Jul 8, 2025
Big Box Gyms: Yay or Nay?
And how do they compare to working out with a personal trainer? Amy Hudson and Dr. James Fisher look at big box gyms and the benefits of working with a personal trainer.
You’ll hear about everything from motivation and habit-building to fitness results, and will walk away with clarity on which option to go for to make the most out of your time and exercising efforts.
- Dr. James Fisher kicks things off by sharing a frightening stat: only about 10% of the population engages in regular strength training.
- What’s interesting is the fact that only about one-third of people attend big box gyms, meaning that about two-thirds of people don’t actually even attend once per week…
- Dr. Fisher and some of his colleagues have done some research and have identified a lack of motivation, not being supervised and advised by a personal trainer, and not seeing progress from your workouts, as key factors that lead to that phenomenon.
- Did you know that 50% of new gym members will stop their membership within the first six months because of non-attendance?
- True, big box gyms provide you with the space and equipment you need… but if you aren’t already engaged or lack a certain level of understanding and commitment, you won’t attend regularly.
- To some degree, gyms are reliant upon a degree of non-attendance – if all of their members showed up at the same time, they would have to turn some people away because of maximum occupancy.
- Dr. Fisher touches upon a couple of big social elements that play a crucial role in the big box gym context.
- Ask yourself this: “When thinking about the gym, do I go there for the health benefits of exercising or for the social element in that environment?”
- Amy Hudson talks about the lack of time aspect that’s often part of the equation for many people who are thinking about strength training.
- Dr. Fisher and Amy discuss how a model like the Exercise Coach Studio’s one differs from big box gyms and helps people succeed.
- Studies on exercising motivation show that, unlike other groups like people who focus on CrossFit, people engaged in supervised strength training reported higher motivation for things such as ill health avoidance and health-related benefits as key reasons for exercising.
- Amy lists one of the key motivators for having a personal trainer: it collapses the timeline for you to get where you want to get to.
- As she points out, getting people to that place of seeing results faster will lead to them being motivated and wanting to continue with exercising regularly.
- Amy shares a question they often ask their Exercise Coach: “If you and I were sitting here a year from today, what things would have to happen for you to feel very satisfied with your progress?”
- Amy and Dr. Fisher go into studies in which participants were paid to go to the gym… but were still unsuccessful with exercising regularly.
- A good reminder from Amy: motivation is hard to keep, and it’s important to stay honest about that.
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