At a glance: Leroy Palmer runs Health First Development, a group-fitness gym in Townsville, far North Queensland. When COVID hit, his revenue dropped 50% almost overnight — while a serious back injury had him all but bedridden. After joining More Gym Members (LeadsNow’s earlier gym-marketing brand), he remodelled the business into a hybrid of group fitness and online training, made an additional $63,500 in sales in three months, and finished 15 members up on his pre-COVID numbers — with weekly revenue per member up from $30 to $50-plus. All figures on this page come straight from the filmed interview, as told on camera.
The numbers, as stated in the filmed interview
| Metric | Result |
|---|---|
| Additional sales in the last three months | $63,500 |
| Members vs pre-COVID | Plus 15 |
| Weekly revenue per member | Up from a $30 group fitness membership to $50-plus per member |
| Members now | 70, pushing for a long-held goal of 100 |
| Starting point when COVID hit | Revenue down 50% almost overnight |
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Watch Leroy tell it himself
A note on the era: this campaign was delivered under More Gym Members, LeadsNow’s earlier gym-marketing brand, and the video was filmed in 2020. It predates the AI sales agents LeadsNow runs today — what you see here is the team’s earlier high-ticket fitness work: lead-generation programs, business remodelling and coaching, exactly as described on camera.
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Where Health First was when COVID hit
Before COVID, Health First Development was a traditional group-fitness gym — group classes as the core offer, with the occasional personal training session as an upsell. Then the pandemic arrived, and the damage was immediate.
“My revenue went down 50% pretty much that week, but was very lucky to have some loyal members that stayed on board anyway. We just dropped their memberships down to 50%.”
— Leroy Palmer, Health First Development
The gym was luckier than some — Leroy already had an online setup, so he moved classes to Zoom with programmed training and kept things running in the background. But the personal toll compounded the financial one: Leroy had a significant back injury at the time and was, in his words, pretty much bedridden. Not being able to physically get out of the house and go to work was, as he puts it, a bit of a downer — softened by loyal members who got around him and gave him their support.
The turning point
Leroy already knew the More Gym Members team — he’d done one-on-one business coaching with Bo the year before. When he saw the Remote91 program being shared around, he talked it over with a trainer mate in Townsville and they both jumped on it. He was, in his words, wrapped by it — and stayed on for the Elite 100 program. As he says on camera: the rest is history.
It nearly didn’t happen, though. Leroy admits he’d inquired about the same sort of help a full year earlier and sat on it, hesitant to pull the trigger — a hesitation he now says he’s very glad he got past.
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What actually changed: remodelling the business
The core move was remodelling Health First through COVID from a pure group-fitness gym into a hybrid business: group fitness combined with online training, with the occasional personal training session for each member. The result wasn’t just more members — it was more value per member, in both directions.
“The actual weekly revenue per member is up. So instead of just a $30 group fitness membership, it’s now $50 plus per member. So a lot more value per client. And they’re obviously getting a lot more value out of their membership now.”
— Leroy Palmer, Health First Development
The results
Three months of the rebuilt model produced an additional $63,500 in sales — stated at the top of the filmed interview. And once Leroy crunched all the numbers, the comparison with his pre-COVID business came out ahead on both count and yield.
“Once I’ve crunched all the numbers, I think we’re plus 15 members than what we had pre-COVID… But not only that, the actual weekly revenue per member is up.”
— Leroy Palmer, Health First Development
The gym now sits at 70 members, and Leroy is pushing for a long-held goal of 100 — plus a better-located studio, ideally one with air conditioning, because far North Queensland gets quite warm. He’s also weighing whether to commit to another lease or lean further into the hybrid model.
The personal turnaround matched the business one. Asked how he was within himself after a year that started bedridden with a back injury, his answer was immediate:
“100%, like a completely different person from March, physically and mentally… just, I guess, giving me something to look forward to and having that goal each week to push for, rather than just going through the motions.”
— Leroy Palmer, Health First Development
Leroy’s advice to other gym owners
“Definitely book in just for at least a consult call and just have a chat to the guys and find out what they can actually do. Because I’ve been sitting on it for a while now… and was very hesitant to pull the trigger, but very glad that I actually pulled the trigger. Like I said, the business is in a much better place now, thanks to MGM.”
— Leroy Palmer, Health First Development
Frequently asked questions
Are these results typical?
No — and anyone who promises a specific result is being loose with the truth. Leroy had an existing online setup, loyal members who stayed through the worst of COVID, and the willingness to remodel his entire business model mid-pandemic. What the story shows is that the fundamentals — a genuine offer, a model that delivers more value per client, and disciplined follow-through — compound quickly when an owner commits.
How hard did COVID actually hit gyms like Health First?
Leroy’s 50% overnight revenue drop was brutal but far from unusual. In the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Business Impacts of COVID-19 survey (22–28 April 2020), 84% of arts and recreation services businesses — the sector that includes gyms and fitness centres — expected reduced cash flow over the following two months, and 94% expected to be affected by government restrictions, both well above the all-industries averages. Coming back 15 members ahead of pre-COVID from inside that sector is what makes this story worth filming.
What did the program actually involve?
As described in the filmed interview: Leroy joined the Remote91 program, stayed on for the Elite 100 program, and worked with the team to remodel Health First from a pure group-fitness gym into a hybrid of group fitness and online training with occasional personal training per member — lifting weekly revenue per member from $30 to $50-plus. It was lead-generation, coaching and business-remodelling work, not AI; LeadsNow’s AI sales agents came later.
Does LeadsNow still work with gyms and fitness businesses?
Yes. This campaign ran in 2020 under LeadsNow’s earlier gym-marketing brand, More Gym Members, before today’s AI sales agents existed. The same team now works with high-ticket coaching and fitness businesses across Australia under LeadsNow, with 50,769+ AI-booked sales appointments since 2017 and 1M+ leads generated.
Want to see how other clients have gone? See all client stories — including how CrossFit Movida turned a COVID low into a $34,000 month.
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