Other Schools

Avoid what you find at other schools (what they don’t want you to know)

Elsewhere: Once they get your credit card number, or a voided check with your bank account number, you’re on “auto-pay”, forever, every month, all year, with open ended, month-to-month commitment through a third-party billing company – typically involving a 1-month-plus lag to freeze your account, designed with the hope that you’ll avoid the hassle (or forget) to cancel your debit authorization (see their Yelp reviews with complaints about continued charges after quitting). With KMSD, register for each multi-week session, and pay for that multi-week session.
Elsewhere: “Introductory specials”; “punch cards”; a 12 month contract “deal”, or “package deal”, or an “even better pay-up-front deal” (none of which are “deals” for serious students).
Elsewhere: Classic Ponzi pyramid scheme, where the school owners encourage students (who have the money) to “become instructors”, even though the student isn’t that good and their dojo doesn’t need more instructors. Why would they do this? – Money! The school owners contracting with these organizations typically get to keep 1/2 of the course fee for each “instructor candidate”! The other half of the money goes to the next level up on the pyramid. The only “requirement” to become a “certified instructor” is a credit check to ensure the payment will clear. Most of these new “instructors” lack the years of experience true Krav Maga Instructors should have. And they seem to “jump” multiple ranks every few months – but only after paying someone to come in from out of town to “promote” them. Everyone pays = Everyone passes. These are shady marketing tactics imported from outside of the USA.
Elsewhere: Boxing, kickboxing, or jujitsu classes. It’s light sport-fighting training (e.g. 1-on-1; with “rules”; no weapons); but not actually street-applicable training. Krav Maga San Diego training builds Krav Maga mindset: win on the street / in the field, and escape + / or get to a safe place. Good Krav Maga includes techniques from boxing, kickboxing and jujitsu but with appropriate finishing moves for the real world scenario, where you’ll assume a weapon or other attackers will suddenly present. If you want to train in those great martial arts / sport-fighting systems, seek out those experts, not krav maga.
Elsewhere: They don’t want you to do the simple math; elsewhere, students will be paying up to $2000 for a year of medium-quality krav maga training (that does not include many “extra” charges). These students pay up to $155.00 of their money, per month, every month of the year, essentially directly transferring money from the student’s personal bank account into the school owner’s personal bank account, so he / she can use it to pay business (or personal) expenses.
Elsewhere: Their students are continuously hit with “additional membership fee”, collected when testing or “fee to stamp your ‘passport’” – described as going to some “international krav maga organization” franchise headquarters. It’s the classic 1980’s-style multi-level marketing scheme. This is simply transferring money from student’s personal bank accounts into the school owner’s personal bank account.
Elsewhere: Uniform requirement”, so every student must buy their “official” krav maga shirt, hat, socks, pants to participate in class. This is simply transferring money from student’s personal bank accounts into the school owner’s personal bank account. KMSD is not a martial arts program. Students are asked to purchase KMSD shirts, but those shirts are reserved only for students who’ve actually trained with KMSD, not for non-students to order off of a website so a school owner can make more money.
Elsewhere: The students there appear to be amazingly highly “ranked”, and the instructors are now suddenly “ranked among the world’s top ranked krav maga instructors” (but only on their own website), with barely any instructor training – after paying someone to come in from out of town for a few days to then “promote” them. Or even after failing their instructor course. But even beginners who observe their classes can see that they are not very good at krav maga. That’s because they “purchased” their rank from overseas. And, some are in fairly poor physical condition. If you ask them, directly, you’ll find that most of the instructors have previously trained with KMSD… but subsequently left for a “franchise location“… with fake exams and fake instructor certifications, where “everyone-pays-and-everyone-passes”. Those tests don’t count… and they know it. But they do transfer a lot of the student’s money to the franchise owner who owns the school.
Elsewhere: “Wow… I guess I’m honored to be invited by my krav maga master to test…” Translation: stop pushing me to test every few months just so you can make more money off of me and pretend all of the students here are so highly ranked! We both know that I’m not ready, so it’s a fake promotion, an unethical business practice, it makes the school look substandard in comparison, and it’s actually personally insulting.
Elsewhere: Almost every student just happens to live near the dojo, and are paying for membership there because it’s convenient. If they want to get good at krav maga, they eventually have to make their way to KMSD, where serious Krav Maga civilian, military, and law enforcement students are challenged (some KMSD students have been regularly traveling for years to train with KMSD from as far away as: North County Inland, Tijuana, Riverside County, South Bay, East County, North County Coastal, and of course everywhere in between).
Elsewhere: “Sort Of Advanced” or “Sort Of Level 5 / Advanced” class – you see a small number of students invited to these classes, as “reward” for paying overpriced monthly dues for way too long. But, the instruction doesn’t seem that good, and neither do the students. Or, you see a large number of beginning students invited to the “advanced” class after they “passed” a few simplified versions of “exams”.