Rainer Schaller (4 January 1969 – 21 October 2022)
was a German entrepreneur. He was the
Founder CEO
A founder CEO is an individual who establishes a company and holds its chief executive officer (CEO) position. If the firm's CEO is not a founder or the founder CEO is succeeded, the firm is said to be led by a non-founder CEO or successor CEO.
...
of the RSG Group, which includes the
McFit
The McFIT GmbH is the largest fitness center chain in Germany with 246 studios and over 1.4 million members in Germany, Austria, Italy, Poland and Spain. The company's headquarters is in Schlüsselfeld. Directed by founder Rainer Schaller, the ...
, John Reed and
Gold's Gym
Gold's Gym International, Inc. is an American chain of international co-ed fitness centers (commonly referred to as gyms) originally started by Joe Gold in Venice Beach, California. Each gym offers a variety of cardio and strength training equi ...
fitness studios. He hit headlines as a result of the
disaster at the 2010 Love Parade in
Duisburg
Duisburg () is a city in the Ruhr metropolitan area of the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Lying on the confluence of the Rhine and the Ruhr rivers in the center of the Rhine-Ruhr Region, Duisburg is the 5th largest city in No ...
, which he organized. On 21 October 2022, Schaller and his son Aaron died in a private plane crash in Costa Rica.
Early life
Schaller grew up in
Schlüsselfeld
Schlüsselfeld is a town on the southwestern edge of the Upper Franconian district (Landkreis) of Bamberg
Geography
Schlüsselfeld lies 24 km southwest of Bamberg in the Steigerwald (forest) in the valley of the Reiche Ebrach, 299 m abo ...
,
West Germany near Bamberg. His mother and grandfather worked in retail there.
The conductor and
Anton Bruckner expert,
Gerd Schaller, is his brother.
Business career
Retail
Schaller completed his training as a
retail salesman in Schlüsselfeld.
He supplemented this with further training to become a business and retail specialist. At the age of 22, he took over his first
Edeka
The Edeka Group is the largest German supermarket corporation , holding a market share of 20.3%. Founded in 1907, it consists today of several co-operatives of independent supermarkets all operating under the umbrella organisation ''Edeka Zentr ...
supermarket, and shortly afterwards three more in his home region.
[Lisa Nienhaus: ''Der Muskelmacher'' he muscle maker (In German) ]Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
The ''Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung'' (; ''FAZ''; "''Frankfurt General Newspaper''") is a centre-right conservative-liberal and liberal-conservativeHans Magnus Enzensberger: Alter Wein in neuen Schläuchen' (in German). ''Deutschland Radio'', ...
, 6 January 2008.
Fitness industry
In 1997, he switched to the fitness industry and opened his first studio under the McFit brand in
Würzburg
Würzburg (; Main-Franconian: ) is a city in the region of Franconia in the north of the German state of Bavaria. Würzburg is the administrative seat of the ''Regierungsbezirk'' Lower Franconia. It spans the banks of the Main River.
Würzburg ...
, Germany.
He tapped into the
discount segment of the market with this brand. By mid-2006, McFit was operating 62 fitness studios in Germany with a combined 400,000 members and 1,000 permanent employees.
In 2011, McFit was considered the largest fitness studio operator in Europe, with more than 1 million members. Schaller gradually
diversified his business to reach different target groups. In 2018, Schaller appointed Vito Scavo to oversee operational management of his
holding company
A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own shares of other companies ...
. In August 2019, the McFit Global Group holding company was renamed RSG Group and encompasses twelve fitness chains (including McFit, John Reed, High 5). In 2020, Schaller acquired Gold's Gym, which was in bankruptcy (
Chapter 11 proceedings) due to the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
. By the end of 2020, Schaller's group of companies employed 41,000 people in 48 countries,
managed 17 different brands and more than 1,000 studios.
Love Parade
In 2006, Schaller became managing director of Lopavent,
which organized the
Love Parade
The Love Parade (german: Loveparade) was a popular electronic dance music festival and technoparade that originated in 1989 in West Berlin, Germany. It was held annually in Berlin from 1989 to 2003 and in 2006, then from 2007 to 2010 in the Ruh ...
until 2010. The aim was to use the event to promote McFit's studios.
The Love Parade went off without incident, under Schaller's direction, for three years. In 2010, however, he came under fire for the
Love Parade disaster
On 24 July 2010, a crowd disaster at the 2010 Love Parade electronic dance music festival in Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, caused the deaths of 21 people from suffocation as attendees sought to escape a ramp leading to the festival ...
in Duisburg, which left 21 people dead and 652 injured. Schaller testified as a witness in the court proceedings on the accident in 2018, accepted moral responsibility, but was not charged.
Disappearance and death
On 21 October 2022, a
Piaggio P.180 Avanti
The Piaggio P.180 Avanti is an Italian executive transport aircraft with twin turboprop engines mounted in pusher configuration. It seats up to nine people in a pressurized cabin and may be flown by one or two pilots. The design is of three-su ...
plane carrying Schaller, his partner Christine Schikorsky, their two children, a 66-year-old Swiss pilot and another German passenger crashed into the
Caribbean Sea
The Caribbean Sea ( es, Mar Caribe; french: Mer des Caraïbes; ht, Lanmè Karayib; jam, Kiaribiyan Sii; nl, Caraïbische Zee; pap, Laman Karibe) is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere. It is bounded by Mexico ...
near
Limón
Limón (), commonly known as Puerto Limón, is a district, the capital city and main hub of Limón province, as well as of the Limón canton in Costa Rica. It is the seventh largest city in Costa Rica, with a population of over 55,000, and is ho ...
, Costa Rica, while on a flight from
Palenque
Palenque (; Yucatec Maya: ), also anciently known in the Itza Language as Lakamhaʼ ("Big Water or Big Waters"), was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that perished in the 8th century. The Palenque ruins date from ca. 226 BC to ca. 799 AD. ...
, Mexico. The bodies of one adult and one child were recovered, but not initially identified.
On November 4, the remains of the two bodies were identified as those of Schaller and his son.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Schaller, Rainer
1969 births
2022 deaths
21st-century German businesspeople
Businesspeople from Bavaria
Love Parade
People from Bamberg
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 2022
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in Costa Rica
20th-century German businesspeople