my kids program is doing very well. I would be glad to help if you want some info.
Bei
This is mantis teachers discussing how to promote mantis. I dont want to discuss it with a wing chun guy. He doesnt have the same problems.
I want to discuss this topic with people who have the same problems teaching praying mantis kung fu that I do.
A mantis forum doesnt have to be about who is the toughest mantis guy up for the cahallenge. It can also be about promoting the style and overcoming common problems of praying mantis teachers.
I think this is a helpful thread.
Oso,
Have you ever thought about doing a demo at universities in your area? I remember seeing some demos while walking through the union here at school. Perhaps you could arrange that with the school(s) and some of your students go and run through the drills you do, displaying the increasing levels of complexity/intensity of what you teach. Be sure to have some female students drilling. Pass out flyers to onlookers. Try to setup around lunchtime and/or in between classes. On a typical day, I would think you could have several hundred onlookers seeing what you do.
I dont want to discuss it with a wing chun guy. He doesnt have the same problems.
Maybe you should start a new thread in the mantis forum again, but this time address mantis specific buisness problems right off the bat? Your original post is kind of general. I really don’t see anything indicating what makes mantis different from wing chun, at least in a buisness since.
shadowboxer, good idea. but, unfortunately the karate/jujitsu teacher I mentioned above, who is also my jujitsu teacher and a good friend, has those things wrapped up. Not a bad thing, he’s been teaching for 30 some years and has been a very good mentor to me.
lol, in fact, I just got back from a ‘search & destroy’ mission with him. a guy has started teaching in town and is using the same school name I have been using for over 3 years now. We went to find some flyers I’d heard were up around town as proof for when I get a lawyer to write a ‘cease & desist’ letter.
now there’s an effed up problem that has just come up for me.
Good thread, to bad it got moved,
I have two sides to this. I owned a school for 8 years and taught tradionally. I had a great group of hard core students who were only interested in real kung fu and got what they wanted for 65.00 a month 5 days a week. I also saw 350 students walk in and out of the Tae Kwon Do school down the street.
They have a 5,000 floor , I had wood and carpet, they had a loocker room and showers, I had a bathroom and a curtian to change behind, they taught crap and promoted BB’s within a year, I taught tradtional Kung fu and it took 6 years to get ranked in our system.
Did this make me rich? absolutly not I was almost always in the red, but the rewards of teaching quality are unsurpassed. I have since went to teaching part time for FREE in a friends school and working full time. I teach the same, nothing changed. I still have my top students who are serious about there training. Would I trade it for the money fame and glory? NEVER
What am I worth? ask my students who have followed me for 8 years … peace
What is it worth VS. How much can I charge my students.
You know, if this thread had been about promotion of Praying mantis, ie. what could I teach or do to teach mantis in a better ecconomical fashion/ make it a better art/ let my students learn faster/more efficient; this thread would NOT have been moved.
Almost all of the replies to the thread were about how to promote yourself or your school & how much to charge while doing it. The praying mantis forum is not Martial arts buisness 101.
Sorry if you do not get my point, but the thread will remain here or be deleted.
Best Wishes to all,
~BTL
BTL, I understand your methodology and this thread certainly didn’t meet those rules.
I would like to make one point though.
The prevailing theme of conversations on the PM Forum has been about trying to get past the walls that separate the different branches of PM.
Obviously, trying to discuss the technical differences/similarities between branches should be the main thrust but do you not think that discussion between teachers about some of the issues that are confronting us on a day to day basis will help promote a better sense of understanding between us?
Getting to know each other a little better and realizing that “Hey, this Wah Lum/7*/Pong Lai guy is going through the same ***** of a time as I am” can only help, IMO.
So, I have to say that I feel that this thread could have stood based on the fact that no one was calling anyone a jerk 
or downing a particular branch and it was happening between members of the KFM PM community.
with much respect to the job you do,
Matt
one of the best marketing moves any of you can make is to plaster the walls of your training hall with Ralph Maccio posters.
and a shrine to bruce lee also doesn’t hurt.
have 78 different levels of rank and charge an extra 50 bucks everytime someone gets something marginally right or has the 50 bucks ready to go!
all kidding aside, check the prices around town and find a happy medium.
knowing the cost of something doesn’t equate to the value of it more often than not.
cheers
Brad
I didnt start the thread
Bei
move the thread, delete it or whatever you want.
I still think it was a good thread and appreciate the input from everyone.
Thanks
Today, my school is open 6 days a week, I have classes all day, I have heavy bags, mats, a ring, weights, and I have a staff to pay. Obviously, I have bills to pay. And I have mouths to feed. So I have no reservations about charging $120 per month and actually collecting it.
Sounds about right. From what I can tell lkfmdc, you actually have services that you sell and that’s the way to go. A friend of mine has a commercial school and by trying to be more profitable ( a good thing ) he’s gone from teaching a solid martial art to teaching something acceptable to soccer moms. He’s been wondering why his better students and black belts have been drifting away.
My sensei teaches for next to nothing, he just likes to teach. If we need equipment we all just toss some money into the till.
Originally posted by Oso
get your students to teach your kids class.
Make sure you give the student the go-ahead to beat the unholy hell out of the parents of the dumb kids, though. You know the ones. They pick their nose and spin when it’s time to do anything.
Vash, man that is the wrong technique.
You kill the most obnoxious kid at the beginning of each month and prop them in the corner as en example to the others.
keeps things quiet and running smoothly with little johnny sugar freak slowly rotting in the corner.
You have to admit, it is fun using the class bully or the obnoxious kid as a demonstration dummy.
yep, man I got some stories…helped teach kids class from '94 till '01 for my old sifu. From about '97 to '01 I was the kids class instructor. He took them from 4 up…and gave them to me…:eek:
heh, just broke 3000…
Originally posted by rogue
[B]…A friend of mine has a commercial school and by trying to be more profitable ( a good thing ) he’s gone from teaching a solid martial art to teaching something acceptable to soccer moms. He’s been wondering why his better students and black belts have been drifting away.
[/B]
Thats his mistake. What you charge and how you teach don’t really need to go hand in hand.
People will pay well if they think they are getting a cutting edge challenging experience.
Kids classes are entirely different. You can’t put kids through the grinder like an adult. It has to be lighter. But of course it has to reflect reality by not pumping them up full of fool ideas.
The lesson here is that those who have the small hardcore group are basically the same as those who have a small hardcore group surrounded by a big more casual group. Except of course one is poorer than the other. The hardcore group will never be big in any place. It has to be accompanied by the lesser student group.
This “poor teacher” paradigm is something carried over from the movies, the whole “wandering monk” phenomenon. This myth is stupid. And as Ross pointed out not really the reality.
People have no qualms about paying through the nose to have little johnny ride a horse for an hour. Or, pay huge amounts for guitar classes. Why should it be any different for quality instruction? The teacher is giving of his time, experience, knowlegde, dedication, facilities, employees, etc. Those that have a problem with this are cheap muerto de hambre mo-fos that don’t appreciate whats being given to them. Money does NOT equate to bad quality. The bad quality would be bad at any price.
Word!
oso-
you broke 3000 kids?
it’s martial arts man not horse training…
[size=1](actually i understand what you meant, it just looked funny)[/size]
yea, good post SifuA.
LOL, yep stacked the little buggers up…didn’t get a clean break on the bottom 4 though…
and sorta speaking of kids class and teaching…newish pics at my site.
http://www.ashevillemartialarts.com/Photos.htm
I like my kids class now…6 on a good day.
as much as I’d like to have a good 12-15, once you get that many you have to use a more military, rank & file approach and I don’t think that imparts the best training to a kid.