Are you going to a health club or boutique exercise studio several times a week? If so, you are an exception. The business of fitness is in decline. After COVID, 25% of health clubs did not reopen. Thirty percent of boutique studios did not reopen. I have a friend who has a thriving Pilates studio. Pilates is “hot,” but her studio is prospering because two other Pilates studios near hers closed during COVID and did not reopen.

The exercise & diet biz has just been one long, fabulous 60-year ride. No one ever thought there'd be any obstacles to growth even as the bodies morphed from mostly slim to mostly obese. The response of the exercise business to these failures has been MORE Branding!

Winston Churchill famously observed that “Americans will always do the right thing, only after they have tried everything else.” Now it’s time to try something else!

Before 1985, the CDC used the HAMWI formula. A 5’ 6” woman at 160 lbs was obese. Then they made a BMI so that same woman can be 185 and NOT obese. What we call “grading on the curve.” That's why we had to close down our economy for COVID because the CDC knew the real statistics. We started to gain weight in the 60s despite the new diet and exercise routines. People have no idea why our branded solutions made us fatter. Now we know that hormones rule-- forget calories. Ozempic and Wegovy and Mounjaro really fix hormonal imbalances. But the advice is still “eat healthy and exercise more.” The exercise/diet industry is working on new branding, not new programs or a new point of view, but just new branding because that's what we do in America.

We take some new term such as “Functional Fitness” and rename a Stretch & Tone class. We don’t go to a deeper level such as when someone is doing a Rotation Move there should be a cue to inhale. We get a new name such as Wellness which no one can define. We used to understand exercise as cardio or strength training. The brands were many-- Orange Theory or Barry’s Boot Camp or CrossFit or Hot Yoga. But regardless, there are only 10 spinal movements. Choose a spinal movement and add choreography so we do different moves with the four limbs.

Today when you take an exercise class, you have people leading you through a sequence. They always say,” If you do anything and you have pain, then stop. Of course, for most of the past 60 years it was: “No pain, No gain.”

But since Americans are masochists, consumers talk about an exercise brand as being “hard.” Pilates’ spoofs-- particularly the Saturday Night Live bit-- were about it being so hard. For 60 years, I've been a Pilates client and I didn't find it hard when I started. I am 83 now and I still don't find it hard. Understand that fitness instructors know about adding repetitions or speed to make a class more intense. Music is essential: Peloton pays $113 million dollars every year to play Taylor Swift and other name artists because they know no one is going to participate without it. Instructors put together a class so that there's always a theme which is coordinated with a playlist.

It's all very superficial if you consider that the real subject is gluttony and sloth: two of the seven deadly sins. We have a country of people who can’t stop talking and thinking and obsessing about nutrients. In the 60s, people were all excited about exercise and diet and they thought it was all good and they didn't know they were opening up this Pandora's box of GUILT.

We can get it right this time and that begins with the individual getting in touch with his/her own body. You need to be able to take your body and your mouth anywhere. Pilates and 80Bites is a start. Forget Wellness and Healthy. Ignore these meaningless terms. You take charge because it's your one and only body which is unlike any other body.