Fitness First seeks enters into company voluntary arrangement | Business | The Guardian

The country's biggest gym company, Fitness First, is set to shed nearly half its sites as it attempts to avoid falling into administration, with Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou's no-frills easyGym expected to be one of the biggest beneficiaries.

The struggling business, which has around 10,000 employees worldwide, has proposed a company voluntary arrangement (CVA) with its creditors, mainly its 120 landlords, to shrink its £560m debt.

Richard Fleming, UK head of restructuring for accountants KPMG, which is organising the deal for Fitness First, said: "We estimate that the return to compromised landlords to be within a range of 23-28p in the pound, versus less than 0.5p in the pound in administration."

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