What are the key sales KPIs for the Health Club and Gym Operations industry in 2027?

👁 0 views📖 2,002 words⏱ 9 min read5/30/2026

Direct Answer

The nine KPIs that actually run a health-club and gym-operations business in 2027 are: Member Count per Club, Monthly Dues ARPU ($/member), Annual Attrition %, Net Joins per Month, Secondary Spend Mix % (PT, classes, F&B), Per-Club EBITDA Margin, Revenue per Square Foot, Fitness-Class Utilization %, and New-Club Ramp Time (months to maturity).

Together they answer the only three questions a multi-unit fitness CFO cares about: are you packing the floor, are the members staying long enough to pay back acquisition cost, and is the second dollar of spend bigger than the first.

TL;DR
— A healthy U.S. Health club runs annual attrition under 30%, blended dues ARPU between $15 (value/HVLP) and $200+ (premium racquet-and-pool), per-club EBITDA margin between 25% (Planet Fitness franchise) and 30% (Life Time), and new-club ramp of 18–30 months to mature membership.
If attrition pushes past 35% or secondary-spend mix is under 15% of total revenue at a full-service club, the model is broken. Track member count and joins/cancels daily, ARPU and secondary spend monthly, and ramp curves quarterly — that is the operating cadence Life Time, Planet Fitness, and EoS Fitness all use.

Why Health Clubs Work Differently

Fixed-cost real-estate flywheel. A health club is a real-estate business wearing membership-business clothing. Rent, utilities, equipment lease, and salaried staff are largely fixed; every incremental member above breakeven drops 70–80 cents on the dollar to EBITDA. Planet Fitness corporate-owned clubs hit ~40% four-wall margins at ~7,000+ members per unit.

Life Time, with a 100,000+ sq ft footprint and pools, racquet, and cafe, needs ~10,000 members per center to clear ~28% adjusted EBITDA margin (the level it printed in Q1 2026). Miss the member count and the operating leverage flips against you in one quarter.

Attrition is the silent killer. IHRSA's industry baseline is ~28.6% annual attrition, but nearly 50% of new joiners quit inside the first six months. That January-joiner cohort is the worst — the gym economics depend on the gap between contractual commitment and actual usage.

Planet Fitness deliberately built its model around low-frequency members ($15/mo, ~50% visit-rarely cohort) because they generate dues without crowding the floor. Premium operators (Equinox, Life Time) use higher dues plus secondary-spend lock-in (kids academy, racquet leagues, in-club spa) to compress attrition to 20–25%.

Secondary spend is the margin lever, not dues. Dues cover rent and electricity. The profit pool sits in personal training, small-group training, swim/tennis academies, F&B, spa, and pro-shop. Life Time's "in-center revenue" mix (membership plus dues plus in-center) is the company's headline metric — average center revenue per membership hit ~$881 in Q4 2025, of which more than 30% is non-dues.

Planet Fitness, which deliberately downplays secondary spend, still pulls 15–20% of system sales from Black Card upgrades, retail, and prepay. If a full-service club is under 20% secondary mix, the personal-training program is undermanaged.

Boutique competitors set the bar for instructor-led economics. Orangetheory, F45, Barry's, and Solidcore charge $25–$40 per class — versus $0.50/visit at a Planet Fitness. Big-box operators now run class formats (Life Time's Alpha, EoS's Body Pump, LA Fitness's Fit Lab) to defend group-fitness ARPU.

Class utilization (% of class capacity actually filled) is the operating KPI that tells you whether the studio inside the box is earning. A healthy big-box class line runs 55–70% utilization; a boutique studio needs 75%+ to clear rent.

The 9 KPIs, In Depth

1. Member Count per Club (members). The single most important volume number. Planet Fitness averages ~7,000 members per club (19.7M members across ~2,800 clubs at year-end 2024, ~2,909 clubs in Q1 2026).

Life Time averages ~10,000 per center across 190 centers. EoS Fitness clubs target ~8,000. Below ~5,500 members per HVLP unit or ~8,000 per premium center, the rent line stops working.

