Knowing what the larger fitness and wellness brands are doing is useful when you are building something of your own. This article was first published in May 2022 and looks at five brands as they stood at that point.
Ollie Bell
Managing Director · 31 May 2022 · 2 min read
Reviewed by
Robert Taylor
Ten years in digital marketing, eight of them in fitness education
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Knowing what the larger fitness and wellness brands are doing is useful when you are building something of your own. Their launches, campaigns and product decisions are a free case study in what a fitness audience responds to, and the thinking scales down to a single trainer with a client list.
This article was first published in May 2022 and looks at five brands as they stood at that point. The lessons hold. The company details have moved on.
The observations below describe where these five businesses were in 2022. Ownership, pricing and product ranges change. Read this as a record of what worked at the time, not as a current view of any of these companies.
None of them grew on the strength of the product alone. Each sold something around it: a content library, a service promise, a data set, or a clear position on sustainability. That is the part a personal trainer can copy, because it is the same job at a smaller scale.
| Brand | What stood out in 2022 | What a trainer can take from it |
|---|---|---|
| Peloton | Built a subscription content library alongside the hardware, then saw demand fall away once gyms reopened | Recurring revenue is only as strong as the reason people keep turning up |
| Bluefin Fitness | A family run UK business that grew on home gym equipment and on customer service | Responsiveness beats budget when you are the smaller operator |
| Oura | Turned a small wearable into a data set that research teams and sports leagues wanted to use | Measuring something properly gives clients a reason to trust your programming |
| Chilly's | Sold reusable bottles on design and sustainability rather than on function | A clear position gives people something specific to repeat about you |
| Tonal | Sensor led home strength training, sold on feedback rather than on floor space | Technology raises the floor on programming, so your value has to sit in the coaching |
The useful question is not which brand to admire. It is what a client would say about you if a friend asked them what you do. Pick one thing to be known for, then make it visible in how you price, how you post and how you deliver.
If you are not yet qualified, the routes in are on Create’s course range. If you are qualified and the gap is the business rather than the coaching, the PT Business Accelerator covers pricing, positioning and retention.
Company specific figures from the original 2022 article, including share prices and staff numbers, have been removed because they can no longer be verified. The article now sets out what a trainer can take from each brand's approach.
Ollie Bell
Managing Director
Ollie has spent 15 years across sport, physical activity and education. He is a published author with leadership certification from Harvard and emerging technology certification from Oxford, and writes about where fitness qualifications are heading.
Reviewed by Robert Taylor, Ten years in digital marketing, eight of them in fitness education.
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