Speaking with Hotelier India’s Simona Terron, John Young who is Senior Vice President, international sales of Cybex international, talks about the latest trends in hotel health clubs and what it takes to set up facilities in hotels
Which hospitality properties in India do you currently provide health club solutions to?
We’ve been developing our business with major chains around the world; we are a preferred vendor with chains like the Wyndham, Four Seasons, the Sheratons, Mandarin Oriental, Diamond resorts, Intercon, Le Meridien, Marriott. If you’re not a preferred vendor you can’t even get your foot in the door when these chains open up around the globe. We’ve developed these relationships with these groups. Normally they have one to three suppliers, that then enables our local distributor to get in and sell our products. So if there is a Wyndham or Marriott etc coming up, there’s a good chance that we can get in there and do business with them. With our local distribution here, we’ve spent the last two years really focusing on the commercial market. So our new strategic direction for 2011 is to focus on the hospitality space. The current exposure for Cybex in India is with the Radissons, the Sheratons, etc.
What are the costs involved in setting up the fitness centres for hotels?
It’s the same as any health club. Traditionally hoteliers don’t really know how to set up, design, build and operate a fitness facility. What we’ve done is set up a hotel Cybex division, which has three main parts – one is called the facility development guide and that is further divided into the pre-opening set up; so the design of the operation, its concept, how much space you need, what is the flow of the facility such as not mixing dry areas with wet areas, how many passive and active areas are needed, all these design concepts, which a hotelier traditionally is not usually comfortable with, we develop and provide a facility guide for them for free. We partnered with consultants in America to develop interior design and operating specifications so that when hoteliers come to me and say that they’re interested in fitness equipment, we say that first we need to understand the operating concepts of the facility, whether the users will be business travellers, if they will have outside memberships or is it just for hotel guests, is it a destination resort, will a spa be needed? We can then recommend how much space is needed, the lighting levels, the air conditioning needs, the number of lockers and toilets needed. So we act more as a consultant and that is very important for us because then we offer value to the hotelier, it’s not just a price driven transaction. The second part is managing operations, the job descriptions for the front desk, while again in a hotel they know how to manage a front desk but when it comes to a facility, the safety procedures, the standard operating procedures, the housekeeping procedures, keeping the facility clean, all these procedures, we provide all this electronically, so that the hoteliers can integrate it into their standard procedures. Cybex understands that when you run a hotel health club that facility must be at exactly the same quality as the rest of the hotel. Everything has to be consistent with the style, the operating concepts of the hotel. So those SOPs that we provide are like a benchmark for them and they can customise them to match their concept of the hotel. So we’ve now helped them with the design, the management of the facility and then comes the equipment. We’ve done a line of equipment that is very space conscious. Some of our products are designed keeping in mind the function, we won’t compromise on the functionality of the product unless the customer really demand it. For the hotel market the customers normally have space constraints so we’ve designed a line of equipment which is called Duals, which have dual functions. So for example we’ve designed equipment that takes care of twelve major muscle groups. So although they’re space saving, they don’t compromise on the functionality of the equipment. The major areas where we have designed a package to be able to provide consultation, services and products that are specifically designed for the hotel product.
What are the challenges of dealing with the Indian patrons of hotel health clubs?
The Indian hotel guests are similar to guests in a lot of emerging markets where the average user is not really comfortable with the product and don’t really know how to use it. So we highly recommend ease of use as being the top of the list, it has to be very simple. When we track the usage of products in hotels, 89% of all people use the quick start button. So when I’m talking to procurement managers, and they ask us “How many programs does it have?” I tell them that hotel guests don’t really like to use the programs, they get on the machines and go straight for the quick start button. They like to watch the television, they use the quick start button and they’re not interested in any other programs. If they want to get a real good workout, people prefer to use their home gyms. For the average hotel user, its ease of use so the product that we make for this market has got to have ease of use, and simple is better.
What are the typical expectations of Indian hotels when it comes to equipping their health clubs? Is it relatively standard across the category (like 5 stars would all demand the same thing) or do they differ in their demands?
We have a little bit of a battle with hoteliers – research says that the hotel fitness centre is the most important facet or service in a hotel after a business centre and room service. Some of the hotel operators that we meet don’t feel that having a fitness centre is that important. But research indicates that hotel guests want to replicate the experience they have in their home gym. So he’s looking for an experience that is almost like a commercial gym so that he can maintain a similar exercise routine that he does every day when he’s a travelling. Some of the challenges we’ve faced with hoteliers is that they don’t really appreciate that and they tell us to just put anything. So it’s an education process to make them understand that their guests want a commercial gym experience and that they can’t scrimp on the kind and mix of equipment they install. That being said, most of the average guests will tend to use cardio vascular equipment instead of strength equipment. However in a hotel market the average frequent independent traveller has a limited amount of time in the gym and so we recommend a specific mix of equipments for that. We even do two dimensional and three dimensional layouts to show the hotelier in full colour what it needs to look like.