2. Monthly Dues ARPU ($/member). Blended dues per member per month. Planet Fitness sits at ~$24 blended (Classic $15, Black Card $24.99–$29.99 post-2024 price hike).

Life Time blended dues are ~$200/month per membership (often family). EoS Fitness ~$10–$40 by tier. Crunch ~$10–$30.

ARPU growth is the cleanest read on pricing power — Life Time grew average center revenue per membership 10.7% in Q4 2025.

3. Annual Attrition % (annual member loss). IHRSA industry average is ~28.6% annually. Best-in-class operators (Life Time, Equinox) run 20–25%. Value HVLP chains run 35–45% because the $10–$15 price point invites churn. Anything north of 50% means the join-flow is masking a leaky bucket.

4. Net Joins per Month (joins minus cancels). The growth metric. Q1 (January) is the seasonal peak — Planet Fitness adds ~40% of annual gross joins in the first 90 days.

The trick is decomposing it: organic vs promo (PIF, first-month-free) vs new-club openings vs reactivations. Mature clubs target +1–2% month-over-month net member growth; new clubs in ramp target +8–12%.

5. Secondary Spend Mix % (PT, classes, F&B, spa, retail). Share of total revenue from non-dues sources. Life Time ~35%.

Equinox ~30% (PT is the engine). Planet Fitness ~15% (Black Card upgrades plus retail). Below 15% at a premium club means the personal-training program is undermanaged; below 10% at any club means the secondary motion does not exist.

6. Per-Club EBITDA Margin (four-wall). Four-wall club-level EBITDA after rent, payroll, utilities, and supplies but before corporate. Life Time printed 28.7% adjusted EBITDA margin in Q1 2026 (corporate-level, but center-level is higher).

Planet Fitness corporate-owned clubs run ~40% four-wall margins; franchisees ~30–35%. Boutique studios (single F45, Orangetheory) target 25%+ four-wall to justify the $400K–$600K buildout.

7. Revenue per Square Foot ($/sq ft/year). Real-estate efficiency. Planet Fitness ~$50/sq ft (20,000 sq ft box at ~$1M/yr revenue).

Life Time ~$80/sq ft (100,000 sq ft at ~$8M/yr per center, including dues plus in-center). Orangetheory and F45 ~$200–$300/sq ft on a 2,500 sq ft footprint. The metric exposes whether you are paying for square footage that doesn't earn — common failure mode at legacy 24 Hour Fitness and LA Fitness boxes.

8. Fitness-Class Utilization % (seats filled vs capacity). Group-class capacity actually consumed. Boutiques (Orangetheory, F45, Barry's) target 75%+ to clear unit economics. Big-box operators target 55–70% across the schedule with peak classes hitting 90%+. Below 50% means class load needs pruning or the instructor lineup is weak.

9. New-Club Ramp Time (months to mature membership). Months from grand opening to ~85% of mature member count. Planet Fitness HVLP boxes hit maturity in ~24 months.

Life Time premium centers take 30–36 months because the membership is more considered. EoS and Crunch run ~18–24 months. Ramp drag is the single biggest cause of consolidated EBITDA disappointment for chains in growth mode.

flowchart TD A[New Member Join] --> B{Tier Choice} B -->|Value HVLP $10-15| C[Low ARPU High Volume] B -->|Mid Tier $25-50| D[Mid ARPU Balanced Floor] B -->|Premium $100-250| E[High ARPU Family Membership] C --> F[Visit Frequency] D --> F E --> F F --> G{Visits > 4 per month?} G -->|Yes| H[Low Attrition 20-25%] G -->|No| I[High Attrition 35-50%] H --> J[Recurring Dues + Secondary Spend] I --> K[Cancel Event] K --> L{Reactivation in 12mo?} L -->|Yes ~30%| A L -->|No ~70%| M[Lost Member] J --> N[PT + Classes + F&B] N --> O[Per-Club EBITDA] O --> P[New-Club CapEx Reinvestment] P --> A

Real Operators

Planet Fitness is the HVLP benchmark — 2,909 clubs in Q1 2026, ~19.7M members at year-end 2024, $1.4B system-wide sales in Q1 2026 alone, and 22% revenue growth year over year. Life Time Group Holdings (LTH) runs the premium model — 190 centers, ~$881 average center revenue per membership in Q4 2025, 28.7% Q1 2026 adjusted EBITDA margin, 2026 revenue guide of $3.32–$3.35B, and a $500M buyback announced after Q4 2025.

