Global Sports Health Industry Report 2021: ClassPass 2021 American Sports and Fitness Trends

GWI:

Global sports health industry report released in 2021:

After the epidemic, GWI, a global health research organization, issued a report to analyze the global sports health industry trends. After two years of the global pandemic, GWI (Global Wellness Institution), a global health research institution, once again released the Global Sports Health Industry Report 2021. The theme is based on the outlook under the epidemic. According to the definition of the report, the definition of Wellness is all activities, services, etc., that pursue comprehensive health. These include fitness, physical health, mental health, health tourism, health real estate, etc.

The report’s overall data on the global health industry is due to a certain degree of decline in the epidemic. For example, the total scale of the global health industry is 4.4 trillion US dollars, which is 11% lower than the 4.9 trillion in 2019 before the epidemic. The degree of participation in sports activities in all regions of the world has declined because of venue restrictions. North America is the most affected, while the Chinese market, where the epidemic control is generally better, has less impact on the overall sports participation rate. Other related fields such as health tourism, health real estate, and SPA have all declined to varying degrees due to the impact of the epidemic. Among them, there are two areas that do not decrease but increase, one is healthy eating, and the other is mental health.

First of all, from the perspective of the changes in the scale of the health industry in each regional market, the Asia-Pacific region has the slightest decrease in 2019-2020, which is -6.4%, which is about 1.5 trillion US dollars. On the other hand, the annual growth rate from 2017 to 2019 is 8.1%, which is predictable. After the epidemic has recovered, the Asia-Pacific region remains one of the fastest-growing markets for the global health industry.

The two markets most affected by the global health industry are Latin America and North America, which are almost the two markets most affected by the epidemic. Among different categories of the health industry, health tourism and SPA were the most affected by the epidemic, with a decrease of 39.5% and 38.6%, respectively. But it is worth noting that healthy real estate, mental health, and healthy eating are among the few anti-growth areas.

Among them, Healthy Real Estate continued to grow at a scale of more than 20% for three consecutive years. And healthy eating and weight loss are still the same as before the epidemic, maintaining a steady growth of about 3%. GWI also made relevant annual growth forecasts for the global health industry from 2020 to 2025. Health tourism is the most optimistic, at 20.9%, and health hot springs and SPA fields both have an increase of about 18%. The growth in sports is expected to be 10.2%, and beauty and personal care growth is 8.1%.

The report also puts forward the concept of workplace wellness, which is expected to increase by 3.8%. We focus on the following report, the trend in sports and fitness. The epidemic has affected the global sports industry to a great extent. As a result, the overall sports and leisure sector decreased by 22.2%. Among them, the fitness sector was the most affected, with a decrease of 37.1%, the sports and leisure sector declined by 16.0%, and the mindful movement (mindful movement) decreased by 11.2%.

In the field of sports peripherals, fitness technology has developed rapidly, with an increase of 29.1% in 2019-2020, mainly home fitness represented by Peloton and smart health hardware such as Apple Watch and WHOOP. The sports equipment sector has grown from 4.6% before the epidemic to a decline of 15.5%. The sports equipment sector decreased by 2.1%, which is basically the same as the micro-growth before the epidemic.

In the distribution of sports and fitness markets in various countries and regions, the United States is still the largest market. Although it is decreasing by 23.4%, it still ranks first on a scale of 215 billion US dollars. China is the world’s second-largest market, with a growth rate of US$118.86 billion, from 9.8% in 2019 to -1.8% in 2020. The third-largest market is Japan, which is one-third of the second largest Chinese market, at 41 billion US dollars—followed by the German, British and French markets.

In terms of participation in sports and fitness, GWI also made a relevant summary. The North American market still has the highest participation in sports and fitness at 59.47%, 46.04% in Europe, and 29.27% in Asia-Pacific. The epidemic has promoted the global healthy eating field to varying degrees if we talk about healthy eating. Among them, North America has the most considerable growth with 7.9%, followed by Asia-Pacific with 2.1%, and Europe with an increase of 5.0%. Healthy diet and nutrition areas in major regional markets have doubled their growth before the epidemic.

The report also made relevant analyses in the field of mental health, and the epidemic has increased the demand for the mental health of the general public worldwide. In terms of regions, the North American market has the fastest growth rate of 10.7%, followed by the European market with 6.3%. On the other hand, the Asia-Pacific market grew by 2.5%, while the Latin American region decreased by 6.2%.

ClassPass 2021: American Sports and Fitness Trends

The epidemic has shaped the trend of American sports and fitness, and online has become a factor. ClassPass, an American sports fitness platform, has recently released user fitness trends for 2021 based on platform user behavior. According to data released by the company, since January 2021, fitness bookings have increased by 329%, SPA and beauty bookings have increased by 428%, and members’ current booking prices are 10% higher than before the epidemic.

