The Myth Of The Treadmill Brand

The Myth Of The Treadmill Brand
When people think Toyota, people usually associate it with reliability, stability and longevity. When people think Ford, they might think of the following acronyms:

Fix Or Repair Daily
Found On Road Dead
Failure Of Research & Development

Now for you Ford enthusiasts there, this isn't an article bashing Ford. I'm merely using brand association to illustrate a point. When people think of car brands, they usually have some sort of idea, notion or prejudice towards it. So what kinds of feelings are associated with treadmill brands? When it comes to determining quality, can a brand tell the entire story?

BOWFLEX

Perhaps one of the better known brands out there for the average consumer, Bowflex is famous for its infomercials featuring perfect bodied muscular tanned guys. "Workout on our machine for 20 minutes a day, 3 times a week and you TOO will get this Bowflex body!" Or something to the tune of this. Hey, when you have these hot and sexy, perfectly bodied models telling you how great the Bowflex is, it's hard not to associate positive feelings with it. So how does the Bowflex brand of treadmills hold up? A review of the reviews of Bowflex products on this site shows that there are more misses than hits.

LIFEFITNESS

One of the better known brands of treadmills in gyms is the Life Fitness brand. As they’ve mainly manufactured commercial products in the past, quality has to be at a respectable level in order to be placed in a commercial environment. So when you see the Life Fitness brand, you tend to associate it with quality. Now this is the case for its commercial products but when you see the price tags on these things, you might reconsider its residential line of products instead. But how do the residential treadmills hold up to the competition? When it comes to a home treadmill, is LifeFitness simply piggybacking on the brand name it developed for its commercial line?

PRECOR

Precor is perhaps better known for its high quality commercial line of ellipticals. Hoping to capitalize on this, Precor now also sells treadmills for the upper end of the market. Do Precor treadmills hold up well against the competition?

SPIRIT

Prior to 2007, Spirit has had its fair share of products that are generally positively reviewed. But at the same time, some of these products that were previously positively reviewed are now hit with quality control issues. Furthermore, its new 2007 lineup seems to be suffering too in terms of quality. Are the Spirit glory days over?

SMOOTH

Smooth, a brand of treadmills and ellipticals sold only on the internet, has had a history of different manufacturers produce its treadmills. When a brand switches manufacturers so many times, can they maintain their quality?

REEBOK

Does Reebok sound familiar? Well, it should since it's a company worth a whopping $8 billion when it got acquired by Adidas in 2006. But in the case of treadmills, it’s simply licensed its name out to Icon Health and Fitness. Can you trust the Reebok brand when it comes to treadmills?

THE MYTH OF THE TREADMILL BRAND

For a variety of reasons, when it comes to buying a treadmill, the brand often does not tell the whole story. Companies and their brands have good years and bad years. One year they might be priced too high, another year they might be having quality problems. As a result, they may be receiving best buys this year and then totally suck the following year. A brand is only as good as their latest models.

Simply put, a well known brand does not guarantee a well made treadmill/elliptical.