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Introduction

________________ ?What Women Want?? from a fitness centre ________________ ?What Women Want?? from a fitness centre ________________ Table of Contents 1. Executive Summary 2. Research Focus 2.1. Industry Background and Past Research 2.2. Research Objectives 2.3. Major Contributions of the Research Project 3. Research Methodology 3.1. Focus Groups 3.2. Expert Interviews 3.3. Individual Depth Interviews 3.4. Projective Techniques 3.5. Quantitative Research 4. Research Instrument 4.1. Nominal Scale 4.2. Ordinal Scale 4.3. Interval Scale 4.4. Pre-test and final questionnaire 5. Sampling 6. Results and Analysis 6.1. Descriptive Statistics 6.2. Inferential Statistics 6.2.1. Factor Analysis 6.2.2. Chi-Square Comparisons 6.2.3. One-Way ANOVA 6.3. Statistical Analysis - Research Objectives 6.3.1. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 1 6.3.2. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 2 6.3.3. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 3 6.4. Demographic Profile of Respondents 6.4.1. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 4 6.4.2. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 5 6.4.3. Statistical Analysis - Research Objective 6 6.5. One-Way ANOVA Analysis 6.5.1. Fitness Centre Features and Personal Annual Income 6.5.2. Fitness Centre Services and Personal Annual Income 6.5.3. Fitness Centre Benefits and Personal Annual Income 6.5.4. Fitness Centre Features and Fitness Centre Visits 6.5.5. Fitness Centre Benefits and Payment Method 6.5.6. Fitness Centre Features and Number of Dependent Children 6.5.7. Fitness Centre Services and Number of Dependent Children 6.6. Summary of One-Way ANOVA Analysis 6.6.1. Fitness Centre Characteristics and Services 6.6.2. Payment Methods 6.6.3. Demographics 6.7. Summary of Other Results 7. Conclusion 7.1. Recommendations 7.2. Strengths of Research 7.3. Weaknesses of Research 7.4. Further Research 8. Reference List 9. Appendices 9.1. QUESC Instrument - Desired Aspects of Service 9.2. Focus Group Guide 9.3. Survey Questionnaire: What Women Want 9.4. Map of Perth Suburbs 9.5. Scheffe Tables List of Tables and Figures Tables Table 1: Word Association Test Results Table 2: Sentence Completion Test Results Table 3: Pre-test and Final Questionnaire Format Table 4: Factor Analysis for Fitness Centre Features Table 5: Factor Analysis for Fitness Centre Services Table 6: Factor Analysis for Personal Benefits Sought Table 7: Summary ...read more.

Middle

to 7 (very important) and Figure 2 shows the mean score for each of the characteristics. Figure 2: Fitness Centre Features Important to Women aged 20-40 The fitness centre features with the highest means were: comfortable temperature/air conditioning during exercise, free parking, wide ranges of exercise equipment and availability of group classes. These characteristics were deemed to be the most important features that women aged 20 to 40 wanted from a fitness centre. The features that were viewed as the least important, with the lowest means were female only members, fitness gear/clothing shop and reliable childcare facilities. This indicates that respondents preferred to exercise in a temperature-controlled, cool environment, mainly drove to fitness centres and valued having a variety of different exercise equipment and group classes. The least important statistics suggested that not many of the sample respondents had children, and are unlikely to attend a fitness centre that was female only or shop for exercise attire at their fitness centre. A factor analysis was also used to determine the different market segments existing in the interval data for Question 1, based on fitness centre characteristics that respondents believed to be important. The results are shown in Table 4. Table 4: Factor Analysis for Fitness Centre Features Rotated Factor Matrix(a) Factor 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Fitness centre has a fun culture .939 .003 -.001 .116 .150 .163 .081 Fitness centre is seen as a social place .803 .018 .128 .005 .129 .058 .128 Yoga classes offered -.042 .953 .122 -.007 -.008 -.012 .094 Pilates classes offered -.017 .667 .036 .162 .076 .046 .080 Availability of group exercise classes .354 .438 .014 .171 .084 .078 -.059 Overall appearance/aesthetics .135 .266 .160 .109 .184 .140 .222 Relaxation area i.e. pool/spa/sauna .090 .090 .623 .134 .035 .104 .155 Diverse range of programs on TV screens -.012 .016 .520 -.037 .089 .371 .070 Female only members .016 .090 .406 .087 .213 -.168 .024 Fitness gear/clothing shop .118 .024 .389 .195 .194 .115 .244 Family fitness ...read more.

Conclusion

A factor analysis was conducted for questions 1,2 and 3 and found different target markets for fitness centre characteristics, services and benefits and the results indicated that amenities and additional features, staff, showers and equipment, and health and appearance were most important to the target group. Chi-square comparisons indicated that personal income and work status influenced the preferred fitness centre location and One-way ANOVAs, found that the number of times women visit a fitness centre and whether they had children or not impacted on their expectations relating to services and features. ________________ 1. Recommendations The following recommendation are based on the research objectives for this study. Research Objective 1 - Features Fitness centres should have comfortable temperature and air conditioning levels to ease the comfort of women during work outs. Yet, having female-only members or areas though are unnecessary for clients visiting mixed-sex gyms. Research Objective 2 - Services Female fitness centre members place a high value on services, such as clean, maintained showers and equipment and friendly, knowledgeable staff. These services should be prioritised. Having online membership registration and user friendly forms are not considered to be critical services. Research Objective 3 ? Benefits sought Health and fitness reasons are the most important personal benefit sought by women in the 20-40 age bracket and adequate support should be provided to help them achieve their desired results. Research Objective 4 - Location Fitness centres close to home are very important and new fitness centres should ensure there is ample free parking nearby. Research Objective 5 ? Payment Fitness centres should offer female clients monthly and fortnightly memberships, rather than asking members to pay by individual sessions. Research Objective 6 ? Demographics Fitness centres should offer reliable childcare facilities and make sure group classes are available for women who have children. Fitness centres should target additional services and features to suit frequent users of fitness centres and should consider a range of marketing strategies to capture more women members within a high-income group. Fitness centres should consider more flexible membership terms and conditions as an incentive for women without children to join. ...read more.

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