IRYMPLE residents are still set to gain a new 24-hour gym before the end of this year.
Club Aquarius owner John Hollywood said the new gym was on track to be completed just before Christmas.
“The reason that’s still going ahead is because we paid 90 per cent of the money for it before the pandemic came along,” Mr Hollywood said.
“We’d purchased all our gear, we’d done all our planning and we had all our money saved for it so it’s really something we can’t stop.”
Earlier this year Sunrayisa Daily reported that the new gym, to be based at the Irymple Hub, would be open by June.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a delay.
Mr Hollywood said staff were storing the equipment for the Irymple gym in Mildura.
“It’s costing us as much to store as what it’s going to cost us to rent at Irymple, so we’re better off opening it and getting some money back in,” he said.
Like many others, the pandemic has hit the family-owned business hard but Mr Hollywood is confident Club Aquarius will be able to bounce back.
The two gyms based at Fifteenth Street and Eleventh Street are set to reopen on Monday, June 22.
“Our staff have worked very, very hard and we’re really excited,” Mr Hollywood said.
The gyms will abide by strict health and social distancing regulations to ensure the safety of customers and staff.
This includes more signs and sanitiser, extra cleaning, visits limited to one hour and a limit of 10 people for most classes, excluding barre at Eleventh Street, which will drop to eight people to maintain social distancing.
“We’re very lucky that our gyms are a couple of thousand square metres so we can actually have 10 people in certain areas,” Mr Hollywood said.
“So we’re not going to be too bad.”
During the pandemic, staff have continued to come into work to help prepare the centres for reopening.
Mr Hollywood admitted it had been a challenging time for everyone but the staff had been fantastic.
“The people who went on JobKeeper have certainly worked really hard in the downtime and improved our centres,” he said.
During the shutdown period, many Club Aquarius members have continued to show support for the business by participating in online classes and sending messages of encouragement.
“People even volunteered to come in and pay memberships that weren’t due for three to five months, so the community’s been fantastic,” Mr Hollywood said.
