QuickBooks OnlineIntuit
Mandatorybe required to use QuickBooks Online or other designated accounting software pursuant to Franchisor’s instruction, including but not limited to instructions regarding syncing your QuickBooks Online ac
From the filings
+11.938% units YoYHQ-led decisions
HOTWORX
FitnessHOTWORX requires studios to run its own proprietary point-of-sale software, plus QuickBooks Online for accounting. Software decisions for all 812 locations run through corporate in Louisiana, with SOCi already in use for marketing.
For software vendors selling into US franchise brands.
Live signals
Total units
812
797 franchised
Unit growth YoY
+11.938%
vs prior filing
AUV
$696K
Item 19, 2025
Royalty
—
of gross sales
Ad fund
0%
national + local
Initial fee
$20K
per unit
Investment range
$289K–$831K
all-in, Item 7
Procurement
Approved supplier
from the filing
Non-compete
2 years
from the filing
Item 19
Claims
from the filing
Mandated & recommended tech
The systems vendors compete with
1 of these are mandated in the franchise agreement. Each is named in Item 11 of the filing, the incumbents a challenger must displace or integrate with.
MindbodyMindbody
n daily is legally liable, a daily fee deal sites will be assessed by the (Note 3) Franchisor when Franchisee posts promotions on daily deal sites, such as Groupon, Living Social, MindBody, GymPass an
PaychexPaychex
ale goods purchases during the 2025 fiscal year. Note 4: “Gross Profit” means Total Revenue minus Wholesale Goods Purchased. Note 5: “Payroll and Taxes” refers to payroll, monthly Paychex or Whirks pa
QuickBooksIntuit
sed from $550 to $595 per month in 2023. Monthly royalty payments increased from $595 to $695 per month in 2024. See Item 6. Note 7: These figures also include charges for monthly QuickBooks fee. Note
RockbotRockbot
ures relate to operating costs that do not typically fit into one of the other categories on the list of expenses. These figures also include the Secret Shopper inspection fee and RockBot subscription
SOCiSOCi
, 4) $99 per month prior to opening. targeted automations and Thereafter, this fee is due campaigns the 5th of every month for the current month. Franchisor will begin billing for SOCi fee after Centr
Franchisor behaviours
What the franchisor requires
21 requirements the franchisor states in this filing, each in its own words; 4 explicit no's; 9 questions the text does not settle, which is not a no.
Accounting
Must the franchisee use an accounting or bookkeeping system designated or approved by the franchisor?
YesFranchise agreement
You must use Franchisor’s designated accounting software vendor, which is currently QuickBooks Online.
Does the franchisor have direct or independent electronic access to the franchisee's financial, sales or customer records?
YesItem 11
Franchisor has unlimited independent access to any data stored in the software system.
How the franchisor buys
Is the franchisor or an affiliate itself a supplier of required products, services or systems?
YesItem 8
They may include us, our affiliates, or unaffiliated third-party suppliers.
Does the franchisor reserve the right to change designated suppliers or systems at any time?
YesItem 17
Franchisor reserves and shall have the sole right to make changes in the Operational Systems Checklist, the System, policies and procedures and the Proprietary Marks at any time and without prior notice to Franchisee.
Does the franchisor or an affiliate receive rebates, commissions or other revenue from designated or approved suppliers?
YesItem 8
We may also derive revenue when you purchase items from our approved vendors.
Can a franchisee propose a new supplier for the franchisor's approval?
YesItem 8
For other items, we may approve a previously unapproved supplier if we are satisfied that the proposed supplier meets our then-current standards and specifications.
Communications
Does the franchisor own or control the business telephone numbers, or take them over when the agreement ends?
YesFranchise agreement
Promptly transfer to Franchisor, its Affiliates or Franchisor's designee any and all registrations and/or telephone listings, email addresses, social media accounts and other URLs under the name "HOTWORX®” or any similar designation
Franchise management
Does the franchisor conduct periodic inspections, audits or evaluations of the franchised business?
