Summary
• Employee fitness boosts business success – healthier staff mean fewer absences, better engagement, higher productivity, and stronger workplace culture.
• Health benefits for staff include reduced risk of chronic illnesses, better sleep, more energy, improved focus, and stronger mental resilience against stress and burnout.
• Workplace strategies: employers can encourage fitness through wellbeing advocates, flexible working, internal wellness sessions, cycle schemes, gym discounts, and active meetings.
• Outdoor gyms for businesses: installing open-air fitness equipment on-site provides a cost-effective, inclusive way to support physical activity, improve wellbeing, and promote team building.
14th October 2025
The recent National Fitness Day, Britain’s biggest celebration of physical activity, served as a reminder that empowering employees to prioritise their own fitness doesn’t just help workers. There are tangible business benefits too, from stronger staff engagement to lower absence levels plus greater productivity.
There are numerous benefits to look forward to when your teams enjoy peak physical health, including:
This may sound obvious, but when employers encourage worker fitness, they actively help reduce health risks while supporting long-term employee wellbeing. You help reduce the risk of a number of chronic conditions, from heart disease and Type 2 diabetes to some cancers. According to Sport England, physical inactivity costs the nation almost £7.5bn annually, while a University of Stirling study found that even minor changes to workplace routines can make a significant difference.
It’s well known that physical activity enhances sleep quality and duration, in turn improving mood, productivity and both short and long-term health. It also minimises the risk of burnout, increasingly a worry across workplaces. This year’s Annual Burnout report from Mental Health UK, completed by YouGov, found that, among nearly 4,500 British adults, a third (34%) experienced high or extreme levels of stress or pressure ‘always’ or ‘often’, while 91% had experienced high pressure or stress at some point over the previous year.
Exercise is proven to boost energy levels. The enhanced circulation and oxygen delivery to the brain encourage smarter decisions and more sustained focus. Employees are also likely to feel more alert during the day.
Workplace stress research from Ciphr found that 86% of participants reported feeling stressed at least once a month, a rise from 79% in 2021. More than half (60%) of respondents said they felt stressed on at least five days each month. Exercise brings down levels of the stress hormone cortisol, boosting endorphins which improve mood and generally make people feel better able to deal with work-based challenges.
Clearly, your staff must ultimately take responsibility for their own health. But employer support makes a huge difference, so staff wellbeing needs to be woven into daily life at work rather than feeling like an afterthought or something that’s just ‘nice to have’.
And not only will healthy teams flourish, your business will, too. Having a workforce which is fit and well helps reduce absence levels, drives engagement and encourages an energetic, resilient culture.
There are a number of things you can do, including:
One highly effective, cost-efficient and low-maintenance solution is to install pieces of outdoor gym equipment on-site at your place of work. This gives people of all ages and fitness levels somewhere to exercise right where they work, and yields all the physical and mental health benefits mentioned above, while also encouraging team building and social interaction without any need for supervision. People enjoy all the benefits of becoming fitter and healthier at no charge to themselves – and in the fresh air at an outdoor gym.
At leading UK provider Fresh Air Fitness, we supply outdoor gyms for a variety of employers and corporate campuses. These include household names such as Ford Dagenham, where we installed a dynamic, exciting fitness zone. Our range includes more than 40 pieces from which to take your pick, all competitively priced and with a 25-year warranty.
We know that exercise is an amazing stress-buster and that can improve mental health, workplace wellbeing and productivity. Now your company could be feeling these benefits. Fresh Air Fitness will be with you throughout, from initial consultation through to installation, aftercare and beyond.
Browse our outdoor exercise equipment and get in touch to learn more about how we could help you to have a happier, heathier and more productive workforce. Take the first step today.
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