pany since 1994, and Joe Crowley, the company’s vice president
of marketing who joined ATP in 1992.
“It is very important to keep in mind that, as a direct response program, the Total Gym has been going since 1996. If
you think about those 15 years and the way the DR business
has evolved, you can start to appreciate the efforts the entire
ATP team and its partners have put into the program,” he says.
“Without our key partners, Total Gym would not be where it is
today. It is the responsibility of Joe Crowley and Dave Scudder
to manage the relationships with our partner vendors.”
Expanding the Market
The idea created by Campanaro’s team behind the device
was to use the individual user’s body weight as resistance as rehabilitative exercise. A simple change of position on the glide
Christie Brinkley and Chuck Norris have starred in 12 Total
Gym infomercials, including this 2004 version. The shows have
helped build a total customer base of more than 4 million Total
Gym users.
board allows users to perform any exercise and incorporate the
use of multiple muscle groups together in any plane of move-
ment — something now referred to as “functional training.”
In 1995, though, Campanaro and his Total Gym Inc. team
decided that the product might have a broader reach in the
home fitness market via demonstrations of its use that could
only be provided by a long-form DRTV campaign. They decided
to license the Total Gym Fitness brand to ATP.
“Upon entering into an agreement with Tom, we both
worked to create an infomercial and market the Total Gym to
the home consumer,” McFadden recalls. “Prior to this, Tom and
his company had a successful business with Total Gym in the
rehabilitation and hospital market. Tom had a true vision that
the Total Gym would be embraced by the consumer market but
previous attempts had not been successful.”
McFadden says that Campanaro and his team have played a
major role throughout the 15 years of DRTV success due to their
expertise on “fitness trends and leading-edge developments.” He
adds, “With their help, we engineered the product to be more
conducive for home use.”
It’s no surprise to hear the self-effacing McFadden credit
others. “The founding partners of ATP
and the staff have finely tuned their
DR expertise over the years and found
the ability to apply this expertise to the
various DR channels available,” he says.
“Added to this expertise is another vital
ingredient, which has been a major part
of ATP’s success: creating a strong team
concept within the company, as well as
outside with key strategic partners.”
Still, he’s had his hand in much of the
success of ATP for the past two decades.
“During my 22 years with ATP, I have
been involved in many projects representing various categories.
Working within the ATP team, we all wear many hats and, as
such, get to be involved in all aspects of a project,” he says. “My
main role is to coordinate the management team and make sure
all efforts are focused on priorities. During the past five years,
our primary focus has been on continuing to produce strong
infomercial creative and fine-tuning our call center and Internet
15 Years, 4 Million Total Gym Users
After re-engineering the product for home use in 1995-96,
the next step was producing an infomercial that would appeal to
consumers.
“A long-standing key to ATP’s production success has been
the utilization of celebrities within an infomercial or spot,” Mc-
Fadden says. “Chuck Norris had been a Total Gym user since
1980 and quickly agreed to be part of the project. Next, the
production team at ATP selected Christie Brinkley to team up
with Chuck.”
As McFadden says, “The rest is history.” During the past
decade-and-a-half, Norris and Brinkley have helped produce
12 Total Gym infomercials. “We are completely fortunate to be
working with such professional and wonderful people as Chuck
and Christie,” he contends.
The initial infomercial was produced and tested in 1996, and
rolled out in January 1997. “Before the actual roll out, though,
we realized the importance of retail in this project,” McFadden
says. “Through a meeting with Fitness Quest, we quickly realized the value they could bring as a retail partner. We felt their
knowledge of the direct response business and retail expertise
would be beneficial to the program. Fitness Quest has been a
