Nerio Alessandri, "the Bill Gates of the fitness industry"

Nerio Alessandri was only 22 years old when, following his passion for fitness, technology and well being, he created his first machine in his garage in Forli’, Italy and created his company.

He chose to name it Technogym, the wellness company to underline his focus on technlology improvements and attention to perople’s well-being.

He wanted to develop a new concept in the world of fitness, a concept that now, some 20 years later is shared within all of its 1400 employees and some 30 million users.

People and their well-being have always been a primary issue in the plans of Mr. Alessandri and as he stated “My personal training places somewhat more emphasis on wellness rather than on a traditional fitness regime. One difference between these two terms is that in fitness the stress is on looking good whilst in wellness it is on feeling good”. These are the concepts that he tries to stimulate in his employees and in his costumers; feeling good rather than merely shaping the body.

The attention that Alessandri paid to shape is body was used as well to shape his company. He focused a lot on his employees and worked hard to make them share the same values. This continuous work led him to win the 2003 “

Great Place

to Work” award. This award has consecrated this people-focused policy that Alessandri kept developing throughout the years.

But values and culture, even if they have a vital importance in a company’s life cycle, are not sufficient tools to succeed in business.

Alessandri has been able to integrate the values of his company with a global oriented vision of business.

Charming marketing and attention to the new markets are two of the keys that Mr.Alessandri used to succeed. After the success in the European market Alessandri decided to enter the American one, in 1997. To understand the culture of the new market Technogym hired American professionals. The move seem to have worked: in the first years of its activities in the U.S. Technogym achieved average growth rates of 30%.

One of the success factors though has been the fact that Technogym did not rush up its entrance in the American market with massive investments. It first tried to understand its culture, values and needs and then integrated its activities and its production line in the U.S.

The new goal for Technogym, a part from maintaining its leadership position in the market, is to fully profit from the growth of the new markets such as China or Brasil.

A goal that Technogym may find easier to achieve given that they anticipated the other competitors when it became the only supplier of the Olympic Games in Sydney 2000, Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008. Beijing 2008 and also the Asian Games 2006 helped Technogym to achieve a privileged position in the market.

Below there are a few links which I hope you will find interesting. A good example of the company's culture and marketing activity.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qof9F3MkIK4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gams_h5qaM

This is the youtube page of Technogym which offers a various range of videos about the company.

http://www.youtube.com/user/TechnogymSpa?v=6Hpbnsx36Gc&feature=pyv&ad=5368434867&kw=wellness

Welcome Message

Welcome to Stories of Excellence,

from today every week we will be talking about excellence and how to achieve it. In this journey throughout the stories of those who created symbols of excellence around the world I hope you will be able to find inspiration or simply amusement.

Every business starts with a vision, a dream that a human been wants to see realized.

Of course management it is not a perfect science, it is not maths and two plus two not always equals four. It has to be shaped to fit the vision or the dream as we called it.

That is, in my opinion, the major aim of management, transforming dreams into stories of excellence...

Emanuele Visconti