LA Fitness (private) runs ~700 clubs, mid-tier dues, with attrition pressure from EoS and Crunch. Equinox ~100 luxury clubs, ARPU north of $250/mo, PT-led secondary mix above 35%. EoS Fitness ~200 clubs, growing aggressively in Sun Belt with $9.99–$39.99 tiers.

Crunch Fitness ~500+ clubs, franchise-led, value/mid-tier. 24 Hour Fitness post-2020 bankruptcy now ~290 clubs, repositioned mid-tier. F45 Training and Orangetheory are the boutique HIIT comps — F45 ~1,500 studios globally, Orangetheory ~1,500+ U.S.

Studios at ~$25–$40/class blended. Anytime Fitness (Self Esteem Brands / Purpose Brands) ~5,200+ small-format gyms globally on a franchise model.

Failure Modes

The four that kill health-club operators. (1) Attrition denial — reporting net member growth without breaking out joins, cancels, and reactivations hides a leaky bucket for two quarters until the January boost ends. (2) Secondary-spend neglect — running a full-service club at sub-15% non-dues mix means the personal-training and class P&L is starved of scheduling and management.

(3) Ramp-time optimism — modeling new-club maturity at 12 months when the actual industry curve is 18–30 months overstates near-term EBITDA and triggers covenant trouble. (4) Real-estate-rent creep — signing 15-year leases at 2019 rent-to-revenue ratios when the post-2020 industry now needs higher revenue intensity per square foot to clear the rent line.

Reporting Cadence

Daily: joins, cancels, club visits/check-ins, PT session bookings. Weekly: net member change by club, group-class utilization, Black Card or upgrade-tier mix of new joins, no-show rates. Monthly: dues ARPU by tier, secondary spend per member, attrition cohort, per-club four-wall margin.

Quarterly: ramp-curve actuals vs plan for new clubs, capex per new club, full P&L by region, real-estate occupancy cost as a percentage of revenue for the board pack.

flowchart TD A[Daily Telemetry] --> B[Joins + Cancels + Check-ins + PT Bookings] B --> C[Weekly Operating Review] C --> D[Net Member Change + Class Utilization + Upgrade Mix] D --> E[Monthly Business Review] E --> F[ARPU by Tier + Secondary $/Member + Attrition Cohort + 4-Wall Margin] F --> G[Quarterly Earnings + Board] G --> H[Ramp Curves + CapEx + Regional P&L + Rent-to-Revenue] H --> I[Re-forecast Pricing + New-Club Pipeline + PT Program] I --> A

30/60/90 Day Plan

Days 1–30: instrument the nine KPIs end-to-end. Reconcile member counts across billing (ABC Fitness, Jonas, MoSo), access control, and finance — they will disagree on day one and that gap is the first finding. Establish dues ARPU by tier and attrition by cohort baseline per club.

Days 31–60: stand up the secondary-spend dashboard. Wire PT, group-class, F&B, spa, and retail into one revenue cube with per-member denominators. Identify the bottom-quartile clubs by secondary mix and brief the operating partners with a 90-day turnaround plan focused on PT scheduling and class load.

Days 61–90: rebuild the new-club ramp model using the last 24 months of actual openings. Recalibrate the underwriting curve to 18–24 months HVLP and 24–36 months premium, update the development pipeline NPV, and present the new operating model to the CFO with monthly checkpoints on attrition, secondary mix, and ramp.

