Industry · Health & Fitness

Virtual CFOs for studios and clinics — practitioner pay, multi-location margins, membership LTV.

Subscription-revenue economics for studios, clinics, and multi-location operators that grew faster than their bookkeeping.

Studio owners and clinic operators are domain experts first and finance people second. Membership and class-pack revenue look like SaaS, but the cost line is rent + practitioners + equipment, not servers. We bring a Bookkeeper or Controller for the daily rigour and an FP&A specialist for the membership analytics that drive every pricing and retention decision.

Where it hurts

The health & fitness pains we step into.

  • Membership churn and LTV analytics

    If you don't know what a member is worth and what causes them to leave, you're guessing at the price and the marketing budget. We build the cohort view that ends the guessing.

  • Multi-location P&L

    Each studio or clinic is its own P&L. We make sure the central overhead is allocated fairly and that the head office can see which sites are subsidising which.

  • Practitioner contractor vs. employee accounting

    The contractor-versus-employee question has tax, IFRS, and labour-law consequences. We help you set the structure once and document it cleanly.

  • Cash-flow timing against rent and equipment leases

    Rent runs monthly. Equipment leases run quarterly. Memberships run all over the place. A 13-week cash forecast keeps the rent paid without the panic.

What "fixed" looks like

Outcomes we work toward, 90 days in.

Pattern-based engagements drawn from a CIMA-CGMA finance career. Not client-specific case studies — the first published case studies launch with our pilot customers in 2026.

  1. Pattern 1 of 3

    The member cohort view

    The situation: Memberships are growing, churn feels manageable, and nobody can tell you what a member is actually worth.

    What we do

    • Cohort-based churn and LTV built by acquisition channel and signup month.
    • Contribution per member calculated after practitioner pay and direct cost.
    • Pricing and marketing-budget decisions tied to LTV/CAC, not gut.

    Outcome shape

    Pricing decisions stop being guesses inside 60 days. Marketing spend rebalances toward the channels with provable LTV.

  2. Pattern 2 of 3

    The multi-location P&L allocation

    The situation: Four studios share one head office and nobody can say which site funds which.

    What we do

    • Per-site cost centre with central overhead allocated on a fair, documented base.
    • Standalone P&L per site, plus a group roll-up that ties back to the trial balance.
    • Site-level contribution surfaced so expansion and consolidation decisions get honest.

    Outcome shape

    Head office sees which sites are subsidising which. Expansion plans get stress-tested against real per-site economics, not aspiration.

  3. Pattern 3 of 3

    The practitioner pay structure

    The situation: Practitioners are 'contractors' but the documentation is thin, and SARS / labour-law exposure is hanging over the books.

    What we do

    • Contractor-vs-employee status reviewed and documented site-by-site.
    • Cost line restructured so practitioner pay is visible per class / per session.
    • If a lawyer is needed for the labour-law sign-off, we flag it and recommend one.

    Outcome shape

    Audit and SARS exposure documented and defensible. Practitioner pay shows up in the right line on the management pack, not buried in opex.

Outcome shapes are directional and drawn from JD's prior engagements. Your situation will differ — the free 30-minute diagnostic is where we calibrate.

Most-relevant seats

The right people for health & fitness.

Frequently asked

The questions you'd ask if we were across the table.

Built for studios that grew faster than their bookkeeping.

Walk into the boardroom. Start with the Bookkeeper or the FP&A specialist — your first 30-minute consultation is free.

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