What are your expansion plans for the Asia Pacific region and in particular for India?
We’ve just set up a Cybex liaison office in Delhi, our intent is not to sell directly but to augment the business of our existing distribution, which is already doing a very good job but we need a better understanding of the local market. So that office and the business development manager is dedicated to augment and understand the local market better and we’ve done the same thing in China with an office in Shanghai, and we’ve just hired a China country manager and again his job is to understand the market needs better, to be the conduit for information going back and forth, he’s a local national, speaks the language so that we can better understand what the market is saying and we can better support the market as well. So for us this is a very important strategy. Our business depends entirely on the success of the distributor so we need to train more, educate and support more, and sometimes we need to police them to ensure they maintain our high standards such as our 48 hours response.
How often do hotels renew their equipment or buy new equipment and how does this differ from a regular gym/health club?
The utilisation in an average hotel health club is much less than a commercial health club, typically only 3-6% of guests use the facility. In an average gym, you have 15% of the total membership using the gym everyday so the numbers are massive. In hotel health clubs, the maximum usage is conducted for two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening, hardly anybody uses the gym during the day. So because the utilisation is much less, there’s less wear and tear and the equipment lasts longer. Normally the service schedules, which we give the hoteliers allows them to maintain the equipment very well. So less usage and good maintenance ensure that the equipment lasts between 5-7 years. The only problem is that it then becomes outdated. So it could last longer but it needs to be upgraded. In commercial gyms, the equipment lasts 4-5 years at the very most after which it needs to be upgraded.
Do health clubs in tier II cities have the same needs as health clubs in metros?
Yes absolutely, there is a growing demand, these cities are growing rapidly and obviously there’s not a lot of penetration in those clubs, mom and pop neighbourhood gyms are slowly giving way to Talwalkars and Golds Gyms in these tier II cities. Although they have exactly the same needs, they’re not very well educated about equipment buying decisions, so it will take time to reach out to them and educate them about the different products. Those clubs tend to be mostly like sweat shop gyms with a lot of strength and less cardio, they have a more old fashioned approach.
Do hotel chains ask for standardised equipment across all their properties?
With chains like the Wyndham and the Marriott, they’ll normally select two or three preferred suppliers. With the Fairmont we have an exclusive deal so all Fairmonts have Cybex equipment. With the Four Seasons, they have two suppliers and one of them is Cybex. So those hotel chains then go to the owners developing hotels anywhere in India and say that we’re going to manage the hotel for you but you as the owner must purchase one or two suppliers. So then they’re assured a certain standard and quality. Obviously they’re not going to pick anything less than the best. We’re very fortunate to be one of the Four Seasons’ preferred vendors.
What are your projections for the coming year in terms of health club and fitness equipment trends?
One of the biggest trends around the world is a growing utilisation by older people who are exercising . Traditionally the biggest segment of hotel gym users used to be the 25-35 year group. Now the baby boomers are getting older and they’re now the 35-55 year group, which is demanding really good equipment. The second trend is that more females are using strength equipment. Muscle burns approximately five times more calories than fat even when you’re doing nothing. Increased muscle mass helps burn more calories and since weight management is one of the main concerns with women, they’re turning to weights to achieve that. The other trend is crosstrainers; treadmills have always been the number one most popular way to exercise but now its crosstrainers. People are now demanding almost the same number of crosstrainers as treadmills. Our cross trainer is called the Arc trainer, and it’s won an award two years in a row for the best cardiovascular product in the fitness equipment market in the US. It makes 43% of the company’s turnover. We sell more cardiovascular equipment than strength training equipment but our Arc trainer is now the number one product in the market and is selling like hot cakes. Bicycles are slowly being phased out of hotel gyms.
What are the other offerings your company proposes in order to help hoteliers who are your potential customers?
We also provide hoteliers with prototype gyms in a three dimensional model. If you have a standard five star deluxe hotel in the city and its anywhere between 300-500 or 500-800 keys, we then provide a prototype gym and layout in a 3 dimensional environment to show the hotelier what their facility, how much space they need, what’s the right mix of equipment, etc. We provide all this in a generic form so it gives them a very good understanding of the mix, the cost, what they can expect to spend and we’ve found that it is a very valuable tool and that’s all available on our website www.cybexintl.com and they can download that information for free. We believe that we have to educate the market, its part of our responsibility. I’m willing to take the risk of my competitors taking this information but at Cybex, we feel responsible for educating our potential customers. We are very proud to have the information and we offer it for free while people would be paying a consultant for this.
