Hard on the heels of its purchase of 14 Virgin Active clubs, David Lloyd Leisure has exchanged contracts on the acquisition of the Park Club in west London and launched its third upmarket Harbour Club.
The group, which is backed by the private equity firm TDR Capital, is acquiring a lease on the Park Club from the Hogarth Group and will close it next month for an £8 million refubishment lasting for at least nine months.
The venue was built 20 years ago by the White family, owners of the Hogarth Group, on a 27-acre site in Acton with health and fitness facilities, indoor and outdoor pools, tennis courts, cricket grounds and football pitches and bars and restaurants.
DLL is taking 5.5 acres with the rest of the site remaining under the control of the Whites, who have secured planning permission for a £2 million Club des Sports, with all-weather facilities for football, rugby, netball, cricket, tennis, martial arts and dance.
News of the deal came as David Lloyd completed the acquisition of 14 tennis-based health and fitness clubs from Virgin Active. It originally agreed to buy 16 clubs but two of them, in Brighton and Brentwood, were eventually left out to secure the approval of the Competition and Markets Authority.
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Under the original terms, David Lloyd was thought to be paying about £80 million and analysts estimated that the removal of the two venues had probably cut the purchase price to about £70 million.
The Virgin Active and Park Club deals will lift its total number of clubs to 110, of which 98 are in the UK. It has 12 overseas clubs, in the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain.
The group has also relaunched its Kensington club as its third upmarket Harbour Club after the completion of a £5.5 million investment project. Its other Harbour Clubs are in Chelsea and Notting Hill.
Glenn Earlam, chief executive of David Lloyd Leisure, said: “Taken singly, any of these announcements would be significant in the growth and expansion of DLL; however, to be able to announce all three in a week underlines our ambitious commitment to growth and our vision for DLL to become the No 1 health and fitness brand in Europe.”
The latest developments are expected to provide a platform for TDR Capital to realise its investment in the sports club group over the next couple of years. The private equity firm acquired the business in September 2013 for £750 million from London & Regional and Caird Capital.