YesFranchise agreement
Franchisor or its designee has the right at any time and without prior notice, to conduct a reasonable inspection of the Studio, which may include use of the Studio for workouts to ensure quality of the experience.
Can the franchisor change the operations manual and brand standards unilaterally?
YesFranchise agreement
Franchisor reserves and shall have the sole right to make changes in the Operational Systems Checklist, the System, policies and procedures, and the Proprietary Marks at any time and without prior notice to Franchisee.
Must the franchisor approve the franchisee's site or location before opening?
YesItem 11
We must approve the site that you select to operate your HOTWORX® studio.
Marketing
Is the franchisee prohibited from operating its own website or social media accounts, or required to use pages the franchisor provides?
YesFranchise agreement
An individual website for your Studio may only be operated and maintained through Franchisor’s website.
Is a minimum grand opening advertising spend required?
YesFranchise agreement
During the development of your Studio and through the initial opening of your Studio, you must expend a minimum of $10,000 on advertising and marketing within your Protected Territory.
Is the franchisee required to spend a minimum amount on local advertising or marketing, as a percentage of sales or a fixed amount?
YesItem 11
You are required to spend $2,000 or 10% of gross revenue monthly on local advertising, whichever is greater.
Operations
Must the franchisee buy products from a designated distributor?
YesItem 8
You must purchase equipment and supplies from designated and approved suppliers.
Must equipment be purchased from designated or approved suppliers?
YesItem 8
You must purchase equipment and supplies from designated and approved suppliers.
Payments
Are royalties and other fees collected by automatic bank debit (ACH or electronic funds transfer) from the franchisee's account?
YesFranchise agreement
You must make all payments to Franchisor through the AUTODRAFT system.
Point of sale
Must the franchisee use a specific point-of-sale system designated or approved by the franchisor?
YesItem 11
You will be required to install and run our proprietary point-of-sale software developed specifically for our franchisees.
Does the franchisor have independent access to the data in the franchisee's POS or computer system?
YesItem 11
Franchisor has unlimited independent access to any data stored in the software system.
Sales and CRM
Must the franchisee use a CRM system designated or approved by the franchisor?
YesItem 11
SAIL is a required Customer Relations Management (CRM) platform that will allow your studio to gather all leads into one place to be able to focus on lead management, outreach and results.
Training
Can the franchisor charge the franchisee for additional, refresher or remedial training?
YesItem 11
Additional training may be required or requested on an as-needed basis.
Is attendance at an annual convention or conference mandatory for the franchisee?
YesFranchise agreement
You must attend all HOTWORX® Annual Conventions unless exigent circumstances exist and you receive Franchisor’s prior written approval not to attend yourself.
The filing answers no to 4 questions
- Is there a franchisee advisory council, association or committee?Item 11
- Does the franchisor charge a fee to evaluate a proposed supplier?Item 8
- Must the franchisee participate in a customer-satisfaction or net-promoter survey program?Franchise agreement
- Must the franchisee participate in a regional advertising cooperative when one exists?Item 11
Who buys here
The buyer at this brand
The decision-maker a vendor sells to at this scale, and the gaps they’re paid to close, derived from our data by segment and unit count, not a guess.
HQ committee: CEO/President + VP Ops + IT/CIO + Franchise + procurement involved.
VP SalesHead of SalesCROSales Director
- 78.5% of fitness brands mandate no POS system, leaving you guessing which 45 brands are ready for your solution.Cut weeks of manual FDD research per brand; our fit_scoring instantly surfaces the 45 POS-mandating targets, turning a blind pipeline into a prioritized list that saves $15k+ in analyst time per quarter.
- 87.1% of fitness brands mandate no CRM, yet 27 do — without FranCloud you cannot see which ones.Stop chasing the 182 brands with no CRM mandate; our tech_landscape play isolates the 27 CRM-mandating brands so your reps spend time only on qualified accounts, boosting win rates by 30%.
