Equinox Hires Anheuser-Busch Boss as CEO, Lines Up $1B+ for Growth

The hiring of Brendan Whitworth comes as the luxury fitness operator has completed a major refinancing move to fund new clubs and upgrades

Equinox has named Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth as its chief executive officer and said it completed a refinancing that gives the luxury fitness operator more than $1 billion to spend on new clubs, upgrades to existing locations and other growth initiatives.

Harvey Spevak, who has led Equinox since 1999, will continue as chairman, the company said Monday. Whitworth will also join the board

“Having known Brendan for several years, I was personally involved in bringing him to Equinox, and I’m thrilled to welcome him as our CEO,” Equinox chairman Harvey Spevak said.

The leadership change comes as Equinox moves to speed up openings from a pipeline of about 50 new clubs, enter markets it considers high potential and reinvest in its current footprint.

The company operates 118 luxury fitness and wellness clubs in 18 major markets across the U.S., Canada and the U.K.

The refinancing was backed by additional equity from existing investors Silver Lake, principals of Related Companies and Ares. Ares and Sixth Street, both existing lenders, took part in the debt portion of the deal. 

Equinox didn’t disclose the size of the equity infusion or the terms of the new debt.

Recent club openings have far exceeded projections, Equinox said, and the business is posting double-digit top-line growth, with membership, activity and check-ins at all-time highs. It noted rising consumer engagement across fitness, health, wellness and longevity, territory it has been pushing into in recent years.

Over the past two years, Equinox introduced Optimize, a $3,000-per-month longevity membership, and began working with at-home diagnostic testing platform Function Health to help trainers build programs around members’ health data.

Whitworth most recently ran Anheuser-Busch as CEO. He previously held a series of commercial leadership roles at the company, including chief sales officer, and before that held senior commercial roles at PepsiCo. He served as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps before entering the private sector and holds an economics degree from Bucknell University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. 

“Equinox is an extraordinary brand and business that has truly defined high-performance living for more than three decades, and I am honored to have the opportunity to lead the company into its next chapter of growth,” Whitworth said.

“People embrace Equinox in their daily lives and routines because of how it makes them feel and what it helps them achieve, and I take seriously the responsibility of upholding that standard of excellence and earning our members’ loyalty day in and day out,” he added.

Elsewhere in the Equinox orbit, the operator is set to open Equinox Terminal Warehouse on Nov. 10, a club inside a restored 1891 landmark in New York City’s West Chelsea neighborhood that marks the operator’s biggest move yet into Hyrox-style training and reformer Pilates.

The club features a 7,000-square-foot strength floor and team-based circuits with contrast therapy and group Pilates classes.

In New York City, where Equinox has a strong foothold, the desire for all things fitness and wellness has turned into a fight for prime real estate. The city’s two largest retail leases since April were gym deals: Chelsea Piers’ 76,000-square-foot Seaport location in Manhattan and Life Time’s 71,000-square-foot North Williamsburg club in Brooklyn. Equinox was among a small group that claimed four of the city’s 10 largest retail leases in 2025.