Great facility, awful staff, enrollment fee
Written: Feb 15 '03 (Updated Feb 17 '03)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Lots of color-coded equipment, machines for every muscle
Cons: Pushy salespeople put down other companies, more friendly when they think you have money
The Bottom Line: Great facility with plenty of nice equipment. Staff is rude and slanderous. No overcrowding problems at my location.
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| seanmichael's Full Review: 24 Hour Fitness |
My wife and I recently signed up for 24 Hour Fitness. We enjoy the wide assortment of exercise machines and freeweights, and they are in very good condition. Another big plus is that it was in a nice, well ventillated building, so there was no odor. On the negative side, the man who showed us around (the general manager) was very friendly until he found out that I couldn't afford much, then got rather rude. He also put down every other gym we named and told us things like "they stink" and "they're equipment's old and no good" when we said we wanted to look around. We did go to a couple other places to look, and the place he said had old, no good equipment had very nice equipment that they said was no more than 18 months old, which I definitely believe by looking at it. The rudeness of him and one other staff member made us very apprehensive about joining, but they were one of the cheapest places with a great facility. I haven't had any problems with waiting for machines - it's always pretty open at the location I go to. My wife and I have found other members of the staff to be very rude, as well.
24 Hour Fitnesses equipment is mainly Nautilus and Cybex machines where I go, with several other brands as well. When I said machinery is color-coded, I mean like the green ones work your legs, black for your chest, gray for back, etc. so it's easy to find what machine I want. All machinery has good illustrated instructions and illustrations and brief descriptions of what muscles are targetted. Some of the machines also work by air hydraulics, fed through a hose from the floor, which is very nice and easy to adjust the resistance (just press a button). They have a large variety of freeweights in a seperate room in the back. They also have tanning, though I believe you have to pay extra for that, and they have a small booth at the front where you can purchase things such as towels, water bottles, protein bars, and energy drinks. To give an idea of how crowded my location is, generally when I am working out, of the ten machines closest to me, about two of them will be occupied (I go Tues, Thurs, Sat, and Sun somewhere around 6pm-10pm), for freeweights, then about four will be occupied, and for cardio (which I don't do - my wife does) such as bikes and treadmills, about three will be occupied.
Their cardio equipment is pretty cool, by the way, being able to take your heart rate and seeming rather feature rich, though I rarely use it.
Locker rooms are nicely kept with plenty of lockers available, though one thing that struck me as odd is that they have individual shower stalls, but they all have glass doors so people walking by them can see you. Haven't found any cameras or anything yet, though. It's also like this in the women's room.
They do also offer day-care weekday mornings from approximately 9am-1pm, and in the evening from 4pm-8pm, and on Saturday from 9am-1pm or so. There is no daycare offered on Sundays. Also, they have a small variety of group training such as kickboxing, step, and stretching. I have not gone to or seen any of those classes in action, and they are offered every couple of hours more or less from 5am-6pm. They do not have staff on floor to help - just the personal trainers. The machines have good instructions and my wife or friend spots me when I do freeweights, so I've never asked a staff member to help me. I'd be reluctant to do so, however, being that I find most of them rude (it's not just my imagination - this is a complaint I hear often from others).
Overall, I think that it's a great facility with terrible staff. The reason I give 4 stars is because I don't do personal training or anything, so I don't much interact with the staff. If courteous service were a big thing to me, it would get two. The fact is that I did join them because no other gym I found came close to the quality and extend of machines and freeweights. The best advice I could give is check out other places BEFORE coming here because they really try not to let you leave. Also, their prices are negotiable, so you may not want to seem too anxious.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
seanmichael
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Reviews written: 5
Trusted by: 0 members
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