High Value, Low Price (HVLP)
Insights
Market Players
The HVLP Juggernaut Continues At Pace
High Value, Low Price (HVLP) clubs offer members a wide range of high-quality facilities, services, and amenities at a relatively low price point. Their popularity has been steadily growing over the last 5 years but in the last 12-24 months their growth has been astronomical, as consumers prioritise affordability and accessibility to meet their fitness and wellness goals. Investors and financiers, buoyed by recent strong HVLP financial performance, are happy to fund this growth, spurring an active funding and M&A market (Crunch, Planet, PureGym, EoS, Vasa, Mountainside). Many stalwart US companies are quickly expanding their footprints globally (Planet, Crunch) and other international brands continue their regional and international expansion (Basic Fit, Smart Fit, PureGym). Further encouragement is that membership price points have plateaued, avoiding a price war, and VIP and tiered membership rates are proving very popular with members, as operators add new health, beauty and wellness services to improve member experience and at the same time, their bottom line.
Redouane Zekkri
COO
Basic-Fit
The HVLP fitness segment is maturing rapidly worldwide, taking up a large proportion of new club openings and attracting many first-time members. This is a positive for the whole sector, as HVLP players help consumers build their first fitness routine, after which some spread out to other gym concepts. Increased competition drives further innovation and efficiency efforts. For example, at Basic-Fit we continue to improve our smart camera surveillance system and we now scan potential club locations in 3D to speed up our expansion process. We are excited about the launch of Basic-Fit franchising in 2025, unlocking our years of innovation & development for big investors to bring affordable quality fitness to more places in the world.
For PureGym, we have made very good progress this year with over 45 new openings and considerable investment across the core estate. The most exciting development has been our acquisition of the Blink Fitness business in New York. We will be operating over 700 sites and have around 2.5M members by the end of next year which is a long way from the 80 or so sites that I took on when I started as CEO 10 years ago. As I move on to the Chairman role and hand over to Clive Chesser and the brilliant PureGym Team I think the industry is in good shape overall. Of course, there are challenges but the fundamentals of healthy demand and offering a good quality, fairly priced service to members are robust and the future is bright.
Humphrey Cobbold
Chairman
Pure Gym
Thiago Somera
Infrastructure & Supply Chain Director
Smart Fit
2024 is/was an important milestone for Smart Fit. This year we reached the 1,600 clubs mark and more than 5 million members. This gives us more energy to keep pushing and also, energy to develop new markets in 2025. Morocco will be our first market outside Latin America and we are thrilled to start this new venture. The market in general is super responsive and gives us confidence of our expansion, no matter what business model we are considering. The proof of that is Bio Ritmo’s international expansion to Chile, Peru and Panama – markets that we understand are underserved with premium clubs as well. Looking ahead further, consumers will have lots of choices and alternatives to workout and this is wonderful! More people engaged with exercise, more customers to our clubs and digital products. No other market is great as this one in this days!
Phillip Mills
Founder & Executive Director
Les Mills International