Jason Poure, Peloton’s director of Industrial Design, breaks down Peloton’s approach to fitness equipment design.
Written by Raji Sahota & Kosta Constantakis
With wide-spread fitness center closures directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic, the at-home fitness equipment market has unsurprisingly exploded with new hardware and software technology. The latest tech promises intense workouts with the detailed capture and analysis of personal metrics.
Stationary bike and tread-maker Peloton is one such lifestyle fitness tech company that’s seen users flock in droves to their ecosystem during the lockdown. They’ve married modern, state-of-the-art hardware with a huge and ever-growing live and on-demand workout catalog that’s certain to challenge—and exhaust—the most die-hard of exercise addicts.
Now boasting 6.2 million members on the platform and numerous celebrity trainers, Peloton has not only become a household name, it’s also achieved success during a time marked with unprecedented financial hardships. The company will even be opening a one million square feet manufacturing and office facility, dubbed the Peloton Output Park, on U.S. soil in 2023 and invest a cool $400 million to ramp up hardware production and keep up with a growing demand.
So how did Peloton pull off the near-impossible in a market saturated with fitness products and in a tough economic period? A good boutique studio fitness experience of spin and strength-training classes at home is one part of the equation. But great industrial design and engineering is certainly the other. We interviewed Jason Poure, Peloton’s director of Industrial Design, to examine Peloton’s philosophy on their approach to designing fitness technology. We discovered how that philosophy was applied to the redesign and re-engineering of the original Bike to the Bike+, Poure’s thoughts on general tech trends in the fitness industry, and of course, the future for Peloton.
Decoding the Design with Peloton’s Director of Industrial Design, Jason Poure
Watch our interview with Peloton’s director of Industrial Design, Jason Poure. The video interview contains design and engineering details not found in the article below.
Designing At-Home Fitness Gear
The success story that is Peloton is well known. It started when former Barnes & Noble executive John Foley, co-founder and CEO of Peloton, an engineer by training, had a thought: what if the studio fitness experience could happen in the home? With that simple idea in mind, the competitive cyclist, triathlete, and addict of boutique group fitness classes founded Peloton in 2012. “We made our own hardware, developed our own software, and created our own content with our very own world class instructors,” said Foley.
The original Peloton Bike. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
“[Foley] saw this need for a convenient fitness studio experience. He loved going into the fitness studios and the whole competitive aspect,” explained Jason Poure, Peloton’s director of Industrial Design. “He saw both himself and his wife juggling family life and cycling classes. And then out of that, he had the idea [for Peloton], which is creating a bike and an experience that allows people to fit that into their [homes] and lives.”
John Foley, co-founder and CEO of Peloton. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
The development of the original Peloton Bike, with its integrated and internet-enabled touchscreen, is a textbook example of a multi-disciplinary approach for product development. Software, mechanical engineering, and industrial product design teams had to collaborate on development. This was accompanied by a library of fitness content creation and the championing of celebrity instructors. On the manufacturing side, logistics and the global supply chain for material sourcing had to be sorted. Finally, a unified marketing campaign went hand-in-hand with the opening of retail stores nation-wide.
This holistic approach had a positive impact on the Peloton user experience, garnering a loyal subscriber base and fueling Peloton’s growth, the pandemic notwithstanding.
Another of Peloton’s key value propositions is the ability for a user to purchase a Peloton App Membership to their standalone app. This on-demand workout streaming service, packing in programs in strength, outdoor running, yoga, bootcamp, stretching and meditation, is hardware agnostic. Users don’t need the Peloton Bike or Tread to use to this service. This business model is reminiscent of other streaming fitness providers such as Beach Body, but one that may entice users to purchase a Bike or Tread downstream.
The Peloton App on a personal device. (Images courtesy of Peloton.)
Evolution of the Bike to the Bike+
Introduced in 2020, the Peloton Bike+ ($2,495) is a hefty step up in price, features, and functionality relative to its older brother, the original Bike (now $1,495). Combining cardio and strength training, the Bike+ is built from a high-grade powder coated steel frame (weight: 138kg) to support users large and small. It integrates a soundbar and subwoofer system right into the screen for an enhanced aural experience. “You are going to feel the energy through the speakers,” commented Jess Sims, a celebrity Peloton instructor.
Some of the refinements to the Bike+ include a redesigned handlebar, which accommodates a larger 23.8-inch high-def sweat-proof touchscreen with an embedded 8MP front-facing camera. “Designing of the handlebar to accommodate the user interface [was needed] to make sure that the handlebar and the screen placement are in the correct place. It was something that we did a lot of testing on internally so that we had the right measurements and distances and also the right angle to accommodate a good user experience,” explained Poure.
The rotating screen allows users to dismount and seamlessly transition from a spin class on the Bike+ to any floor-based workout routine. The front-facing camera allows a user to video chat with other users during workouts, provided the two users are following one another and taking the same class simultaneously.
