Blush Boot Camp creates an amazing sense of community for women keeping each other physically and mentally fit, and individual gyms have been forced to go to court to protect these communities which they love and have poured their livelihoods into. Help these gyms fight this lawsuit and protect their members' access to the caring, supportive communities these gyms have created.

Amanda Austin said this best:

The gym is more than just a gym to me and so many others. Being a military family we had no “village” when we moved here and I was having a hard time finding a place to “fit in”. Then someone told me about Blush and I signed up the next day. The outpouring of love I have received since joining and the village it created is something I won’t ever be able to thank Charice and the ladies inside those walls enough for. That gym gave my 3 kids a mom back. It gave me friends who will be with me for life. This gym saved me when I was at my lowest and now a year and a half and 600 sessions later I am still just as in love as day one. The Clinton location is my second home and honestly it’s what gets me through all of my worst and best days.

Please help keep these opportunities available for the women who rely on them.

Blush Boot Camp is unique. These are women-only gyms that empower women through fitness. Most gym owners are women who were members first that fell in love with BLUSH and wanted to share that opportunity with others (many husbands and other family members joined and supported as co-owners). These gym owners literally bought into the program they had grown so passionate about.

Unfortunately, the gym owners were given inaccurate information on the expenses and budgeting to run these gyms. A Blush Boot Camp is a labor of love, a small business that is perfect for someone who wants to work in the fitness industry, wants to work closely with the members who work out at the gym and knows that these locations will not provide massive profits. But gym owners still needed accurate information to set their budgets, pick appropriate locations and avoid signing up for long-term expenses that could have been avoided. The owners bought into a brand expecting to receive the same kind of support and guidance which they provide their members. This is not what they experienced.

The gyms now seek to “reset the clock” and ensure the gyms stay open by reducing unnecessary expenses and payments. Just like fitness, there is no “get rich quick” scheme to running a Blush. But the owners can earn enough income to keep the gyms open if they win this suit and reduce those unnecessary payments. That will keep the gyms open and let the owners continue to grow the communities they have built.

Litigation is always expensive, but the court has added a substantial expense to this litigation: a receiver. The Court found that it was necessary to appoint an independent third party to oversee the franchisor's operation. This is closely related to a finding by the Bankruptcy Court of Kansas, which also found that the corporate franchisor is a disorganized mess that shuffles money between multiple "companies," some of which do not even have their own bank accounts! It will take a lot of time, energy and expertise to sort out the confusion in the corporate franchisor; we currently estimate this cost will be $150,000.00.

And the Court ordered the gyms to pay a large portion of that cost. The cost is more than the gyms should be forced to pay, and the gyms do not want to pass this cost on to their members. We want the members to focus on their own growth, fitness and wellbeing, so we can keep hearing stories like this one:

I started at Blush in May of 2023, my sophomore year of college was the hardest just wrapped up and I was living down at college away from my parents for the summer. I was in a big slump at that time in my life and wanted to get out of it. I wanted to get into working out, but it made me anxious and nervous to try it out. So, I decided to try Blush I was so scared when I went into my first session. But I met some awesome ladies and had so much fun, so right after my first session was over, I knew immediately I was going to sign up! Getting into the consistency of working out was my hardest challenge at first but when I started making so many friends at Blush. I wanted to see my friends every day while getting to work on myself! Joining Blush was one of my best and favorite decision I have ever made! It helped me gain my confidence back, put myself first, and feel better mentally while being in college and getting my degree. I am so grateful to Blush, my Blush moms, and to my friends.

In a normal lawsuit, the gyms could hope to recover their expenses and fees from the franchisor when they win. But, the Franchisor attempted to declare bankruptcy and revealed that it has virtually no money or assets. The franchisor's owner was paying himself and his wife hundreds of thousands of dollars per year instead of reinvesting the franchise fees into supporting the gyms. Even more shocking, the bankruptcy revealed that the franchisor had taken out hundreds of thousands of dollars in loans, supposedly to open his own gym locations, but that money has just disappeared without any new gym being opened. This selfish behavior threatened the gyms and force the gyms to seek help in the court.

This behavior also necessitated the appointment of a receiver. In the bankruptcy court, the franchisor's owner revealed that he has been treating multiple businesses as if they were just one business, including not opening individual bank accounts for his multiple "LLCs." Thus, a receiver needed to be appointed to sort this tangled mess out and to ensure that the franchisor operates openly and fairly with the franchisees.

Please stand with the gym owners as they stand against corruption and for their members. The appointment of a receiver is a major win and step forward to protecting the future of the programs our members have come to rely on, but it also represents a major increase in litigation costs.

*All funds raised will go directly to the gyms through to help pay legal costs and fees, specifically including the immense cost of the receiver, whose appointment and continued intervention will protect the interests of our individual club members and the communities they have formed. This GiveSendGo fundraising campaign was authorized by the gyms and owners involved in the lawsuit.

This campaign is unpublished.

GiveSendGo