New Website Launched - Feedback Please?

Well Leisure Industry Week is over for another year and following months of hard work from the staff at LIW and the FIA I think we can confidently say it was a true success. In fact don’t take my word for it:

‘I just wanted to say a really big thank you to the FIA team for all the hard work at LIW...really well done chaps and pass on our thanks from the Trixter team’ Patrick Murray, MD Trixter Europe Ltd.

Luan Underwood, MD of Fitness TV had this to say, ‘We had a thoroughly enjoyable time and have made some extremely promising leads and useful contacts. The stand and supporting signage were super and exceeded expectations. I would also like to extend an applause to the rest of your team who all, without exception, seemed to work really hard, entirely professionally and with an unfailing smile on their faces.’

Launched at LIW was the new FIA website to be found at http://www.fia.org.uk/. So what is new on the site?

• Well the FIA gym finder now has the functionality to allow the general public to directly send an enquiry through to an FIA member club/centre. Great news to help generate more footfall into our industry and an added benefit of FIA membership.
• The marketing doughnut is also up and running on the site which allows all members to access expert knowledge on how best to market their club in these tough times. The doughnut is updated twice a week with new ideas and best practice and should become a major tool for club owners and sales managers in their business strategy.

Over the coming months the FIA website will continue to evolve to attract both the consumer and the industry and increase the information and tools available for everyone. But far from thinking we know it all I would like to hear from all sectors of the industry about what you would like to see on the site and what would help you in the day to day running of your club or centre.


I received valuable feedback from independents, trusts, multi site operators and suppliers while at LIW and now we can start use that feedback to ensure your trade body is offering what you need. However let’s not let it stop there if you have positive or challenging comments (I actually love these because it directs me the way you want the industry to go) please contact me and let’s continue to ensure the FIA offering improves and you get value for membership.


Richard Blackmore - FIA Sales and Marketing Director

Leisure Industry Week Announcements

LIW looms like the Kilimanjaro peak on my horizon. To all my fellow exhibitors, I hope you have a great LIW – may all your enquiries be great leads. To all visitors, I hope you have a great time and, having spoken to quite a few exhibitors, I know you will walk away with at least three good ideas. This year’s LIW is a big one for us for three major reasons:



1. We will announce the results of the 2009 MoreActive4Life campaign
2. We will unveil our new CMO
3. We will launch the next generation of MoreActive4Life: a proposition developed with the obesity specialists MEND, which will give every FIA member an exciting new consumer proposition and a new tactic to leverage the Change4Life connection.


John Searle, our new CMO, must be unique in our industry having an illustrious medical career behind him, a Level 3 qualification and he was a former arthritis sufferer who cured himself through exercise (and a few drugs). John is critical in the FIA’s/ industry’s medical community ‘engagement plan’. If we can overcome their lack of knowledge of the benefits of “exercise medicine” and perhaps even whatever prejudices they have, then we really will have a 360 Degree solution to the nation’s public health time bomb – a solution comprising the DH, the FIA, programme developers (such as MEND), FIA members and ‘referers’ ie the healthcare community. That would be brilliant for consumers and very lucrative for FIA members (if we get it right).

I am now off, in a packed car, to head up the M40 with mission critical collateral in my keep. God help me if I break, lose, misplace or damage anything..... I will have to suffer the wrath of Hayley, our Events manager .......... for three full days! Day and evening!!


David Stalker, FIA Chief Operating Officer

Post Holiday Blues and Pre LIW Madness...

With LIW just around the corner the FIA office is buzzing accordingly with anticipation and preparation. Next week is a little different to the norm - with a sports beach, hosted buyer programme, fitness zone… Congrats to the LIW boys!



This last week has been a busy one for me; having just returned from a glorious holiday in the Algarve in a relaxed a smiley mood, I drove straight into the events planning turmoil and have duly forgotten that I’ve been away at all… The fading remnants of a hard-fought-for tan are all that remains!

From Monday morning my feet have barely touched the ground and as always, the scales of work/home life never balance themselves out – Instead of returning home to a cosy sofa, Eastenders, glass of wine and a stir-fry (my preferred school-night activity), I’ve been plunging a ceaselessly blocking toilet (not our own doing I assure you!), screaming at a dying laptop (which melodramatically keeps showing me the “blue screen of DEATH!”), wondering how on earth people got by before the internet existed, and desperately trying to learn the language of the “Computer Geeks” in order to communicate with those funny salesmen on Tottenham Court Road who are trying to sell me a new laptop! As a high point to the week I had some great meetings with Keiser and Cybex, who are set to support the FIA through 2010.

