- Home-exercise company Peloton is known for its luxury exercise bikes, cult-like following, and heavily hyped journey to the public markets.
- In addition to the bike or treadmill, consumers can exercise with Peloton through its app, which requires a $19.49 monthly subscription.
- I signed up for a free trial of Peloton's app and tried three of its virtual classes: a bodyweight strength workout, an outdoor run, and a short office meditation session.
- I was hooked from the first class, which was fun, challenging, and personalized. The incredible variety and personalization that the Peloton app offers convinced me that apps like it are the future of home fitness.
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Like many of us, I work out... sometimes.
I often have trouble finding the time and energy to haul my butt to a gym or a class. I'm bad at running. And I've never really tried working out at home by myself because I wouldn't know where to start.
Workout videos have come a long way since '80s jazzercise with Jane Fonda. Now there's Mirror, the $1,500 mirror that guides you through futuristic augmented-reality workouts; the Nike app with celeb instructors like Kayla Itsines; and, of course, the exercise machines and app from luxury home-exercise company Peloton, which made its debut as a public company at the end of September. Though Peloton has gotten a lot of hype for its dedicated cult following of hip, young people, it stumbled after its IPO, registering one of the worst trading debuts for a mega-IPO since the recession.
Its exercise bikes cost upwards of $2,200 and its treadmills upwards of $4,200 - and that's not including a monthly membership fee of $39. But Peloton's app, which was released in 2018, costs $19.49 a month and grants users access to all virtual and live classes on iOS, Android, and the web.
Peloton said in its S-1 filing before its IPO that it had 120,000 digital subscribers as of the end of June. It also shared that its fastest growing customer segments are people under the age of 35 and those with household incomes under $75,000.
Classes available through the app subscription include workouts using exercise equipment, outdoor workouts, and bodyweight workouts you can do from the comfort of your home.
I decided to give the Peloton app a spin by trying three of its virtual classes, and it convinced me that it's the future of home fitness.