Club Studio — Local services in Elk Grove

1/19/24: Real review. Not from one of the staff members.

I was disappointed with the Club Studio gym in Elk Grove, especially considering the membership costs range from $129 to $135, depending on when you signed up. For that price, I expected much more.

Facility Size and Equipment:

The weights section is surprisingly small—comparable to a standard 24-Hour Fitness or Club Sport location. Given the gym's overall size, I imagined a more expansive setup, but in reality, it feels even smaller. There’s only one of each machine, with a few exceptions. Specifically, I believe there are two rear delt fly machines and two chest fly machines, but for the most part—when it comes to chest pressing movements, back movements, or isolation leg movements—there is only one machine available. This is honestly disappointing, especially considering the high membership cost. For comparison, even a regular Club Sport location typically has at least two of each machine.

Advertised Amenities vs. Reality: I also felt misled by the promotional materials and staff, who emphasized "all-inclusive benefits." However, upon visiting, I realized several amenities were missing:

No pool, hot tub, steam room, or cold plunge. Only a small dry sauna, which was crowded when I visited (6 other men were in there at the same time). No basketball courts, pickleball courts, or indoor sports facilities.

Recovery Section Costs: One of the biggest surprises was the recovery section, which is not included in the base membership. If you want access to red light therapy, hydro massage chairs, or leg compression therapy, you must pay an additional $80 to $90 per month, on top of the $130 membership fee. This means you’re essentially paying $200+ per month to access full benefits. This critical detail is not mentioned on the website and is something they should address transparently.

Value for Men vs. Women: As a male gym-goer, the limited equipment and amenities make this gym less appealing. It seems better suited for women who might enjoy the included fitness classes and courses more than the strength training options.

Final Thoughts: Overall, the gym doesn't feel worth the high membership cost, especially for those prioritizing weight training or expecting access to the recovery facilities as part of the advertised "all-inclusive" benefits.

Edit - Another very weird policy is that you cannot bring your gym bag inside the exercise area. The Asian gentleman working that day came up to me and told me "We have a no bag policy, you can put your stuff in the lockers." I may have perceived it differently, but felt a bit condescending. It was my first time there and I had no idea of the rule. No hi/hello, just a instruction to remove my bag from the premise.

You must lock up your bag in a locker. So if you have exercise bands, water bottle, foam roller, phone, or any other accessory gym material - you essentially just carry it all with you or leave it on the floor. It breaks the flow of someone who takes working out seriously. You essentially have to go in and out of the bathroom to get weightlifting straps or a belt. This is the only gym I've ever experienced this and to be quite frank think it's completely excessive.

Another issue is the classes. My fiance came 5 minutes late, and they did not let her enter. This was understandable (I agree it's important to be on time), but they also ended up charging her $5-10 late fee even though it was her first offense. This honestly turned us off so much, and most likely we will be cancelling in the coming month. Life happens and we would have at least hoped to get a warning prior instead of receiving a penalty/fine. Please be understanding of that.

Review is not meant to discourage, but to shed some light. All in all - clean gym, nice staff, but worth the $$$ and supposed...

I have been attending this gym since it opened on 12/31. Prior to becoming a member, I had several studio memberships + a gym membership so the price point is honestly a steal. No complaints there.

Gym: The gym is okay and meets most of my needs. They could use more equipment in terms selection but generally they have most machines needed. A bit shocked that there's only 1 lat pull down and 0 seated cable row machines. Nonetheless, the stretch area, bands, and other small equipment provided are a nice touch and I'd still rate the gym area a 4.

Studios: Love this aspect. I have taken 25 classes to date, many with the same instructor several times. Yes, they fill up fast, so yes, you need to book most of them as soon as they open. I have a bit of an obsessive personality so this works for me lol. Here are my highlights.

Reformer: My favorite instructor is Brianna. I love her playlists and her repeated cues, because let's be honest, some of us are a little slower than others in understanding the assignment. While I do think she can be persistent with her cues, I've never been offended and I'm sure I have at least on one occasion been the reason why she needed to repeat herself so many times. I've taken 6 classes with her thus far and have enjoyed them all. I always feel challenged, I may even take an excessive amount of breaks on the reformer and while she gently pushes us to stay in it and to keep going, I don't feel judged when I don't. Overall I would highly recommend her as an instructor and always look forward to her classes.

