has opened up two studios in the past three years, and last month the rent for one of the fast-growing Denver gym’s locations came from an unexpected revenue source: .
The came to Denver in December, offering users unlimited access to classes at 185 gyms and studios around the city for $99 a month. Users are limited to three classes a month with the same company.
ClassPass is barely two years old but has entered the fitness industry at a time when boutique fitness studios are gaining popularity. (Smaller studios made up about 21 percent of the health club industry in 2013, .) The service has allowed these studios, which specialize in everything from cycling and yoga to barre and CrossFit, to promote themselves in an increasingly crowded market despite their often limited budgets.
“ClassPass is simply a sign of the times,” said Jamie Atlas, who owns , which uses ClassPass. “(Gym membership) used to be like a professional sport, where people stayed with one place for a lifetime. But now there’s so many great choices out there that we can’t fault people for trying other stuff.”
Denver is one of the strongest fitness markets in the country, and ClassPass has already racked up 40,000 class reservations in Denver since its launch, said Michael Wolf, head of operations for ClassPass. The service has found that about 80 percent of its users have either never or only occasionally used a boutique fitness studio before joining ClassPass.
and word of mouth but gets about 100 visits a week from ClassPass members, said Laura St. John, who owns the company with her husband, Scott. The profit share each studio gets from a ClassPass visit varies, but at Pearl Street it’s about half what it receives from a full membership.
St. John sees that lost profit as opportunity cost since ClassPass is cutting into overall class revenue, but said that in the end “the pros outweigh the cons.”
“There’s a lot of gyms that are worried about the competition of being up there with other gyms, but I think the competition is really healthy,” she said.
The competition fueling the growth of these small studios is even influencing bigger health clubs in Denver. , which offers more than 200 classes a week, has embraced the boutique studio trend by hiring instructors who are the “best of the best” in these specialized fitness areas, said Keith Moore, the club’s director of development. This approach helps the club’s members, who pay $180 a month, feel like they’re getting access to several specialized studios, he said.
Pura Vida previously tried out the subscription gym service model when it signed with ClassPass competitor FitMob last year. The club ended its partnership because too many ClassPass members were using facilities at Pura Vida that weren’t included with the ClassPass, Moore said. Though the service didn’t work for Pura Vida, Moore said “if I were a new studio trying to get people through the door, it would be great.”
has seen more people come through its doors since signing up for ClassPass, but marketing manager Jack Cuneo sees the service as a way for people to check out a lot of gyms before committing to one, rather than as a long-term fitness solution. Boutique fitness studios are popular because they offer a sense of belonging and feeling of “coming home” that can’t be replicated through something like ClassPass, he added.
Lori Melchior, whose cycling studio uses ClassPass, also thinks ClassPass users are missing out on the whole studio experience if they just “date around” instead of committing to one studio.
“Don’t people want to be in a relationship? You don’t want to date your entire life,” she said.
But Atlas, owner of Bonza Bodies Fitness, thinks ClassPass is part of a more substantial change in the boutique fitness industry. Given that, the studio, which gets about eight to 12 ClassPass visits a day, has added services specifically geared toward ensuring these users get the full studio experience. Bonza Bodies offers a special $50 a month for five classes deal to ClassPass members and has added a nutrition class specifically for them as well, he said.
Though very few of these ClassPass members have asked about membership, the service has helped fill slots in off-peak classes and improved Bonza Bodies’ marketing, Atlas said.
“Some see ClassPass as an end,” he said. “I see ClassPass as the one thing that will save the small studio.”
Jessica Iannetta: 303-954-1510, jiannetta@ denverpost.com twitter.com/ JessicaIannetta
