The sports coaching market - Italy

1.2 Global Market

The sports coaching market is poised to grow by $**,***.** million over ****-****, accelerating at a CAGR of *.**% during the forecast period. The market is driven by increasing government initiatives, technological integration in sports coaching, and increasing demand for sports coaches [***].

The sports coaching field is expected to continue performing well in the years to come due to increased participation in sports for health benefits as well as to offset the high cost of college tuition through sports scholarships. Sports camps and academies are growing as parents seek sports coaches and programs to help their children stay active and improve their likelihood of receiving sports scholarships.

Fitness trainers work with people of all ages in health clubs, gyms, fitness or recreation centers, and in yoga and Pilates studios. They lead group classes, instructing students and demonstrating exercises. They also evaluate individuals for their strength and conditioning, and create exercise programs to help people improve their fitness levels. Furthermore, they teach strength training, stretching, and cardiovascular etc... [***].

The number of people working as Sports Coaches, Instructors, and officials (***).

Full-time: Less than half work full-time (***), showing there are many opportunities to work part-time. Hours: Full-time workers spend around ** hours per week at work (***). Age: The ...

1.2 Italian Market

The economic value created by sports coaching services can be consulted on the istat website, taking the following ateco code as a reference: **.**.** – Sports and recreational courses, which includes the activities of:

sports training (***) sports training centres and camps gymnastics courses riding courses or schools swimming courses sports instructors, teachers, and coaches martial arts courses card game courses (***) yoga courses

We see from the graph how the value increased from **** onwards, steadily, and then fell following the start of the pandemic in the year ****, where the recorded value is about **% lower than in the previous year.

  Value of the production of sport coaching services Italy, ****-****, in thousands of euros Source:[***]  

1.3 Impact Covid-19

The closures and limitations of gyms have forced all operators to reorganize: this situation has been seen as an opportunity to experiment with online or distance coaching. Online coaching, in fact, allows one to manage one's current clients but also to expand one's clientele, providing a diversified source of income when it is possible to return to the facilities.

However, the pandemic has enabled the digitization of sectors that would never before have thought they could benefit from online. While there had already been an increase in this respect in recent years, in **** with the pandemic there was an unprecedented surge, also in the fitness/sport sector. According to several economic studies, online personal training, followed by pilates and yoga, are the activities with the highest growth between the first and second blocks [***].

Also, in the post-pandemic, new sporting habits have emerged, the way people view exercise has changed dramatically: high-intensity interval training will give way in **** to more balanced routines. “The HIIT trend that was much exploited in the pandemic when cardio movement was the best way to relieve stress and tension will see a lot of alternation with gentler techniques: stretching, mindfulness, meditation and mind-body workouts such as yoga, ...

2.1 The practice of sport in Italy

In Italy, only **.* percent of people aged * years and over practice sport continuously, some **.* million. The highest percentage is recorded for those who practice neither sport nor physical activity, a total of **.* million. It was also seen that almost * out of ** children practice sport when both parents are regulars, compared to just over * out of ** children when both parents are nonpracticing.

People aged * years and over who in their free time engage in sport, some physical activity or are sedentary. Italy, ****, in % Source: ****

The largest concentration of persons aged * years and over who participate in sport on a continuous basis is concentrated in the central municipality of the metropolitan area, followed by the periphery of the metropolitan area and population centers with **,*** to **,*** inhabitants and more. Conversely, the areas with a lower prevalence of people practicing sport on a continuous basis are the small towns, up to *,*** inhabitants and **** to **,*** inhabitants.

People aged * years and over who play sports in their free time by type of municipality Italy, ****, per *** persons in the same type of municipality Source: ****

Over the past ** years, the practice of sport has increased, especially among people with higher educational qualifications. We can see that for each age ...

2.2 The numbers of federal sporting activity

THE FEDERATIONS WITH THE MOST REGISTERED ATHLETES IN **** Football Tennis Volleyball Basketball Athletics   THE FEDERATIONS WITH MORE SPORTS CLUBS IN **** Football Volleyball Basketball Tennis Cycling   AMONG THE DSA THAT HAVE MORE ATHLETES AND MORE SPORTS CLUBS, RESPECTIVELY. Checkers Sports billiards   The ranking of the most widespread federations in Italy in almost all territories differs from the national ranking - football, tennis, volleyball, basketball and athletics – in that it is the regional sporting cultures and the historical, social and urban characteristics of the regional territories that prevail: in VALLE D'AOSTA - an area with a tourist vocation – the most popular sports disciplines are winter sports and not football in MOLISE, football absorbs **% of registered athletes in CALABRIA, over two-thirds of registered athletes are concentrated in the top five most popular sports. The federations with the greatest presence of sports clubs in the country – football, volleyball, basketball, tennis, cycling – differ more unevenly from one region to another, as regional rankings are affected by local sporting traditions, the availability of sports facilities, climatic-environmental aspects and the morphological conformations of their territories: In CALABRIA and the P.A of BOLZANO the top * most popular sports represent about **% of affiliations, while in PIEDMONT, a less polarized ...

