Gracie Barra Franchise Systems

The vendor opportunity at Gracie Barra

Gracie Barra Franchise Systems operates 367 total units in the fitness segment, with 353 of those franchised and 14 company-owned. The brand’s headquarters is in California. Year-over-year unit growth sits at 8.95%, meaning the network added roughly 30 net new units in the most recent reporting period. For a software vendor, the immediate addressable base is those 353 franchised locations, all of which operate under a five-year initial term. Average unit volume and royalty percentage are not disclosed in the 2026 FDD.

The system does not report a parent company and appears independently owned. No multi-unit operator footprint is mapped in our corpus, which suggests either a highly fragmented operator base or limited public aggregation of operator data. This matters for sales planning: without a concentrated operator group, a vendor’s path to multi-location deals likely runs through headquarters, not through a handful of dominant franchisees.

Who controls software purchasing

The FDD’s Item 1 lists four executives: Carlos Gracie, Jr. (President and Founder), Flavio Almeida (Chief Executive Officer), Marcio Feitosa Souza (Vice President), and Dave Weber (Chief Operating Officer). No chief information officer or chief technology officer is named. In systems of this size and structure, the CEO and COO are typically the most relevant contacts for enterprise software decisions, especially when the franchisor mandates specific platforms. The absence of a named technology executive suggests that operational leadership evaluates and approves software that touches school management, scheduling, billing, or member experience.

Because the franchisor mandates at least two systems (see below), the buying center likely sits at HQ. Vendors should expect a top-down evaluation process rather than a decentralized, franchisee-led procurement model.

Mandated and current tech stack

The 2026 FDD mandates two systems: Kinetic Data and a School Owner Dashboard. Kinetic Data is a named third-party platform; the School Owner Dashboard appears to be a proprietary or semi-proprietary tool. No other mandated or recommended systems are disclosed in the FDD. This means the core operational stack is relatively lean on paper, but it also means any new software that overlaps with member management, class scheduling, billing, or reporting will need to integrate with or displace these mandated tools.

Vendors selling complementary software — marketing automation, lead management, staff scheduling, or advanced analytics — may find a cleaner path if they can demonstrate integration with Kinetic Data or the School Owner Dashboard. The FDD does not describe an approved-supplier program or a formal technology review process, so the evaluation timeline and criteria are not publicly documented.

Procurement, renewals, and timing

Item 8 of the FDD, which typically describes procurement obligations, did not yield an extract in our corpus. This means we cannot confirm whether Gracie Barra designates specific suppliers, maintains an approved-supplier list, or leaves purchasing open to franchisees. In practice, the existence of mandated systems suggests at least some procurement control from HQ, but the full scope is unknown.

Item 17 provides a clearer signal on timing. Franchisees must sign a new agreement and release to renew, and they must provide notice of their intent to renew between 180 days and one year before the end of the five-year term. The FDD also warns that renewal contracts may contain materially different terms and conditions. For a software vendor, this creates a recurring window: every five years, a franchisee faces a new agreement and potentially new operational requirements. That moment is a natural trigger for re-evaluating software, especially if the franchisor updates its mandated stack or if the franchisee’s original contract terms change.

How to read the Gracie Barra FDD

The full 2026 Franchise Disclosure Document is embedded below. It is filed with state franchise regulators and contains the legal and operational disclosures that govern the Gracie Barra franchise system. For software vendors, the most actionable sections are Item 1 (executives), Item 11 (mandated systems), Item 8 (procurement obligations, if present), and Item 17 (renewal conditions). These sections together define who buys, what they already use, and when the next conversation is likely to happen.

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