FAQ

Is monthly or annual attrition the right metric? Annual attrition is the industry standard (IHRSA reports ~28.6%), but the operating metric is monthly cancels per club broken down by tenure cohort. The first-90-day cohort cancels at 3–5x the rate of 12-month-plus members and hides in an annual roll-up.

How do you compare HVLP to premium club economics? Normalize on EBITDA per square foot, not member count or ARPU in isolation. A 20,000 sq ft Planet Fitness at $1M revenue and 40% margin produces ~$20/sq ft of EBITDA. A 100,000 sq ft Life Time at $8M and 30% margin produces ~$24/sq ft.

The premium model wins on absolute dollars per location, the HVLP model wins on CapEx-to-EBITDA.

What is a healthy secondary-spend mix? Below 15% means the program is undermanaged at any full-service club. 15–25% is the HVLP norm (Black Card upgrades plus retail). 25–35% is premium-club expected (PT plus classes plus F&B). Above 40% usually means dues are mispriced low.

How long should new-club ramp take? 18–24 months for HVLP (Planet Fitness, EoS, Crunch) and 24–36 months for premium (Life Time, Equinox). Anything modeled at under 12 months is wrong and will miss the consolidated EBITDA plan.

Sources

Health & Fitness Association (formerly IHRSA) — Global Report and Profiles of Success
Planet Fitness, Inc. — Form 10-K (FY2024) and Q1 2026 Form 10-Q
Life Time Group Holdings, Inc. (LTH) — Form 10-K (FY2025) and Q1 2026 8-K
Health & Fitness Association — How 77 Million Fitness Members Work Out (2026 member survey)
FitnessNav Intelligence — 2026 Global Fitness Profitability Report
Club Industry — Top 100 Health Clubs (annual ranking)
ClubIntel — Industry Trends Report
ABC Fitness Solutions — Industry Benchmark Data
McGinn Investment Management — U.S. Fitness and Gym Industry Report 2025–2030 Outlook
Athletic Business — Fitness Operator Survey

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### Direct Answer

The nine KPIs that actually run a health-club and gym-operations business in 2027 are: **Member Count per Club**, **Monthly Dues ARPU ($/member)**, **Annual Attrition %**, **Net Joins per Month**, **Secondary Spend Mix % (PT, classes, F&B)**, **Per-Club EBITDA Margin**, **Revenue per Square Foot**, **Fitness-Class Utilization %**, and **New-Club Ramp Time (months to maturity)**. Together they answer the only three questions a multi-unit fitness CFO cares about: are you packing the floor, are the members staying long enough to pay back acquisition cost, and is the second dollar of spend bigger than the first.

> **TL;DR** — A healthy U.S. Health club runs annual attrition under 30%, blended dues ARPU between $15 (value/HVLP) and $200+ (premium racquet-and-pool), per-club EBITDA margin between 25% (Planet Fitness franchise) and 30% (Life Time), and new-club ramp of 18–30 months to mature membership. If attrition pushes past 35% or secondary-spend mix is under 15% of total revenue at a full-service club, the model is broken. Track member count and joins/cancels daily, ARPU and secondary spend monthly, and ramp curves quarterly — that is the operating cadence Life Time, Planet Fitness, and EoS Fitness all use.

## Why Health Clubs Work Differently

**Fixed-cost real-estate flywheel.** A health club is a real-estate business wearing membership-business clothing. Rent, utilities, equipment lease, and salaried staff are largely fixed; every incremental member above breakeven drops 70–80 cents on the dollar to EBITDA. Planet Fitness corporate-owned clubs hit ~40% four-wall margins at ~7,000+ members per unit. Life Time, with a 100,000+ sq ft footprint and pools, racquet, and cafe, needs ~10,000 members per center to clear ~28% adjusted EBITDA margin (the level it printed in Q1 2026). Miss the member count and the operating leverage flips against you in one quarter.

