How to Get the Best Price on Treadmills and Ellipticals

This really applies to all fitness equipment but we get questions about treadmills and ellipticals at a rate of 100 to 1 compared with other types of fitness equipment. So how can you get a great deal on a piece of exercise equipment? We have found in our 30 plus years in the fitness business that the following are great ways to save.

Buy either at New Year’s Resolutions time or at clearance time. These are two distinct times of the years that always have the best deals for the general public. When the new models are introduced in the fall, you will typically start seeing deals around Black Friday and going through the new year. The big box stores will have purchased a great quantity of machines so they put sales on them until they can determine how many they will sell during the season. The quicker they sell, the quicker the discounts go away. The slower they sell, the bigger the discounts get to reduce inventory. Clearance time comes during the late summer and early fall period. This is the time that if the factories have new models coming to market, they have to clear the old stock out.

Look for sales, coupons, and discount codes. Regardless of how you research your purchase, you can find deals throughout the world wide web. Just Google for instance- NordicTrack Coupons and you will find sites that can get you an extra bit off your purchase. I don’t know all the coupon sites, but they are out there. You can also find special discount codes from time to time on the different affiliate sites. These sites get paid when you make a purchase but they have to have some type of come-on to get you to their site so a discount or coupon is normally how they do it. Never buy a treadmill or elliptical at full price. Specialty stores will negotiate the price so you can always save at those and fitness equipment is commonly put on sale on a regular basis. The exception would be the club stores like Costco and Sam’s although they also promote them when they first get in their shipments.

Pick up discount gift cards at secondary gift card sites. I recently needed a new bed for one of my kids and I visited both Raise and Cardpool and found gift cards that saved me over $50 on a $500 purchase. After just visiting these sites today, I saw you could buy Dick’s Sporting Goods cards, for instance, that would save you 17% on your purchase. If you are buying a $1,500 treadmill, that alone would save you over $250 on your purchase. Nothing to sneeze at! These sites have cards for all the major fitness retailers like Academy, Modell’s Sears, and Sports Authority too, among others.

For those who really don’t mind rolling the dice, there is always the option of browsing sites like Craigslist for a good used machine. Don’t ever buy one from a marathon runner because no matter how good the machine looks, it is likely worn out. We have found expensive machines at huge discounts on these types of sites. Just keep in mind it is a roll of the dice because you lose the warranty when the machine transfers ownership in most cases and you don’t know the history of the machine.