Gym owner strikes gold

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It took years of hard work to realize his vision of hard muscles, sweat and success; Blair McHaney has built a career helping others take control of their bodies

Thursday, August 26, 2010

World photos/Kathryn Stevens

Gold’s Gym co-owner Blair McHaney greets customers as they enter the Wenatchee gym for a yoga class. Starting with a few members and an alley-entrance gym in 1983, McHaney has realized a vision of creating a local fitness industry with two award-winning fitness centers and nearly 4,800 members.

McHaney, managing owner of the valley’s two Gold’s Gyms, stands at his desk while making phone calls Monday morning. He said he rarely sits down throughout his workday.

A weight-lifting frog sits on McHaney’s desk at Wenatchee’s Gold’s Gym.

WENATCHEE — From the time he was a teenager, Blair McHaney knew he would one day operate his own gym.

McHaney, 51, with help from three partners, now co-owns two gyms in the Wenatchee Valley. And according to the Gold’s Gym chain to which the local gyms belong, McHaney and his employees are doing a bang-up job in the changing fitness industry.

Gold’s Gym of Wenatchee Valley received the Best Community Outreach Award at the chain’s annual franchise convention in Las Vegas last month.

The award was based on voting by franchise owners. Gold’s Gym is the largest gym chain in the world with more than 700 gyms in 28 countries. The award was for the gyms’ success in raising more than $5,600 for the Dr. Richard Tucker Project to help with local diabetes education and awareness.

At the same conference, McHaney received the company’s Presidents’ Award, for exceptional service to the company. McHaney said that award had to do with his serving as president of the company’s franchise association and taking it through some rocky economic times the past three years.

McHaney said he knew he wanted to own a gym from the first time he picked up a barbell at age 14. He loved the feeling of control and power that he got from a vigorous workout. It’s something he’s done at least three times a week for the past 37 years, he said.

“It’s all about control. I wanted to control everything about my body,” he said during an interview in his office high above the cavernous 16,000-square-foot Wenatchee gym at 12 N. Worthen St.

Training, he said, is a way to control the body and focus the mind.

While the goal may be body fitness, getting there offers its own rewards.

“It’s a discipline, but there’s tremendous gratification in maintaining that,” he said.

Control over body and mind is one thing. Control in business is another. McHaney said his success with Gold’s Gym is more about creating a great environment for employees rather than micromanaging them.

“As a business owner, I want to create an honest, hospitable community for our members. But it’s all up to the employees,” he said. “We want to create an open, honest team culture. We want our employees to be honest, responsible and intelligent, but we don’t want to be looking over their shoulder. If you want to build a community with your members, first you have to build a community with your employees.”

Work, McHaney said, can be a job, a career or a vision. For him, it’s been a vision, but a changing one. Fitness training has come a long way since he opened his first gym — The Training Station — in the bottom level of the Casscadian Mini-Storage building on Mission Street in 1983. Appropriately, the space was formerly a body shop — for autos. Laura Jaecks was co-owner.

The gym moved to a 10,000-square-foot space on the second floor of the Grand Central Building, above Arlberg Sports, in 1986. Membership grew to more than 1,200 by 1996, when McHaney teamed up with new partner Jacki Thomas and joined the Gold’s Gym chain for the move to its present location on Worthen Street, close to the Apple Capital Recreation Loop Trail.

McHaney and Thomas took on two new partners in Brent and Diana Anderson of Kent in 2008 to finance a second Gold’s Gym in the former Eastmont Junior High School gym on 9th Street Northwest in East Wenatchee.

The two gyms now have a combined membership of about 4,800.

“It was more akin to a varsity weight room,” McHaney said about the first Training Station location. He had free weights, two stationary bikes and — in 1985 — the first Stairmaster step treadmill sold in the Pacific Northwest.

His clients were nearly all young men who learned about weight training through high school sports.

“It was 80 percent male. The average age was probably 22,” he said. Today, females make up 54 percent of Gold Gym’s two locations. The average age is 45.

The change is driven by the huge baby boomer population that doesn’t want to feel its age, he said.

“We’re seeing people choose to exercise for very different reasons. Even 10 years ago, people worked out to have a good body. Now, they work out to be able to do things well, like hiking and skiing,” he said.