**Attrition is the silent killer.** IHRSA's industry baseline is ~28.6% annual attrition, but nearly 50% of new joiners quit inside the first six months. That January-joiner cohort is the worst — the gym economics depend on the **gap between contractual commitment and actual usage**. Planet Fitness deliberately built its model around low-frequency members ($15/mo, ~50% visit-rarely cohort) because they generate dues without crowding the floor. Premium operators (Equinox, Life Time) use higher dues plus secondary-spend lock-in (kids academy, racquet leagues, in-club spa) to compress attrition to 20–25%.

**Secondary spend is the margin lever, not dues.** Dues cover rent and electricity. The profit pool sits in personal training, small-group training, swim/tennis academies, F&B, spa, and pro-shop. Life Time's "in-center revenue" mix (membership plus dues plus in-center) is the company's headline metric — average center revenue per membership hit ~$881 in Q4 2025, of which more than 30% is non-dues. Planet Fitness, which deliberately downplays secondary spend, still pulls 15–20% of system sales from Black Card upgrades, retail, and prepay. If a full-service club is under 20% secondary mix, the personal-training program is undermanaged.

**Boutique competitors set the bar for instructor-led economics.** Orangetheory, F45, Barry's, and Solidcore charge $25–$40 per class — versus $0.50/visit at a Planet Fitness. Big-box operators now run class formats (Life Time's Alpha, EoS's Body Pump, LA Fitness's Fit Lab) to defend group-fitness ARPU. Class utilization (% of class capacity actually filled) is the operating KPI that tells you whether the studio inside the box is earning. A healthy big-box class line runs 55–70% utilization; a boutique studio needs 75%+ to clear rent.

## The 9 KPIs, In Depth

**1. Member Count per Club (members).** The single most important volume number. Planet Fitness averages ~7,000 members per club (19.7M members across ~2,800 clubs at year-end 2024, ~2,909 clubs in Q1 2026). Life Time averages ~10,000 per center across 190 centers. EoS Fitness clubs target ~8,000. Below ~5,500 members per HVLP unit or ~8,000 per premium center, the rent line stops working.

**2. Monthly Dues ARPU ($/member).** Blended dues per member per month. Planet Fitness sits at ~$24 blended (Classic $15, Black Card $24.99–$29.99 post-2024 price hike). Life Time blended dues are ~$200/month per membership (often family). EoS Fitness ~$10–$40 by tier. Crunch ~$10–$30. ARPU growth is the cleanest read on pricing power — Life Time grew average center revenue per membership 10.7% in Q4 2025.

**3. Annual Attrition % (annual member loss).** IHRSA industry average is ~28.6% annually. Best-in-class operators (Life Time, Equinox) run 20–25%. Value HVLP chains run 35–45% because the $10–$15 price point invites churn. Anything north of 50% means the join-flow is masking a leaky bucket.

**4. Net Joins per Month (joins minus cancels).** The growth metric. Q1 (January) is the seasonal peak — Planet Fitness adds ~40% of annual gross joins in the first 90 days. The trick is decomposing it: organic vs promo (PIF, first-month-free) vs new-club openings vs reactivations. Mature clubs target +1–2% month-over-month net member growth; new clubs in ramp target +8–12%.

**5. Secondary Spend Mix % (PT, classes, F&B, spa, retail).** Share of total revenue from non-dues sources. Life Time ~35%. Equinox ~30% (PT is the engine). Planet Fitness ~15% (Black Card upgrades plus retail). Below 15% at a premium club means the personal-training program is undermanaged; below 10% at any club means the secondary motion does not exist.

**6. Per-Club EBITDA Margin (four-wall).** Four-wall club-level EBITDA after rent, payroll, utilities, and supplies but before corporate. Life Time printed 28.7% adjusted EBITDA margin in Q1 2026 (corporate-level, but center-level is higher). Planet Fitness corporate-owned clubs run ~40% four-wall margins; franchisees ~30–35%. Boutique studios (single F45, Orangetheory) target 25%+ four-wall to justify the $400K–$600K buildout.