Strength training ranks first in the specific fitness data, followed by yoga, spinning classes, Pilates and Barre. It is worth mentioning that online yoga ranks ninth, and dance ranks in the top ten. The epidemic has quickly promoted courses that are easy to be online. In terms of users’ fitness behavior, Tuesday is the day with the highest fitness participation rate of the user in a week. Five o’clock in the afternoon after getting off work is the peak fitness period of the day. The general fitness time is about one hour, and the highest scheduled amount of platform courses is strength training.

Among the personal care, the number of reservations for nails is the highest, and Thursday is the day with the most significant number of reservations for the beauty industry. In terms of specific demand trends in the beauty industry, nail art is first, followed by massage and facial care. Following fitness programs also brings up the importance of the body composition scale. This can be effectively done by using body composition analysis techniques.

According to the user survey of ClassPass, the fitness class reservation is related to the intensity and pressure experienced by users in different sports. For example, 60% of people prefer high-intensity exercises such as boxing or HIIT on a stressful day, while 40% prefer calm and stimulating activities such as yoga. In terms of urban distribution, it was the earliest in the Minnesota area. Californians like dancing most, users in Missouri like cycling most, Dallas urbanites in Texas like fitness most, and Los Angeles residents like vitamin D most.

Before Meta-Universe Fitness, Fitness Companies Have Started a Technological Revolution

The Meta-Universe fitness has begun to show signs of growth. For example, on the second day, when Facebook changed its name to Meta and started the meta-universe business, it announced that it would acquire a VR fitness game developer. The game focuses on a similar rhythmic hitting style mode and encourages users to participate in a series of high-intensity aerobic training. Immersive atmosphere, high-frequency interactive experience, realistic somatosensory – Technology in fitness will be essential for realizing “scene online.” Also, fitness entails the ratio maintenance of protein and fat and the body fat scales can be measured by analyzing the body fat percentage through effective 3D body scanners like Visbody.

Peloton, an American home fitness company, has just released its annual inventory of user behavior, including the total number of training days and courses often attended by coaches. For example, all platform members have ridden, ran, and walked 1.8 billion miles; a total of 250,000 people have participated in Dance Cardio dance courses. Suppose you start from the home fitness experience. In that case, I believe that in the future, more fitness companies will move towards a new way of interaction for users through the combination of hardware and software and form a deep connection with users in the form of content.

The Technology of the Fitness Scene

The emergence of Peloton may be the beginning-binding real-world hardware bicycles with virtual world-course content based on standardized course scheduling and personalized, high-quality coaches. This technology fitness company once reached a 30 billion US dollars market value. Regarding further development, it will give users personalized feedback and real-time guidance, such as sensors and AI technology, which have been installed on many devices, including fitness mirrors.

Take Tonal as an example. This wall-mounted strength training device uses 17 sensors to track the human body’s movement and position and guide the user to complete each action. In addition, Tempo uses 3D motion capture and AI artificial intelligence to track the user. Correct fitness movements in time. Of course, the motion capture technology itself is also advancing rapidly. For example, smartphone-based fitness applications Onyx and dance applications Oga have been born one after another. So, perhaps, the invention of fitness equipment with interactive technology using any combinations of cameras and screens would be helpful in the future.

Finally, augmented reality AR and virtual reality VR, the application prospects of these meta-universe elements in fitness equipment, are significant in this field. For example, on the Oculus platform of Facebook’s VR headset game, games like Supernatural and FitXR that focus on exercise have achieved good growth in audience and results. In addition, the company is currently integrating VR headsets with Apple’s health service Apple Health, aiming at VR fitness. The premise for home fitness to continue this meta-universe development path will largely fall to the content technology innovation to meet user needs.

Conclusion

The rise of home-based Internet fitness began with the new crown epidemic. The closure of gyms and restrictions on outdoor activities provided opportunities for home-based fitness solutions. As a result, much home-connected fitness equipment such as treadmills, rowing machines, cycling platforms, and strength fitness emerged. The continuation of the epidemic and monetary easing policies have allowed these home-connected fitness equipment manufacturers to gain enthusiasm for capital.

Technology giants have also increased their digital fitness. In their meta-universe vision based on virtual reality technology, the integration of sports fitness in virtual form and reality will be an essential scenario. However, the development of digital fitness is not all good news. Although everyone firmly believes that the digital fitness market will continue to grow, we must be wary of excessive optimism about its development speed.

The future trend has been revealed that the fitness solution will eventually be the deep integration of physical fitness space (gym, home, and outdoor), innovative equipment (intelligent equipment, wearable, and various display terminals), and digital content (course, entertainment, concept, and social).