Seattle Executive Fitness Members: Shoo Shoo, Go Away - We Are A Completely Unfriendly Customer Abusive Establishment

When buddies have finished their workouts and feel like sitting around to chat for a little while after a couple hours of getting their sweat on, the people who operate Seattle Executive Fitness want them to know that their establishment is definitely not the friendly, cozy place to do it. The owner/managers of Seattle Executive Fitness have recently begun posting signs around the sections of the gyms that have seating areas telling members they are not welcome to sit there more than thirty minutes. The sign below is a good example of this sort of member harassment and threats being posted on the walls at Seattle Executive Fitness by its management. Anyone considering a membership with this company, whose reputation as an unscrupulous establishment is already hopefully well known, should probably reconsider.

One of the many reviews of this gym on yelp.com also takes specific notice of the relatively recent appearance of these socially abusive signs at Seattle Executive Fitness. The screen shot of the yelp.com reviewer's thoughts as expressed below probably speaks for itself.  However, in case the screen shot text is too small, the yelp.com member wrote in part that:

... someone on the management team really likes to write passive-aggressive notes and post them all over the gym.  I'm not exaggerating when I say these notes are everywhere--on the walls, in the bathrooms, in the locker rooms, in the stairwells, and on every doorway, patrons are greeted with threats of reduced services and permanent expulsion from the gym for using too many towels, opening the wrong door, or hanging out for too long in the tv area.  We are paying customers, not children, but all the notes make it feel like a kindergarten.  ... because being assaulted with "rules" everywhere we turn pisses off those of us who already follow them.

It should be noted that although there are 46 reviews of this particular Seattle Executive Fitness location displayed by default on yelp.com, there are also a whopping sixty-eight (68) reviews that yelp.com has hidden. However, the hidden reviews contain a wealth of detailed information about what has transpired at Seattle Executive Fitness over the past couple years, one repulsive incident after another, (see this link).

The Current Seattle Executive Fitness Entrance ...

When Merle Gregg took over the gym at 511 Olive Way from its previous owner, Bob Padgett, when its brand was AllStar Fitness, the gym had its own separate entrance from the medical/dental building entrance at 509 Olive Way, in downtown Seattle, WA. It was apparent at the time that Bob Padgett and his five AllStar Fitness locations were in serious financial trouble. Bob Padgett sold the two downtown Seattle locations to Merle Gregg and Sam Adams who at that time together owned Epicenter Fitness. Bob Padgett later sold his Olympia, WA, and Portland, OR AllStar Fitness locations, leaving just his West Seattle location, which recently went bankrupt. 

Makeshift plastic taped  over Allstar Fitness signage

Meanwhile, Sam Adams and Merle Gregg's business relationship deteriorated and Merle Gregg apparently bought out the interest the Adams brothers had in the business. Then he rebranded and reincorporated the business as Seattle Executive Fitness in the fall of 2011. Members of the gym had great hopes that Merle Gregg would reinvent his business practices too, develop his company into a gym that Seattleites could enjoy. It wasn't long during late 2011 though, before it became apparent that Merle Gregg wasn't going to do much except try to change his stripes, but he was still the same cheapskate business predator.

As the many articles on this site describe and illustrate in detail, one after another, every indicator, small and large, demonstrated that the condition of the gyms owned by Merle Gregg wasn't going to get better, it was going to get worse. One example of this was the failure of Seattle Executive Finess management failed for a long time to change the signage and corporate image over from AllStar Fitness at all. In fact, to this day, the AllStar Fitness sign high above the street along Fifth Avenue remains. During the interim, instead of investing in appropriate, professional signage, Merle Gregg, left a temporary plastic sign over the AllStar Fitness signage, until finally, the financially troubled business capitulated the ground floor retail space back to the landlord of the Olive Way building. That space is now being transformed into a Weight Watcher's franchise. 

The consequence is that Seattle Executive Fitness no longer has a street level presence or external signage. Anyone passing pay in a car or a bus probably wouldn't ever notice that the business was there. People who here about it by some other means, might have trouble finding it even while standing outside the building near its entrance. Taken together with all the signs and symptoms of trouble at Seattle Executive Fitness, the reduce entrance way presence does not seem like a very good indicator of the fitness of this fitness business. 

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