Rainer Schaller
Rainer Schaller | |
|---|---|
 Schaller in 2018 | |
| Born | 4 January 1969 |
| Died | 21 October 2022 (aged 53) |
| Occupation | Founder CEO of RSG Group GmbH |
| Partner | Christine Schikorsky |
| Children | 2 |
| Relatives | Gerd Schaller (brother) |
Rainer Schaller (4 January 1969 – 21 October 2022)[1] was a German entrepreneur. He was the Founder CEO of the RSG Group, which includes the McFit, John Reed Fitness and Gold's Gym fitness studios.[2] He hit headlines as a result of the disaster at the 2010 Love Parade in Duisburg, which he organized. On 21 October 2022, Schaller and his son Aaron died in a private plane crash in Costa Rica.[3][4]
Early life
Schaller grew up in Schlüsselfeld,[5] West Germany near Bamberg. His mother and grandfather worked in retail there.[6] The conductor and Anton Bruckner expert,[7] Gerd Schaller, is his brother.[8]
Business career
Retail
Schaller completed his training as a retail salesman in Schlüsselfeld.[5] He supplemented this with further training to become a business and retail specialist. At the age of 22, he took over his first Edeka supermarket, and shortly afterwards three more in his home region.[9]
Fitness industry
In 1997, he switched to the fitness industry and opened his first studio under the McFit brand in Würzburg, Germany.[9] He tapped into the discount segment of the market with this brand.[10] By mid-2006, McFit was operating 62 fitness studios in Germany with a combined 400,000 members and 1,000 permanent employees.[8] In 2011, McFit was considered the largest fitness studio operator in Europe, with more than 1 million members.[11][12] Schaller gradually diversified his business to reach different target groups.[13] In 2018, Schaller appointed Vito Scavo to oversee operational management of his holding company.[14] In August 2019, the McFit Global Group holding company was renamed RSG Group and encompasses twelve fitness chains (including McFit, John Reed Fitness, High 5).[15] In 2020, Schaller acquired Gold's Gym,[16] which was in bankruptcy (Chapter 11 proceedings) due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[17] 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.[18]
Love Parade
In 2006, Schaller became managing director of Lopavent,[19][8] which organized the Love Parade until 2010. The aim was to use the event to promote McFit's studios.[9] The Love Parade went off without incident, under Schaller's direction, for three years.[20][better source needed] In 2010, however, he came under fire[21][22] for the Love Parade disaster in Duisburg, which left 21 people dead and 652 injured.[23] Schaller testified as a witness in the court proceedings on the accident in 2018, accepted moral responsibility, but was not charged.[24]
Disappearance and death
On 21 October 2022, a Piaggio P.180 Avanti 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 near Limón, Costa Rica, while on a flight from Palenque, Mexico. The bodies of one adult and one child were recovered, but not initially identified.[25][26] On 4 November the remains of the two bodies were identified as those of Schaller and his son.[1]
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