September News

August 21, 2009

Dear Members,

Thank you all for your support during our ‘tumultuous’ month of July. Your words of encouragement and enthusiasm when the decision was made to keep our Curves open were most appreciated. And, the wonderful happy faces and joyous celebration at our party on August 12^th made all the efforts to keep our Curves open worthwhile! (If you haven’t yet seen those marvelous photographs from the party taken by member Marcy Forrest, please ask the staff to show these to you on the CurvesSmart computer.)

Many of you wrote suggestions for making our Curves more vibrant for which the staff and I are grateful. You clearly want our Curves to succeed, and many of your suggestions are going to be implemented this fall. Some of these are:

*Longer Hours – as you have already read in my previous letter, we will be open from 6:45am to 2pm on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; and 6:45am to 12noon on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The evening hours will be 4pm to 8pm, except on Fridays when we close at 7pm. Saturdays will remain the same: 8am to 1pm. AND, the big news is that we will be open the first and third Sundays each month. Curves Expo near Montgomery Mall will alternate Sundays with us, so they will be open 2^nd and 4^th Sundays. Those of you who wish to work out on Sundays can do so here in Bethesda and also at Curves Expo. Sunday hours will be from 10am to 1pm. We will keep these hours until December, and re-evaluate at that time whether to continue this schedule or make some changes.

*Classes – once a month we will offer the following classes: Stretch class taught by Elvi Moore; Refresh Your Work-outs taught by Kathy McGuire; Abs Workout taught by Morgan Hogarth (she is getting her personal training certification shortly). AND, a free monthly weight management class. A schedule of these classes will be posted on the bulletin board soon.

*Machines – Our resident ‘engineer’ Kathy and her assistant, Morgan have made a commitment to service the machines every six weeks. You may have already noticed that the machines are tighter and giving you a better work-out since Kathy and Morgan have serviced them. Additionally, new hydraulics are on order for the glute squat and hip abductor/adductor machines.

*Chair Massage – We are going to experiment with having a massage therapist come once a week for a couple of hours to give ten minute upper back massages. There will be a nominal fee for this, and you will have to sign up. More on this later when we confirm the day of the week and hours as well as fees with the therapist.

*Art and Crafts Fair – We have so many artists among our members that we think it would be great to schedule a Fair at our Curves (or out on the Plaza if we can get permission from the landlord) sometime in early November in time for holiday gift buying. So, start thinking about what you would like to show and sell! We might even consider giving a percentage of the sales to a charity.

*PARTY! - Because we had so much fun at the party on August 12^th, it was decided that we should have another one in December around the holiday season. We will schedule one weeks ahead of time so we can all mark the date on our calendars.

There is obviously lots to be done to get our membership up this fall. While we are working on a number of promotional projects, we all know that the best source of new members is from current members. We need your buddy referrals!!! Please give us names and telephone numbers of your friends who would benefit from the Curves work-out and we will do the rest. We will contact them and invite them to come for a free week. Any member who brings in a friend who signs up, will receive a t-shirt; a member who brings in two friends who sign up will receive a free month!

Again, thank you for your support, and most of all, your friendship and good cheer. Let’s make OUR Curves Bethesda an exciting place to be!

Elvi Moore, Owner, Curves Bethesda