As baby boomers grow older, McHaney said he’s seeing even another change. Some members tell him they want to be in good enough shape to play with their grandkids and be around to be a strong role model in their lives.

It still all comes down to control, discipline and vision.

“You have to be motivated to have a good body, but to be a good role model, you have to be inspired,” he said.

Rick Steigmeyer: 664-7151

steigmeyer@wenatcheeworld.com

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Evansmom 2 years, 9 months ago

I love Gold's Gym! I would never go anywhere else!

therealdeal 2 years, 9 months ago

Sorry folks there are far better gyms in Wenatchee than Gold's. For those who consider drinking a latte, talking on their cellphones and looking for a date part of their workout then Gold's is your gym. On the other hand, for those who are serious about reaching their training goals from experienced trainers who won't turn their back on you after the "contest", then there are far better gyms in town. Gold's Gym...whatever.

Don 2 years, 9 months ago

Without trying to derail the article about a local entrepreneur, I would like to remind everyone with the inevitable school bond coming up for Eastmont that the E Wenatchee Gold's Gym is in the old Eastmont Junior High gymnasium that was deemed beyond economical repair. It sits right next to other commercial space that was made out of the old Junior High School, which was also needing to be condemned and was beyond repair.
. Somehow non-school district entities found ways to make them into functional, and profitable, facilities. And, they found it more economically feasible than building new structures at some other site. For some reason, the age of the buildings didn't seem to be such a factor either. . Just saying.

timrice 2 years, 9 months ago

Good call Don.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

Age of the buildings? Gee Don, as I recall, that Gymnasium wasn't built until about 1955. As school buildings go, that structure was in it's infancy. Still, I agree with you. Mighty good to see my old Jr. High (and later High School) buildings used for something rather than torn down and forgotten as the old WHS and HB Ellison Jr. High were. It broke my heart to find it was no longer a school facility, but I'm glad someone found a way to save most of it.

Mom 2 years, 9 months ago

Don, Just to let you know, the old junior was gutted in order to make it into an office building and the Golds Gym. The reason why it wasn't feasible for the school district to do it is if they had done the same thing that private enterprises did, they would not have received matching funds from the state and it actually would have cost more. School districts only receive matching funds on new construction not on renovation, so it wasn't really an option.
Having been in the building for many years, I can attest to the fact that it had so much wrong with it that the only way to make it useable was to gut it.
I can't say why a building only 45 years old was in that bad of shape, but it was.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

Do you suppose neglect figures in there Susan? I did remodel work on several school buildings in my construction career and always felt that very little maintenance work was put into them. Probably budget reasons, but still, I always felt that maintenance before I got there was next to nil.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

Just thinking back a few years . . . . . it seems to me that both the Cafeteria (multipurpose) bldg and the Gym were built on a real fast track schedule to get them done in time for the beginning of the 55-56 school year and the beginning of the new High School classes. Just could be that the quality of workmanship may have suffered some to meet the schedule.

Anonymouse 2 years, 9 months ago

I love the Eastmont Gold's Gym, but I have to agree with CountryLivin. 3 sessions with a trainer is 99 bucks, and if you want to use the Kinesis machine with a trainer, it costs 99 dollars as well. I rarely see anyone in the Kinesis classes. I wish I could afford a personal trainer, but I can't. Otherwise, the staff is friendly, and I have a good time working out.

Mom 2 years, 9 months ago

You may be right, JimboBear. I wasn't around at that time so don't know, but also having so many buildings on the campus possibly made it harder to keep up as well as the fact that some buildings were in better condition than others. I had the impression that the gym was in better shape than the science wing which was newest, I think.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

I suspect you are right on the gym's condition. You have stumped me though with the "Science Wing". When I was there we had the main building (with the rotunda) the shop and music building, the multipurpose building and the gym. Was there another addition that was erected after I left, or was one end or the other of the L-shaped main building referred to as the "Science Wing"?

2 years, 9 months ago

Like Mom said, the school district gets more matching funds to build a new school that a remodel. So, it is in their best interest to let the schools go down hill by using O&M funds for things other the M (maintenance). That way they get new buildings, which are prettier than them old looking buildings. Look at the new Jr High but at the same time, generally are larger to keep up with the increase in enrollment. .

