Because the system imposed restrictions.
Whether it was Sloth Apartments or the shared gym, employee benefits could only account for a limited proportion of the total capacity.
For example, if Sloth Apartments contained 100 units, only about 30 could be designated as employee housing.
Restaurants and gyms followed the same principle.
They could certainly be used as employee benefits, but only on the condition that ordinary customers also had access to them.
Employees could not completely monopolize these facilities, and the ratio between employee use and public use was subject to strict limits.
Therefore, if Pei Qian wanted to create fitness programs for all of Tengda's employees, he would have to open many more gyms.
Fortunately, as long as these gyms continued to lose money, he would have more than enough motivation to keep expanding.