Planet Fitness

4aces61 · May 2014

So if it's not a gym, what is it? I'd love to know where I have been going to work out, lose weight and get in shape.:noway:

trojan_bb · May 2014

It's their marketing that puts people off.

If Gold's Gym went around and said "join us, no undisciplined fatties here, we kick out people who don't look great"...they'd get a lot of flack too.

Making a gym that caters to the less serious people in the fitness/physique community is a great marketing decision.Antagonizing the other side....not cool.

likitisplit · May 2014

"It's Planet Fitness"

LetsTryThisAgain54 · May 2014

That's what I'd like to know! I guess I haven't been working out in a real gym the last few years! BTW, nice looking Boulevard! I have a Yamaha Roadliner. Happy and safe riding!

oregonzoo · May 2014

It's a shame we have all these people yimmer yammering about their market strategy.
All I needed was the $19.99 a month billboard.

and mr crabby bucket could use their tanning beds.

Unknown · May 2014

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neandermagnon · May 2014

it's interesting how this dumpster fire is still smoldering after all this time....

neandermagnon · May 2014

well, why don't you write and ask their advertising executives to explain why it's not a gym, because their ads all say "we're not a gym, we're planet fitness"

Riffraft1960 · May 2014

No need to write them because even a neander "thal" can understand that they are trying to differentiate their brand from the average gym and what people think about when they think "gym". It is used quite frequently in advertising "We are not (the type of product), we are (the brand name)". It is a way to brand a product.

likitisplit · May 2014

Didn't Xerox do a "we're not a copier, we're Xerox"? but when they did that campaign, they were trying to demonstrate how they were MORE than a copier company...not less.

neandermagnon · May 2014

Why did you put "thal" in brackets? Are you arguing in favour of spelling the name of the human species (or subspecies) "neandertal" to match the pronunciation and the modern spelling of the German place they're named after? If so, then I agree with you, I just like silent letters in words and I happen to like the silent h in neanderthal.

And while neanderthals were a great deal cleverer than people generally give them credit for, they wouldn't have understood the subtleties of TV advertising slogans, given that middle palaeolithic culture didn't include TV or advertising. I'm sure they had plenty to say about mammoth hunting though.

And no, it didn't occur to me to take planet fitness's statement in their slogan "we're not a gym" to mean anything other than "we're not a gym" - it's preceded by someone saying "and *that's* why I don't like gyms!" - yes it's obvious that they want to market themselves as being different to other gyms....... in this case that they're different to the point of not actually being a gym at all. Their status as a non-gym isn't my personal opinion, it's what they say about themselves. I usually refer to them as a gym because I consider pretty much the entire content of their ads, including the slogan, to be ridiculous. But there's absolutely no point in planet fitness members/fans getting butthurt over people saying that planet fitness is not a gym when their own advertising insists that they're not a gym.

likitisplit · May 2014

The "h" in neanderthal is silent? Learn something new every day!

LetsTryThisAgain54 · May 2014

You're putting way too much thought into PF! Seriously, go have a beer and relax! If you don't like PF, don't go. It's that simple!!!

TX_Thundercat · May 2014

Am I too late for pizza?

neandermagnon · May 2014

I'm putting very little thought into it... I type at 90 words per minute so can write a lot in a short time. I'm actually extremely amused by planet fitness enthusiasts who get butthurt over stuff that comes directly from PF advertising campaigns :drinker:

I live in Bahrain, there's no planet fitness here or even in the entire geographical region that I know of, and I work out at home.... this topic is interesting to me from a 100% people-watching point of view.

neandermagnon · May 2014

yep, its prounounced "neander-tal", not "neander-tholl"

not sure about American English, but in British English it rhymes with Carl (remember us Brits don't pronounce the R in R-controlled vowels)

likitisplit · May 2014

Now you have me totally confused.

neandermagnon · May 2014

I'm not well versed enough in American English to say what neanderthal rhymes with. Most Americans pronounce it "neander-tholl" ..... it doesn't sound like that.... it sounds neander-tal... but it doesn't rhyme with pal, it rhymes with dhal as in the indian lentil dish. (which in British English rhymes with Carl because we don't pronounce the r sound in words like car, star, start etc... but it's that long aaaaah sound.... then a l sound....)

Riffraft1960 · May 2014

I was making a play on your screen name that's why the parenthesis. And yes, I was playing into the stereotypical understanding of the intellectual capacity of a Neanderthal. As to it not occurring to you, all I can say is British or Bahrain or whatever advertising you are use to viewing must not use it, because that type of differentiation is used regularly in American advertising.

As to my "butthurt" I couldn't care less what you think or don't think about PF, I was just trying to point out what PF was trying to do figuring you should understand it. Now that I find out you don't understand that type of advertising, hopefully this explains your misconception about it. Just about anybody who knows American advertising should immediately recognize it.