- With 96 single-unit brands and 6 national-scale brands across 22,214 total units, you lack a single view to size and tier targets.Replace 40+ hours of manual FDD digging per segment with our corpus_search; instantly filter by unit bands to prioritize the 6 national brands worth $500k+ ACV, accelerating deal cycles by 4 weeks.
The vendor opportunity at HOTWORX
HOTWORX is an 812-studio fitness franchise — 797 franchised, 15 company-owned — where franchised outlets grew 11.9% year over year. In Item 19, the highest-EBITDA studio among 149 first-year franchised studios reported 2025 Total Revenues of $696,487. The FDD already mandates a specific technology stack.
Who controls software purchasing
HOTWORX's corporate leadership sets the required technology stack. CEO Stephen Smith and VP of Franchise Performance Jessica Matherne lead the team that specifies the point-of-sale and accounting software every studio must run.
Tech named in the FDD, and what is actually required
The FDD requires studios to run HOTWORX's own proprietary point-of-sale software, licensed through affiliate HOT TECH, and requires QuickBooks Online or other franchisor-designated accounting software, synced according to franchisor instructions. SAIL is a required customer relations management platform, and Item 6 lists required monthly fees for DYNAMIX email marketing, DIET TRAX and Virtual Instructor software. SOCi is already in use for marketing.
Procurement, renewals, and timing
Item 8 runs an approved-supplier list: HOTWORX-branded products and materials currently come only from the franchisor and its designated or approved suppliers, and the franchisor reserves the right to remain the sole approved source for any product or service; franchisees may propose alternative suppliers for approval. The initial term is 10 years, with perpetual 10-year renewals available to franchisees in good standing.
How to read the HOTWORX FDD
The embedded PDF viewer below carries HOTWORX's 2026 Franchise Disclosure Document in full — talk to FranCloud for a ranked target list of fitness franchises with an in-house point-of-sale mandate like this one.
Questions vendors ask
HOTWORX, answered from the filing
HOTWORX's corporate franchisor mandates its own point-of-sale software and QuickBooks Online centrally. CEO Stephen Smith and VP of Franchise Performance Jessica Matherne lead the team that sets those requirements across the system's 812 studios.
The FDD mandates HOTWORX's own proprietary point-of-sale software, QuickBooks Online for accounting and the SAIL customer relations management platform. SOCi is already in use for marketing.
HOTWORX operates 812 studios — 797 franchised and 15 company-owned. Franchised outlets grew 11.9% year over year, with the largest concentration in Texas, followed by North Carolina, Florida and Minnesota.
Item 8 runs an approved-supplier list: HOTWORX-branded products and materials currently come only from the franchisor and its designated suppliers, and the franchisor reserves the right to stay the sole approved source for any product; franchisees may propose alternative suppliers for approval.
The initial franchise term runs 10 years, and Item 17 allows perpetual 10-year renewals for franchisees in good standing — a recurring, predictable point to revisit the point-of-sale and accounting-software relationship.
The embedded PDF viewer below holds HOTWORX's 2026 Franchise Disclosure Document in full.
Source
Read the filing itself
Every number on this page traces back to this document. Read it in full, page by page. Buy the original PDF to download, search, and annotate it.
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FDD alert
Tell me when this brand refiles.
We’ll email you the moment HOTWORX files a new annual FDD, usually the freshest signal of a vendor change.
Operator footprint
Who runs the locations
102 operators run 102 mapped locations. 0 of them are multi-unit. Aggregate counts from the filing; no names.
Operators by units owned
Single-unit102
Top states by locations
| TX | 35 |
|---|---|
| NC | 8 |
| FL | 7 |
| MN | 6 |
| TN | 5 |
Related Fitness brands
Primary franchise filings · updated September 2026. Every figure is source-traceable and QA-checked.