The Group CEO
of Holmes Place talks about taking on the baton
from his father, about expansion plans, and
about a business structure that allows for
individual flair across
markets
Everything about the
working life of Holmes Place Group CEO Jonathan
Fisher – from his corporate head office in a
leafy suburb of Tel Aviv, Israel, to his deep
interest in matters spiritual and his
revolutionary ideas for the future of fitness –
says ‘individualist’.
Cambridge graduate
Fisher stands astride a company with a turnover
of US$250m and a membership of 200,000-plus. He
joined Holmes Place in 2007, aged 26, bringing
with him a raft of skills and a keen awareness
of sports retailing, which he developed while
working for a retail offshoot of the company.
Also evident in his running of the business,
however, is a slightly less conventional set of
principles, gained thanks to a deep involvement
in yoga and a year spent investigating spiritual
practices in different parts of the world.
A family affair
Holmes Place
was the brainchild of Fisher’s father, Allan,
who approached Jonathan (photo, left) on three
occasions to join the company and help develop
its interests in Greece, Israel and eastern
Europe – a market now known as New Europe. He
was rejected each time.
“My father was keen
to develop the Holmes Place concept in regions
of the world that were then considered
maverick,” says Fisher. “I thought there was
nothing further removed from what I wanted to
do, but I then had an eureka! moment. The
turning point was when, instead of looking at
what I wanted out of my life, I considered what
the world wanted from me. I came through a
process of intense maturation.”
Fisher revels
in his father’s success and the opportunity to
mirror it. “The psychology of a father/son
relationship is interesting. Up until recently,
families would routinely develop an expertise in
specific fields together, whereas today it’s the
exception. In the early part of my life I was
sitting on Allan’s shoulders. I then began to
take my own footsteps and now we’re walking side
by side.”
Company
history
Holmes Place has a complex
history. Since its inception it has been the
subject of a raft of acquisitions, buy-ins,
buy-outs, IPOs and re-privatisations. Asked for
a run-down of times past, Fisher laughs: “I’m
not sure it’ll make very interesting reading,
but OK!”
Allan Fisher opened the first club
in 1979 in London. It did well, but the 1980s
property boom made it hard to find more
premises, given that the sector was not
developed or known as a reliable business. In
1991 there were three clubs and, by the time
Holmes Place became listed in 1997, it had seven
in London with a market value of just over
£100m.
By 2002, the group owned 68 clubs – 49
in the UK and the rest in Portugal, Spain,
Austria, Switzerland and Germany – as well as a
minority interest in clubs in Greece, Israel and
New Europe. A joint venture with Bally
Corporation resulted in the only US club,
located in Chicago – a partnership that ended
last year when Holmes Place sold its stake to
Bally.
Holmes Place was taken private by
equity houses Bridgepoint and Permira in 2003,
in a transaction valued at almost €450m. In
August 2005, the company sold its 20 operations
in Spain and Portugal to allow it to concentrate
on business in the UK and other European
markets. And in October 2006, in a £210m deal,
the 47 Holmes Place UK clubs were sold to Virgin
Active.
This left the investors with Holmes
Place operations in Switzerland, Austria,
Germany and the US, plus, of course, the
all-important brand. “They were looking for an
exit,” says Fisher, “and, in the last quarter of
2007, we – the development arm of the
Greece/Israel/New Europe section – acquired it
as a buy-back. For us, it presented a great
opportunity, as we believe in the potential and
development of the brand as a whole. Venture
capitalists tend to be short-term in their
outlook. We’re not. The brand is a valuable
asset.”
Under Fisher, the company now
operates via divisional CEOs: Doron Dickman in
Switzerland, Germany and Austria; Neil Burton in
the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, known as
New Europe; Ellie Flenga in Greece; and Lorraine
Tuffi as in Israel. Others involved in running
the now 62-club estate are what Fisher calls
“part-executive directors” – his father, who is
also the company’s chair, and David Turner,
co-founder of LA Fitness – plus more than 4,000
staff worldwide. Administrative functions are
based in Amsterdam.
Holmes Place has one
licensee in Spain and Portugal (Iberia). All
other clubs are operated under the holding
company, with local partners in territories such
as Greece, Poland, the Czech Republic and Israel
assisting with the minefield of local
customs.
“In Iberia we have a very close and
collaborative relationship with the licensee,”
Fisher says. “It’s run by Nick Coutts, who has
been with Holmes Place for 12 years and my CEOs
are in contact with him on a weekly basis,
exchanging information.” So would they ever buy
it back? “Our feeling is that it’s being run
particularly well and we’re quite happy for
things to continue as they are.”
