INTERVIEW
GoodLife Fitness has been on the list of Canada’s 50 Best Managed Companies for the past decade
consistent opportunity for personal growth. We believe in letting great people develop, and as a result GoodLife has been on the list of Canada’s 50 Best Managed Companies for 10 years, and has been named as one of the country’s 10 Most Admired Corporate Cultures.” Caring is also embodied in the
high levels of charity and community initiatives in which the company gets involved. Running alongside that is GoodLife Kids Foundation, a private foundation set up by Patchell-Evans in 1998 with a view to addressing the issues of overweight and inactivity among Canada’s children. The vision is for every Canadian child to have the opportunity to live a fit and healthy good life, inspiring parents, role models and mentors to deliver the message to kids that being active is not only good for their body and mind, but also a lot of fun. So far, so good. But in an industry
where customer service is often found lacking, how does caring manifest itself to members? How do they ensure every member feels personally looked after? “Ours are clubs where people care
about you. That’s our USP. I know we don’t do it perfectly – no-one in the industry does – but it starts with me. If I don’t lead the way properly, if I’m not excited and enthusiastic and energetic, why would my staff be? I’ve even got
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“I view my staff as members and the company is built around giving them the best opportunities”
back into teaching classes – I teach at least one BODYFLOW class a week and am just starting to take yoga training. “Delivering better fitness results is
also key. Fitness means different things to different people, and when I started out in this industry I realised we had to focus more on identifying the needs of each individual. That’s still my driver – I still think we can deliver even better fitness results for our members – but we’re going in the right direction.”
Growth plans Given that better results for members tends to mean better retention levels, it’s not hard to see how the GoodLife culture – and its founder’s focus on the story behind the figures – still translates into a very healthy bottom line. Already with over 300 clubs – “probably
more like 320 by the time you publish this” – the GoodLife estate has grown particularly rapidly in recent months via a number of acquisitions: 13 Extreme Fitness Sites in the Toronto area, 11 former Gold’s Gyms in Alberta and Ontario, and
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Women Only – a ladies-only operation in Vancouver – to sit within GoodLife’s existing portfolio of For Women Clubs. “But we’re actually building more clubs than we acquire,” says Patchell-Evans.
“We built about 15 new clubs last year and we’ll build about 20 this year. “I always look 100 clubs ahead: it used
to be an objective to open 100 clubs in 10 years, then it became 100 clubs in five years. Now we’re at the stage where we’ll probably open about 100 clubs in the next two and a half, maybe three years. We’re not bound by the timeframe though, and I don’t have a board of directors I have to respond to: if market conditions allow it, great; if we can go faster, we do; and if it doesn’t make sense, we go slower. “There are about 6,000 clubs of
different kinds in Canada, so we still account for a small percentage of the total. One in every 39 Canadians is currently a GoodLife member, but I think we could get a lot bigger.” Would he also consider branching out into new markets, either geographically
July 2013 © Cybertrek 2013
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