It is with much sadness and regret that Gracor Fitness was closed on February 25, 2008.
On September 27th of 1999, I was fortunate enough to open the first Gracor Fitness in the San Marco neighborhood of Jacksonville, FL. Over the last 8½ years, Gracor has operated out of 9 locations, performed over 300,000 training sessions, and have connections with 9 personal training facilities that were opened by former Gracor Fitness employees.
I took great pride in opening the first true personal training facility in Jacksonville, but even greater pleasure and satisfaction in the positive impact that we had on our client’s lives. Our greatest stories were not those of helping make people more aesthetically pleasing; Gracor’s greatest success was being the catalyst that enabled people to have a better quality of life.
Examples that come to mind are the grandmother who was able to get up and down off of the floor on her own to play with her grandchild. The Alzheimer’s patient whose doctors informed him not to exercise, but ignoring his doctor’s advice through exercise was able to reduce the # of pills he took on a daily basis from 15 to 1 and was able to go on hiking trips with his children and grandchildren that once were not possible. The breast cancer patient that used exercise as a way to help her stay mentally positive through chemo treatments. It was the thousands of stories similar to these that made Gracor Fitness a success and that I will cherish forever.
From the day we opened, I had a very clear and defined vision: to have a positive impact, both mentally and physically on people’s lives we train and to create career opportunities in the personal training industry. Those were the drivers for EVERY decision I ever made and I hope when people reflect on Gracor and the impact we had as a company that people will remember all I ever wanted was to make lives better.
I want to thank each individual who ever trusted Gracor to help him or her with their fitness goals. I realize it is very difficult to ask someone for help, regardless of what it is for, and it was a responsibility we took very seriously. Again, I thank you for your patronage and support in letting us assist you.
I want to thank each individual I ever worked with. Regardless of how our relationships ended, I learned so much from everyone one of you. I was fortunate and blessed to work with so many amazing individuals and I wish each of you all of the success in the world.
Finally, I would like to apologize to both the clients and co-workers that Gracor’s closing negatively impacted. Please know, both my partner, Chris Evans, and I did everything we possibly could to remain open for as long as we did. I realize that it is difficult and frustrating when a business closes so suddenly, but up until the last second, we were exploring every option to keep Gracor open.
So in closing, I again want to thank everyone whose life I encountered and apologize to anyone who was negatively impacted from the closing of Gracor. When you reflect on Gracor, my hope is that you will always remember the good and that all I ever wanted was to make a positive impact on other people’s lives.
Sincerely,
Brett A. Chepenik
President
Gracor Fitness