Running a multi-branch gym in India: a practical guide

#What changes at the second branch

A single gym runs on the owner being in the room. You see who walked in, you know who hasn't paid, and the rules can live in your head because you're there to apply them. Open a second location and you can only be in one of those rooms, so everything you used to know by looking has to be written down somewhere. That's more or less what this whole guide is about.

I run one studio, not a chain, so none of this comes from my own branches. It comes from the GST rules and from working through the sums.

#Start with the structure, not the software

It helps to get three levels straight first, because a lot of multi-branch confusion is two of them getting mixed up. The business is the legal owner, and one entity (a company, an LLP or a proprietor) can run many branches. The brand is what members see, so the name, the logo, the class types and the minimum standards stay the same everywhere. The branch is a physical place with a manager, a till and a bank deposit, and it can decide things like batch timings, local offers and small purchases.

Separate entities per branch are mainly worth discussing when the partners differ, or when you want to keep the risk of one location apart, and that's a call to make with your chartered accountant. The more useful exercise is writing down what the brand promises and what a branch can decide on its own. If that isn't on paper, each manager draws the line for themselves, and you'll probably find out where they drew it from a member.

#GST: one GSTIN per state, not per gym

GST registration follows the state, not the building, and that surprises a lot of owners. The GST Council's registration flyer says a PAN-based legal entity would have one GSTIN per State, so branches in different States need separate State-wise registrations. It also says a person with multiple places of business in one State or Union territory may be granted a separate registration for each place (GST Council flyer, PDF, as of 2 Nov 2026). The flyer is old, so confirm today's position with your CA.

In practice, it looks something like this:

Billing from the wrong GSTIN creates filing work for later, so the invoice series and GSTIN per branch are worth fixing on day one. The rate and invoice rules are in GST on gym membership.

#Pricing: one rate card, planned exceptions

Members compare your branches, and if the same plan costs different amounts at two locations for no visible reason, someone will ask you why. So the simplest setup is one rate card for the brand, covering plans, durations, and freeze and transfer rules.

There's a fair case for charging more in some places, because a branch in a premium locality really does cost more to run. I'd just write that exception down with the reason next to it, so the answer at the desk is the same on every shift.

The second decision is whether a membership works at every branch or only at the one the member joined. Many chains sell a single-branch plan and a higher-priced all-branch plan. If it works everywhere, you also need to decide who gets the revenue when a member trains at another branch, and the simplest rule is that it stays with the selling branch, with no transfer. That's a little unfair to the branch doing the hosting, but it's a rule everyone can follow, and I'd take that over a perfect split nobody can calculate.

The method for setting the numbers is in gym membership pricing in India.

#Money: every rupee tagged to a branch

I call this one the blended total: the single number that makes all your branches look fine. Here's a made-up example, in lakhs per month. Branch A collects 12 and spends 8. Branch B collects 6 and spends 7. Together you've collected 18, spent 15 and kept 3, and that looks like a healthy business, until you split it and see that A made 4 and B lost 1.

The only way to see that split is to tag everything. Collections get tagged by branch, by day and by mode, so cash, UPI and card. Every receipt says which branch it belongs to, whether the payment account is per branch or shared. Expenses like rent, power, housekeeping, equipment and marketing each go to a branch, or to "head office" if they're shared.

Head office is the one to keep an eye on, because it's the easiest place to park a cost you don't want to think about.

#The rent sum, before you sign

There's one piece of industry advice I'd actually follow here, which is that rent shouldn't be more than 20–25% of what you're targeting to earn. It's the one cost you really can't optimise out of later.

The sum takes a minute. Say the new place costs 2 lakh a month, and take the kinder 25%, which means the branch needs to be targeting 8 lakh a month. If members pay 2,000 a month on average, that's 400 paying members at that one location. These numbers are only an example, so put your own in. If the answer sounds like a lot for that catchment, it's better to find out before the deposit goes in.

#Staff: home branch, and who may move

Every person gets a home branch, and that part is easy. The harder questions are about the people who cross over. Which branch pays a trainer who covers two? How is their time recorded? If a member bought PT at one branch and the session happened at another, which branch pays the commission? There's more on that in how PT commission works. Any of these answers can work, as long as there is one and it's written down before the first argument.

Access is simpler, and my view is that each role gets the least it needs. A desk person sees their own branch's members. A manager sees their own branch fully, and never another branch's money. A manager who leaves shouldn't be able to take every branch's member list with them.

#Members: one person, one record

A member who joins at Branch A and visits Branch B should be one person, not two, because duplicates are how you end up with double billing, wrong expiry dates and awkward conversations at the desk.

Phone number is the natural key, so you search by phone before you add anyone. If you're on a shared sheet, lock the phone column and check for duplicates weekly. It does have one weak spot, which is family members sharing a phone, and I don't have a neat fix for that in a sheet. A note on the record is about as good as it gets.

#The reports a branch owner should see weekly

This list is short on purpose, because the ones you'll actually read are the only ones that count.

Compare the same week across branches, and the same branch against last month. One number means little, but two side by side tell you where to go and look.

#Franchise or own branches?

There's a real case for franchising, because other people's capital pays for the growth, and that's hard to argue with when your own money only stretches so far. It does need a brand, a manual and a way to check standards, though. In a nutshell, if you can't yet write down what your brand promises, you don't have a franchise to sell.

Your own second branch keeps control and margin, and it needs your capital and your time. If you're looking at a franchise as a buyer, read what gym franchises publish about costs. If you're opening a second location yourself, see opening a second gym branch.

#Where Helmr fits

This is the part where I talk about my own product, so read it with that in mind. Helmr, gym management software for India, is being built around the structure in this guide: business, then brand, then branch, with a GSTIN and a payment account per branch, and staff roles limited to the branches they work at. None of that is live yet, and we're in early access.

Pricing will be per business with a per-branch add-on, published before launch, so you'll know the cost of branch number three before you open it. We take 0% of member payments, and the money goes to your own payment account. Migration from your current sheets or software is planned as free, assisted and included. Your members will hear from your own WhatsApp number, and the WhatsApp rail behind that already runs my own studio's number, since 22 Oct 2026.

If you run more than one branch, or you're planning to, and you'd like to be among the first to use it, message us on WhatsApp.