Peloton & the Power of Branding
What do consumers and analysts say about Peloton? “It’s GREAT exercise; too bad the company is poorly run.” In fact, it's the opposite!!! Peloton is the essence of brilliant branding. It’s all marketing. The company executives have taken a tired and ineffective and boring exercise scheme and suckered people into buying their bikes and programming. This exercise is mediocre at best. Peloton, according to the analysts who cover the company, was supposed to go out of biz in 2024. But it seems to be lingering because many investors just love their little Pelotons. And, Peloton has just made a big announcement about closing their two studios on Wednesdays so they can investigate how to get into Wellness!! Wonderful wellness, which is 100% pure marketing hype. Athletech, a fitness industry newsletter, will run a series in October about the coming exercise changes and one part will be devoted to “How to Monetize the WELLNESS CRAZE.”
Peloton is based on abusing your body on a bike or a treadmill or a rower.
Peloton is based on abusing your body on a bike or a treadmill or a rower. They also sell a bit of Yoga for people who want to feel flexible. So now they're going to get into the Wellness racket, which is what all the fitness companies are trying to do since it's pretty obvious that people are walking away from gym memberships and boutiques and “go for the burn” exercise. These big shifts are necessary because of the new miracle diet drugs. The exercise biz is in panic because they have been waiting for the shoe to drop and now it has. Fitness executives always said someday there will be a pill that will make people lose weight and then they won't exercise because they will recognize that this kind of exercise makes them very hungry. Exercise executives felt they were on borrowed time. They never thought that such one drug would fix fat and other serious illnesses too. Scientists think GLP-1 drugs can prevent Alzheimer's. And strokes and heart attacks and ten other issues. Maybe even retard Parkinson's. GLP-1 medicines are miracles, which makes it hard to denigrate them even as they upset the calories in/out exercise formula.
Peloton is branding supreme just like Spinning, which was launched in 1993 when there were cartoons in The New Yorker with captions, “Oh, well, you can always use your bike to hang your clothes on!” We laughed because we knew that people bought stationary bikes but didn't use them because it was so boring and the majority of Americans were not yet obese. Then came Spinning with a slightly different bike and a great name. And they put these cool bikes on concentric platforms in health clubs in dark rooms with LOUD music and maybe candles. Obviously, this is the easiest kind of exercise. It doesn't require any balance, any coordination, any proprioception, any strength—anything that you really need. Now, of course, fitness experts are moving away from cardio to strength training. Cardio was easy to do and to sell because it would torch those pesky calories. So people thought it doesn’t matter that they just gobbled up an entire pizza. Or drank an entire bottle of wine. This is a craziness people fell hard for.
Peloton addicts who think these cycling classes are different really should try one without the music and ignore the instructor. Just put on closed captioning. You won’t last too long. Soon you will figure out that each class has a theme where the speed and the intensity and the playlist are coordinated and your favorite instructor is never correcting your form but only High Fiving YOU! Peloton pays $113 MILLION a year so you can hear Taylor Swift because if you don't, you're not going to want to do it. In fact, MUSIC is so important now that a new Reformer class franchise brands itself by advertising its “well curated music” and its smiling instructors! Peloton used to be located one block from where I live. Until I went inside their store I thought that CONNECTED fitness meant the instructor could see YOU—the exerciser—in your basement in Ohio or anywhere and could make corrections to your biking form!!
So why do people pay for this meager experience? It’s based on the QVC strategy, which involves a “celebrity” on TV pitching some stuff. You buy it and then afterwards you go on air and talk to the seller who is just doing a “show.” Everyone loves it, loves it, loves it! So Peloton had to turn these bikers into STARS! And they are getting paid as if they were: salaries range between $500,000 and $1,000,000 to sit on a bike and trash talk or urge you on or whatever it is that you want to call it and the STAR who is the leader can see you've joined in and gives you a high five because this is the fourth time this week you've done it! Why do people do this? It’s the QVC strategy, which is a TV Channel that's built on what appears to be celebrities who maybe had a name and they're washed up and they're on TV Hawking stuff and the person watching thinks that this celebrity is interested in them so they buy something and then they can call in and be on TV and talk to the celebrity.
People have to be more aware of the branding. It doesn't mean that they wouldn't buy something, but they might have a different view of what it is they're doing and what it's doing for them or not doing for them. Exercise is not a weight loss solution. Exercise is very beneficial for your body and your mind, mostly your mind, certainly Pilates helps the mind. Now you can take a shot—soon only a pill—and it works. That's what everybody always wanted. But that's not the way exercise works. Exercise is complicated. There's no other body in the world like yours. And you will hopefully take some time to figure out what it needs and take care of it. Many good teachers to guide you to make the right decisions for a better body forever.
