Planet Fitness review: Staffing Issue at Planet Fitness in Klamath Falls, Oregon

The Planet Fitness located in Klamath Falls, Oregon, does not employ enough females which is resulting in men walking into the women’s locker room regularly. It’s happened twice while I have been completely naked—once in the shower and once when I was about to enter the shower. It has caused stress, anger, inconvenience, and is a privacy violation that feels like a sexual violation. This is unacceptable and needs to be addressed immediately.

Another time I couldn’t change into my workout clothes in the locker room because there were two males fixing the hand dryer in the late afternoon. Since, like many members who use your services, I was on a tight schedule, I did not have time to wait around; I had to keep my workout brief in my work clothes, a major inconvenience.

Yesterday I was able to see the issue from another perspective when my locker wouldn’t open and I needed to ask a staff member to unlock it. The male staff member asked me to go into the locker room, make sure no one was in the shower, and ask the women inside if they were okay with him entering, an action I felt uncomfortable doing.

Having no choice but to perform this act, I entered the locker room and asked. One women was furious and said she would not allow him to enter while she was there. She said she had filed a complaint about this situation—I am not the first, apparently—and that “this is completely unacceptable.”

I then walked back to the front desk and spoke with a manager whose name might have been Brian. He immediately took offense when I stated that they needed more female employees. He stated that he already “fixed the situation” and had hired some.

When I asked him to then have a female employee unlock my locker he became angry stating that there are no women currently working and when I again firmly stated that this situation was unacceptable and obviously not “fixed,” he said “You know, I don’t this this is going to work,” and began his back-pocket speech suggesting I leave the building. The manager who was working yesterday at 4:15pm when this incident happened lacks conflict resolution skills and displayed sexist, defensive behavior. Men are regularly walking into the women’s locker room while women are nude causing both privacy violations and inconvenience, and my elevated voice—a direct result of the stress, anxiety, inconvenience, confrontation, and sexism I was encountering—is the problem?

If this had happened at the other clubs I belonged to, the manager would have displayed professional skills. She/he/they would have apologized, assured me this was being handled, explained when female employees would be there if that would make me more comfortable, apologized again, and offered me a free bottle of water. This manager lacks the basic skills expected of his position. His downplaying of the situation is shocking. His gaslighting behavior that attempted make the issue about me is alarming and suggests that he may be a further liability in the future.

I’ve been a Planet Fitness Member for over ten years and have loved the professional and congenial service of employees in New York, Michigan, and to locations I’ve used while travelling. But the staffing situation at the Klamath Falls location needs to be addressed urgently.