Ask any gym owner, studio operator or fitness brand what keeps them up at night and you will hear a version of the same answer: the member who stops showing up. Not the one who cancels — the one who quietly stops coming, keeps paying for a while, and then leaves.
So we went looking for how often the fitness industry press writes about it. We indexed every article URL published by Athletech News between May 2020 and August 2026 — 7,014 of them — and counted what showed up in the headlines, year by year.
Pilates appeared in 239. AI appeared in 233. Recovery appeared in 195. Retention and churn, together, appeared in 36.
What the trade press headlines, by year
The industry's attention is easy to trace once you line the years up. Every topic below is counted the same way — how often it appears in a headline — so the shapes are comparable even where the absolute numbers are small.
- Pilates — 239 total, going from 2 headlines in 2022 to 99 in 2025. The clearest boom in the data.
- AI — 233 total, essentially zero until 2023, then 91 in 2025.
- Recovery — 195 total, including saunas, cold plunge and cryotherapy.
- Franchise — 278 total, spiking to 110 in 2024 as operators pushed expansion.
- Longevity — 130 total, from a single headline in 2022 to a full category.
- GLP-1 — 96 total, from zero in 2022 to 41 in 2025.
- Connected fitness — 341 total, but the shape is a pendulum: it peaked at 72 headlines in 2022 and fell to 34 by 2026.
- Retention and churn — 36 total. Across six years.
Retention is not absent because the industry solved it. It is absent because it is not an event. A studio opening is news. A funding round is news. A member who drifts away over five quiet weeks is not news — it is just Tuesday, repeated.
Two honest limits on these numbers
We would rather state these up front than have someone find them later.
This counts headlines, not coverage. Our method reads article URLs, which mirror headlines. A topic can be discussed inside dozens of articles without ever being the headline, and retention is very likely one of those topics. What the count really measures is what gets positioned as news — and that is still a meaningful signal, because it shows what the industry treats as an event worth announcing.
Dates are approximate. We use the publication date recorded in the site's own sitemap, which shifts if an older article is later edited. And 2026 is a partial year.
Neither limit moves the headline finding. A gap between 239 and 36 does not close on a rounding error.
Why the quiet problem is the expensive one
The topics that dominate the headlines are the ones a brand can announce. A new format, a new device, a new location, a raise. They are visible, they are dated, and they photograph well.
Lapse is the opposite. It has no launch date, no press release, and no single moment you can point at. It shows up months later in a renewal rate, by which time the member is gone and the cost of getting them back is many times the cost of keeping them.
That asymmetry is the whole problem. The industry has a rich vocabulary for growth and almost none for the thing that quietly undoes it. If you are a boutique studio in the middle of the pilates boom, the boom is real — and so is the fact that your best member has a work trip, then a sick kid, then a fortnight where the habit is simply gone.
The gap Cadoo is built for
Cadoo runs verified fitness games for brands. A member joins your branded game, does the work, and the camera counts the reps. Steps and distance are never counted that way — they sync from Apple Health or Google Health Connect. Finishing earns a reward the brand funds.
The reason it maps onto this particular gap is that a game gives the quiet weeks a structure. The member who cannot get in on Tuesday still has a reason to do the work at home, under your name, with friends watching the same scoreboard. Social accountability does the job that willpower and a reminder email do not.
Three things follow for a brand:
- You stay in the week they skip you. Verified work between visits keeps the relationship alive on the days the calendar wins.
- The proof is shareable. Every verified workout can render a branded clip your member posts themselves — marketing that happens because someone actually trained.
- The engagement is measurable. Camera-verified reps are real work, not a check-in someone tapped in the car park. Movement totals sync separately from the member's health app.
We are also building toward letting members redeem what they earn as credit with the brand itself — that part is on our roadmap, not live yet. What is live today is the game, the verification, and the shareable.
If retention is the story your industry's press is not writing, it is probably the one your business is living. See how Cadoo works for fitness brands, or email Tim@cadoo.io.
Frequently asked questions
How did you build this index?
We read the public sitemaps of Athletech News, which list every article URL and its recorded date, and counted how often topic keywords appear in those URLs by year. No article text was fetched, stored or reproduced — the analysis is entirely our own count of publicly listed headlines and dates.
Does this mean the fitness press ignores retention?
No, and we would not claim that. It means retention is rarely the headline. Our method reads article URLs, so a topic discussed inside many articles can still show a low count. What the data shows is what the industry frames as news, and launches, raises and new formats dominate that framing.
Why does member lapse cost more than cancellation?
A cancellation is visible and you can respond to it. Lapse is invisible until it appears in a renewal rate months later, at which point the member has already gone quiet and winning them back costs far more than keeping them would have.
How does a Cadoo game actually keep members engaged between visits?
Members join a branded game with a goal over a set number of days. The camera verifies reps such as pushups, squats, situps, dips and pullups. Movement totals such as steps and distance are a separate path, syncing from Apple Health or Google Health Connect. Friends see the same scoreboard, so the accountability is social, and finishing earns a brand-funded reward.
