Inside Kilo, the Gym Management Software Company Behind Gym World

What's up, Gym World?

Every episode, we sit down with a gym owner and break down their business. This week, we're flipping the mic around and looking inside a gym management software company instead: ours.

Mateo Lopez, one of Kilo's co-founders, and Chris McMahon, who joined the marketing team back in March, caught up at the Two-Brain Business Summit to talk about what it's actually like behind the curtain at Kilo. Why is the booth packed every year? Why so many gym owners already know the team by first name. And why a software company can feel a lot like a gym itself.

Here's the recap 👇

How a CrossFit coach ended up running a gym management software company

Mateo didn't start out building software. He started out coaching CrossFit.

He got into a gym as a coach, worked his way into managing the facility, then bought into ownership. From there, he and his partners had to learn how to market, run ads, and compete in one of the toughest CrossFit markets in the country: New York.

That experience is where Gym Lead Machine, and eventually Kilo, was born.

It's a pattern we've seen again and again on Gym World. The best tools in this industry usually come from someone who ran a gym first and got frustrated enough to build the fix.

The booth is packed because the team actually answers the emails

Ask Mateo why gym owners crowd the Kilo booth every year, and he doesn't talk about the product. He talks about the people. It's the kind of answer you don't expect from a gym management software company, but it's the reason gym owners keep coming back.

Most of the Kilo team has either run a gym, coached at one, or still does. That shows up in how they support customers.

Chris backed that up with what he hears from Kilo Crew members at the booth:

Replies to support emails inside a 24-hour window

Staff who'll say "let me show you" and hop on a call instead of pointing to a help doc

Owners who've never met the team in person but already know them by name from months of email support

For many gym owners, tech isn't the fun part of running the business. They got into this to coach people, not manage software.

They ship features, then ask what's missing

One story from the conversation stood out: Kilo recently launched a workout tracker inside the platform. Instead of treating it as finished, the team framed it as version one and asked customers directly what they wanted next.

That turned into real conversations with users, including ideas the team hadn't considered on their own.

It's a small thing, but it's the same lesson that shows up in almost every gym we feature on here. The businesses that grow are the ones that actually listen to the people paying them, not just those who say they do.

The culture is remote, mostly female-led, and full of kids on Zoom

Kilo is a remote company, which means most of the team doesn't see each other face-to-face outside of events like the summit. That makes in-person time rare, and the team treats it that way.

A few things that came up in the conversation:

The team is majority female-led, something Chris said he hadn't experienced before in his career.

Video calls regularly have kids running through the background, and nobody blinks.

Laura Becerra, Kilo's Head of Product Experience, came back from maternity leave and, in Mateo's words, "put the pedal to the metal" on the product roadmap.

Long-tenured teammates helped new hires like Chris ramp up fast, both on the lingo and the culture.

The takeaway for gym owners

You don't have to be a software company to learn something here.

The same principles that make Kilo's support team memorable are the same ones we've seen work inside gyms all year:

Answer fast, and answer like a human.

Build feedback loops instead of guessing what people want.

Hire people who've actually done the job you're asking them to support.

Protect the culture, even when the team is spread across time zones.

TL;DR

This week wasn't a gym owner breakdown; it was a look inside a gym management software company from the other side of the support ticket: ours.

A few things that stood out:

• Kilo's founders come from the gym floor, not just a boardroom

• The support team's speed and tone are the #1 thing customers mention

• New features launch as a starting point, not a finished product, with customers shaping what comes next

• The culture leans remote, mostly female-led, and unapologetically full of kids and dogs on video calls

Kilo has one clear goal: We’re obsessed with making life easier for gym owners.

Your Gym. Your Partner. Your Success.

cheers,

j