Fitness and Recreational Sports Centers (U.S.) — Industry Primer
NAICS 2022 code 713940. NAICS = North American Industry Classification System, the standard the U.S. government uses to group businesses by their primary activity.
1. Overview
This is the gym business — and a bit more. NAICS 713940 covers the places Americans pay to exercise or play recreational sports: budget gyms, premium health clubs, boutique studios (Pilates, cycling, barre, yoga, stretching), plus swimming pools, ice and roller rinks, and racquet/tennis clubs [1]. It is a large, everyday consumer-services industry — roughly 41,600 establishments employing about 708,000 people and taking in around $36 billion a year [2][3].
The economics are those of a subscription business layered on real estate. Fitness runs on recurring memberships: once a location fills up, a monthly-dues model with almost no cost of goods throws off high, predictable cash flow — but returns depend heavily on local site selection, rent, labor, member retention, and (for chains) franchisee quality and capital discipline. Demand has hit record highs: a record ~77 million Americans — close to one in four — held a gym or studio membership in 2024, up from 72.9 million (23.7% of the population age 6+) in 2023 [7][8]. That mix of sticky revenue, a secular tailwind, and low industry concentration is why private equity has spent recent years rolling gyms up.
There are two broad ways to participate:
- Public markets — a handful of listed operators: a large-cap budget franchisor (Planet Fitness), a premium full-service chain (Life Time), and a boutique-studio franchisor (Xponential), plus at-home adjacencies such as Peloton.
- Private markets — where most of the industry actually sits. The biggest chains (LA Fitness, Equinox, Crunch, Anytime Fitness, Orangetheory) are privately or PE-owned, and the most common "investment" of all is owning and operating a franchise unit or the real estate under one.
A franchisor's economics differ substantially from those of the local club owner, so it pays to be clear which layer any investment touches.
2. What it is and how it's structured
Scope. The Census definition covers establishments "primarily engaged in operating fitness and recreational sports facilities featuring exercise and other active physical fitness conditioning or recreational sports activities." Examples run from aerobics and physical-fitness centers, gymnasiums, and health clubs to ice/roller rinks, handball/racquetball/tennis clubs, and swimming or wave pools [1].
What it excludes (and where those activities live instead):
- Golf courses and country clubs → NAICS 713910; skiing facilities → 713920; marinas → 713930.
- Bowling centers → 713950.
- Amusement/theme parks → 713110; arcades → 713120; golf driving ranges, family-fun centers, and recreational sports clubs that own no facility → 713990.
- Sports and recreation instruction (e.g., gymnastics or swim lessons sold as instruction) → 611620.
- Standalone personal trainers with no facility of their own → 812990, All Other Personal Services.
- Diet and weight-loss centers → 812191.
- Resort/hotel spas and gyms bundled with lodging → 721110, Hotels [1].
That last group matters: some of what the public thinks of as "fitness" spending (a personal trainer you hire directly, a medical weight-loss clinic, a hotel gym) is counted in other codes, so 713940 is narrower than "the wellness economy."
Business models. Three broad formats coexist:
- High-value, low-price (HVLP) budget gyms — roughly $10–$30/month, big boxes, large memberships (Planet Fitness, EoS, Crunch, VASA, Chuze).
- Premium / full-service clubs — high dues, owned or leased real estate, pools, classes, cafés (Life Time, Equinox).
- Boutique studios — single-discipline, class-based, mostly franchised (Club Pilates, Orangetheory, Barry's, Pure Barre).
Ownership mix. By count the industry is dominated by small operators and franchisees: about 31,600 firms run those 41,600 establishments [3], and independent single-location gyms — plus nonprofit and government facilities (YMCAs, JCCs, municipal recreation centers, university and military gyms) — make up a large share of where Americans actually work out. The NAICS code describes the facility's activity, not its ownership structure, so corporate operators, franchisees, family businesses, PE-backed platforms, nonprofits, and public recreation departments all sit inside it.
3. How big it is
Federal business statistics for NAICS 713940 (reference years differ by dataset):
| Metric | Value | Source (year) |
|---|---|---|
| Receipts / revenue | ~$36.04 billion | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| Establishments | 41,556 | County Business Patterns (2023) [2] |
| Paid employees | 708,273 | County Business Patterns (2023) [2] |
| Annual payroll | ~$13.51 billion | County Business Patterns (2023) [2] |
| First-quarter payroll | ~$3.21 billion | County Business Patterns (2023) [2] |
| Firms | 31,581 | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| Top-4 firms' share of receipts (CR4) | 14.7% | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| Top-8 (CR8) | 18.0% | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| Top-20 (CR20) | 23.2% | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| Top-50 (CR50) | 30.6% | Economic Census (2022) [3] |
| SBA small-business size standard | $17.5 million avg. annual receipts | SBA (2023) [4] |
The Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) — the standard single-number concentration measure — is suppressed in the federal data for this industry, so no value is reported here. (CR4/CR8/CR20/CR50 are "concentration ratios," the combined revenue share of the largest 4, 8, 20, and 50 firms; SBA = U.S. Small Business Administration.)
