Flagship case study · Oak Cliff Pilates
A studio that stopped selling classes and started selling a third space
Positioning work that took one location to three, on a playbook we run ourselves.
Figures confirmed in writing by Oak Cliff Pilates.
Situation
Oak Cliff Pilates was a single studio competing in a category where every competitor said the same four things: expert instructors, small classes, all levels welcome, book your intro.
Price was the only remaining variable, and price is a race a boutique studio cannot win against a chain. Class packs sold, but members churned out at the end of every pack. Growth meant constantly refilling the top of the funnel.
Diagnosis
The part that decided everything else. Prospects recognise themselves in constraints, not in triumphs.
The studio was selling a workout. People were buying somewhere to be.
Once we named that — the third space between home and work — everything downstream had a rule to follow. What the studio should look like, who it should hire, what it should say, what it should refuse to do.
The offer changed from class packs to membership, because a third space is somewhere you belong, not somewhere you visit nine more times.
The system
Built in sequence. Each piece assumes the one above it is settled.
Positioning
The Third Space framing, written down, with the language the team actually uses at the desk.
Identity
A full brand system built for physical space first — signage, walls, merch — then flattened for digital.
Website
Membership-first architecture. The intro offer sits behind the story, not in front of it.
Ongoing marketing
Local paid, member content, referral mechanics. Same operators, every month, still running.
Result
Revenue grew 400%. The studio went from one location to three. Membership doubled, and the churn pattern that used to define the business went with it.
What’s next
Still running. Oak Cliff Pilates is a Kija-operated business, which is why it doubles as our own proving ground — every play on this site was run here before it was sold to anyone else.
Similar situation?
We will look at yours the way we looked at Oak Cliff Pilates’s — the constraints first, the pretty part last. Thirty minutes and you leave with the first move, whether or not we make it together.