LA Fitness is a gym chain based in the United States that has more than 700 locations in the United States and Canada. The Irvine, California-based business was established in 1984.

The company expanded internationally in 2007 by purchasing six fitness centers in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The company purchased ten Pure Fitness Arizona locations in Phoenix in 2010. All but one of the former Pure Fitness locations closed within a year.

The company acquired 171 clubs from Bally Total Fitness for $153 million on November 30, 2011. After that, LA Fitness began remodeling some of the former Bally Fitness clubs that were close to LA Fitness facilities and closing others.

The company acquired all 33 Lifestyle Family Fitness Clubs in Florida on July 2, 2012. “We evaluated our option to remain an independent company or to sell to a larger organization,” says Lifestyle CEO Stuart Lasher. The board of directors has decided to sell all Lifestyle Family Fitness clubs in Florida to LA Fitness after careful consideration.

LA Fitness made the acquisition of The Buffalo and Rochester Athletic Clubs in western New York public on December 23, 2013. They completed the acquisition of all ten Vision Quest Sport and Fitness clubs in the greater Seattle area on December 30, 2013.

High-intensity interval training classes with Myzone heart rate monitors will begin at some renovated LA Fitness clubs in 2018 for an additional fee. In order to compete with high-volume, low-price gyms like Planet Fitness, LA Fitness launched their new down-market Esporta Fitness brand at the beginning of 2020 and rebranded several former LA Fitness locations as Esporta Fitness.

Who Owns LA Fitness?

In Los Angeles, California, Chinyol Yi, and Louis Welch founded LA Fitness in 1984. Midway through the 1990s, the company expanded by developing, opening, and operating newly constructed properties and acquiring underperforming fitness centers in southern California.