Beware of toxic studio environments - Assistant Studio Manager SoulCycle Employee Review

2.0
Oct 14, 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Pay is fairly good and benefits are excellent. SoulCycle as a company is great in giving each employee, especially each studio manager, the tools and the freedom to succeed and grow professionally. Free classes at all locations and guest rider policy is very generous. Day to day operations are not particularly challenging (can be a pro or a con). There are a number of genuinely friendly, hard-working, and driven individuals who work for this company. Hours can be odd, but it is easy to maintain a good work-life balance.

Cons

At first glance, SoulCycle seems like an extremely fun, rewarding place to work. However, behind its clean, shiny exterior lies a company that, at times, seems more like a high school cafeteria. Demotions and firings are commonplace, and are made seemingly on a whim, with no regard to the livelihoods of hard-working employees. SoulCycle is growing quickly, and the environment of each studio varies alarmingly. Many studios can be very exclusionary, clique-y, and standoffish. The amount of gossip between these cliques borders on offensive. The hard working cleaning staff at almost every studio are treated almost like second class citizens, with almost zero interaction or even acknowledgement from front desk staff or studio managers. The rapid growth of SoulCycle has led to a number of poor quality hires, and a high turnover rate is very common at all levels. While most riders are pleasant and courteous, there is a very loud, and very entitled, minority of unpleasant and rude riders at every studio. While this is the case throughout the entire service industry, SoulCycle as a company enables this entitled behavior. Happiness can be had within this company, but each studio is wildly different and comes with its own set of drawbacks.

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SoulCycle Response
11y
Hi, Thank you so much for your feedback and for taking the time to write us a review. We are so grateful that you took the time to provide some insight about your experience here so we can use it to improve as a company. We really appreciate hearing feedback from the SoulCycle community as a whole, whether it's riders or employees, because it will only help us get better at what we do! We're so sorry that your experience working with us as an Assistant Studio Manager was not positive overall. We truly do believe that successful managers can come from a variety of different backgrounds, and some people do have less experience than others, which can sometimes translate to first time or more junior managers. We continue to try to focus on learning from and developing our new leaders so that we can improve the company for everyone (both employees AND riders!). We're currently in the process of re-vamping and improving the management training program so that we can develop even better and more cohesive leadership teams, which is an exciting undertaking for us! Also, because our ever-growing community is so important to us, we want there to always be camaraderie and fairness at all of our studios no matter what position you hold at SOUL. We all want to work together as a team and we know that without one another, we could not succeed at providing the best service and experience for our riders. We appreciate you letting us know your thoughts on this in particular matter because this is definitely something we will look into and address. This review is extremely valuable to us so that we can take a moment to stop and absorb this feedback. We will absolutely put it to use as we aspire to achieve the positive work place environment that we strive to create for our employees!

Explore other reviews about SoulCycle

5.0
Apr 27, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Fun environment, good people, ride for free

Cons

Lots of cleaning involved around the studio and bathrooms

4.0
Jun 2, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Love it- free rides are the best

Cons

Nothing love my coworkers !

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