The Pilates industry has changed in the past 10 years!

Omg!  The Pilates industry has changed quite a bit in 10 years. Everyone seems to know what a reformer is now.  And everyone wants to try it!  Gyms have reformer classes!  There is a viable and growing pilates reformer studio franchise!  Different ethnicities, ages, sizes, physical abilities and more are wanting to try pilates now.  The boutique fitness world has grown!  Group classes or group fitness are becoming more popular even among men.  While men still don’t gravitate towards Pilates, cross fit and bootcamp style fitness are bringing men out into the group class setting.  Even big gyms are appealing to an experience and trying to offer that “boutique” fitness feel within the large framework of a gym.  This includes hot yoga studios and classes, spinning studios, aerial yoga, pilates studios dedicated to reformer work and more.  It’s like a one stop shop for fitness!  There are even women’s only gyms within these larger gyms.  It’s definitely a world of its own when you want into one of these mega gyms.  Almost like a smart centre for fitness.  Of course with this comes a price tag with a membership and a monthly fee. This is something else that I’m noticing with fitness places, boutique or large gyms, the fee structure.  They really ding you for paying for a single class.  They do certainly encourage paying for multiple classes upfront at least and if not that then unlimited types of memberships at a higher price tag.  

Fast rise in the Pilates Industry

Pros

• More people are exposed to Pilates and its benefits.
• More people are being exposed to the different pieces of equipment used in Pilates.  
• More interest in being created in Pilates
• Less education is required to convert an interested participant into a client.
• More people are searching for Pilates classes and training.
• Less barrier to entry for new participants.
• More people are interested in getting into the industry.  E.g. instructors
• The range of demographics Pilates reaches is wider now.

Con

• Since there are more people curious and interested in trying Pilates, the quality of clients is not as high.
• More complaints.
• More demands from clients.
• From some new clients there is an expectation the studio is like a gym.
• There is still the mentality that Pilates is easy and not a true workout.
• These are not early adopters trying Pilates but rather the late majority and laggards as a result the mindset is quite different.
• With more reformer classes popping up in big gyms, there is a “fitness class” feel to the reformer and pilates classes which lessens the small group training and personalized attention.
• The mindbody connection that Pilates has seemed to have fallen in the shadows.
• Since there are more younger generation people trying Pilates, it has come into social media more.  (This is both a pro and con.)  This gives a very singular view of what Pilates is.
• Because of the greater prevalence of Pilates in social media it has become more of a performance activity rather than an activity that people from the inside out.