2.3 Italians' interest in the fitness world

The ** percent of Italian respondents answer to the Statista survey on "Fitness and health service purchases" with "Gym membership". The personal trainer option counts just the *% of the respondents. The survey was conducted in ****, among *,*** consumers, between **-** years old.

Fitness and health service purchase Italy, ****, in % Source: ****

As Italy tops the chart of the biggest health and fitness spenders in Europe. The average annual per-capita spending on health and fitness is *.*** £ in Italy.  

  Average annual per-capita spending on health and fitness in selected European countries in **** Europe, ****, in £ Source: [***]  

2.4 New Fitness trends after the pandemic

To find out what habits have become and how they have changed over the course of a year, *,*** sportsmen and sportswomen (***) from *** countries worldwide were interviewed.

The first and clearest result was that the most popular trend in **** was outdoor activities. Indeed, **.* percent of respondents chose outdoor activities such as running, cycling, park workouts, hiking and walking as the best way to stay fit, up **.* percent from the beginning of ****.

As many as **.*% of gym members (***) [***].

Fitness trends: How active adults are staying fit in **** vs **** World, ****-****, % Source: ****

3.1 Structure of the Italian Market of sport coaching

Based on the ateco code described earlier in part *.*, it was possible to derive the number of practitioners of sports and recreational coaching services in Italy, from **** to the last updated year of ****. We can see from the graph a steady growth, dampened in the year **** by the advent of the pandemic. The decrease between **** and **** is about *%. 

Number of practitioners active in the provision of sports and recreational coaching services Italy, ****-****, in absolute value Font:[***]

The sector is mainly characterized by small and medium-sized enterprises, as can be seen from the graph, **.*% have the legal form of self-employed, individual and freelance entrepreneurs. **.*% have the form of a limited liability company and *.**% the form of a general partnership. This breakdown refers to the latest year updated on the Istat page, namely the year ****.

Breakdown of the legal form applied by sports and recreational coaching service providers Italy, ****, in % Source:[***]  

3.2 Federal sporting coach

The figure of the sports coach comes in various guises, there is the fitness coach who refers to the figure of the personal trainer, practicing both within sports facilities and at home, and coaches associated with a regulated sport, related to the federal sports world, e.g. football coach, volleyball coach etc. The last ones are called technicians, are duly registered with the Federation and hold the qualifications of instructor, coach and/or master. Sports directors and technical directors are also included in this category. The ratio of technicians to athletes is * for every **, of which approximately **.*% were men and the remaining **.*% women, in ****. 

Historical series ****-**** of technicians belonging to fsn* and dsa* in Italy. Italy, ****-****, in absolute terms Source: ****

The abbreviation fsn and dsa stand for Federazioni Sportive Nazionali (***). Together with the Benemerite Associations and the Military Sports Corps, in fact, these bodies - by bringing together the various societies and coordinating sporting activity – make up CONI - the Italian National Olympic Committee – which in turn, to put it mildly, acts as the Ministry of Sports. [***].

After the boom in the number of members in the post-Olympic year, which was due to the knock-on effect of the victories ...

3.3 Professional fitness coach

A professional fitness coach is a professional in the field of fitness and exercise, most often instructor (***), including professionals sports club's fitness trainers and aerobics and yoga instructors and authors of fitness instruction books or manuals [***].

In all, there are ***,*** fitness instructors who help gym-goers find the right type of workout. This means that in Italy, there are **.* personal trainers for every gym. It is also interesting to see the average employment rate of those who take a degree in motor sciences, for new graduates it is very high at **.*%. Twelve months after graduation, however, it drops to ** percent.

Source: ****

In ****, the number of Italians who joined a gym for a specific purpose or just to take a break from the work routine was *.* million, *.* per cent of the resident population, a flow of sportsmen and women that allowed the *,*** fitness facilities in Italy to turnover EUR *.* billion in ****. As with most entrepreneurial activities in Italy, the gym sector is also mainly composed of small and medium-sized realities; precisely **% are small and medium-sized fitness clubs, while the large gyms are far fewer, representing in fact only **% of the offer. The remaining percentage, as shown in the opening graph, is made up ...

