Studio owners, have you ever felt like your current business plan is just a little bit off? Jennifer DeLuca, who owns a Pilates center in Brooklyn, recently confronted this reality when the demands of her growing client list and expanding family weren’t jiving. Here she shares her journey through different business models and reprioritizing her time.

Five years into its life, my studio, BodyTonic Pilates Gymnasium, was busting at the seams. In 2004, I had a bustling apprentice program, 10 instructors, classes, private training and semi-private training. With a one-room, 900-square-foot studio in Park Slope, Brooklyn, I tried everything possible to contain the overflowing energy and noise, including sound absorbent banners on the walls, room dividers and even strategically asking teachers to face a certain way to have their voices carrying in opposite directions. Clients and teachers all made the best of it, but finally people started to complain. Clients couldn’t hear their instructors and instructors couldn’t hear themselves! I had to take on another lease or I was going to lose clients. At least, that was what I thought.

Feeling I had no other options, I took the leap and committed to opening a second location, adding the physical, mental and financial responsibilities of a huge, gutted, two-story teaching center to my already jam-packed career life. Nothing ever goes quite how you plan it: Three months after signing the lease, and well into renovations, I found out I was pregnant with my first child. Everything was busting at the seams! Enthusiastic about it all I pressed on, and at first everything seemed like it was working out fine.

Five months after our opening, Leila was born. When she was four weeks old, I was teaching 3 full days with her in a sling along with apprentice weekends. The expansion was still so new I had to take a pay cut. As time went by the compression of upkeep was palpable: We needed new desk staff, the heat wasn’t working properly, the website needed updating, the office manager was moving down south. I was trying to maintain all of the responsibilities of an instructor, a CEO, a new mom and wife, all on sleep intervals of 2 to 4 hours. Clients seemed happy, but the staff liked things better in the old studio, and frankly, so did I. My instructors began to miss each other—it was hard to share ideas from several blocks away, and we all suffered from a lack of collaboration and community. I played it out as long as I could and finally my husband said to me, “You need to right-size.”

I knew he was right. “Right-sizing” was the perfect phrase, too, because it’s really easy to get caught up in the myriad things you find stimulating. The change he was talking about may have involved some downsizing, but ultimately it would mean getting more out of everything, not less. I faced the music—along with my feelings of failure, loss and wasted time and rolled up my shirt-sleeves once again. There was some serious work ahead.

The first thing I had to do was accept who I was in the present. I was a mother, which was completely new territory. Even though I was still very much the same person, my work life had to change drastically. I wanted at least two weekdays to be home with my daughter and if I was to spend that time focused on our time together, then I needed to cut back on work.

From there, I had to decide what could be taken out of my work life, which meant deciding what fulfilled me and interested me most. For me, I wanted to hold onto as much time spent teaching alongside my talented instructors and training apprentices as possible. Last on my list was the business end of things—promotion, marketing, directing, bookkeeping, customer service, etc.—all of which had increased in intensity once I took on the second BodyTonic location. Letting go of the second studio was a must, I realized, and I needed to do a thorough analysis of cost and benefit when reorganizing the original BodyTonic’s offerings.

I took a long look at our most devoted clients and teachers. I saw what BodyTonic did well and what the teachers and clients wanted most. Our private clientele was our most dedicated class clientele. In addition, much of the remaining regular class clientele showed a real interest in private and semi-private training. I stuck to the motto “keep it simple.” I let go of old perceptions, completely closed down our schedule of 30-plus classes per week, decided on a new color scheme, took down the website, let the old brochures run out, and even cut my hair super short.

Now, roughly 5 months after combining two studios into one, BodyTonic has settled into a renovated, stream-lined, more elegant, more mature, more professional environment than ever, with expenses nearly cut in half, more income, a happier staff and a much more exuberant owner! I focused on maintaining a very simple mix of private, semi-private, and group class times for the studio and set up some workshops for people to catch up in certain areas of mat and equipment work. I lost many of the students that dropped in for an occasional Pilates class, but I made the serious Pilates enthusiasts very happy.

BodyTonic now looks at the year quarterly. We are currently running classes and workshops that people sign up for in advance with a commitment of 12 weeks. The classes are limited to 7 people and there are no drop-ins. Any classes that do not fill to cover costs are canceled. The same people show up every week, which allows the participants and teachers to consistently progress. Private and semi-private training sessions are booked in advance, at the discretion of the clients. Many clients book 3-6 months in advance and we offer discounts to people who use their packages up within a certain time frame. With this studio mindset of dedication and consistency, people really change their bodies and the studio remains robust. So, the simple idea of offering higher quality to fewer people, has increased revenue and lessened expenses (and headaches!).

A quick glance at my own schedule is also proof that BodyTonic has been “right-sized”: I can now take two Pilates sessions a week with our talented staff, indulge in an art class, shop the local food co-op, see a movie with my husband and not be worried about work. Best of all, I get two delicious days with my daughter each week, where we only have to stop by work to say hello.