As with all hobbies, sports and educational courses there is a price to pay, and in the case of learning the martial arts that is also something for potential new beginners to think about.
Some may be lucky and find themselves a teacher that is willing to give instruction without a fee, while others who often say they don’t teach for the money, will only charge a small fee to cover costs such as the hiring of a room and so on. However the subject regarding the price of class lesson fees can often be misleading when it comes to teaching standards. Cheap, or even free lessons, can be thought of as cheap low quality instruction in the martial arts while expensive class fees, some will think, is to do with high instruction and high quality training methods. However that is not always the case. Cheap goods for example often makes people think of low quality products that fall apart within a short period of time while expensive products will last a lifetime as they are made from high quality material, however, that is not always the case when it comes to what type of martial art instructor is standing in front of you. Some instructors really are of a good level at teaching regardless of how much they charge for a lesson while others are simply not worthy of your time. Therefore the price of lessons has got nothing to do with teaching standards. The main thing to think about when it comes to what is a good, or maybe a reasonable, price to pay for class lessons does greatly depend on what other services are included in the price, such as changing rooms and training equipment included in the price and so on. The price of lessons is also somewhat set by other martial arts schools in the area to a degree. The remarkable thing about class fees compared to decades ago is that tuition fees are somewhat cheaper now than way back in the 1970’s when the popularity of the martial arts were at an all time high thanks to martial art films of the time. My time in the martial arts started in 1973. Back then the price of a lesson, that lasted for 90 minutes and was hard training throughout, was one pound, (£1), yes just £1. But of course the price of things, and wages, were a lot less back in those days. Back then you could buy 4 pints of beer for £1. Today based on current prices, with a pint of beer being on average around £4 plus, the price I paid for lessons back then would now be around £16 per lesson. So therefore very expensive compared to other martial art classes in the area at that time. Some lesson fees back then were only 25p. In other words the class I attended was four times higher in price than at other clubs. It should be noted at this point that prices stated are based on British currency and the region I lived in at the time. Therefore for those of you who live in other countries you would need to check on current exchange rates for comparison and also note the date that this article was published. Back in 1973 I attended a karate class that was under the instruction of a blue belt. A blue belt of course is a student level rank that is somewhat half way through the student ranks before becoming a black belt. Although clearly he was not qualified to teach he did do a reasonable job. He charged 25p a lesson which as stated already was more or less the going rate for lessons in that area at the time, but sadly however the training room, (Dojo), was not ideal. It was held in a pub with people drinking and playing pool, and talking, surrounding the floor area. Needless to say I never went back. This short article on the subject of martial art class fees was written and published on the 7th of November 2023. For a more indepth related article on the subject of costs and fees within the martial arts click >HERE< Comments are closed.
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