Started As a fitness coach, now 26 clubs. Our mission? Getting the whole of the Netherlands fit in a short amount of time!

Almost seven years ago, in 2015, Alex and Romano founded Happy Bodies Lifestyle Clubs. With it, they gave a completely unfamiliar interpretation to the gym concept. No enormous gym full of gleaming bodies, large mirrors, exciting equipment, and rousing music, but a special fitness formula for people with limited time, where attention, customer experience, and results are paramount. There are now 26 locations throughout the Netherlands, from Alkmaar to Eindhoven. In this blog post, Managing Director Romano explains what drives him and why Happy Bodies works.

Stuff upside down

Alex and I both come from the fitness industry, where we started out as fitness coaches. We saw that the average gym is quite intimidating for most people, and we thought it would be a great challenge to change that. Enticing the people who need it most to come to the gym—that would never work with the traditional concept. So we completely turned things around. Instead of enormous gyms, we opted for small, boutique-style fitness clubs. We traded the upbeat music for calming background music, and the large mirrors made way for a homey atmosphere with a cozy coffee table. This created a completely different setting.

Effective training in 35 minutes thanks to the Milon circle

There was another hurdle we wanted to address. Not everyone has the time or inclination to spend an hour and a half at the gym four times a week. That's when we discovered the Milon Circle. A fully automated circle with fitness equipment where you can train your entire body in six 35-minute workouts each month. Before you start working with us, we conduct an intake. During this intake, the innovative Milonizer scans your body in seconds using biometric markers. This ensures that all the equipment is automatically set correctly during every workout, even for older people or those with physical complaints. For example, someone with knee problems will never be subjected to exercises that hyperextend their knee, and someone with shoulder problems will receive the precise range of motion their shoulder can handle.

From lifeguard to personal lifestyle coach

All these ingredients were enough for us to open our first location in Amstelveen in 2015. It was such a success that we quickly opened more locations, first in Heemstede, Overveen, Alkmaar, and later in Amsterdam-Zuid, Haarlem, and Hoofddorp. We noticed that the coaches were also very happy with our concept. Helping people through personal contact and genuine attention, rather than acting like a lifeguard in a large, cold gym, appealed to them too. Looking at ourselves, it was mainly the further expansion of the Happy Bodies formula that made us happy. That led us to decide in 2017 to expand our success through a franchise. This way, we can also help people who dream of their own club, but who want something different than the massive, low-budget gym, spread the Happy Bodies virus. In early 2022, we opened our 26th location in Aalsmeer, and in April of this year we will celebrate our seven-year anniversary. We look forward to getting many more people involved in sports in a fun way.