**7. Revenue per Square Foot ($/sq ft/year).** Real-estate efficiency. Planet Fitness ~$50/sq ft (20,000 sq ft box at ~$1M/yr revenue). Life Time ~$80/sq ft (100,000 sq ft at ~$8M/yr per center, including dues plus in-center). Orangetheory and F45 ~$200–$300/sq ft on a 2,500 sq ft footprint. The metric exposes whether you are paying for square footage that doesn't earn — common failure mode at legacy 24 Hour Fitness and LA Fitness boxes.

**8. Fitness-Class Utilization % (seats filled vs capacity).** Group-class capacity actually consumed. Boutiques (Orangetheory, F45, Barry's) target 75%+ to clear unit economics. Big-box operators target 55–70% across the schedule with peak classes hitting 90%+. Below 50% means class load needs pruning or the instructor lineup is weak.

**9. New-Club Ramp Time (months to mature membership).** Months from grand opening to ~85% of mature member count. Planet Fitness HVLP boxes hit maturity in ~24 months. Life Time premium centers take 30–36 months because the membership is more considered. EoS and Crunch run ~18–24 months. Ramp drag is the single biggest cause of consolidated EBITDA disappointment for chains in growth mode.

```mermaid
flowchart TD
    A[New Member Join] --> B{Tier Choice}
    B -->|Value HVLP $10-15| C[Low ARPU High Volume]
    B -->|Mid Tier $25-50| D[Mid ARPU Balanced Floor]
    B -->|Premium $100-250| E[High ARPU Family Membership]
    C --> F[Visit Frequency]
    D --> F
    E --> F
    F --> G{Visits > 4 per month?}
    G -->|Yes| H[Low Attrition 20-25%]
    G -->|No| I[High Attrition 35-50%]
    H --> J[Recurring Dues + Secondary Spend]
    I --> K[Cancel Event]
    K --> L{Reactivation in 12mo?}
    L -->|Yes ~30%| A
    L -->|No ~70%| M[Lost Member]
    J --> N[PT + Classes + F&B]
    N --> O[Per-Club EBITDA]
    O --> P[New-Club CapEx Reinvestment]
    P --> A
```

## Real Operators

**Planet Fitness** is the HVLP benchmark — 2,909 clubs in Q1 2026, ~19.7M members at year-end 2024, $1.4B system-wide sales in Q1 2026 alone, and 22% revenue growth year over year. **Life Time Group Holdings (LTH)** runs the premium model — 190 centers, ~$881 average center revenue per membership in Q4 2025, 28.7% Q1 2026 adjusted EBITDA margin, 2026 revenue guide of $3.32–$3.35B, and a $500M buyback announced after Q4 2025. **LA Fitness** (private) runs ~700 clubs, mid-tier dues, with attrition pressure from EoS and Crunch. **Equinox** ~100 luxury clubs, ARPU north of $250/mo, PT-led secondary mix above 35%. **EoS Fitness** ~200 clubs, growing aggressively in Sun Belt with $9.99–$39.99 tiers. **Crunch Fitness** ~500+ clubs, franchise-led, value/mid-tier. **24 Hour Fitness** post-2020 bankruptcy now ~290 clubs, repositioned mid-tier. **F45 Training** and **Orangetheory** are the boutique HIIT comps — F45 ~1,500 studios globally, Orangetheory ~1,500+ U.S. Studios at ~$25–$40/class blended. **Anytime Fitness** (Self Esteem Brands / Purpose Brands) ~5,200+ small-format gyms globally on a franchise model.

## Failure Modes

The four that kill health-club operators. **(1) Attrition denial** — reporting net member growth without breaking out joins, cancels, and reactivations hides a leaky bucket for two quarters until the January boost ends. **(2) Secondary-spend neglect** — running a full-service club at sub-15% non-dues mix means the personal-training and class P&L is starved of scheduling and management. **(3) Ramp-time optimism** — modeling new-club maturity at 12 months when the actual industry curve is 18–30 months overstates near-term EBITDA and triggers covenant trouble. **(4) Real-estate-rent creep** — signing 15-year leases at 2019 rent-to-revenue ratios when the post-2020 industry now needs higher revenue intensity per square foot to clear the rent line.

