My ultimate goal when it comes to my Affiliate Policy can be summed up in one sentence:
Be 100% transparent.
Garage Gym DIY does contain affiliate links. Affiliate links are connected to products and if you click on them, I may at no extra cost to you, earn a commission.
Doesn’t that make your reviews biased?
Honestly, if I allowed it to be, it certainly could.
But, here’s the truth:
I only purchase products because they are the products that I want for my gym. Then I’ll review them and give you my honest opinion. If it’s an awesome product, I’ll tell you. If it sucks, I’ll tell you that too or I just won’t mention the product on this site.
I will not purchase products just so I can write an affiliate review.
Even more importantly, I will not review a product that I haven’t used personally. Ever.
Finally, if I get sent a free product from someone to review (which hasn’t happened yet), I will make that clear in the review.
Are all of your product links affiliate?
No. Not at all. In fact, some of my favorite pieces of equipment don’t even have an affiliate program.
A great example is my Uesaka Barbell. I love that bar and talk about ad nauseum on this site. Uesaka doesn’t have an affiliate program. I have no incentive to go on and on about how much I love that barbell. But, I do. So, I will.
So, what affiliate programs are you affiliated with?
In the interest of my goal of 100% transparency, here is a table showing what brands/companies that I do and do not have an affiliated with.
| Company | Affiliate Program | Notes |
| Amazon | Yes | I am an Amazon affiliate so any traffic I send there is an affiliate link. |
| Rogue | No | Some law about living in Georgia doesn’t allow me to be a Rogue affiliate. However, I use a good bit of Rogue equipment and you’ll see them mentioned often. |
| Titan | Yes | Overall I’ve had a really good experience with Titan equipment. My favorite thing about Titan? Everything ships free. |
| Uesaka | No | Uesaka does not have an affiliate program. Don’t care. They still make the best barbell on the planet. |
| Eleiko | No | I’ve actually tried to sign up to be an Eleiko affiliate and I think their sign up form is broken? |
| Academy Sports & Outdoors | Yes | They pay a 1% commission so not retiring off my Academy commissions anytime soon. |
| Fringe Sport | No | Currently working to get approved |
| Life Fitness | No | Currently working to get approved |
| Vulcan | No | Currently working to get approved |
| Sorinex | No | Sorinex does not have an affiliate policy as far as I know. |
Why do I make such a big deal about this policy?
When I first began developing this site, I really struggled with the idea of whether or not to do an affiliate program.
By nature, I’m very skeptical of people and when I know someone is going to benefit directly over recommending a product, it’s a big red flag for me.
I didn’t want that to be an issue with Garage Gym DIY which is why I didn’t do any affiliate programs at all for almost the entire first year.
Then some friends convinced me that if I’m just straight with people and do honest reviews, people will be able to pick up on that and trust what I’m putting out.
So, here I am. Trying to be as transparent about the process as I can.