Clubindustry

With Michael Gerend’s departure as Life Time Fitness’s chief operating officer effective this Friday, there seems to be a growing trend within this industry that more and more companies are doing away with the COO role. more

Today, I realized that May 27-30 is not that far away, so I’d better start preparing for the Club Industry East conference in Boston. I checked flights and can get a good price on Midwest (non-stop and with chocolate chip cookies!). more

While spending a few days in the Bay Area after the IHRSA show last month, news of the shooting deaths of four Oakland police officers was all over the TV and newspapers. One club company, CrossFit, raised almost $13,000 last Saturday for the families of the slain officers. more

I normally blog a lot more at trade shows either on site or in the days after returning to the office. However, after spending some extra time in the Bay Area after IHRSA 2009 and hustling to get the April issue out, I haven’t posted anything officially other than this post on the IHRSA Financial Panel.

I’m starting to make a habit out of this. I didn’t blog about last December’s Athletic Business show until February. It’s a habit I hope to break at future shows.

So against the wishes of my boss—who’d rather I just plow ahead with other duties—and with my boss not around on a lazy Friday afternoon, and with the Royals playing their home opener (that’s where my boss is right now, by the way), I thought I’d take a few minutes to give you some of my highlights of IHRSA 2009 in San Francisco. more

Despite past concerns with the Gold’s Gym corporate office, Blair McHaney, president of the Gold’s Gym Franchisee Association (GGFA), is cautiously optimistic about the company’s new leadership.

“The communication from and with [new Gold’s Gym CEO] James Weaver has been outstanding,” McHaney says. “From our perspective, Mr. Weaver appears to either naturally or strategically focus on four things – 1. Listen with an open mind and a humble attitude. 2. Use that information to make swift and relevant decisions that drive the Gold’s Gym family forward. 3. Socialize those decisions quickly. 4. Make sure the rest of his team in Dallas is doing the same and that they have the appropriate authority to make their own decisions.”

He notes that effective communication involves listening to input from franchisees, as well as sending updates from the corporate office.

“We know that this doesn’t mean that we will agree on everything,” says McHaney. “But when you are heard, truly heard, and not just the appearance of someone listening, you can have confidence in being treated fairly.”

Also, the recently introduced small box model for Gold’s Gyms is something that both franchisees and the franchisor have discussed for several years, McHaney says.

“We have a lot of incredible gyms out there that are getting ‘chipped away’ a bit by smaller box models,” he says. “We (the GGFA) have looked at this with the franchisor for a number of years and have been asking for tools like the small box concept in order to begin to build an arsenal for the new competitive environment. In fairness, there are several people on the franchisor side that wanted this as well. It didn’t take long for the new leadership to see the needs of the franchisees as well as some of the work that had already been done by key employees at GGI and say ‘let’s move.’ It appears that it is being received very favorably.”

So it should be interesting to watch the progress Gold’s Gym makes with enhanced collaboration between franchisees and the corporate office.

I recently saw a press release from The Radial Group about altruistic marketing in the health and fitness club industry. Leslie Nolen, president of The Radial Group (and online columnist for our publication), noted that she is seeing more altruistic marketing from health clubs these days. On the company’s Web site, she offers five tips for altruistic marketing, including “Give a gift that keeps on giving,” and “Don’t be greedy.” These tips can help you “pay it forward” in many ways and may help you to gain some loyal customers long after this recession ends.