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Planet Health CEO says fitness center visits are maintaining up in opposition to the omicron variant

Planet Health is seeing fitness center visits and club expansion cling up in opposition to the Covid omicron variant, in keeping with the chain’s leader govt officer, Chris Rondeau.

“Ahead of there used to be a vaccine, we did see a pullback on joins and workout routines and cancellation spiking,” Rondeau mentioned in an interview Monday on CNBC’s “Squawk Field.”

“Right through the delta variant and omicron, we aren’t seeing that pullback. … We are not seeing participants slowing to come back in. We are not seeing joins slowing. We are not seeing cancelations emerging,” the CEO mentioned.

Rondeau mentioned that as a substitute folks strolling into Planet Health’ gyms are understanding greater than they’ve prior to now. Participants really feel extra ok with the well being and protection protocols installed position at health facilities and are prioritizing health of their lives, he added.

U.S. fitness center visits for the month of October had been down simply 8% from 2019 pre-pandemic ranges, in keeping with monitoring knowledge from funding company Jefferies. That is forward of an anticipated surge in sign-ups and visits that generally comes across the first of the 12 months as shoppers decide to wholesome resolutions.

“We noticed some nice, nice momentum final 12 months — we noticed second- and third-quarter expansion that we had by no means observed prior to,” Rondeau mentioned. “Member workout routines are simply rather down from 2019.”

Planet Health stocks rose about 17% in 2021. Peloton, period in-between, dropped 76%.