January Newsletter 2026

MANAGERS CONFERENCE

On Friday 12th December we held our annual manager’s conference and awards ceremony at the Leonardo Hotel Birmingham. The meeting was attended by over 100 employees representing over 80 of our sites around the UK. The day included some brilliant sessions, including an opening keynote from Montell Douglass who is the only British athlete to compete in both the summer and winter Olympics and has also been a competitor on strictly whilst currently hitting the TV screens as gladiator ‘Fire’.

In the evening, we held our annual awards.

The winners were:

Manager of the Year – Sponsored by Topline Pools & Myzone Sara Stewart, Hythe Imperial Health Club

Finalists – Keegan Aranha & Mike Howes

Spa Manager of the Year – Sponsored by Spa Breaks & Ishga

Eva Karlakova, Rena Holborn

Finalists – Claire Tapp, Brands Hatch & Cherelle Welsh, Devona Spa

Corporate Manager of the Year – Sponsored by Lifefitness & Ishga

Emma Blight, FIT

Finalists – Sheree Louise Joseph & Jimmy Higham

Club of the Year – Sponsored by Swimnow Romans Health Club

Finalists – Fashionable Fitness & Juvenate East Midlands

Spa of the Year – Sponsored by One Journey & Ziva

Municipal Spa

Finalists – Rena St Pauls & Devona Spa

Corporate Club of the Year –Sponsored by Tecnhogym

Catterick Leisure Centre

Finalists – The Basement & Zone 10

Newcomer of the Year – Sponsored by Aliance International

James Barron, Landmark Health Club

Finalists – Lance Thompson & James De-Silva

Apprentice of Year – Sponsored by COPA Training

Kim Blackburn, Spa Naturel Dunkenhaugh

Outstanding Contribution – Sponsored by Gladstone Mark Leonard

COMPLIANCE GENIE

Over the past 2 years we have been in the market for a digital Health & Safety compliance system to move all compliance checks, document management, accident reporting and much more into the digital world.

We have tried and tested numerous systems and following a successful trial period we decided to partner with Be-Safe technologies for their Compliance Genie Health & Safety App.

In January we have successfully onboarded 120 sites and over 500 employees onto the system with site specific documentation and checklists which have been built over the previous 4 months.

The Be-Safe Technologies team have been excellent in supporting with the build, delivering the training, their ongoing support after the launch date and making the transition across a smooth one.

BIG TEAM CHALLENGE

In October we joined the nation in celebrating National Fitness Day, this is an occasion which brings the world of fitness to the nation and encourages everyone to get out there and try some exercise.

With this in mind, our group-wide campaign saw us open the doors to our clubs across the UK, completely free of charge, whilst asking people to cycle 30 minutes each, hoping to keep an exercise bike going for a 12 hour period. There were also extra group exercise classes at certain locations and some of our corporate clients joined in too, with open days and special activities.

Overall, the occasion was a huge success, with all clubs seeing large numbers of new faces through the door, and more importantly, lots of people embracing National Fitness Day… and over 20,000 miles cycled!

The event, as always, was coordinated from our support office by our Digital Marketing Manager, Andy Rudkin, who added ‘Every year we aim to do better than the last, and again, we feel like we have. Seeing that many people enter our clubs, and enjoy exercise, some for the first time, was amazing to witness. It’s now our job to top it again in 2026!’

SPA DEVELOPMENT MEETING

In November we hosted our Spa Managers meeting at the Leonardo Hotel, Tower Bridge. This saw some fantastic presentations from Leon at Ishga, Mathieu Ecollan from Staycation, plus presentations from our spa team on 3rd parties, online sales, business development, and discussion around the mystery shopper results.

All who took part in the day fully engaged with the presentations and their spas will certainly benefit from their new found knowledge.

RISING STAR

In September we held our latest Rising Star course at Catterick Leisure centre. This was a 2 day course held by the Northern Operations team for the up-and-coming senior leaders within the business. Presentations were held on finance, operations, business development, spa, HR and standards.

Huge thanks to Les and his team and Catterick leisure centre for hosting us.

Dan Glue Northern Operations Director said:

“This was one of the best courses we have run to date, as the venue and support from the onsite team was superb. Presentations were on point and the attendees really got into the spirit of the training with a great blend of onsite learning and networking with colleagues across the UK”

MEMBER FEEDBACK

We have recently completed member surveys across all the sites that we support. This has involved surveys being sent to over 200,000 members across 100 clubs with all the results then benchmarked and specific feedback reacted to. The Key information that came out of the process was:

• Completion rate up from 13.4% to 16.4%
• Members visit an average 2.3 times per week
  (unchanged on 2024)

• Facility rating up from 4.3 to 4.4
  (out of 6 max)
• Service rating up from 5.2 to 5.3
• Cleanliness rating up from 4.5 to 4.6