A telling detail: ~$13.5 billion of payroll across ~708,000 workers is only about $19,000 per employee per year [2] — a workforce that is heavily part-time and hourly (front-desk staff, class instructors, trainers), which is how gyms keep labor flexible against seasonal demand.
Undercount and timing caveats. These are an employer-business baseline, not a complete census of the activity:
- County Business Patterns (CBP) excludes the self-employed, businesses with no paid employees, and most government workers [5]; separate Nonemployer Statistics cover the no-payroll businesses [6]. So public pools, municipal and school/university recreation centers, military gyms, and tiny owner-operated studios are absent, understated, or classified elsewhere.
- Nonprofit operators — the YMCA is one of the largest fitness providers in the country — are tax-exempt and only partly reflected in business receipts.
- The federal data provide no national measure of attendance, peak-hour utilization, member churn, customer lifetime value, or franchisee profitability.
Because of the wider lens and post-2022 growth, third-party industry trackers put the broader U.S. health-and-fitness-club market at roughly $40 billion or more by 2024 [9]. The federal figures fairly size the for-profit establishment industry; the activity's true footprint is larger.
4. The investable universe
Publicly traded pure-plays are few; the private and PE-backed roster is far larger. (Tickers and exchanges are for reference; operational scale is shown by revenue, members, and footprint. Figures are the latest reported, FY2025 unless noted.)
Public companies
| Company | Ticker (exchange) | Model | Reported scale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Planet Fitness | PLNT (NYSE) | HVLP budget, ~90% franchised | ~20.8M members, 2,896 clubs, ~$1.33B revenue, +6.7% system-wide same-club sales; ~$552M adjusted EBITDA (~42% margin) [10] |
| Life Time Group Holdings | LTH (NYSE) | Premium full-service; owns/leases real estate | 189 centers, ~872,900 memberships, ~$2.995B revenue [11] |
| Xponential Fitness | XPOF (NYSE) | Boutique-studio franchisor (Club Pilates, Pure Barre, StretchLab, YogaSix…) | ~$314.9M revenue, ~3,097 global studios (2,606 N.A.), ~704,000 active members, ~$1.746B system-wide sales [12] |
| Peloton Interactive | PTON (Nasdaq) | At-home connected fitness (adjacent, not a "center") | ~$2.7B revenue (FY2024) [13] |
| Basic-Fit | BFIT (Euronext Amsterdam) | Largest European HVLP operator (little U.S. exposure) | European gym leader [14] |
System-wide sales are not franchisor revenue — they include the gross sales generated by franchisees, so Xponential's ~$1.75 billion of system sales sits above its ~$315 million of company revenue [12]. None of the three U.S. names is a clean one-to-one proxy for NAICS 713940: Life Time bundles wellness, hospitality, and events; Planet Fitness and Xponential have international units. (EBITDA = earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, a rough proxy for operating cash flow.)
Major private / other owners
| Operator | Owner / backer | Footprint & notes |
|---|---|---|
| Fitness International (LA Fitness, City Sports Club, Club Studio) | Seidler Equity Partners | ~700 clubs; acquired XSport Fitness in 2024 [14][30] |
| Equinox Group (Equinox, SoulCycle, Blink) | Related Companies + investors (incl. Silver Lake) | Luxury/premium, multi-brand [14] |
| Crunch (Crunch Holdings) | TPG-backed; strategic investment from Leonard Green & Partners (2025) | 3M+ members, ~500+ gyms [14][32] |
| Purpose Brands (Anytime Fitness + Orangetheory) | Roark Capital (2024 merger) | 7,000+ locations globally [15][33] |
| Gold's Gym | RSG Group (Germany) | Global franchised brand [31] |
| EoS Fitness | Private (HVLP) | Regional; buying Gold's Gym Southern California clubs in 2025 [23] |
| VASA Fitness / Chuze Fitness | Private regional multi-unit operators | Value-format, multi-state [14] |
| 24 Hour Fitness | Private; ownership changed in a reported 2026 deal involving founder Mark Mastrov and LongRange Capital | ~280 clubs [34] |
| YMCA of the USA | Nonprofit | ~2,600 Ys; tens of millions served [14] |
Note the churn on the public side: F45 Training went public in 2021 and delisted in 2023 after its stock collapsed [22]; Town Sports (New York Sports Clubs) went bankrupt in 2020. Boutique and mid-market fitness is a graveyard as often as a growth story, which is why most boutique capital now sits in private hands.
