How to Stop Gym Germs Before They Harm Your Members

Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, many businesses, including gyms, had to figure out how to protect their employees and gym members. Unfortunately, one of the main obstacles gyms face is related to ensuring gym members’ adherence to hygienic measures. Namely, while exercising, people tend to forget or neglect gym safety regulations. For this reason, we will discuss how to stop gym germs before they harm your members.

Enforcing strict sanitary measures is the most efficient way to ensure your gym members do not contract easily transmissible diseases. Also, it is not only the coronavirus that can endanger the health of gym users. Gym equipment, machines, mats, and other gym elements can be sources of E. coli, flu, and MRSA. In this respect, providing access to hand hygiene sanitizer dispensers alongside other preventive measures is something that can immensely help you in your effort to keep your clients safe in the gym.

And remember! Healthy clients raving about your dedication to keeping them safe is the best way to boost your gym’s reputation. In light of this, let’s look at which preventive measures you should introduce to your gym.

Spread out sanitation notices all around the gym

You can begin your sanitation mission by providing helpful information about hygiene all around your gym. Sometimes, people catch diseases in the gym simply because they are not adequately informed. To prevent such unfortunate oversights, you should tape down easily readable sanitation instructions in key spots all over the gym.

Aside from text, follow up the brief instructions with pictures or catchy warning phrases. Try not to write the warnings using complicated medical terms and long sentences. Instead, go for short, impactful, memorable, and even humorous notifications. For example, you can write something along the lines of:

• ‘Sanitize your hands all day and keep the Covid away’
• ’Don’t touch the machine if your hands aren’t completely clean’
• ‘CLEAN ME PLEASE’

Be sure to place the instructions in the locker rooms, toilets, machines, next to weights, mats, equipment, etc. Basically, wherever a lot of touching or human contact happens.

Warn people that they need to clean yoga matts before and after use.

Alt: a woman doing a plank on a clean yoga matt

Instruct gym-goers they need to be careful with water bottles, door knobs, lockers, etc.

Your fitness instructors, personal trainers, and other gym staff may also spread information about prevention techniques. In line with this, instruct your employees to draw gym members’ attention to what things they should avoid doing. So, point out places and surfaces in the gym they always need to disinfect before and after use.

Although your staff and your clients may think this is redundant, it is best if you do not leave anything to chance. One reason why hand sanitation is so crucial in the gym is that exercising makes people forget themselves. In other words, no matter how conscious and responsible the gym-goer is, moments of inattentiveness happen to the best of us.

People forget about their surroundings when they exercise.

So, whether they are weight-lifting, doing cardio, or yoga, they should always pay attention not to touch their water bottle cap unless they have sanitized their hands and the cap first. The same applies to lockers, locker keys, boxing gloves, and other often-touched pieces of gym equipment.

Also, it makes sense to choose automatized devices such as soap and sanitation liquid dispensers or lockers you can open remotely, or with a card. In this way, gym members are not exposed to germs since they do not have to touch anything.

Place hand sanitizer dispensers and other sanitation products everywhere

Be sure to provide easy and ample access to everything gym members need to sanitize their hands and equipment. In fact, you will see that people tend to make use of clean paper towels and hand sanitizer dispensers all the time if they do not have to search for them. So, if a hand sanitizer is within reach, there is a greater chance that you will stop gym germs before they harm your members.

Of course, other things can be used to supplement hand sanitizer dispensers in the gym. The COVID-19 pandemic has completely changed what hygienic standards in the gym look like. Antibacterial sprays, wipes, free masks, and other sanitation products have become indispensable when it comes to enforcing new precaution measures since the start of the pandemic.

Do not neglect feet protection in the gym

Interestingly enough, showers, locker room floors, and yoga mats are germ paradises because they are stomped on all the time. And by a lot of people. This means that ensuring hands and equipment are disinfected is, unfortunately, not enough. People can also spread contagious diseases through footwear.

Gym equipment should be sanitized before and after use.

Alt: a man holding a barbell in a gym.

Yes, that means that you have to encourage people to use disinfectant liquid not only on their hands but also on the soles of their shoes or feet if they exercise barefoot. Aside from this, the floors need to be wiped with strong disinfectants and cleaning solutions at least once an hour.

Another way to stop the spread of diseases is to deny entry to the showers without slippers or flip-flops. Gym users may start complaining, so instruct your staff to explain that even a micro-cut on their foot is enough to allow diseases into the bloodstream.

Smartphone sanitation

Contrary to popular belief, one of the greatest gym germ allies is not our hands. It is our smartphones. People make use of smartphones all the time while they are exercising. They might listen to music, follow a training session online, monitor their heartbeat or running speed… As useful as they are, smartphones are generally very unsanitary and, what’s more, rarely sanitized. To stop gym germs before they harm your members, make sure you draw attention to smartphones as carriers of disease.