A home run
Nashua – Two relatively new local business owners have tapped into a seemingly recession-proof industry where recent profits have been a home run.
Ryan Coulter and Keith Adamyk are co-owners of the branch franchise Extra Innings-Nashua, an indoor baseball and softball training facility. Over the past year, while many local businesses struggled to stay afloat in a difficult economy, this seasonal business reported a 38 percent increase in revenue. The owners attributed their success primarily to the demand nationwide for personal trainers for young athletes.
Last year more than $4.1 billion was spent on private coaching and sports instruction in the United States, according to Pat Rigsby, vice president of International Youth Conditioning Association, an organization dedicated to educating fitness professionals specializing in youth sports. Interest has gone up incrementally over the last three to five years with at least a five percent yearly increase across the board, Rigsby said.
“Fitness as a whole has been pretty flat over the past year,” Rigsby said. “But youth has seen significant growth.”
There are two main drivers for personal trainers, said Pete McCall, exercise physiologist with the American Council on Exercise. Hiring a personal trainer provides structured activity for kids, he said. If a school district cuts the physical education budget, then children who want to be active need a way to do it.
The second driver is scholarships. “With everything else going up in price, parents are looking at options that will save them in the long term,” McCall said. “Parents will spend money now on a youth coach in chances of their child winning college scholarship later.”
The cost of specialized training is high. more families are turning to specialization at an earlier age and are willing to pay anywhere from $200 per week up to $10,000 annually, according to Robert Malina, retired professor emeritus at the University of Texas Austin, and member of the American College of Sports Medicine.
However, there is a catch.
“People think it’s good to get a scholarship for college,” Malina said. “It’s highly unlikely to get a scholarship because there aren’t that many around. Most of them are partial. there are a lot of misperceptions of the probability of success.”
Malina estimates no more than 2 percent of male and female high school seniors get full and partial scholarships.
Extra Innings-Nashua is a 12,800-square-foot training area located at 9 Congress St. that opened in January of 2007. it is one of 39 locations nationwide, all of which reported profits in the last year.
They offer softball and baseball cage rentals, batting and pitching tunnels, professional instruction that includes year-round camps and instructional clinics, and operate a pro shop with baseball and softball equipment and apparel.
“The versatility allows Extra Innings to have different revenue sources to generate an income year round,” Coulter, 36, an insurance agent, said.
Extra Innings has mirrored the national trends with a decline in memberships over the last year, but saw an increase in private lessons.
“In a good economy or bad economy everyone still wants their kids to do well,” said Adamyk, 48, who also owns a construction company. “We haven’t been hurt too much. People don’t absolute need stuff in the pro shop but they need to train every week.”
Adamyk said sales in the pro shop have slowed because people aren’t buying new bats every year as they once had.
Extra Innings offers 15 lessons a day, which will increase with the arrival of little League baseball season. Lessons for non-members are $39 for one-half hour. Depending on which membership package an individual has, lesson rates vary.
The facility provides training and clinics for men and women of all ages, but their core demographic is seven to 15-year-olds, Adamyk said.
“We like to get the younger kids in because they stay a lot longer and sometimes up through college,” he said.
The two business partners, who met through the Hollis/Brookline High School baseball team, where Coulter is the varsity coach and Adamyk is the assistant coach, are busy planning Extra Innings’ future. Coulter and Adamyk have been visiting leagues in the greater Nashua area to recruit coaches who teach younger children. their objective is to have coaches come in for a clinic and receive a certificate.
“Often with little leagues, parents do it and don’t have much experience,” Adamyk said. “That’s when the kids learn to walk basically. When they get to high school and move forward, it’s hard to teach them to walk all over again. We are reaching out to try and make it mandatory to go to a quick one-hour coaches clinic. so kids are on the same page and helps out the coaches.”
This fall, they also hope to have their first girls softball college showcase, in which athletes demonstrate their abilities to some 10 to 20 college coaches at the facility.
They plan on holding a similar baseball tournament that would last several days next summer. Both show tournaments would be an extra fee for members.
Coulter and Adamky have discussed the possibility of opening another larger facility within the next three to five years that would include indoor fields. they have not selected an exact location but have flirted with north of Manchester or southwest near Keene.