Fitness trends rise and fall, but this strategy supports brands through everything

Think about the fitness industry in the 2000s and compare it to now. How many trends based on sports science, nutrition, etc, that we've seen take the industry by storm.

HIIT redefined cardio by proving that short, intense bursts can outperform long steady sessions. Functional training gained ground when we realised isolated movements didn’t always translate to real-world strength. And recovery became a billion-dollar business once we understood that muscle growth accelerates during rest. 

Now, try to follow every trend, and you risk spreading your offerings too thin, losing your core thesis and identity. But look on obliviously, and a big break might pass you by. 

The most successful studios stay anchored in their core offering – the method, experience, or philosophy that keeps members coming back – while staying ready to adapt when the moment calls.

There’s one dependable way to do that well – by building on systems that don’t break your business when you break the mold.

Why fitness trends become opportunities when you have solid foundations

Great ideas need great foundations. Think about any successful creative project – whether it's a musician experimenting with new sounds or a chef developing their signature dish. 

The freedom to innovate comes from mastering the fundamentals first. In business, you need a stable base before you can take the calculated risks that fuel your success. 

It’s the same story in fitness. When your day-to-day operations run smoothly – when members can book classes without a snag, payments process reliably, and staff aren't drowned by admin – you can really get creative. That means:

• Testing new offerings without worrying about breaking your operations
• Handling new class types through existing booking systems
• Processing  different pricing models without payment issues
• Targeting the right members with relevant promotions instantly
• Building and iterating entirely new business models and strategies

We hear a lot about “pivoting” in fitness, but this still implies a strong base and sense of direction. For example, FitStop had tried challenges before with their "Refine You" program back in 2018–2020, but moved away from them during COVID. By 2022, they realised challenges were a missing piece in their offerings.  Their "Move More Challenge" became their top keyword driving organic traffic – showing how rapidly they capitalised on the trend. 

The result? FitStop landed 33rd on the Financial Times list of fastest-growing companies in APAC – the only fitness brand to make the cut. They didn’t walk away from their core offering. They built on top of it. 

With Hapana's industry-first fitness challenge software, they could reintroduce challenges without rebuilding their entire system.

How a dependable stack supports you through any trend

Adapting to profitable trends often means adapting your operations. New programs, new formats, sometimes new business models. 

Technically speaking, this so often proves a nightmare. Take the example of adding recovery services to your membership model. A smart move on paper – high demand, relatively easy upsell. But in many legacy systems, that means adjusting access rules, rewriting billing logic, and duplicating memberships. 

With Hapana, the building blocks are already there. You can identify an opportunity, build it, and bring it to market without disrupting your operational workflows. Here’s what this unlocks:

Run fitness challenges

Want to run a fitness challenge like FitStop? You can run challenges across one or multiple sites, customize goals to suit your brand, charge separately for entry, target by membership type or location, and automate marketing around key moments – all through the same system.

Introduce new pricing models and memberships

Need to introduce new pricing models or flexible memberships? Hapana makes it easy to adjust how you package your services – whether that’s combining in‑studio and on‑demand access, adding recovery sessions, or running guest passes. 

You can adapt your core membership strategies without total system overhaul. Just drag, drop, edit, and tweak. 

Manage multi-sites easily

For studios expanding across borders, Hapana’s multi-site engine and reporting enable you to scale control from a single dashboard. KX Pilates expanded into four countries, utilising Hapana to manage multi-currency payments, localised onboarding, and site-level autonomy – all while preserving a unified brand experience.

Director Andrea Fiorenza said, "The most important thing we were looking for in a technology partner was someone who could listen and work closely with us to customize our needs. Hapana was very receptive and it was a 2-way street.”

Guide decision with advanced reporting

Excellent reporting helps you analyse performance and explore opportunities. Hapana provides over 60 reporting templates that reveal granular insights across all your locations.

You can identify which new class formats are gaining traction, which pricing models drive better retention, and which marketing campaigns convert prospects into long-term members. Make adjustments while there’s still time to influence the outcome.

Work with your existing tools

Here's where so many studios get stuck when expanding or innovating. They end up with a stack of tools that barely acknowledge each other’s existence.

Hapana bucks the trend. With over 40 integrations and easy API access, new opportunities don't mean starting from scratch. 

Your existing marketing tools, payment processors, and wearable devices are ready to plug in. Test new ideas in days instead of weeks without data migration friction or late-night retraining.

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Have the freedom to grow on your terms

When your operations are no longer fragile, you can be bolder. You get better odds for your calculated risks. 

• For some brands, that means diversifying formats and adding more diversity into the mix.
• For others, it’s about expanding across regions with consistent delivery but localised pricing, payment types, or class structures. 
• Some operators might build challenge-based programming into their year-round strategy. 
• Others might double down on personalisation, layering content and communication based on individual training goals. 

Develop and innovate your strategy – your system will support you. That’s an ideal situation for any business. 

Build a dependable foundation with Hapana

There’s a famous quote from New York Times best-selling author James Clear: “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”

The idea is that big ambitions mean very little if the infrastructure underneath them can’t keep up. When you have a well-designed foundation to back you, you gain the room to lead on your own terms. 

We all know that the fitness industry moves quickly – the next big thing is always around the corner – but with Hapana, you don’t have to trade stability for innovation. While others are caught in quicksand, managing workarounds and chasing operational issues, you can drive value by delivering great experiences and building your brand.

Book a tour of the software to see how Hapana supports ambitious studios ready to move faster, and with less friction.