Anytime Fitness Brings 24/7 Gym to Downtown Melrose

A common refrain from those who know they should exercise more is, "I simply don't have the time."

Well, whatever time works for you, will have its doors open. And they mean anytime.

The new fitness center at 462 Main St. fills the rest of the vacancy left behind by Melrose Drug Center's closing in October 2009—D'Amici's first moved into the now-divided commercial space—and is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Members access the gym using a key fob.

"It’s all about convenience really, 24/7," said Joshua Thomas, owner of the Melrose branch. "Also we have a reciprocity program—access to one, access to all. You can also refer people and earn extra months also. We like to provide more of a homey feel than other gyms. It’s all about quality, state-of-the-art equipment and keeping it clean."

The state-of-the-art equipment offers modern amenities, such as treadmills with high resolution TVs and iPod docks built-in, but it's the self-service nature of the equipment available that makes the 24/7 concept possible.

For instance, a touchscreen display outside a workout room provides a variety of classes to choose from, which then play on the projector-style screen indoors. Want to be led through a Pilates workout? Simply punch it up on the screen and head into the room.

"You can start the on-demand classes at any time," said Camille Bruno, the branch's sales and marketing manager. "Debbie (O'Brien, a certified personal trainer available to members) helps with personal training and I can show people during my time here how to use the machines."

It's not just the workout room that lets Anytime Fitness members call up workouts à la carte. Weight machines and other in the gym also have touch screens, which can demonstrate a particular chosen exercise.

O'Brien added that the touchscreen demonstrations can also be programmed to help people reach their next exercise goal.

"For example, if you were going to be lifting something here and you're at 30 pounds, and your next goal is to go to 60 but you weren’t quite there, we have buttons that take you in between," she said.

And the reciprocity program gives you options around the world, whether you're caught away from home or on vacation—from Wilmington and Billerica, the nearest Anytime Fitness branches, to Mexico and "a bunch (of branches) in the Netherlands," Bruno said.

"So, you could go work out there—if you like," she said with a laugh.

"We had some guys from New Orleans come in here on like the second day," Thomas added. The gym opened earlier this month and held a grand opening celebration on Jan. 7, where they held a raffle to support Melrose High School athletics.

There are memberships specials as the gym gets up and running, Thomas said, and a "hero discount" is available for police officers, firefighters, armed forces servicemen and women, and teachers. There's also various packages for personal training, singles and couples.

Anytime Fitness of Melrose actually belongs to a couple—Thomas and his fiancé, who decided to open their own business.

"When I got out of school I worked in some labs, which was boring, so after that I got into retail and sales for a while," Thomas said. "I did classes at night, I got my M.B.A. and met my fiancé. We decided to do our own business and this is where we ended up. I was tired of working 12 hours a day, 70 hours a week for someone else, so we’re doing our own thing now."

Originally from Cambridge, the couple put a radius around their home city and began searching for locations, finding a few locations in Cambridge that didn't pan out.

"When we saw this one we were really interested, because it’s right in the center of town, number one, so the location is great," Thomas said. "And once we got to know the town a little bette, it's such a nice town. Everybody's been so nice. We're very happy that we ended up here in Melrose."

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