Clients were in shock Wednesday learning that Jim Miller’s longtime Parksville gym, ‘Jim’s Gym’, has closed for good.
According to Miller, repeated closures due to COVID-19 restrictions in B.C., have hit the one-time Olympic wrestler so hard, he can’t get back up.
“I feel sad. Basically heartbroken to be leaving and I wish it wasn’t this way but it is,” said Jim Miller, Owner of Jim’s Gym.
“Little places like Jim’s Gym, they take the brunt of it,” said a longtime client of Jim’s Gym, Kent Wood.
Miller said the financial losses for the 12-year-old gym were too much. Despite gyms and yoga studios preparing to re-open on Thursday after a fourth shutdown in two years, he said the uncertainty is still huge.
“I sort of thought that next week it will be better, next month it will be better and now I’m not so confident that it’s going to be better anytime soon,” said Miller.
Shelley D’Amico, owner of Namaskar Yoga in Parksville, said she had considered closing too — so the closer of Jim’s hit close to home.
“I’m devastated for them. I’m so sad. There have been a lot of times I’ve thought this is it, and even God forbid if there’s another shutdown, I don’t think I’d be able to survive that,” said D’Amico.
“I feel sorry for them because we are kind of going through the same thing,” said Dale Nagra, owner of Parksville’s Bodyworks Fitness.
Nagra had gyms in both Parksville and Qualicum Beach going into the pandemic but shuddered his Qualicum Beach location last year for good.
“We thought we can’t just keep taking losses there so we shut that one down,” said Nagra.
Skye Ryan
