Owners of pilates and yoga studios in the US got political and encouraged their followers to vote on social media
Your local pilates instructors only want you to do two things: breathe through your side-planks and vote.
In the days leading up to the US midterm elections, a wave of posts from fitness and wellness accounts blanketed Instagram, eschewing their typical messaging around the importance of strengthening your core in favor of the importance of exercising your civic duty. Owners of pilates and yoga studios and instructors across the US posted reels and pictures on platforms like Instagram encouraging their followers and clients to vote. Engagement varied depending on their following: posts reaped anywhere from 70 to more than 10,000 likes.
“A strong core is cute. Having a voice is powerful. Go vote,” posted Frederick Ocansey, a pilates instructor who goes by the name flyfreshfreddy on his Instagram account with nearly 25,000 followers.
“A pilates class no-show only costs you,” an Instagram reel posted by a Flatbush, Brooklyn studio KGC Pilates read. “An election no-show costs all of us.”
Mome Studios, a pilates studio in South Portland, Maine, posted a picture of a sign outside their door taking a dig at Elon Musk’s ambitions to colonize Mars that said: “No Pilates on Mars. Vote.” Kore Pilates, a Nassau county, New York, Black-owned studio posted in plain block letters against a black backdrop: “Pilates Girls Vote.” Yoga studios also offered free drop-in classes for anyone who brought in their “I voted” stickers and others have offered to waive fees for canceling a class too late so people can go vote.
For many of those instructors and creators, there’s a natural connection between pilates and politics.
“Wellness is actually on the ballot at the end of the day,” said Kiersten Gibson-Cooper, the owner of KGC Pilates in New York City’s Flatbush neighborhood. “You’re voting for things related to healthcare, for wages, for grocery prices. I don’t want my clients to have to decide between booking a pilates class and affording groceries.”
Posts that show off “I voted” stickers or that encourage people to vote have become reliably viral content for social media during US elections in recent years. Platforms like Instagram often capitalize on the moment, creating filters or stickers to overlay on images being shared to users’ stories. Using celebrity to encourage people to vote, especially for less attended elections like midterms, is also well-trod territory. The “Rock the Vote” campaign of the 90s famously tapped rappers and singers to bring younger people to the polls. Social media has combined the two phenomena, mobilizing the influence of semi-famous fitness instructors who command deeply loyal followings.
It’s not lost on Gibson-Cooper that her posts about voting could be seen as a ploy to boost engagement and business. But she said her past posts and the studio’s work with the community are proof that this isn’t just about bringing more people into her studio.
“Social activism and community activism is not anything that is done as a one-off or to get more business,” she said. “This is something that I actually truly stand for.”
Pilates has taken the place of Soul Cycle and CrossFit as the fitness fad du jour in the US. Over the summer, studios, social clubs and businesses across the country hosted pilates pop-ups that took place on rooftops, in parks, after dark, with matcha in hand, and more – many of which were hosted by big corporate brands as a means to enable their online consumers and influencers to engage with their brand and products offline.
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In just the last few weeks, those pilates pop-ups became a little more civically themed, pivoting to the news of the moment. In Houston, the League of Women Voters (LWV) hosted their own pilates pop-up to encourage women to vote. “Let’s get Civically Fit,” the flyer for the event read. “Pilates to the Polls.” The organization worked with a fitness non-profit, Fit Houston, to organize an hour-long free pilates class in a park where there was also a polling location.
“One of the goals of League of Women Voters is to empower voters and defend democracy, so I find pilates very empowering too and creating communities empowering just like voting is,” said Sabine Hodge, the development manager at the LWV who is also a pilates instructor. “Democracy and pilates are my two passions.”
The surge in popularity of pilates dovetails in many ways with the post-pandemic desire for and creation of in-person community, places where people can meet outside the confines of social media. Coffee shops have long advertised discounts for any customer who brought in their “I voted” stickers. For Ahtasham Azim, the owner of Shaam Chai and Coffee in Katy, Texas, encouraging his customers to vote might have some financial side benefits for his business, but he said the offer is really about doing what it takes to build community.
“We do these things because we recognize it’s good for business, but it’s good for business because it’s good for people first,” he said.