There is no widely held, dedicated U.S. fitness ETF (exchange-traded fund); public exposure comes through owning the individual names above or via broad consumer-discretionary funds that hold Planet Fitness and Life Time. Nonprofit and public-recreation operators are economically important but are generally not investable through corporate equity.
5. How the money works
Gyms make money the way subscription businesses do — but with real estate and equipment underneath. It helps to separate the operator (runs the club) from the franchisor (licenses the brand).
Unit (operator) economics. A gym has high fixed costs (rent, equipment, base staff) and very low variable cost per member — essentially no cost of goods. So profit is a function of membership density: fill the box and operating leverage does the rest. New locations typically take 12–24 months to break even, then mature units run net margins around 15–25%, with well-run budget and boutique formats going higher [20]. A typical Planet Fitness location does roughly $1.7 million in annual revenue serving 6,000–8,000 members at ~$15/month — profitable precisely because of scale and because many members pay and rarely show up [20].
Revenue sources. Recurring dues are the core, often plus enrollment and annual fees. Non-dues revenue — personal training, small-group classes, childcare, retail, food and beverage, recovery amenities, and digital services — is an increasingly important profit driver. Major costs are rent/leases, labor, utilities, equipment and maintenance, insurance, payment processing, and marketing.
The metrics owners actually watch:
- Membership growth, retention, and churn — churn is the single biggest swing factor on margin.
- Average revenue per member and non-dues mix.
- Same-club (same-store) sales and average unit volume (AUV) — organic growth per location.
- New-club ramp time and cash payback — a Planet Fitness franchise runs roughly $1.6M–$4.8M to open [20].
- Club-level EBITDA, maintenance (replacement) capital, and rent/interest coverage.
- Breakage — dues from members who rarely attend (economically important for budget gyms).
- Franchisee closures, transfers, and financial health.
- Seasonality — a January "New Year's resolution" surge, a summer lull.
Utilization matters but has no single standardized measure, so investors should read attendance and peak-hour density alongside raw membership counts.
Franchisor economics (the asset-light layer). The public budget and boutique names mostly franchise: the franchisee funds the build-out and runs the club; the franchisor collects a cut of the top line, plus fees, and sells equipment. Planet Fitness charges franchisees roughly a 7% royalty on member dues plus a ~2% national-advertising-fund contribution and an initial franchise fee, and franchisees are contractually required to buy their equipment from Planet Fitness [21]. Because the franchisor bears little club-level capital cost, its margins sit far above the unit's — Planet Fitness posted ~$552 million of adjusted EBITDA on ~$1.33 billion of revenue (about a 42% margin) [10]. That gap — thin-ish unit margins, fat franchisor margins — is the core of the public budget-gym thesis, though it makes the franchisor dependent on franchisee health and compliance.
Premium chains like Life Time run the opposite model: they own or lease large, amenity-rich campuses and charge dues that can exceed $200/month, monetizing real estate, food and beverage, and in-center services — higher revenue per member, but far more capital-intensive [11].
6. What drives demand
- A record and rising participation rate. Membership reached ~77 million in 2024 (close to one in four Americans), up from 72.9 million (23.7% of the population age 6+) in 2023 — the highest penetration on record [7][8]. More members is the tide that lifts the whole industry.
- A large untapped gap. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports only about one in four U.S. adults fully meets both aerobic and muscle-strengthening guidelines [35] — headroom for gyms, studios, coaching, and recreational facilities.
- Demographics — young and getting younger. Gen Z and Millennials make up roughly two-thirds of gym members, Gen Z is joining fastest, and younger members spend more per month than older ones [17].
- The strength-training boom. Strength has overtaken cardio as the top workout for under-40s, pulling demand toward gyms with free weights and machines — a tailwind for HVLP and full-service formats [17]. Recovery, mobility, pickleball, and swimming add further draws.
- GLP-1 weight-loss drugs — a net tailwind, not the threat once feared. Surveys show people who start GLP-1 medications (Ozempic-class glucagon-like peptide-1 drugs) tend to work out more, and gym membership among users has risen; operators now partner with drug providers rather than brace for lost members [16][25].
