Gym chain Total Fitness is already a well-established name in the North of England with 15 “superclubs” peppered across the region. But despite her ambitious goal of quadrupling the Cheshire-based company’s portfolio in the next five years, CEO Sophie Lawler has zero interest in expanding into the South. It’s a bold move as, according to a 2023 YouGov survey, the regions with the highest percentage of regular exercisers are London, the East and South East of England.
But Lawler reckons this targeted approach is exactly what will end up setting the company apart from its competitors. She said: “The clear promise I make to my staff is that anything is possible when you work for Total Fitness – if that’s to be true then I’m not going to open a club in Bournemouth. “We want to open them where our staff can make the most of the increased opportunities and career paths.
We’re very clear that we want to expand, but we want to do it in the right way.” The right way, according to Lawler, does not look like trying to compete with operator giants like Pure Gym or The Gym Group . “We’re not a budget chain and that’s not what we’re trying to be.
We know we’ll never be able to compete with those names in that market” she said. Instead, Lawler said that Total Fitness had held its position in the middle of the market where it had, in recent years, been increasingly capitalising on “switchers” – people either looking to spend less than they would at a l.