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Planet Fitness Partners With iFit, Boosts In-Home Workouts

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In a bid to strengthen and enhance its digital offerings, Planet Fitness, Inc. (PLNT - Free Report) collaborated with iFit — a leader in streaming home workouts and a pioneer in interactive connected fitness technology. 

Notably, this partnership announcement is an expansion of the recently launched ‘United We Move’ campaign.

Under the collaboration, Planet Fitness will be providing a series of new streaming in-home workouts for people of all fitness levels and interests. The workouts that include a broad range of fitness and wellness categories — including at home cardio, at home strength-training, stretching and more — will be made available exclusively on the Planet Fitness app for free. It also offers workouts with a beginner and intermediate levels to help people progress through their fitness journeys. 

Chief executive officer at Planet Fitness, Chris Rondeau stated, "We want everyone to know that we're here for them, as their long-term partner in wellness, and we're bringing our Judgement Free Zone to them. iFit has a strong heritage of innovation in connected fitness and home exercise, and is the ideal partner to help strengthen and enhance our digital offerings.”

Stores Shutdown Due to Coronavirus

This partnership will be very helpful for Planet Fitness customers as the company’s stores are closed due to the coronavirus pandemic. The company has also withdrawn its 2020 outlook due to the pandemic. It has also suspended its share repurchase program for the time being. The company will utilize its strong levels of liquidity to fund ongoing operating expenses due to the outbreak. At the end of 2019, the company had $436 million of cash.

We believe that despite the outbreak of coronavirus, the company will be able to retain its members due to low-cost gym model. Although the nature of the business is traditional, the company’s strategy to attract customers with a $10-a-month membership fee and no-frills atmosphere helped it gain a significant share in existing market and expand market size. The low-cost model also helped Planet Fitness to tap into the market that is enthusiastic enough to join a cheaper second gym. Despite a lower-than-peer membership fee, higher demand and lower costs have helped the company generate above-average profits. 

So far this year, shares of the company have declined 27.4% compared with the industry’s plunge of 58.1%.

Zacks Rank & Stocks to Consider

Planet Fitness currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

A few better-ranked stocks in the same industry are Camping World Holdings Inc. (CWH - Free Report) , Twin River Worldwide Holdings, Inc. and RCI Hospitality Holdings, Inc. (RICK - Free Report) , each sporting a Zacks Rank #1.

 Camping World and Twin River Worldwide are expected to witness 197% and 6.1% rise in 2020 earnings, respectively.

RCI Hospitality’s 2021 earnings are expected to rise 45.1%.

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