By the way Jimbo, it was a High School before a Jr High. I always thought it could have been remodeled and used as a grade school (there use to be one across the street where City Hall sits) but apparently that isn’t how the State School Bldg fund works.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

You are correct to a point John. It was the junior high and then became the high school when the sophmore year was first offered in the 55-56 school year. Up until that time the sophmores juniors and seniors were bussed to WHS. The first year of the new HS we had only freshmen and sophomores. Everyone stayed together and the next year we had frshmn, soph. and juniors. The graduating class of 1958 was the first senior class of Eastmont High School. Not sure when the new HS was built, but I think it was about 20 years later, and at that time the building reverted to a junior high.

I only know because I was there. Great to have been a part of that history.

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

You are also correct about the old grade school accross the street. We used the gym and locker rooms there for our first year as a high school.

Mom 2 years, 9 months ago

Jim, When I was teaching there before the new junior high opened, if you entered the parking lot between the gym and the main building, the building straight ahead was the library, science and shop rooms. Connected to that was the two or three computer classrooms and then the music rooms at the bottom of the campus. I hope this makes sense. It wasn't a whole lot different when I was there in high school in the early 70s. All I know is the science rooms seemed worse than the main building and the gym, more like inferior materials were used and I believe it was the newest addition to the campus. I don't know when it was built, though. The main building looked pretty good, but it had all kinds of issues related to electrical, plumbing and heating, etc... I could write a short story about all the weird and broken things in the building, oh, including the mold room that had been totally sealed off from the rest of the building. It did make for an interesting conversation starter. :)

JimboBear 2 years, 9 months ago

AhhHa! Making some sense now Susan. Originally, that building had only three class rooms. Wood Shop in the east side, Metal/Vo-Ag Shop and classroom on the west and one large band and chorus room on the north end. I think that now you mention it there was an addition to the east that was built after I graduated (maybe middle sixties?) that must have been the library and science rooms you mention with the computer rooms perhaps in what used to be the music room. Then I am assuming that a new music building was built below the shops on the SW corner of the campus.

Very interesting indeed. Was that "Mold Room" down on the lower level of the south wing? Oh, and the main building was built during the year I was in the second grade which must have been 1948 & '49. I remember that because my Dad worked on the building as a plumber and I could see him from my classroom in the old elementary building. So that date explains a lot about the problems the main building had. I do know that it was used as the junior high until we started the HS in 1955, and I believe that was also the year when the Eastmont School Dist. was formed. Until then, I think it was just the East Wenatchee Sch. Dist. but they incorporated with Palisades, Rock Island and Orondo and then chose the new name. Emphasis on think. I was kinda young then to know much about school districts. It was bad enough that I had to know about school. :-)

Thanks for your input Susan. .

SumGuy 2 years, 9 months ago

Nice job Blair!! They did a great job on the East Wenatchee location!!

Blair 2 years, 9 months ago

Hello "Real Deal." Of course my first inclination is to tell you just how off-base you are. You will also notice that I am using my real name on this comment. But I am not interested in trying to convince you to believe differently than you already do. That said, I would be willing to invite you "behind the scenes" to learn more about us with the intention of just opening your viewpoint a bit if you want. I would like to invite you to our next employee training. You can learn what we say behind closed doors and see what our team is really made of. If you are interested in learning about us, I will invite you with open arms to attend. I would even be happy to spend extra time with you before our after our training session to help you undrstand our culture. If not, that's fine too but I wanted to give you the opportunity. We are serious about helping our employees, customers and community. Please let me know if you would like to attend and your contact information and I will get us set up. Respectfully, Blair C. Mchaney

Blair 2 years, 9 months ago

Hi all, I love that people recognize the value in maintaining a piece of Eastmont culture in the old basketball gym that now lives on as Gold's. It was a major bit of "recycling" and it has paid off.

One more thing, if the person that commented about needing to pay extra to get help would like to contact me personally, I will make sure we get the job right this time. We always have free options for getting you aquainted with workout programming and helping to guide you. My personal e-mail is blair@goldsgymwen.com. Contact me and I will help. Thank you for your comment. It is comments like yours that help us get better. Blair C. McHaney