## Reporting Cadence

**Daily:** joins, cancels, club visits/check-ins, PT session bookings. **Weekly:** net member change by club, group-class utilization, Black Card or upgrade-tier mix of new joins, no-show rates. **Monthly:** dues ARPU by tier, secondary spend per member, attrition cohort, per-club four-wall margin. **Quarterly:** ramp-curve actuals vs plan for new clubs, capex per new club, full P&L by region, real-estate occupancy cost as a percentage of revenue for the board pack.

```mermaid
flowchart TD
    A[Daily Telemetry] --> B[Joins + Cancels + Check-ins + PT Bookings]
    B --> C[Weekly Operating Review]
    C --> D[Net Member Change + Class Utilization + Upgrade Mix]
    D --> E[Monthly Business Review]
    E --> F[ARPU by Tier + Secondary $/Member + Attrition Cohort + 4-Wall Margin]
    F --> G[Quarterly Earnings + Board]
    G --> H[Ramp Curves + CapEx + Regional P&L + Rent-to-Revenue]
    H --> I[Re-forecast Pricing + New-Club Pipeline + PT Program]
    I --> A
```

## 30/60/90 Day Plan

**Days 1–30:** instrument the nine KPIs end-to-end. Reconcile member counts across billing (ABC Fitness, Jonas, MoSo), access control, and finance — they will disagree on day one and that gap is the first finding. Establish dues ARPU by tier and attrition by cohort baseline per club.

**Days 31–60:** stand up the secondary-spend dashboard. Wire PT, group-class, F&B, spa, and retail into one revenue cube with per-member denominators. Identify the bottom-quartile clubs by secondary mix and brief the operating partners with a 90-day turnaround plan focused on PT scheduling and class load.

**Days 61–90:** rebuild the new-club ramp model using the last 24 months of actual openings. Recalibrate the underwriting curve to 18–24 months HVLP and 24–36 months premium, update the development pipeline NPV, and present the new operating model to the CFO with monthly checkpoints on attrition, secondary mix, and ramp.

## FAQ

**Is monthly or annual attrition the right metric?** Annual attrition is the industry standard (IHRSA reports ~28.6%), but the operating metric is monthly cancels per club broken down by tenure cohort. The first-90-day cohort cancels at 3–5x the rate of 12-month-plus members and hides in an annual roll-up.

**How do you compare HVLP to premium club economics?** Normalize on EBITDA per square foot, not member count or ARPU in isolation. A 20,000 sq ft Planet Fitness at $1M revenue and 40% margin produces ~$20/sq ft of EBITDA. A 100,000 sq ft Life Time at $8M and 30% margin produces ~$24/sq ft. The premium model wins on absolute dollars per location, the HVLP model wins on CapEx-to-EBITDA.

**What is a healthy secondary-spend mix?** Below 15% means the program is undermanaged at any full-service club. 15–25% is the HVLP norm (Black Card upgrades plus retail). 25–35% is premium-club expected (PT plus classes plus F&B). Above 40% usually means dues are mispriced low.

**How long should new-club ramp take?** 18–24 months for HVLP (Planet Fitness, EoS, Crunch) and 24–36 months for premium (Life Time, Equinox). Anything modeled at under 12 months is wrong and will miss the consolidated EBITDA plan.

## Sources

- Health & Fitness Association (formerly IHRSA) — Global Report and Profiles of Success
- Planet Fitness, Inc. — Form 10-K (FY2024) and Q1 2026 Form 10-Q
- Life Time Group Holdings, Inc. (LTH) — Form 10-K (FY2025) and Q1 2026 8-K
- Health & Fitness Association — How 77 Million Fitness Members Work Out (2026 member survey)
- FitnessNav Intelligence — 2026 Global Fitness Profitability Report
- Club Industry — Top 100 Health Clubs (annual ranking)
- ClubIntel — Industry Trends Report
- ABC Fitness Solutions — Industry Benchmark Data
- McGinn Investment Management — U.S. Fitness and Gym Industry Report 2025–2030 Outlook
- Athletic Business — Fitness Operator Survey

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