Thinking of opening a gym for co-workers. Need advice.? -

I ve thought a lot lately about opening a gym for my co-workers at my plant. We have over 500 employees on site. We have no place to work out and the gyms in the immediate area are terrible and expensive.We have checked with corperate and they will not approve any equipment for us to use.I ve scouted a place in a small town that is right down the road from us.The plant is a couple of mile from anywhere and everyone pretty much has to drive through this small town.It seems that the overhead would be low. Lease, electricity, water/ sanitation, equipment, and a security system.The closest gym charges $50 a month and doesn t offer much in the wasy of amenities. The cost of equipment isn t a problem and the start up cost for the lease and bills won t be hard to deal with.(After all of that...) My questions are:1. Is it legal to only offer membership to my co-workers and contractors in the plant? 2. Is it possible to set it up where members have a key and are responsible for unlocking and locking up As they come and go? (We work rotating shifts and I believe people would be in and out at all hours. This is one of our problems. There are no facilities that offer 24hr. service.)3. What type of insurance does a business like this have to carry?4. Should it be a social club ? And, would that circumvent the insurance and membership problem? 5. What is the best way to set up payment?6. Does this seem to be a viable plan?I d like to do this as a service and really am not looking to make additional income off of it in the near future. I just want to cover the costs and do it legally. I d like to put any money made, back into the place. Sorry that this is so long.

There are a couple of things that you need to be concerned about...Start-up costs, legal fees and permits, liability insurance, and operating expenses are a few of those...In my experience, the cost to open the front door for business will likely exceed $75,000.IMHO leaving building security and operations to members would be a disaster! Simply put, they won t do it!If you re OK with the beginning costs, contact your local SCORE ( www.SCORE.org) office to engage a counselor (for free!) to pull the particulars together.Good Luck!