INTERVIEW
The AlterG anti-gravity treadmill enables larger people to exercise more comfortably
need respect for what they’ve been asked to achieve – an appreciation that it will bring about important changes in their lives. Finally, they must be given an understanding of why they’re being asked to do certain things. Don’t just tell them to go and run on a treadmill for 10 minutes – tell them why. “We’re really honest with people too.
We tell them it will probably hurt a bit, and they might be stiff afterwards, but if they stick with us it’ll change their life.” Support for the concept wasn’t always
there – “I couldn’t get anybody to believe in it at first, so we just went ahead and did it with £250k of our own money,” says McPhail – but it’s proved highly effective. Membership is up to 1,500, the centre is on-track to turn a profit next year, it’s tapped into new funding streams as a result of its achievements, and it’s now held up as a best practice example within the borough and beyond. “It just proves that tapping into the
non-13 per cent can be commercially viable,” says McPhail. “And it’s absolutely something that could be replicated by any operator in the country, whether public or private sector. In fact, if we’re going to have any impact on public health, the private sector operators have to be just as convincing as the local authorities and trusts in changing their tactics. “The problem is, I think we as a sector
hide behind the smokescreen of people blaming lack of exercise on lack of time. The real issue is that we can’t be bothered to put something in place that actually meets the demands of the individual. That’s what Avondale was all about.”
PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE Besides the commercial rationale, McPhail also has a very personal reason for broadening the reach of his centres. He may now be a CEO who has grown his business from a turnover of £3.5m when he joined in 2007 to £11.5m in 2013, but his childhood was a tough one:
“I came from a single parent family, I spent some time in care, my father was an alcoholic, I used to stand in free school meal queues being identified as poor and different from everyone else. “When I questioned this, I was always
told ‘that’s just the way it is’, and I developed a hatred for that statement. Even today, it drives me to challenge tradition and conventionalism. For
me, ‘that’s the way it is’ isn’t acceptable as an answer to anything. “Fortunately for me, I was a reasonable
athlete: I was British Counties Champion and held numerous Scottish titles at 400 metres and 400-metre hurdles. Sport gave me the discipline and focus to make my life what I wanted it to be. “Now I’m in a position where I can
make a difference, although it sounds cliché, that’s what I want to do. I don’t want to provide health and fitness only for those who can afford it. I also want to give opportunities to people like myself. “In any case, at some point the sector
has to get sick and tired of fighting over the same people – the same 13 per cent. In a way I’m now glad the budget operators came along and forced us to rethink our model, because they can have the fit, healthy 16- to 25-year-olds. Their arrival has forced me into making that step to go after the other percentage, the silent majority, and I’m over the moon about it.”
RETURN TO ACTIVITY But reaching beyond the 13 per cent isn’t just about changing the offering and pricing at leisure centres. At the heart of the Avondale experiment was the pilot of
34 Read Health Club Management online at
healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital
an intervention known as actiLife – a ‘back to activity’ scheme that targeted local residents who were either overweight or felt too intimidated to use a gym. “You can’t expect these people to
come straight to the gym,” says McPhail.
“You need an industrial-sized concept or intervention that just gets them interested in physical activity more broadly.” So what was the actiLife concept?
Quite simply, it was to start people off by getting them walking, with a specially designed walking programme and walking officers on-hand to run sessions. McPhail explains: “Public health departments have confused the public with conflicting messages in the past, not to mention campaigns suggesting that all people need to do to get healthy is to walk. Walking alone isn’t enough. However, it is the first step on the journey to health and fitness.” A total of 300 participants were
recruited onto the ‘pre-membership’ scheme via a range of channels, including GP referrals and links with the local housing association and job centre. Running over a period of 12 months
– actiLife was one of the interventions monitored in the 2012 ukactive Research Institute study – the results were
August 2014 © Cybertrek 2014
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