The Importance of High Quality Fitness Centers In Hotels and Apartments

We have all seen it before, an apartment building or a hotel boasts of having a fitness center. Sometimes they go as far as saying it is “Club Quality” or “State of the Art”. Excited to check it out as a possible future residence, or to get a workout in while on vacation you walk into the gym and are instantly hit with a wave of disappointment. A small rack of dumbbells, one bench, a treadmill or two and a multipurpose machine with too many levers to track. This is a trend that I believe needs to be squashed.

For me and many others a truly quality fitness center can easily be the deciding factor in which apartment I want to live in, or which hotel I want to have an extended stay at.  Apartment wise, if the gym is nice enough now, I don’t have to get a membership somewhere else and can do all of my workouts without getting in my car, driving, parking, waiting for equipment, driving home, etc. At a hotel the main benefit lies in consistency. As I have preached before, consistency is king. If you stay consistent, you will make progress, and nothing disrupts consistency like a vacation. If you have a suitable gym the vacation no longer disrupts our routine. For many people this can easily be enough to attract them to choose one property over another.

This is a problem that can be easily fixed. Recently I worked with Eagle Ridge Development in Fargo, North Dakota to design and install a truly club quality fitness center in their new apartment building. Check it out here https://www.eagleridgeplazaresidences.com/photogallery.aspx.

I am not saying all apartments need to have this caliber of fitness center, but if you have a nicer 1000 square foot facility than your competitors 1000 square foot facility you are going to get more leases and fill up faster. The money already gets spent on a fitness center, so why not spend it on one that is equipped enough to be useful to residents and provide them with an amenity that they want! Hotels can do the same. I have seen hotels with some great facilities! Those are the ones I look to stay at the next time I travel. Almost like a good breakfast it feels like they care about their customers and are providing them with a product that extends past the stay itself and gives personal attention to their daily routine and needs.