By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
A fitness center in Myeongdong in central Seoul was filled with its members Tuesday. They gathered not to burn calories but to vent their anger and rally against the club, which suddenly closed without prior notice.
They're moving to sue the luxury fitness franchise, whose Korean operations went under Monday, for reimbursement of their membership fees.
Three Seoul centers of California WOW Xperience (CWX), an offshoot of gym chain California Fitness, which has 22 clubs in Asia, suspended operations Monday morning, according to police. They defaulted on maturing debt amid fierce competition and excess business expansion, police officials said.
The three centers are located near Gangnam Station, Apgujeong-dong in southern Seoul and Myeongdong. The gym franchise gained popularity with personal trainers and celebrity members including pop star Rain and ``Barbie doll'' actress Han Chae-young.
Another club in Daegu was operating Tuesday morning but is expected to fold soon.
On the centers' doors was posted a note to members: ``Each club was forced to suspend operations as of April 14 due to rental debt. If you wait until reopening, we'll guarantee that you will be able to use the facility for the period remaining in your membership.''
No company officials were available for comment at the closed centers.
A staff member of the Daegu center said: ``We do not know what happened. Even our manager here learned about it Monday evening after a news report.''
Gym users opened Web sites to collectively demand the clubs refund their membership fees. The head of the franchise said via email to one of the sites that he would offer refunds but could not say when.
About 40,000 members plan to file a complaint against the fitness center head.
The victims claim the fitness club lured members into the centers by reducing fees even though it had decided to dishonor its debts. Lifetime membership, which was about 4 million won at first, recently dropped to around 1.2 million won.
``I paid for a lifetime membership at the Apgujeong club a week ago and it closed!'' a member with the ID ``cutebrit'' said on a Naver site for former members.