One factor that's not really understood in the fitness equipment industry is the importance of patents and intellectual property.
It shows up all over the place, though. Mostly in strength equipment and elliptical machines, though everywhere to a lesser degree. There *are* dumbbell patents. It's also becoming more prevalent in the world of connected Fitness.
And this is one of the big differences between the lower end/online brands and the real commercial brands that you see in gyms. A good example is that most companies that make multi-gyms are residential companies. Hoist Fitness, somebody I've worked with for 28 years, has been a commercial strength manufacturer since the 1980s. And because they make commercial equipment, they've been smart enough to
patent a lot of their biomechanical advantages. This means even when you're buying their multi gym, you still have access to many of these patents, newer and residential and especially online companies don't have access to.
This is also why I often have to tell people that when they're looking at an elliptical machine, one of the differences between this type of workout and most other cardio modalities is that due to the way the way patents work, there are whole whole varieties of non-impact gate simulators that can only be found at the commercial level. The Arc trainer, the lateral x, the Octane xt1, these are all bound by patents and are literally not made at any level except the commercial level. So you can't get the best machines at the lower level, or especially the online level.
Heck, Life Fitness spent $190 million on Cybex, and they're pretty much only using the arc trainer patent.
This is also why the brands that make commercial equipment normally make better residential equipment. In any category, if a brand is prevalent in the gym, even their residential equipment will normally be better and more advanced than the residential-only brands.
Joe-bob's imported look-alike multitrainer that you buy online is very different than the one you are getting from a local dealer.
So while a medicine ball is a medicine ball, and a slam ball is a slamball, this is not true for all fitness equipment. And it's why you should talk to your local expert about any equipment and about the different patents that are being used.