Deptford's MGM Gym Aims to Double Its 80 Members in a Year

A Deptford gym named after its founders’ father has around 80 members three years after opening, and the brother and sister who run it want to more than double that within the next 12 months.

MGM Gym was launched in 2023 by siblings Jonathan Moore and Hannah Ruth-Moore and takes its name from their father, Milton George Moore. It has recently been named for Best Community Impact: the award plaque the pair are holding in their photograph carries the Big Business Entrepreneurs name.

Muay Thai, functional fitness and a dance studio

Jonathan leads the gym’s Muay Thai programme. The gym says the sessions mix conditioning with Muay Thai technique, and are meant to help mental wellbeing as well as fitness, with people encouraged to build confidence, discipline and resilience.

Alongside that is functional fitness, built around everyday strength and movement, and a dance studio, Sayaw Studios, led by Hannah, a professional dancer with more than 30 years’ experience. Sayaw’s classes are for children, young people and adults. Since opening, the gym has also started its own running club.

3,000 pupils a week, before the gym existed

The schools work came first. Since 2012 the siblings have run Muay Thai and dance programmes in schools across London, and they say they now work in around 20 schools with roughly 3,000 pupils a week. The programmes are for 11 to 18-year-olds, who can go on to Muay Thai, dance or both.

“We have been supporting schools and providing dance and Muay Thai programmes since 2012, operating within 20 schools in London and working with around 3,000 pupils a week,” Jonathan and Hannah said. “For us, it is about life-skill development. Hard work, discipline, honesty and fun are the messages we like to put across.”

Between them, they say, they have more than 50 years of experience, and the mentoring side of the business carries on alongside the gym.

Online again, and further afield

The pair ran their programmes online during the Covid-19 pandemic and plan to return to that, with the MGM Gym website due to be relaunched later this year. For the next 12 months the aim is a bigger membership, the online offer and the schools and mentoring work. Jonathan’s ambition goes a good deal further:

“I see MGM Gyms in every city and town in the country, I really do think that could happen. We have come so far since opening in Deptford.”

MGM Gym can be reached on 07915 440362 or at welcome@mgmgym.co.uk, and its website is mgmgym.co.uk.

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