3.4 Major players in the provision of sports coaching services

Corresponding to ateco code **.**.**, there are the largest Italian sports centres whose offer is very diverse, from swimming courses to motorbike sports instruction.

The table below shows the largest companies in this role:

4.1 Analysis of the sporting coach figure

Coaching is a practice that is also becoming increasingly popular in the world of sport, where it is called Sports Coaching and focuses on all situations related to motivation, concentration, performance anxiety, improving technique, and more. The goal is to unlock the athlete's full potential. Put another way, coaching is a methodology that improves the performance of individual athletes and teams, thanks to the use of scientific tools, the application of specific techniques, and the relationship established between coach and client and between client and client (***).

Sport is an area where coaching is a powerful tool for growth, both at individual and team level. Athletes can benefit from coaching both before an important event, such as a race or competition, and throughout their career, to improve and strive for performance excellence.

Teams of athletes, on the other hand, can benefit from coaching on both the tactical and psycho-physical level. Coaching, when developed in agreement with coaches, can bring out better strategies for their team to win, can help athletes overcome difficult moments, stay motivated throughout the season, and find solutions where they previously saw problems.

There are about *,*** professional coaches currently registered with professional associations in Italy, with a steadily increasing ...

4.2 Cost of the service

The range is very varied: it starts at a minimum of **–** euros and goes up to *** euros for an hour's lesson. There are several factors that influence the price of a session with a gym trainer, including education, the level of specialization, the type of client and training, the time required for training, and the time slot in which training takes place. One must also take into account where one wants to conduct the training class.  

Various alternatives on the market are analyzed below:

Online coach:  The cost of an online coach depends on the type of training chosen: a standardized training plan can cost as little as ** euros per month, while the cost of a customized training plan, perhaps complete with a nutrition plan, drawn up in collaboration with a nutritionist, varies between ** and *** euros per month. On the other hand, if the online coaching service is offered by famous or particularly qualified trainers, the monthly price can be up to *** euros. In addition, the online personal trainer can make use of different payment systems, which are suitable for every need and requirement, convenient and easy to use. Personal trainer at the gym or clubs : A personal trainer in a ...

4.3 How is the figure of the sports coach evolving?

In the past, the coach was seen as a mother technician, with tasks limited to athletic preparation and choice of formation. However, this conception has changed, and today the coach is seen as a true leader, with a strategic vision and ability to manage group dynamics.

As an example, we can cite the Italian coach Carlo Ancelotti, who has proven his ability to manage top teams such as AC Milan, Chelsea, Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid. Ancelotti is known for his ability to communicate with players, motivate them and create a positive working environment, characteristics that go beyond mere technical competence.

The evolution of the coach's role has been facilitated by the development of sports science and psychology, which have led to a greater understanding of the mental and physical dynamics of athletes. Furthermore, the growing importance of media and marketing in the world of sport has made it necessary for coaches to develop communication and image management skills.

In short, the figure of the sports coach has evolved over time from a simple technician to a leader capable of managing all aspects of the game and team dynamics. This transformation has been facilitated by the evolution of scientific knowledge and ...

5.1 Regulation

The new provisions on sports work for amateurs and professionals:

On * January ****, the new provisions contained in Legislative Decree No. *** of * October **** aimed at a reorganization and reform of Italian sports regulations will come into force.

Last * November, the following was published in the Official Gazette Legislative Decree no. *** of * October **** was published in the Official Gazette on * November. Article * of Law No. ** of * August ****, aims to amend, in a “corrective” perspective, the provisions of Legislative Decree No. ** of ** February **** .

In detail, the measure aims to introduce simplification measures in order to make the impact of the **** reform more sustainable for amateur associations and clubs.

Among the main innovations introduced by the measure under review, which consists of ** articles, the amendment to Article ** of Legislative Decree no. **/**** stands out, which broadens the notion of sports worker, which, as of today, includes not only the athlete, coach, instructor, technical director, sports director and athletic trainer, but also 'any member, within the meaning of Article **, who performs, for consideration, the duties falling, on the basis of the regulations of the individual affiliating bodies, among those necessary for the performance of sporting activities, excluding duties of an administrative-managerial nature'.

Turning instead to the regulation ...

5.1 Segmentation

• Sport Management S.p.a
• RABE 23 S.R.L.S.
• SAN CARLO SPORT
• CENTRO SPORTIVO BABEL