Garry Tonon’s Brunswick BJJ Academy in New Jersey is the first big name academy to be forced to close due to the economic crisis resulting from the Coronavirus pandemic.
Tonon said that he is not going to make a gofundme and that he is 100% sure that he will one day reopen the academy.
Tonon detailed what happened in his IG post:
“Summary: I was subleasing my gym, and the primary leaseholder went bankrupt/defaulted. This terminates my lease. Building owner was not interested in renegotiating a new lease despite me having money to continue to pay rent. We have like 3 weeks or so to leave (technically we could stay longer because courts are closed, but it would be meaningless Because we’d have to leave anyway.)
I have no problem with operating against the governors orders, in fact I was about to announce to my students that I was going to do that. However since now we would have to move to a new facility build again, and reopen illegally, it no longer makes sense to do so. It would be taking on a huge financial risk, just to potentially get shut down anyway. Think of it this way. If you were going to start a new Bjj school, would you try to open one right now? My heart tells me to find a new place, open and not give af, but my brain tells me not to bankrupt my business when we could save money and re-open in the future. this is not the end for @brunswickbjj but a new beginning. We have lost a lot, but we will come back stronger.
Despite being heartbroken that I’m temporarily losing my life’s work, Understand financially I’m going to be ok. While I appreciate all of you offering to send me money and things like you did on my last post, there are many people in this world that need charity, but I am not one of them. That’s not because I look down on people who need and get financial help, it’s just because I genuinely don’t need it, and would feel wrong accepting it. If you want to support me, buy an instructional, book a private with me, book me for a seminar, sponsor me, but I’m not taking free money, I gotta work for it. love you all, I am sad, but I’m more sad that there are people out there who are never going to be able to bounce back from this😢💔”