- Return to in-person. The pandemic-era boom in at-home connected fitness has cooled; consumers came back to clubs, and home equipment is now treated as a complement rather than a substitute [13].
- Income and discretionary spending. Memberships are discretionary but cheap and sticky, which makes budget gyms relatively recession-resilient. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported average household spending of $272 on social, recreation, and health-club memberships in 2024, versus $225 on sports and exercise equipment [36].
- Payer-funded members. Programs like SilverSneakers (fitness benefits in Medicare Advantage plans) and employer wellness subsidies push additional members through the doors.
- Cheaper space. Better availability of second-generation retail and commercial real estate lowers the cost of new locations.
Judgment: digital fitness is more likely to complement strong physical brands than replace facilities, but it can pressure weaker clubs and lower switching costs.
7. Regulation
There is little federal, industry-specific regulation; the binding rules are mostly franchise-disclosure law, state consumer-protection statutes, and local health and safety codes.
- Franchise disclosure. The Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) Franchise Rule requires a franchisor to give prospects a Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD) — 23 specified categories of information — at least 14 days before they sign or pay [26]. Franchise-sales practices are actively policed: in 2025, boutique franchisor Xponential agreed to pay millions to settle FTC and franchisee claims [24].
- State health-club statutes. Many states (New York, New Jersey, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and others) require gyms to register, post a surety bond, include specific contract disclosures, honor a short cooling-off cancellation right, and refund prepaid dues if the club closes. States are especially strict on pre-opening sales — e.g., Maryland and New Jersey require a $50,000+ bond before a not-yet-open club can take members' money [19].
- Cancellation / auto-renewal. The FTC's 2024 "Click-to-Cancel" Negative Option Rule would have forced gyms to make cancelling as easy as signing up, but it was vacated by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2025, so the federal rule is not in force [18]. Numerous state auto-renewal laws remain, and cancellation is a live issue: in 2025 the FTC sued Fitness International, alleging that LA Fitness made memberships hard to cancel (the allegations are not a final finding) [27].
- Access, safety, and health. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) covers privately operated clubs as public accommodations [28]. Local building, fire, zoning, and pool codes apply; the CDC's Model Aquatic Health Code (MAHC) offers voluntary pool-safety guidance that becomes binding only where a jurisdiction adopts it [29]. Many states also mandate automated external defibrillators (AEDs). Injury-liability/waiver law and standard employment rules (minimum wage, trainer classification) round out the load.
- Data and privacy. Apps and connected devices holding identifiable health data create exposure beyond the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA); the FTC's Health Breach Notification Rule can reach certain health-data businesses outside the HIPAA framework [37].
8. Competitive dynamics and consolidation
The industry is highly fragmented but actively consolidating, and competition is fundamentally local — a club's real rivals are the nearby gyms, studios, recreation centers, apartment amenities, employers, schools, outdoor options, and at-home alternatives.
National concentration is low: the top four firms hold 14.7% of receipts and the top 50 hold 30.6% [3]. Those national ratios say nothing about local market concentration, brand overlap, or who owns individual franchise units — so a nationally fragmented industry can still be crowded in a given trade area.
- A barbell market. Budget HVLP on one end (Planet Fitness, EoS, Crunch) and premium/boutique on the other (Life Time, Equinox, Club Pilates, Barry's), with mid-market full-service gyms squeezed in between — the segment that produced most of the bankruptcies.
- Private equity is the dominant force. A majority of the largest U.S. chains are PE-backed; recurring dues, real-estate collateral, and franchising all appeal to financial buyers, and hundreds of brands have been acquired since 2019 [15].
- Franchising is the growth engine. The asset-light franchisor model lets brands scale on other people's capital — the reason Planet Fitness and Xponential can add hundreds of units without funding each box.
- Recent moves: the 2024 merger of Anytime Fitness and Orangetheory into Purpose Brands (7,000+ locations) [15][33]; RSG Group's ownership of Gold's Gym [31]; Fitness International's 2024 acquisition of XSport Fitness [30]; a 2025 Leonard Green strategic investment in Crunch [32]; EoS Fitness buying Gold's Gym's Southern California clubs in 2025 [23]; and a reported 2026 change of control at 24 Hour Fitness [34].
Judgment: consolidation should continue at the franchisor, regional-operator, and multi-unit-franchisee levels, but the industry is unlikely to become nationally dominated by a few firms — local real estate, consumer preferences, and formats stay too diverse.
9. Risks
- Discretionary and cyclical. Memberships get cut in downturns, though cheap budget gyms are more defensive than premium clubs.
