The Future of the Fitness Industry

The Future of the Fitness Industry

For many years, the fitness industry has been incredibly successful at changing and adapting products to suit its own requirements. Taking an existing concept, putting a different spin on it and repackaging it as a different version of itself has allowed the fitness industry to grow and evolve into the multi-billion worldwide industry it is today. But what next? Where does the future of the fitness industry lie? How can we adapt the industry and push it forward?

A chameleon quality has led the fitness industry through various financial trials and tribulations, allowing it to grow from the underground bodybuilding scene that the Weider brothers started back in the 1940’s and 50’s. Since those early days commercial fitness has gone from strength to strength, surviving the jogging trend of the 70’s, the aerobics trend of the 80’s, the spinning craze of the 90’s and the Zumba trend of the new millennium.

Fortunately, good training principles have remained true and like a good pair of jeans, have never gone out of fashion.

In 2012 the UK fitness industry was been officially valued at £3.86 billion – a 1.4% growth that has bucked many trends during the recession. The industry is bigger in America and represents a larger % of GDP in Australia – the point is it’s large and still growing.

Some areas of the fitness industry have plagiarised their way to success. The evidence is displayed all over group fitness class timetables and fitness websites. Look at the following examples for more proof……. Bootcamp was army training – now PT’s are taking classes in parks the world over. Pilates in its purest form is a musculoskeletal therapy – now gyms are teaching classes to women who want to ‘get rid of their belly’. There are dance classes, cycling classes, boxing classes – none of these started with the purpose of helping the masses lose weight and get fitter.

By its very nature, sport preparation lends itself to group exercise. Entrepreneurial fitness professionals spotted the opportunity for profit from sports conditioning, with only minor tweaking required! Even pole dancing has made it into the commercial fitness industry – just a few years back pole dancing was only seen by strip club regulars! Now you can learn to pole dance in your local gym or health club, all under the guise of health.

The perception of gyms being full of size zero models and bodybuilders is now fading fast, and that can only be a good thing for the strength of the industry as a whole. The more inclusive our industry is, the better.

So where next for the fitness industry?

The health of the masses is the more important than profit and commercial gain in my view, so care needs to be taken to not only appeal to the larger audience, but to deliver quality products that people want. If we fail to deliver quality to new exercisers, we may lose the opportunity to change a person’s life.

As the fitness industry has evolved, it has appealed to more and more people – the net result of this is being a gym member or a regular exerciser is a common thing – far more so than it was even as little as 10 years ago. But how does the industry take the next step? The leisure database company say that there are now 7.4 million members of health clubs, but with over 47 million adults (16 years and older) How do we go from a growing industry to a dominant one?

The fitness industry is arguably the most important industry of the next generation. With worldwide health declining at an alarming rate, it really is no exaggeration when I say those with the opportunity to change health for the better are going to be among the most important people of the next generation.

We can function without money, without technology and without transport – we did so for millennia. We can’t however, function without our health. This puts health industries in a very strong position.

The fitness industry as a whole needs to evolve into the ‘health’ industry. Slowly it is happening – new centres are rarely referred to as ‘fitness’ clubs, they are now ‘health’ or ‘leisure’ clubs. The traditional gym is being replaced by a community-focussed fitness health facility.

At the cutting edge of the industry facilities now offer so much more than the old ‘gym and swim’ options. There are health food cafes, physiotherapy, beauty therapy, massage therapy, social meeting groups, a massive variety of fitness classes, shops, crèche facilities, and in some really high-end facilities, an in-house medical service.

Collaboration between fitness and medicine absolutely has to be the future for both industries, and the global population to survive with good health. Financial crisis means the American health model will not work for the long term – many people can’t afford medical insurance. Our own system in the UK cannot cope with the demands on it already, and that is only set to get worse as health and budgets decline. The fitness industry can literally save the medical system in this country by promoting upstream medicine.

In this country, the ‘joined up thinking’ approach taken by the government means this is slowly happening. Government health initiatives have started to provide funding to NHS specialist posts, and there are exercise professionals being employed to bridge the gap in knowledge between exercise and medicine. These links are in their infancy, but have to get stronger. Both industries can learn a lot from one another.

The private sector training providers have been offering GP referral exercise training for a number of years now, and it seems the fitness industry as a whole is slowly realising the benefits of working with this previously untapped market. The unfortunate thing however is that the emphasis for many at the moment is on profit and not professionalism.