4aces61 · May 2014

Thanks bro, and you too.

likitisplit · May 2014

I think tholl is as close to we come to dhal.

neandermagnon · May 2014

It wasn't your butthurt I was referring to.... it was butthurt in general, i.e. everyone on every planet fitness thread ever who gets butthurt over anything that comes from planet fitness advertising. Thank you for explaining that little fact about USA advertising slogans. Very interesting. But the internet is a global medium and American's (including American companies and their marketing departments) need to understand that people outside America are likely to take those kinds of slogans literally. So if they say they're not a gym, people are going to think that they don't want to be considered to be a gym.

The stereotypes about neanderthals and their intellectual capacity are woefully inaccurate... they actually had larger brains than Homo sapiens people, and during the middle palaeolithic era, a similar level of technology. Homo sapiens people had a higher level of technology in the upper palaeolithic era, but that can't be taken as proof that Homo sapiens people were cleverer - it's possible that they were, but it's also possible that Homo sapiens people had wider social networks therefore were better as a population of sharing and accumulating knowledge, or that neanderthals didn't adopt most upper palaeolithic technologies because they had a stable way of life with the technology that they had so don't see a need for them (some very late neanderthals used some upper palaeolithic technology). Neanderthals had a complex culture, were adept toolmakers and there's evidence of symbolic behaviour and that they had a complex language. And they quite possibly invented clothes. (it's hard to say which species of human invented anything so early on, but neanderthals had specific stone tools for processing animal hides and also for punching holes in animal hides e.g. to fasten them and earlier species probably didn't need clothes as neanderthals were cold-adapted and inhabited Europe and Western Asia (e.g. Siberia) where the climate was cold, so would have needed to invent clothes) It was thought that the invented hafted stone tools, but an earlier species - Homo heidelbergensis (thought to be the common ancestor of neanderthals and Homo sapiens) - has been recently found to have done that as well, i.e. a stone spear point hafted on a spear shaft.

Also, neandermagnon is what you get if you cross a neanderthal with a cro-magnon (palaeolithic Homo sapiens sapiens population in Europe who lived alongside neanderthals in Europe from around 40,000 years ago to 28,000 years ago, after which neanderthals disappeared, previously thought to have gone extinct but modern theories suggest that they interbred and got assimilated by Homo sapiens, i.e. neanderthal admixture hypothesis) (I invented this word neandermagnon, based on how if you cross a lion with a tiger you get a liger, etc). So my username is already 100% caveman... it's just a play on the neanderthal admixture hypothesis, because my build/body proportions are more neanderthal than Homo sapiens. I'm pretty sure my rib cage could be considered as evidence for the neanderthal admixture hypothesis. I have a vertical forehead and pointy chin though, i.e. Homo sapiens traits, hence the magnon part of my username.

scuse the tl;dr post.... if you didn't guess I'm a sciencey nerd and this is my favourite topic in the whole of science. :drinker:

maillemaker · May 2014

I think the people who like Planet Fitness are the people who know they will never have to worry about being kicked out of a Planet Fitness. And the people who don't like Planet Fitness are the people who worry that they would be kicked out of a Planet Fitness.

likitisplit · May 2014

I don't think that necessarily holds. There are some pro-PF people on here that I aspire to look like. Most of us arguing back and forth seem to be pretty average.

I think it has to do with some interaction between your experience with PF (either in-person or through the media) and your determination to hold true to your principles/engage in interminable debates on the internet.

TheGreatBeyond · May 2014

Is this the weekly Planet Fitness "Two Minutes Hate" thread?

ChriJMitch · May 2014

Hate on PF all you want, they have the best bang vs. buck ratio I have come across. I miss my swim workouts, and definitely miss the real weight lifting area, but the extra $60 in my pocket every month is very happy it stayed there. Plus, the signup fee was only like $20 and they don't charge you if you need to transfer franchises if you move. I hate that whole stupid *kitten* "lunk alarm" thing, that really pisses me off, but honestly I stopped giving a crap. I get in, get my workout done, and get out.

When I was at LifeTime, they wanted to charge me $140 to start (I said no and left, then they called me back the next day saying they now had a promo going and could start me for $90. Imagine that.) Sure it motivated me to not skip days because I was paying so much @ $70/month, but that is an asinine reason not to go to the gym. I workout 4 days a week at PF, so that's about $0.62 a workout. I am laughing all the way to the bank.

digitalbill · May 2014

Ahh... the "Lunk Alarm".
Monday I didn't work so, I went to the Planet Fitness near my house.
There were only a few people there (11:00 AM) but, the lunk alarm kept going off.
I finally realized that every time the Air Conditioner kicked on, it made a "klang" sound which triggered the alarm.

jigsawxyouth · May 2014

GASP...
BUT THE PIZZA...

oregonzoo · May 2014

After 4 years I finally heard that damned lunk alarm go off for the first time yesterday.

And I keep forgetting to go in shorty shorts and a bra top to see if anybody is "intimidated". For science, ya know.

SnuggleSmacks · May 2014

I finally quit the PF and went back to Rush. I still find nothing at all wrong with the PF here, but I missed the power rack, pool, sauna, steam room, classes, and when I went to visit to make my decision, I found that the Rush had added a lateral elliptical which is FUN AS *kitten*!! It's 3x as much and it's across town, but it also has more enticing things to do to motivate me.

Planet Fitness

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