The Peloton Bike+ with its 360° rotating touchscreen. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
With that philosophy in mind, additional UX enhancements included the addition of the digital Auto-resistance system that matches instructor callouts. “Anytime an instructor sets a resistance cue, the bike will automatically adjust,” explained Tom Cortese, Peloton’s COO and head of production development. “You don’t even have to touch that resistance knob,” elaborated Marissa Braveman Tyack, Peloton’s senior engineering program manager. “You hit that lock button and the resistance is controlled digitally for you.”
The digital Auto-resistance system. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
Another design enhancement of the Bike+ is the integration of Apple’s GymKit, which brings the Apple Watch experience to the Bike+. “You can sync your watch off the screen and then your heart rate, your calories [are] linked, which is really important to our members,” said Braveman Tyack. On the downside, this feature is only available in cycling classes and not for the bike bootcamp program, as outlined on Peloton’s support page.
Syncing the Apple Watch on the touchscreen. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
The software driving the Bike+ hardware boasts a ton of metrics for the die-hard fitness addicts who crave analytical details: heart rate monitor, distance travelled, calories burned, power output in watts, total energy output in kilojoules, and cadence in rotations per minute. Peloton’s leaderboard harvests immense amounts of data and has a long-term memory that tracks anyone who has ever taken a Peloton class.
The Peloton user dashboard. (Images courtesy of Eric Hwang, Graphic Designer.)
What About The Tread?
In more recent news, Peloton released the new Tread model in the U.S., Canada and the U.K. in late August, delaying the initial rollout due to issues with the touchscreen. The company also voluntarily halted sales and recalled the Tread+ in May 2021. As reported by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), “a 6-year-old child … died after being pulled under the rear of the treadmill. In addition, Peloton has received 72 reports of adult users, children, pets and/or objects being pulled under the rear of the treadmill, including 29 reports of injuries to children such as second- and third-degree abrasions, broken bones, and lacerations.”
The new Tread model ($2,495) however, is designed with safeguards in mind. It features a tread lock that requires a unique password to prevent unauthorized access (i.e., preventing kids from using it), and a safety key that will force the Tread to a quick stop if detached.
“Simplicity and interface are some of the core features of the Peloton. There’s a lot of fitness equipment out there that has this proliferation of … buttons and things that you can click. We are the first platform that really has a fully integrated user experience through a touchscreen, and we strip away the complexity of tactical interfaces to optimize for touchscreen use,” noted Poure.
The Peloton Tread. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
With this design philosophy, one of the developments on the Tread was the addition of two rotating knobs: one to control speed and the other to control the incline. A standard treadmill relies on up/down controls embedded on a dashboard for speed and inclination changes. Alternatively, the Tread’s controls knobs are intuitively positioned to the right (for speed) and left (for incline) of the handlebars and can be changed effortlessly with the arms’ natural stride while running.
“Tread is a little bit more complex in the fact that you do need to go by regulatory standards and have a manual speed activation, and then also a manual incline activation,” revealed Poure. “We decided, after a lot of testing … boiling it down to this super simple interface where you have a knob for speed and another for incline … As you’re running, the natural gait of your run and the swinging of your arms is in line with the actuation of the knobs. We wanted to make sure that we carried that over into Tread and Tread+ through the way that the rails flow up into the screen and the user interface.”
The Tread’s incline control knob. (Image courtesy of Peloton.)
Just as it does for the Bike and Bike+, Peloton aims to redefine running with the Tread with a strong emphasis on the user experience. The 23.8-inch HD touchscreen comes with integrated front and back speakers. The carbon steel hardware boasts a 59-inch traditional belt that maxes out at 12.5 mph (20 km/h) and a 12.5 percent grade. The Tread’s live and on-demand content, much like the Bike and Bike+, is vast. The classes track in-workout metrics like speed, mileage, elevation gain and heart rate. A leaderboard lets users compete with other members, and workout history, milestone achievements, streaks, and badges can all be connected to a user’s smartwatch.
The Future for Home Fitness Tech
What does the future hold for Peloton and the high-end in-home fitness market? One thing is certain: Peloton’s sleek hardware, slick interface, continuous iteration, and large catalog of workouts has gained many fans. The hefty price tag of the hardware and monthly membership helps ensure that committed Peloton users are unlikely to abandon ship.
The challenge? Regardless of the pandemic, locked down fitness centers are opening up and fitness goers may seek to reconnect with fellow humans in person. There is also competition with other lifestyle fitness companies such as FORME Life. Others may seek less expensive fitness solutions from other streaming providers. These challenges may all conspire to slow Peloton’s growth. But it’s all good news for fitness enthusiast, who have more options than ever for working out.
Share your thoughts:
What do you think the future of at-home technology will be?