- Fixed-cost / lease risk. Long leases and equipment obligations make an underfilled box bleed cash; new units can take up to two years to break even [20].
- Churn and seasonality. Retention is everything; the January-to-summer fade pressures cash flow and marketing spend.
- Oversupply / cannibalization. Aggressive franchise expansion can crowd a trade area and depress same-club sales — a factor in boutique-brand stress, and local markets can mature before national growth looks finished.
- Franchisee stress. A franchisor can post strong royalties while individual franchisees struggle, close units, or stop opening contracted locations — so franchisor and franchisee health can diverge.
- Boutique fragility and fad risk. Single-discipline studios are capital-intensive and trend-dependent; F45's delisting and Town Sports' bankruptcy show how fast the model can break [22].
- Regulatory / litigation exposure. Cancellation practices, hidden annual fees, and franchise-sales disclosures draw state AGs and the FTC — see the Xponential settlement and the FTC's LA Fitness suit [24][27].
- Leverage and rates. Many chains and franchisees are debt-financed; higher interest rates raise the cost of both roll-ups and new-unit expansion.
- Digital substitution. At-home and outdoor fitness compete at the margin and can weaken pricing power, even with the connected-fitness threat receded [13].
- GLP-1 uncertainty. The net effect has looked additive so far, but operators (Planet Fitness included) acknowledge it could cut demand if some consumers treat medication as a substitute for exercise [10][16].
- Injury, liability, and data risk. Accidents, health claims, wage disputes, thin insurance, and — increasingly — biometric/app data create exposure beyond traditional operations.
- Idiosyncratic governance risk at some franchisors (litigation, short-seller scrutiny) can dominate the equity story regardless of unit health.
10. How to invest, and the outlook
Public routes (this is where tickers and valuation belong).
- Budget scale / franchisor economics: Planet Fitness (PLNT) is the cleanest large-cap proxy — asset-light, high-margin, the membership leader. Watch membership growth, same-club sales, royalty rates, franchisee leverage, and club openings [10].
- Premium + real estate: Life Time (LTH) offers full-service, higher-dues exposure with owned/leased campuses; more capital-intensive and more cyclical. Watch mature-center returns, membership yield, ancillary revenue, capital spending, and leases [11].
- Boutique franchising (higher risk): Xponential (XPOF) is the listed way to play studio fitness, but carries loss-making years, governance/legal overhang, and a recent FTC settlement. Watch studio openings vs. closures, AUV, same-studio sales, active members, and the gap between system-wide sales and company revenue [12][24].
- At-home adjacency: Peloton (PTON) is a turnaround/complement story, not a "center" operator [13].
- International: Basic-Fit (BFIT, Amsterdam) for European HVLP exposure [14].
- Indirect real estate: net-lease REITs (real estate investment trusts) sometimes hold gym boxes leased to operators — a lower-volatility, rent-based way to touch the sector.
For the listed names, read enterprise value-to-EBITDA (EV/EBITDA), free-cash-flow (FCF) yield, net leverage, same-club growth, and capital intensity together rather than leaning on any single multiple — membership scale alone is not proof of attractive owner returns.
Private routes (where most of the industry actually is).
- Own and operate a franchise unit — the most direct investment: a Planet Fitness, Anytime Fitness, or Club Pilates location, typically a six- to seven-figure build-out with a multi-year payback [20].
- Regional platforms and multi-unit franchisees — buy or finance a portfolio of clubs.
- Private equity / private credit — most big chains are PE-owned; access comes through PE funds, franchise-focused vehicles, or lending to operators.
- Real estate and equipment — buy the box and lease it to an operator (net-lease), capturing rent rather than operating risk, or finance equipment.
Before committing, weigh the FDD, local competition, lease terms, staffing model, membership-billing data, maintenance needs, and mature-club cash returns more heavily than brand recognition alone.
Outlook (forward-looking judgment). Constructive but selective. The near-term setup is favorable: record and still-rising participation, a young and strength-oriented member base, a GLP-1 tailwind that has proven additive, and a return to in-person that has stuck [7][16][17]. Both ends of the barbell — budget HVLP and boutique — are growing, and consolidation should keep rewarding asset-light franchisors and well-capitalized operators. The watch-items are consumer spending and interest rates (which hit leveraged operators and franchisee expansion), local oversupply, and the unsettled state of cancellation/auto-renewal regulation. For the mid-market full-service gym caught between cheap and premium, the squeeze is likely to persist. The best investments are operators with strong retention, disciplined site selection, proven mature-club economics, manageable leases, diversified revenue, and financially healthy franchisees.
Sources
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