Flexibility and flair
Holmes
Place currently has three club models. Four of
its 62 clubs are branded ‘family’ and offer
supervised childcare; 12 are ‘energy’ – smaller
operations with a narrower range of facilities,
designed to deliver an energetic member
experience; and large, full-service ‘premium’
clubs make up the balance. Sizes range from
1,300 to 6,000sq m (13,993 to 64,583sq ft).
Membership fees, says Fisher, “can’t really be
standardised. We look at it across regions,
taking everything into account.”
Operating
across such diverse markets brings challenges.
“Our biggest is creating, maintaining and
developing a genuine sense of team across the
different operational theatres,” says Fisher.
“You also have to be clear about rules and
responsibilities when you’re allowing individual
managements to be decentralised yet, in our
philosophy, we feel it’s important to allow them
to make their own calls and deviations from the
norm.” As we talk, Fisher makes, with evident
pride, several mentions of the quality of his
people.
Fisher seeks to run the company
seamlessly, irrespective of the various
shareholdings; strengthening and developing the
brand is a priority within the limitations of
the local arena. “Much of the industry is owned
by venture capitalists,” he says, “and they will
try to make a business as efficient as possible
by standardisation. But that may stunt
individual development and I’m aiming for each
of our territories to have the freedom to
express their own particular flair, without
losing sight of best practice.”
Expansion plans
New markets
present a further challenge, but one Fisher is
keen to explore. “What’s been correct
historically is changing,” he says. “We’ve
looked for markets that display a desire for our
offering, where we can get first-mover
advantage. But we’re now looking at more mature
and competitive markets where we feel there’s
something new we can offer.” Fisher is currently
at various stages of negotiation on 30 sites for
new-build operations, looking at licence
agreements in Romania and China, talking with
several parties about acquisitions, and looking
to develop further in existing
territories.
Later today, he’s on a plane to
India, where discussions are, he says, “fairly
advanced. I’ve been visiting India regularly,
for personal development and for my yoga, and
I’ve been able to see the middle-class explosion
first-hand. The potential is breathtaking. It’s
too early to say how many clubs we’d like or how
much we’ll spend, but our first should be up and
running over the next quarter.”
I tackle him
on industry murmurs that he is to introduce a
new form of membership that will not involve gym
visits. He is helpful, but a tad cagey. “This is
a wide initiative and it would be premature for
me to go into it at this stage,” he says.
“Holmes Place’s slogan – well, it’s more than a
slogan, it’s an axiom – is ‘One life. Live it
well’. We look to provide that through exercise
guidance and motivation, nutritional behaviour,
and life habits and attitude – it’s the
combination of those platforms that improve the
way people live. We’re looking to deliver our
axiom in ways that don’t require regular club
attendance – to be more holistic about
it.
“Holmes Place is no longer synonymous
with health clubs. Our brand is about delivering
living-well solutions, and the initiative we’ll
launch towards the end of the year will open it
up to people who don’t want to come to a
club.”
A clue to the future may be the
video-on-demand service the company has launched
in Israel where, for a monthly fee, members can
download a series of films on yoga, pilates,
kickboxing or body shaping. Fisher is clearly
intent on expanding the concept worldwide.
The way forward
Ask who he
admires in the business and Fisher cites David
Turner – “it’s not just by chance that he’s on
our board” he says. “And I really admire my
father’s achievements.” Both men are,
coincidentally, also non-executive directors of
health club operator Esporta.
Fisher feels
the fitness market has not progressed much over
the past five years. “There’s been a period of
consolidation and the next ten years will see
much more development,” he says. “The health and
fitness industry is a little lost at the moment,
not sure in which direction to go, falling back
on old solutions and revamping them, trying to
drive more efficiency out of the same business
models. But models that were applicable in the
80s and 90s will not be appropriate from 2010
onwards.
“The majority of the population
still doesn’t exercise on a regular basis and
the industry needs to be more open-minded about
what it provides. I feel things will move in a
more holistic direction, and I’m proud to be at
the forefront of that. We don’t want to be
prescriptive; the Holmes Place culture is a way
of searching out a variety of solutions. We want
our clubs to be supportive, to be a springboard
on people’s journeys to getting the best out of
life.” | |
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 European empire: Holmes Place has
62 clubs including Koln Media Park in Germany
(above) and Hilton Warsaw in Poland
(below) |
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