Utilization, Margins & the Anxiety That Never Stops: The Yard

Joe Cicero built The Yard — a strength-forward training model with two profitable studios in San Francisco (56% operating margin, ~150% utilization) and Mill Valley (22% margin, ~87% utilization) — and grew 44% YoY. He unpacks the expansion decision framework when SF is pushing the utilization ceiling, why the wins last 2 minutes but the anxiety lasts days, and the exact spreadsheet tab he builds first when evaluating a third location.