Success Story: Club Bayer São Paulo

A study of wellness trends in the corporate world shows that 45% of companies view their healthcare strategy as an integral part of their workforce strategy. Bayer, a company with more than 150 years of history in the fields of health and nutrition, has been offering a wellness program in Brazil since 2011. The program, called My Life, includes physical and mental health solutions and at the heart of this offering is Club Bayer São Paulo. As a non-profit association created 46 years ago, Club Bayer is maintained by the employees and widely considered as the great promoter of wellness in the company. In order to stay fresh and add more value to the services offered to members, Club Bayer São Paulo found Gympass, the most complete corporate wellbeing platform.

The Challenge

Headquartered in São Paulo, Brazil, Club Bayer’s amenities include courts, a gym, swimming pools and leisure areas available for members and their families to use. When the Covid-19 pandemic hit in 2020, the Club’s coordination saw the number of members drop and, in partnership with Bayer’s HR director, realized that it was time to reinvent itself, introducing hybrid solutions to its offerings.

While Bayer already offered Gympass to its employees, in October 2021 the Club started offering Gympass to its members, with a plus: Premium Access, a subsidy of part of the monthly fee representing a significant discount on Gympass prices exclusively to members.

Alexandre Bigai, Club Bayer’s coordinator, believes that Gympass was essential to add more value to the Club. “In this pandemic scenario, we had a big challenge of reinventing ourselves, (we were) hopeless about what our future would hold. We needed members to see value for what they pay. With Gympass, we attracted new members and increased membership rates. It was a good partnership for all sides.”

Investing in Health – and the Club

Since the implementation of Gympass, Club Bayer has seen its membership rates grow by 21%, reaching close to the same numbers as pre-pandemic. This includes a new category of Club members who do not live in São Paulo or have access to HQ’s amenities but can enjoy exclusive online services, including Gympass’ offering.  

Club Bayer’s members have only good things to say about the new partnership: “Between October and December [2021], a lot was said about online personal trainers. Many members used this offering, shared their trainers, and helped others understand the offering better. And in January [2022], I have the impression that [the members] started using in-person gyms and studios in their cities.”

The number of check-ins made by Bayer employees grew by 15% between December 2021 and January 2022, showing that the hybrid wellness model, combining digital and in-person wellbeing options, results in greater usage and more consistency by users.

A survey conducted with Gympass users* showed that those who combined digital and in-person solutions, called hybrid users, were 21% more active than those who used only in-person offerings.

*Gympass proprietary user data, based on monthly averages, year over year, Oct. 2020 vs. Oct. 2021: Check-ins among users who combined digital and in-person programs compared with in-person only.

**Check-in: A Gympass member confirms they are joining an activity.