Despite the frantic nature of the week I am confident that our various events at LIW next week will be a success – our Drinks Reception on Tuesday night has been highly subscribed to (in fact it is totally full to bursting point). This will be a great chance for Health & Fitness to gather, chat, drink & nibble – all thanks to our lovely, generous sponsors; Fitness TV and Matrix!

I am pleased to say that I think this week’s storm is finally calming and I hope that the FIA staff BBQ this evening will vanquish any remaining knots of stress and bring me back to holiday mode!

Hayley Bevan - FIA Events and Sponsorship Manager

Are we fit for purpose?

As Dillon (my Red Setter) disappeared into the horizon and totally ignored my whistle, my bellowing and even my swearing, the phrase ‘fit for purpose’ kept ringing in my head. Despite all my training, this dog was definitely not fit for purpose!!

You might think that that was a strange way to describe my dog, but I have just spent the entire previous day in a room full of the brightest and most creative brains in our industry discussing whether we, as an industry, we are ‘fit for purpose’ and what, if anything we have to do to make us so.

My head was full of snippets of conversations such as “...where do we, as an industry, want to be in five years time....how do we get there....do we have the right skills sets to get there and deliver when we do .........if we don’t, what are the skills sets we need.....if we want to be a ‘government delivery partner, are we “fit for purpose”...its no wonder that I needed a calming walk with Dillon after all that.

Next year the FIA will be celebrating its 20 anniversary, so what better time (some bright spark said) to think about developing a five year plan for the industry? The argument is that we could either, just drift along and ‘evolve’ OR we could take control of our destiny, decide where we think we want to be and develop a collective plan to make it happen.

Why? Well, most people accept that the industry has hit a glass ceiling – around 12% market penetration - and most accept that ‘exercise medicine’ is a great opportunity to break through that glass ceiling. But are we fit-for-purpose (that phrase again) in terms of professional skills, people skills, programmes, facilities etc? Can we get financial help from the government to help us evolve? These are the conversations we want to have with the industry. Last week was the 1ST step and now the FIA secretariat needs to work with the commissionaires over the course of the next 8-10 months to pull together the facts, statistics, wants, desires and opportunities. If you want to be involved and our going to LIW then call in at the FIA Moreactive4life lounge and have a chat.

Do we do a Dillon and spend lots of energy chasing spectres, or do we have a plan and gently move in a direction which will benefit every single organisation in our sector?

Speaking of LIW, whilst I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible at the FIA Lounge next I think we should all spare a thought for the hundreds of people slaving away to make sure that deadlines are met and that everyone has a great show.

Back to important issues......... where is that blasted dog!

David Stalker, FIA Chief Operating Officer

FIA Campaigns and Programmes - Get on board!

Having joined the Campaigns and Programmes Department at the FIA a few short months ago, it is amazing the amount of exciting stuff we have on at the moment. We have created a new flagship campaign—moreactive4life—that launched this summer. Year 1 of this 3-year campaign has taught us a lot: from the importance of helping our members with community engagement, to the media’s love of overweight bus drivers running on treadmills. I think what this campaign showed me was that our industry is great at marketing, but not necessarily at grassroots organisation. Approaching your local doctor’s office or supermarket is a challenge when it is often the first introduction they have had to our sector. I have been on the phone with nearly a thousand members these past few months, and everyone is saying the same thing: how do we foster local relationships with small businesses, doctors, schools, and families?

So our department is also shifting its focus at the moment. While we will continue to deliver our national campaigns, we also want to help our members engage with their community. This is at the heart of sustaining our sector, and ultimately the thing that makes even a national campaign something really special. This is also what the FIA does best—programmes like ‘go’ and ‘active at school’ bring students (and their families) into our clubs and introduce fitness in a non-traditional and fun way (P.E. is great, but what P.E. class offers Pilates or spinning?). So this is about making fitness fun. This is also about getting into your local GP’s office and explaining how you can help out. This is about partnering with your local pub to showcase how a circuit workout can burn off that pint you just downed. This is about our sector becoming a logical partner for a community’s health and wellbeing—and more foot-fall across your floor means more people, more active, more often.

I am really excited about the upcoming changes, so watch this space!

Matt Reents - FIA Programme Manager

How is the FIA assisting its members?

So this is my first entry into the world of blogging and it offers me the fantastic opportunity to open a two way conversation with FIA members.

Over the coming months I will be talking about the successes FIA member benefits has delivered to our members both operators and suppliers and also ask what more the industry is looking for from it trade body.

