Riding on success: Santa monica company makes inroads into the exercise equipment industry by joining with reebok to use the sports apparel giant's marketing clout. (Small business).

As a young man Umbert Ciccolella remembers being just "one biscuit away" from turning into a roly-poly butterball. Then, a friend turned him on to aerobic exercise 20 years ago. His life has never been the same.

A true believer in the benefits of working out, the West Virginia native whose parents emigrated from Italy became a certified fitness instructor.

But later it was, his interest in exercise equipment that led him to form his own company in 1995, now called Reebok Fitness Associates and tucked away on a quiet street in Santa Monica.

At the time, Ciccolella was the manager of Main Street Fitness and Dance Studio in Santa Monica, which was one of the first clubs in the area to offer spinning classes using Schwinn-made stationary bicycles.

"I realized (spinning) was a great program with lots of potential, but the cycle was not very club friendly," Ciccolella said. "It was a high maintenance piece of equipment."

Different type of bike

So Ciccolella hired a bike designer, Steve Potts, who helped him create a one-wheel stationary bike that was belt rather than chain driven and didn't require as much maintenance.

Ciccolella, who by this time had formed a company called Fitness Associates Inc., approached Massachusetts-based Reebok International Ltd., the No. 2 U.S. maker of athletic shoes, about a collaboration.

Ciccolella talked to Reebok's vice president of licensing, John Farscotti, sending him pictures of the prototype. In early 1996 they struck a deal: Reebok would be responsible for marketing and promoting the new stationary bike and Ciccolella and partners Lewis Moore and Robin Warner would be responsible for manufacturing, sales and distribution.

As part of the partnership, Ciccolella changed the company's name to Reebok Fitness Associates, which remains an independent company of which he is president. Reebok has no direct financial investment and Ciccolella's firm would probably need to change its name if it ever lost the licensing agreement with Reebok.

Getting started

Ciccolella had very little business background. His first career was as a male model for The Wilhelmina Agency in New York from age 18 to 26. After that, he was a fitness instructor and later a fitness club manager, which led to his interest in exercise equipment. Ciccolella, now 50, still teaches a low-impact aerobic exercise class twice a week at Sports Club/LA.

He and his partners started Reebok Fitness Associates with $100,000 of his own money to develop the prototype of a stationary bike. The trick was to find a manufacturer willing to produce an order of bicycles with little money down.

Ciccolella discovered Profab Inc., an Orange County company that made bicycles and exercise equipment. Profab agreed to make the first 1,000 Reebok studio cycles. To guarantee the order, Ciccolella put his house up as collateral.

"It was kind of scary when you think you might end up in a box," observed Ciccolella, who said he was confident that the bikes would sell quickly with Reebok behind him.

At $795 for the belt-driven model, they did sell well, helping boost Reebok Fitness Associates revenues to $5 million last year.

The bikes are used in health clubs whose exercise classes take the bicycling experience from the street into the fitness studio. The Reebok cycle is one of the top five bikes used in health clubs, according to the International Health, Racquet and Sportsclub Association.

"It is definitely easier to teach new people on this bike," said Ian Cooper, general manager of the Meridian Sports Club, who has used the bicycles for years in his cycling class. "One of the positives about this bike is that Schwinn, which manufactured the spinning bicycle, went bankrupt and it's hard to get their parts. It is easy enough to get parts for the Reebok bike."

Besides the stationary bicycle, Reebok Fitness Associates this year came out with the Reebok Core Board, which was developed by Alex McKechnie, an L.A. physical therapist. McKechnie, who works with members of the Los Angeles Lakers and is a consultant to the National Hockey League's Vancouver Canucks, had been using a wobble board to get his athletes back into shape. But the wobble board, which is a gym device that promotes exercise and balance among athletes, doesn't create motion around a vertical axis.

So McKechnie developed an exercise board that allows users to stretch, twist and develop their core abdominal and upper torso muscles.

So far, Reebok Fitness Associates has sold 20,000 boards, which retail for $249. The company is about to launch a home-version of the core board, which will be sold at sporting goods stores and other retailers.

Spotlight

Reebok Fitness Associates

Year Founded: 1995

Core Business: Exercise equipment

Revenues in 1996: $1 million

Revenues in 2001: $5 million

Employees in 1996: 3

Employees in 2001: 16

Goals: To add to the sales staff in order to double revenues in the next three to four years

Driving Force: Innovation to develop new products