Fit Athletic Club, the downtown-headquartered, $16 million fitness club chain, is helping its members keep their fitness goals while at home.
The 2008-founded company, with five locations in the county, launched its Virtual Training Program last week, through which Fit Athletic members can work out with a certified Fit personal trainer, live or via pre-recorded videos.
Early projections are that the program will attract a couple thousand users by early next year, said Bridget Keefe, virtual training program head at Fit Athletic.
“The first day since launching, we signed up 30 people,” said Keefe. “By month four, we hope to have an infiltration rate of 25%, or 4,000 users.”
Three Tiers
The program is broken up into tiers, said Keefe.
The first tier is free for members and includes four different categories: fat loss, male body building, female body building and longevity. Within those groups, Keefe and her team created three-month programs that can be used at home and at the gym. At the physical location, Keefe said users can log into the Fit Athletic app, select their program of choice, see a video of the exercises and use a sets and reps counter to complete their workout. At home, Keefe said members can use the provided timer to get the same workout done within the specified time frame.
At $99, tier two includes everything from tier one with an added accountability aspect. This is provided via a messaging portal on the app through which users have access to trainers 24-7 as well as a weekly 15-minute Zoom call with a trainer.
Tier three provides live virtual training with an instructor via a video conferencing program of choice. The cost is $95, said Keefe.
Important Element of Fitness
Scott Lutwak, CEO of Fit Athletic Club, said the decision to go virtual (Fit Athletic hosted less-structured Instagram and Facebook Live workouts as well during the pandemic) is because it has always been an important element of fitness, even before the pandemic.
“While going virtual can’t replace the total gym experience, it’s part of what people need to adopt in order to achieve all around wellness,” he said. “Fit decided to offer virtual training to help its members create balance throughout their lives. Now they can do a little bit at home, a little bit outside and a little bit in the gym if they want to. This provides a balanced wellness experience and an effective way to stay healthy.”