Thankfully, in the public and leisure trust sectors profit isn’t as important as professionalism so the GP referral projects are working very well. A new breed of exercise on referral course is also educating on best practice which will improve the delivery of service in future. Educating from the ground up is vital so we can maintain a consistent level of quality.

As partnership work is increasing and improving, we are seeing a new breed of fitness professional. There is room for serious people who have a niche interest and the skills to work in areas such as exercise on referral. When I started in the industry, there was a definite gap between ‘fitness instructor’ and ‘group exercise instructor’. Not much else existed – Personal Training was a very small niche, exclusive to the very fortunate. GP referral instructors were very few and far between. For most of the employees in the industry, working in fitness was a starter job, and fitness instructors stayed in the industry for an easy few quid until they decided what they wanted to do as a ‘real’ job.

Fast forward 10 years and Personal Training is growing. With the additional skills Personal Trainers brought to the table a few years ago, raised the bar across the industry. The Register of Exercise Professionals stepped in to ensure a level of quality control, but the message is simple – the days of NVQ Level 2 being enough for you to be taken seriously are gone for good.

There are different avenues, higher skill sets and continued professional development pathways being established in the fitness career world now. Fitness is now more than just a hobby industry – there is a definite career path, an opportunity for expansion and a definite reason to stick around.

The obesity crisis, GP referral exercise, improved economic conditions and poorer working conditions generally have all been a catalyst for the health industry to grow. Working alongside medicine has to prove vital for our growth and stability as a whole. There was a fear that economic crashes would be the death of the Personal Training industry, but it hasn’t been the case. Instead it has trimmed the herd – removed those trainers without the skills and determination to do well.

Fortunately, the Personal Trainers charging £75 per hour and delivering a £10 service had to leave, and hopefully won’t return. For the industry to thrive, it has to deliver honest and quality. The ‘premium’ end of the UK fitness club market has suffered – David Lloyd, Virgin Active and Total Fitness are dropping members and the budget gyms are spreading like wildfire. My prediction is they wont last – they will saturate the market soon. I am not saying they will disappear altogether, but they wont take over the industry in the way many believe.

The business-savvy Personal Trainers are standing to gain from this change in the industry. Members are realising the value of a gym membership lies within the quality of the staff and the results they achieve – not having a fluffy towel handed to you by a receptionist wearing too much make up. We are a results business, and there is no better barometer. Value is decided directly by the results a member/client achieves, and thankfully, quality always thrives. The results are a direct result of a client’s interaction with a member of staff who guides them correctly – the better the fit pro, the better the results.

The future of the fitness industry

The next step in the evolution of the fitness industry is for fitness professional to become the norm, not the exception. Qualification and professionalism needs to increase industry-wide, and GP referral has to be the initial medical response for cases of obesity, hypertension, early metabolic syndromes etc. We have to reinforce the message of lifestyle choices rather than medical intervention.

Closer links between doctors, physiotherapists and elite personal trainers will ensure the success of the industry, both for the clients/patients AND those of us who work in all three industries. We need to raise the bar in terms of working practice in fitness, making elite not just a self-awarded title, but one given based on qualifications, body of work and contribution to the industry.

The facilities where health and fitness is taught will also need to evolve into human performance centres. I would like to see gyms built for what members NEED rather than what they WANT. The kind of gym that exists in professional sports clubs and top sporting universities should become the norm, not the exception. A place where health is taught and developed, rather than focussing on merely the removal of symptoms.

My favourite gym is the one at Loughborough University. This could serve as a model for the health and fitness facilities of the future – places where health is taught from the most basic principles, rather than a place where the focus is on the removal of symptoms.

The fitness industry will then evolve into the ‘health’ industry, and good fitness professionals will be regarded with the same respect as other health practitioners such as Doctors, Physiotherapists and Nutritionists.

With medical models collapsing under the stresses and strains of the western lifestyle, the fitness industry can be the knight in shining armour – but only if it gets its house in order and moves away from ‘fitness’ and towards ‘health’.

Our understanding of health is improving all of the time, and as the practitioners we need to make sure this new understand of all things health and fitness isn’t wasted – we should be using the new knowledge to improve the health of those who seek our help.

If you want to contribute to the future of fitness, perhaps qualify as a personal trainer yourself. Resources like this one from ‘Become a Personal Trainer‘ are really helpful!