'Tis the season for video fitness releases

Drug Store News, Oct 20, 1997 by Allene Symons

The diet and fitness season kicks in about the same time as worry about holiday weight gain: It starts before Thanksgiving and really gets rolling in December and January.

Most fitness video customers are female, and that's what makes fitness video a potentially good fit for drug chains (no pun intended).

It doesn't seem to matter that many fitness video purchasers already have a tape or two. A new fitness tape, like a new diet or a new lipstick, seems to give the buyer a boost. In this case, it's a rush of resolve to turn over a new leaf with a better health and fitness routine.

This season not only brings a selection of new video cassettes, but the launch of two new fitness lines from Disney under its new ESPN sports banner.

ESPN Fitness is the umbrella promotion over two fitness video lines and a single title. Under the Fitness Pros line are four titles, "Body Sculpting," also "Circuit Workout," "Hi-Low Aerobics" and Hip-Hop Aerobics" (SRP $9.99 each).

In the Body Shaping line, four titles include: "Abs," "Arms, Chest and Shoulders," "Hips, Thighs and Buns" and "Step Aerobics" (SRP $12.99 each). Disney's ESPN line also includes "Tracy Scoggins' Mind Your Body" (SRP $12.99). All Disney's new ESPN Fitness videos have a prebook of Nov. 4 and a street date of Dec. 2.

BMG Video recently announced its '97-'98 plan for its The Firm fitness line, along with details of its newly acquired Reebok line and the release of a new video from one of the role models for mature females, the "Linda Evans: The New You" workout video.

The Firm's new line extension is Firm Basics for beginners, targeting the less experienced exerciser who wants to start an exercise routine. The first three titles are "Fat Burning," "Alec, Buns and Thighs" and "Sculpting with Weights." Priced at $19.95 each, these titles are on sale Nov. 18 (prebook Oct. 23).

Also available Nov. 18 are the first three titles in BMG's Reebok line, "Power Blast," a total body workout which incorporates moves found in boxing and kickboxing, and the dance-based aerobic workout, "Rhythmic Power." (BMG is also repricing three previously released Reebok Step titles, "The Video," "The Power Workout" and "The Best of Step TV" for $14.98 each; prebook Oct. 23).

WarnerVision has paired up with Gold's Gym for its Buns of Steel fall fitness video season. Titles come with in-pack certificates for a two-week free membership (valued at $50) to Gold's Gym.

The relaunched titles are "Buns of Steel Target Toning Workout," "Abs of Steel Target Toning Workout" and "Buns of Steel Total Body Fat Burner" ($9.95 each, on sale Sept. 2). WarnerVision has also relaunched its six best-selling Buns of Steel videos under the new Buns of Steel Classic Series banner with new packaging.

The new crop of fitness titles include both basics and more advanced titles and those geared for younger consumers, such as Sony Music Entertainment's just-released "Advanced Workout: Total Body Training with Keith Byard" for the intermediate to advanced fitness levels. This video also adds a scenic segment, a yoga cool-off in the desert canyonlands of Utah ($14.98, street date Oct. 21). Also from Sony and MTV, the fourth in the series, "The Grind Workout: Fat Burning Grooves" with Eric Nies and "The Grind" dancers (SRP $12.98, street date Oct. 21).

In most drug chains, home video is found adjacent to photo and electronics. But this crop of fourth quarter fitness videos seems like a good candidate for impulse sales adjacent to the cosmetics department where--with all the great bodies displayed on new video packaging-consumers might just succumb to the seasonal message of Dicken's Christmas Carol: a salable mix of future hope to replace past disappointments.