Mad Dogg Athletics, the American fitness giant that also owns the Spinning brand, has rescued the Spanish fitness startup Volava, which last June entered bankruptcy after registering a 60% drop in sales over the last 12 months and carry losses close to 5 million euros. The purchasing company is considered the creator of spinning.
Included in the bankruptcy proceedings was an offer to purchase the production unit that the Spanish subsidiary of Mad Dogg Athletics has acquired for 300,000 euros, an operation that includes the subrogation of the 12 jobs of the current Volava team.
The startup achieved meteoric growth during the pandemic with its at-home program of stationary bikes and online personal trainers, but once normality was restored, it saw how the business fell and was unable to refinance a bank debt of almost two million euros. “As an investor it is a disaster; as an entrepreneur, a bittersweet feeling, because the business continues,” said yesterday Joel Balagué, one of the partners of Volava, who will remain in charge as an employee of the company that has been created with Mad Dogg Athletics to continue the business.
Founded in 2017 in Barcelona, ??Volava started with an initial investment of one million euros with the vision of developing software that would offer the user the possibility of exercising and training from home. First, they marketed smart stationary bicycles, with screens so they could follow the instructors’ classes from home or access the lessons on demand.
With this, they attracted investment from two funds, Inveready and The Crowd Angel, which allowed them to accelerate their growth process and add boxing and running to their services. It employed around thirty people and had a turnover of one million euros (2020). It was when the German distributor Fitshop, from the Sport-Tidje group, came into play, with which they wanted to repeat the success of Spain and for which more staff were hired. But the covid variable was decisive, and the end of the pandemic put things in place and put people back in the gyms.
