Planet Fitness has seen its stock drop by a significant amount in recent days after consumers were urged to boycott the gym chain amid controversy over a transgender locker room policy.
The company’s stock price, which traded at a high of $66.92 on March 7, dropped to $56.46 on March 19, although the price as of March 21 stood at $58.34. This month’s stock plunge over the controversy has wiped $400 million from the company’s value, according to Fox Business and other outlets.
It came days after a woman said on social media that she had encountered a “man shaving in a women’s bathroom” at Planet Fitness in Fairbanks, Alaska, adding she believes he “wants to be a woman.”
The woman, whom media outlets identified as Patricia Silva, said a young girl was also in the locker room in a towel. The “little girl sitting in the corner ... could have been [12 years old],“ she said, adding the child was ”in a towel kind of freaked out.”
Ms. Silva said in the clip that the man had been shaving his face, telling her he was “queer.” The woman then said she relayed her concerns to management at Planet Fitness, and her membership at the gym was revoked because she took a photo of the man, who hasn’t been identified.
Planet Fitness has a policy allowing people who claim to be transgender to use the locker room designated for the sex opposite their biological sex.
“Our gender identity non-discrimination policy states that members and guests may use the facilities that best align with the sincere, self-reported gender identity,” the gym said in a statement responding to the incident.
The company added that individuals operating in “bad faith” and “improperly [asserting] a gender identity” will be asked to leave the locker room and “their membership may be terminated.”
Responding to Ms. Silva’s claims and posts on social media, the company claimed that “the member who posted on social media violated our mobile device policy that prohibits taking photos of individuals in the locker room, which resulted in their membership being terminated.”
In 2015, a Michigan woman filed a lawsuit against Planet Fitness, claiming her membership was wrongly terminated by the firm after she complained about a male in the locker room. The woman said in the suit that her rights under Michigan’s consumer protection law were violated when Planet Fitness didn’t disclose an unwritten policy about its transgender policy.
Earlier this week, a large X account, Wall Street Silver, wrote on the platform: “Is it time to give Planet Fitness the Bud Light treatment? #BoycottPlanetFitness.”
Last year, Bud Light’s sales were hit hard after it helped promote a transgender individual on social media, leading to similar calls to boycott the brand. Reports have indicated that the boycott likely cost parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev more than $1 billion in lost sales throughout 2023, while Bud Light was forced to significantly change its marketing strategy.
On March 21, End Wokeness, an account with 2.4 million followers, wrote on X: “I guess forcing women to share their locker rooms with hairy men was not the greatest business model. Keep this going. #BoycottPlanetFitness. Eventually, companies will get the memo.”
“Turns out people don’t want to support companies who cave to gender pseudoscience and allow men in womens’ private spaces!” Libs of TikTok, another major conservative account, wrote on X. It also called for a Planet Fitness boycott to “keep going.”
X owner Elon Musk weighed in on the controversy, replying to another post this week: “Planet Fitness sounds like a creepy place.”
Planet Fitness didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time.