Over the last year we have seen members benefit substantially from the FIA collective purchasing scheme that is now place saving thousands of pounds on business services ranging from stationary to utilities. FIA Business Services is currently finalising a basket energy agreement that will help all members large or small access even greater savings on their electricity for the future.

We are now also coming to the end of the first moreactive4life campaign. For those of you who do not know this is the industry’s sub brand for the department of health’s change 4life campaign.

Over July and August over one thousand FIA members have taken advantage of the free collateral and national exposure to generate hundreds of extra enquires for the facilities as well as using the campaign to manage retention.

Now we are starting to build for year two, looking to develop new marketing channels to expose moreactive4life to an even wider audience. I will keep you updated on how this develops and more importantly how you can be involved.

Richard Blackmore - FIA Sales and Marketing Director

The FIA Flame Conference

Most will be aware that the FIA recently pulled off the mammoth task of launching the first ever Flame Conference. As a first attempt I think all will agree that it did what it said on the tin and was a success. Granted, there were hiccups and unexpected episodes, but all in all people were educated, fed, watered and serenaded by none other by the legend that is James Brown (who knew he was a white guy?). So, moving forwards the challenge is to replicate, improve and exceed expectations for the Flame Conference 2010… suggestions anyone please? I have recently discovered that squeezing 900 fit and healthy people into one room for a formal occasion is not something that many venues aspire to, thereby making the search for a conference and Ball of Fire venue something of an obstacle. But obstacles were made to be overcome and it is somewhere on the way over that hurdle that the epiphany of a “marquee” presented itself – how exciting! So it would seem we are getting there and bit by bit the plan for 2010 is coming together and looking rather attractive at that! However, I would like to make a plea to all hotels, stadiums, racecourses and universities across the UK – BUILD BIGGER ROOMS, THE FITNESS INDUSTRY NEEDS YOU!

Hayley Bevan - Events and Sponsorship Manager

Yes Prime Minister - FIA Public Affairs

It’s quite exciting to make my first post. No doubt, there will be countless more. Many posts will relate to the happenings in Whitehall, Westminster and the corridors of power in the devolved assemblies. Others will draw attention to the local projects and programmes that are putting the policy theory I spend my days pontificating on into practice.

There will be times when my inane thoughts are of no interest at all! The beauty of this blog is that you will be able to tell me. I will do my best to respond to comments and point you towards other sources of information that you might find more interesting. All I would ask is that you keep it clean and constructive and I will do the same!

For me, the main opportunity will be to draw attention to the team we have at the FIA and the progress we are making. The Public Affairs and Policy Team at the FIA is like a well oiled engine, powering towards the achievement of our goals. We don’t usually have the opportunity to update our stakeholders as much as we should. This blog provides that opportunity. Over time, I will introduce you to the Public Affairs and Policy Department. Together we are working hard to support the whole physical activity sector and this blog should provide the forum to let you know what we are doing.

Steven Ward - FIA Public Affairs and Policy Manager

Welcome from the FIA (and Dillon)

As I was walking my dog (Dillon) this morning my mind inevitably turned to work. I know it sounds sad, but my early morning walks with my red setter are always a good time for me to think about the various things bubbling away on my agendas – whether its work or my son’s A-levels (thankfully now a past worry). On this occasion it was work; the fact that next year the FIA will be celebrating its 20th anniversary and I pondered about how the world has changed in the last 20 years.

For us in the fitness industry it’s been evolution at the speed of sound. From Fonda to globally-networked exercise cycles, as well as rowing and running machines: from leotard enthusiasts to GP referrals: from niche fad to ‘government delivery partner’.

Twenty years ago who would have thought that the Government would give us money to take our proposition into our communities – but I suppose 20 years ago who would have thought that we’d be talking about ‘50% of the adult population being overweight or obese’. Mind you, 20-years ago a fledgling FIA’s only agenda was to try to get the support of an industry that was dominated in all sectors by visionary entrepreneurs focused on picking up on the Fitness boom in the United States and staking a claim on the UK market

Today I (and my team) worry about communications: do the 200,000 odd people who work in our industry know who we are, what we do, how we do it and how we can benefit the 5,700-odd facilities up and down the land. The answer is probably not. It’s ironic, given the great strides we have made in communications; the more we say sometimes the less we are heard. The purpose of this blog is to start a dialogue with those who are ‘listening’. Of course we want to tell you what we’re doing, but more importantly, we want to hear from you about what you’re doing, what you’re thinking, what you want us to do. We might not always be able to do what you want of us, but we will try.

So talk to us

David Stalker, FIA Chief Operating Officer