Yoga: I wish the classes were a bit warmer. Seems like the temperature doesn't quite reach the "hot" standard. I don't need it to be 105 but sometimes it gives 80. That's probably my only suggestion in general.

Instructors I loveeee Lia! She's so sweet and she remembered my name and gave me subtle shout out during one of our classes. Subtle things like that make a difference and are nice especially when there are so many people in the classes making it a little difficult to build community. I also enjoy her playlist and really just her overall sweet nature. I'm a regular!

I've only attended one of Larraine's classes BUT it was great. I loved her set up and lighting changes. Her first song was I Get So Lonely by Janet Jackson, yasssss 🙌🏽. Was such a vibe, of course I'll be back :)

Boxing: I've only taken classes with Sergio but he's GREAT. He's highly motivating, provides corrections, and in general you can just tell he loves what he does. I feel extremely unstoppable when I leave boxing lol (I probably should relax). I also burn a ton of calories so it's another class that I try to regularly attend. BTW, the discipline quote that he uses from Mike Tyson is now something I tell myself daily. Again, he's great, highly motivational and I have found the impact of that outside of class.

Ride: I really enjoy Alex's ride classes. She's amazing, like no really. I can't say riding is my favorite as it generally hurts my butt but Alex makes it fun, lively, she pushes you to challenge yourself and I have found the things she says really push me to be better outside of classes. I think that's an important part of fitness for me, the way it impacts my mental health/well-being and ride with Alex does that for me. With that said, I try to do it weekly even if my butt is sore after!

Pilates: I've attended a few Pilates classes. I went to a hot Pilates studio in the past and am very use to a format that incorporates HIIT into the workout. This is a bit different so I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about it.

Overall, I'm glad I signed up for Club Studio. Yes it's busy, yes the parking can be challenging, but I still attend multiple times a day/week and have found it to be a great...

Premium price with poor customer service and systemic issues. All staff members have no idea how to solve any issues, directing to the manager(Kira) who is not there during busy times, she has a very rude attitude and accepts no responsibility or accountability for mistakes and miscommunication on their end.

I recommend avoiding this place if possible. Read below for our personal experiences.

As others have mentioned, staff members have no ability to sort out issues if one (even minor ones) come up. Their checkin system is inconvenient, manually checking people in one by one instead of leaving the scanner on the counter so people can independently check in. Once a problem comes up, staff members direct your questions to the manger, who’s often not there during the busiest time (after 4/5pm). If problems can’t be answered, sorry please contact corporate, what’s their number? They don’t know, nor is it on the website. Great.

We were members starting before their opening day. They had issues since day 1 and we gave the benefit of the doubt as they would get their sh*t together once things get rolling, but nope.

Problem 1: We get charged for a “no-show” class despite being in the class. When asked for a refund, this took weeks as they needed to get “manager approval”. Apparently this happened to numerous people. Again, the charge is $15 which is not a lot considering the membership price, but the principle of just charging your account and not refunding the money in a timely manner irks me.

Problem 2: We were informed about their policy on pausing membership as we needed to travel for 2 months. One staff member told us it was a ONE TIME CHARGE OF $50 per member and we can unpause our membership at any point. Then another told us it was $50 per person, PER MONTH, okay fine we do that. We get charged ($100 for 2 ppl) the first month. Then the second month, we don’t get charged. No phone call, no email, or anything so we just assumed the first person was right and the second person was wrong. We return from our trip, go in 5 days before our billing date to get unpaused. They told us that we can just return on the billing date so everything starts back up smoothly. Okay, we did as we were told. Once we returned, we were told that we owed money for the second month that we were paused for and that our account was unpaid and revoked. ?? We pay the charge (second $100) and attempt to unpause and pay our regular monthly dues but unable to. Additionally, our app no longer worked and we could not book classes, which is the main reason for the premium price of this gym. They told us they will talk to corporate. Then a few days later, we were told we had to pay a third month of paused fees (despite our efforts to reactivate exactly on our billing date and going in a week before to confirm) AND regular monthly dues($234 for 2 people) because of the MISTAKES ON THEIR END. After going back and forth and trying to make things work, we just decided to end our membership. Additionally, we were told we were unable to use the gym anymore in the middle of the month despite paying for the first and last month and paused fees($200) while we were gone. A staff member (Alexia?) even mentioned that things seemed to be unfair but the manager (Kira) didn’t...