Research
The trend of market consolidation by financial and strategic investors continued despite the influence of the pandemic
Annual report In April, Deloitte and Europe Active published the ninth edition of their yearly European Health and Fitness Market Report, as Karsten Hollasch explains
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imilar to the year 2020, the European fitness market was strongly impacted by temporary COVID-19-related club closures and operational restrictions during 2021. As a consequence, many operators tried to overcome this situation through the development of innovative solutions and concepts to enable fitness practitioners to either work out in a safe environment, or in a virtual environment when fitness clubs were closed.
Beyond the health club Besides market developments and trends, this year’s report provides additional insights into the fitness behaviour of European consumers which goes beyond health clubs. Almost 11,000 consumers from 19 countries were asked about their fitness routines in a representative survey in terms of gender, age and urbanisation. Even if the survey results show that the pandemic had a 56
Issue 4 2022 ©Cybertrek 2022
negative impact on consumers’ fitness behaviour in many European countries (in 14 of the 19 countries, the share of consumers who cut back their fitness routines since the outbreak of the pandemic exceeds the share of consumers who increased their exercise frequency), the consumer sentiment indicates that an increase in physical activity beyond pre-COVID-19 levels might occur once exercise becomes and remains possible in a safe and largely unrestricted setting. After the sharp decline of fitness market KPIs in 2020, the number of European fitness clubs (63,173) and overall memberships (56.3 million) in 2021 increased slightly by +0.2 per cent and +2.0 per cent, respectively. A further reduction was prevented mainly through the strong rebound in memberships in the UK and Spain – two of the biggest European markets – as well as through the continued expansion of larger fitness operators compensating for pandemic-related club closures.
