As many campus recreation centers look for innovative ways to upgrade and modernize equipment, the University of Central Florida turned to Matrix Fitness.
“Overall, it’s a super positive company and environment to work with,” said Aliyah Valdez, the assistant director of Fitness at UCF. “You can’t go wrong with Matrix.”
Below, Valdez explains what led UCF to Matrix Fitness, surprises about the partnership and more.
Why did you decide to partner with Matrix Fitness? What problem were you looking to solve, or what solution were you looking to incorporate?
Working with fitness equipment in any sort of facility, there are options with different vendors and companies. I think ultimately the goal we were trying to solve or accomplish was modernizing our facility. We have great internal maintenance, so our equipment lasts a long time, but you could see aesthetically we were behind on what our equipment looked like and the pieces of equipment that folks wanted. So, we’ve modernized our machine weight floor as well as our cardio floor. We chose Matrix for a variety of reasons — for the aesthetic, the customer service, the warranty, etc. So many different reasons.
What are the benefits to your rec center as a result of this partnership?
A lot. Specifically, I’ll start with March 2024. We did a 24-stack multi-station on our machine weight floor. Jake Glore of Matrix tells me I’m the first one to design and implement one of those into my facility. So I’m really excited about that, but it has definitely brought in a lot more individuals. Our cable station used to just be four stacks, and so to go from four to 24, that means at any given time, 24 people can be using that same piece of equipment. That’s been really huge.
I think it’s also provided a lot of risk management benefits in the sense that it’s very spaced out. No one’s on top of each other or feeling super crowded while they’re utilizing equipment.
Then on the cardio floor, I think it was also that modernization. We had a lot of ellipticals. We had a lot of pieces that just weren’t what the people needed. Now we have 10 ClimbMills. We went from four to 10, and at any given moment — similar to that multi-stack — all 10 of the ClimbMills were occupied. So, just utilizing the information the students share, what they want to see more implemented and then asking them which brand they prefer. Over and over again, we get positive feedback on the Matrix equipment.
I think for our personal benefit, the maintenance on it, the warranty and then — my absolute favorite part —the customer service.
What are the benefits to your students as a result of this partnership?
I can think of one story that synthesizes their response. When we were doing the cardio floor redo, we were cutting off the caution tape and were ready to open up the floor when a student walked past me, looked at me and just went, “Thank you.” That thank you was just like, “OK, we’re listening to them. We’re providing the changes to the feedback that they’re giving us.” I think with that comes more people feeling more comfortable. We’re losing fewer students to the commercial gyms because of our outdated equipment or because of our broken equipment, things like that. Now we’re retaining the participants a lot more. So just that retention and seeing the folks having more availability of equipment to use has definitely been that benefit.
Have you been pleasantly surprised by working with Matrix Fitness in any way?
Something I’ve been thinking about is that prior to my role currently at UCF and all of my fitness experiences, I didn’t oversee fitness equipment — I only oversaw the program areas. So, coming into this, I was really nervous. I’m like, “I don’t know how to do any of this. I don’t know how to purchase things. I don’t know how to draw a floor plan, things like that.” What I would say I’ve been pleasantly surprised by is their customer service. Jake has made this transition and my learning process extremely seamless. Again, with the maintenance and warranty, folks are very quick to respond; it’s a customer-first kind of support.
Ultimately, I think another benefit specifically to Matrix is there are individuals on that team who deeply understand and appreciate the work we do in campus recreation. I think a lot of vendors or companies can say, “Oh, we’re just selling equipment.” So, the fact these customer service and sales representatives come into my space and ask, “What do the students want?” means they know that space, and they know how to have that conversation. It makes me feel really understood. And again, that learning curve that I experienced, to have the support and the patience from the Matrix team. They make the experience a lot more seamless and a lot easier, because spending a lot of money, while it’s cool, it’s overwhelming, and so without that customer service, I think this would be a lot more challenging. So I definitely appreciate all of the folks at Matrix.
What else can you tell other campus rec professionals about the benefits of working with Matrix Fitness?
No. 1 is you’re going to get that support. You’re going to get that customer service and support that you need — that quick response. If you want a comparison of Matrix versus another vendor, they’re going to provide that to you. Another thing they do really well is it’s never a bashing of the other company. It’s just here’s what we have, here’s what they have and feel free as the customer to decide. Overall, it’s a super positive company and environment to work with. And then, as it pertains to the equipment specifically, it’s super durable, user-friendly and looks really nice. With those things together, you can’t go wrong going with Matrix.
