As someone who goes to a crosscut gym, I'm guessing privacy is the least of their concerns. Most are focused on user retention and renewal rates. Sadly many if these gyms get sucked into groupon cycles

I never understood why CrossFit gyms were so much more expensive then mass market gyms -- the mas market gyms had more equipment, more expensive equipment, and larger, more expensive spaces. I also know that the big gyms depend on people not using their memberships for a large portion of their profits, but that couldn't be everything, could it?

I understand a premium, but a mass market gym could be 40 to 60 dollars, and a crossfit gym was 140 to 200 dollars.

Crossfit gyms are very labour-intensive compared to normal gyms. You're getting something that's close to training with a personal trainer every time you show up.

As a CrossFitter, I can tell you that I compared the price to personal training. I feel like I get the results of a personal trainer + a community feeling -- and it costs $7/session instead of $30 or more (since I go 5 days/week). After a year, I feel like the results justified this decision.

Yes, as the owner of a CrossFit gym, I can verify that the trainer pay is the main difference in costs and the reason why CrossFit is more expensive.

Crossfit gyms properly have more people who actually show up, and they may also have license fees to pay.

As the owner of a CrossFit gym, I can also verify this. Our business model is built around getting people to show up to the classes, and in any given week we have around 90% of members showing up. In one of the larger gyms (24hr, Lifetime, Gold's, etc.), you're looking at closer to 10%. The main difference in costs is the trainers though, since every class is closely coaches and led by experienced instructors.

Cross fit branded ones pay a license fee of several k a year (3 if I recall ) to the crossfit brand owner.

We just asked, and gave them the stats as to why ("Gyms who use this feature have X% more athletes claim").

Worst they could do was say "no".