Top Franchise Leaders: Chris Rondeau, CEO of Planet Fitness

Chris Rondeau’s journey with Planet Fitness goes way back. In 1993, he began working as a front desk associate at the very first Planet Fitness location in Dover, New Hampshire. In 2003, he was named Chief Operating Officer and later became Chief Executive Officer in 2013.

At its inception, Planet Fitness was not the heavily inclusive “Judgment Free Zone®” it is today. Rather, the gyms catered to bodybuilders with Olympic weight-lifting tools, 100-plus-pound dumbbells and weight-gain supplements for sale.

When the concept was in its earliest stages, there were two locations in rural New Hampshire, fighting to gain traction with the relatively small percentage of the population who were avid gym-goers interested in a bodybuilding-style gym. To expand its horizons and bring in more revenue, Planet Fitness began evolving.

“We started off just by saying, ‘Let’s do the unthinkable,’” Rondeau told Kelly Card for a Fitness Industry Innovation Podcast episode. “Honestly, it was a little bit out of desperation. We weren’t making any money; we had nothing to lose. So we dropped our price to 10 bucks a month, and overnight we just saw droves of people coming through our doors that had never come in before.”

To this day, the $10 per month model is one of the most distinctive characteristics of the concept, and Rondeau says that will not change — even with inflation.

He added that, regardless of which club you’re in, a treadmill on the five mile-per-hour setting will run five miles per hour. By cultivating a more welcoming environment that catered to the needs of a variety of people, the concept could draw on a larger audience.

“In ‘98 was when we implemented the colors you see today. The Judgment Free Zone® was born, and the Lunk Alarm was put on the wall,” he said. “That was our third store that we opened in Concord, New Hampshire. That’s when we blatantly went out to the world and said that we were judgment-free, and that club, on day one, opened up with 2,200 members. Back in those days, that was almost unheard of.”

Now, the brand has more than 2,300 locations system-wide, with a global membership of over 16 million.

In a 2018 article, David Millward wrote, “Its target market is not the body beautiful, but the ordinary person who wants to get fitter and is put off going to the gym by hard-core devotees. It is a formula which has been spectacularly successful.”

Planet Fitness did the unthinkable again in 2000. The concept was not only brightly colored, judgment-free and just $10 per month, but it also got rid of daycare and group fitness offerings in exchange for loads of cardio equipment. Rondeau says this moved the staffing model from about 40 employees down to 12–15. The first location that embraced this model opened with about 2,000 members.

“The margins are better, and the customers were happier,” he explained. “What had happened is we created a model that we couldn’t disappoint the customer anymore… Our customers were happy because we have five things we do, and we do them right 100% of the day.”

As the concept continues to grow, it has seen such success because of its specific model. 

“It’s really focusing on who your customer is and not trying to be everything to everybody,” Rondeau said.

Buy-in throughout the franchise network — a deep commitment to the mission of doing something different — keeps everyone engaged and working synergistically to deliver the unique, welcoming experience Planet Fitness is so well recognized for.

"If I can gain their [franchisees’] respect and they have my passion, then they'll do right for our members," Rondeau told Marilyn Much for an Investor’s Business Daily article. “I always tell my staff we're in a unique business with two sets of customers — our franchisees and our members. If we can make our franchisees a happy customer, then that will trickle down to our members. I have a very collaborative and open relationship with franchisees. We have about 200 different franchisee groups. I look at that as an asset. Our franchisees bring me ideas and thoughts on how to fine-tune the business, and we work collaboratively.”