Recently, PF Southeast met a major milestone: it opened its 99^th and 100^th clubs! One of the clubs opened in Greer, South Carolina, and the other opened in the Charlotte, North Carolina area.

COVID did get in the way of the club openings and affected the celebrations, but the group wasn’t deterred.

“Under normal circumstances, we would have had an in-person celebration to recognize the entire team’s significant effort to get us to this milestone. Like many things, COVID restricted our ability to do that, but we still plan on having that celebration later in 2021,” said Shane McGuiness, co-owner and CEO for PF Southeast. “Instead, we sent a gift to each of our clubs along with a note of thanks. We wanted to make sure they knew how much we appreciate everything they do that allows us to continue to grow and serve more communities across the Southeast. The fact of the matter is that we would not have been able to open a second club, a 50^th club or our 100^th club without each and every one of our team members working collectively toward a common goal.”

The pandemic delayed the opening of these clubs, which were meant to open in Q2 of 2020. COVID-19 essentially froze development. “However, our VP of Development, Kevin Murray, and his team did a fantastic job of getting things back on track and we ended up opening ten clubs in the second half of 2020. An absolutely amazing accomplishment,” McGuiness said.

The new Planet Fitness^® in Greer is 20,307 square feet and features plenty of top-notch amenities. There is brand new equipment, an oversized PF 360 area, a TRX station, a lie-down tanning station, a stand-up tanning station, hybrid technology tanning, Total Body Enhancement, hydromassage beds and new lounge-style classic massage chairs. “The combination of exceptional customer service and state-of-the-art equipment and amenities helped PF Greer open with a 70% Black Card rate,” McGuiness said.

The Charlotte-Ballantyne Planet Fitness is 22,000 square feet with a convenient layout. Like the Greer location, the Charlotte location has a Black Card Spa equipped with lie-down tanning, stand-up tanning, hybrid technology tanning, Total Body Enhancement, hydromassage beds, and classic massage chairs. Tiffany Robinson, general manager, said, “The excitement is definitely high here at PF Ballantyne and the members are rolling in!”

When it came to getting the word out about the new clubs, PF Southeast’s Vice President of Marketing Scott Breault explained that the group started with awareness marketing – they wanted to prime the market before presale started. They then ramped up spends and channels as they began their presale, and that approach included TV, online video, radio, direct mail, social media and more. “Like all of our new club openings, we activated a multi-channel marketing campaign that saturated both communities with our brand messaging and pre-opening offers,” he said. “We also used quite a bit of public relations to help spread the word about the openings.”

Reaching this milestone has been extremely meaningful for McGuiness and his group. “Opening this milestone club is something we could not dream of when we became the first franchisee of Planet Fitness back in 2003,” he said. “Since then, we have brought on incredible partners and built an incredibly talented A-level team at every level of the business, and that has made this possible. Being able to achieve our 100th club opening with our partners and team has been immensely rewarding.”

Congratulations to PF Southeast on meeting this incredible milestone! It is wonderful to see the opening of its 99^th and 100^th club.