1-2-3 FIT Sold to Diversified Health
There’s an ancient saying that’s been passed down through generations of fitness franchise bloggers: Old Fitness Franchises Never Die, They Just Get Acquired by Diversified Health & Fitness.
And just as Blogstradamous predicted, the troubled and troubling 1-2-3 FIT franchise chain was sighted being led across a misty field by a grim character carrying a scythe and sporting a black “Diversified Health & Fitness” hoodie.
Yes, just after aquiring the Butterfly “I’m not quite dead yet!” Life fitness chain, Diversified Health and Fitness has acquired 1-2-3 Fit, the coed express fitness club created by the supposedly dark knights of franchising, the controversial founders of the Quiznos franchise chain, Rick Schaden and Brooksy Smith. 
For more on the acquisition, check out the Unhappy Franchisee post: 1-2-3 FIT Acquired by Diversified Health
Make Millions in 5 EZ Steps!
To understand what I suspect this Diversified is all about, let me share a neat trick I learned from the folks who ran the Java Jo’z and Cuppy’s Coffee scam. Feel free to follow it to scam a bunch of people and have nobody be able to touch you.
1) Form a corporation and collect a bunch of money from naive and trusting prospective franchise owners.
2) Don’t follow through on your obligations.
3) When the finally music stops and they’re all ready to sue you, sell the assets (including franchise agreements and intellectual property), but not the liabilities of the corporation to a 3rd party.
4) Since the 3rd party is not liable for you, the franchisor’s, obligations and since your ass is on the beach in Cancun by this time, the franchisees are left to sue an assetless corporation.
5) When funds run low or you’re bored with golf and tropical rum drinks, return to #1 and repeat.
So what’s Diversified Health & Fitness up to?
Why ask me? I’m just a lowly blogger who’ll be lucky to vacation under some NJ shorepoint boardwalk this year. OK. I’ll give it a shot…
It seems to me that Diversified Health (kind of an ironic name, aye?) CEO Roger Wittenberns is selling escape pods, and playing the role of the “3rd party” that acquires the assets when the franchisors are ready to bail.
Pretty brilliant, really. He probably gets these little chains for a song (or a dirge) and can play the savior to the remaining franchisees of the chain, collect their royalties and go after the others for what they might still owe on their franchise agreements.
Kind of like a combination collection agency & hospice program.
I could be wrong… Maybe the folks at Diversified Health & Fitness and franchisees of those they’ve acquired can set the record straight with a comments left below.
Related stories:
BUTTERFLY LIFE: Assets Bought by Diversified
DIVERSIFIED Health & Fitness, ShapeXpress Franchise Complaint
LIBERTY FITNESS Franchise Owner Describes Chain’s Decline
Diversified Health & Fitness Wants Failed Liberty Fitness Owners to Pay Up
“They Lie”: 1-2-3 Fit Franchise Owners Sound Off
Will the 1-2-3 Fit Franchise be the Quiznos of Health Clubs? Is That a Good Thing?
WHAT DO YOU THINK? SHARE A COMMENT BELOW.
Image: Unhappy Franchisee
Post from: Franchise Pick