CHANHASSEN, MN — When financial analysts are praising you over the phone, you know your company is having a good quarter.

That's what happened during last month's financial earnings call for Life Time Fitness, when as many as four analysts said either “nice job” or “congratulations” to Life Time CEO Bahram Akradi and Life Time CFO Mike Robinson during the call's question-and-answer period.

Judging by Life Time's first quarter 2010 results, the Chanhassen, MN-based company had every reason to field compliments. Life Time grew its revenue 6.5 percent to $219.8 million in first quarter 2010 compared to $206.4 million in first quarter 2009. Life Time had $17.8 million net income in first quarter 2010 compared to $15.1 million in first quarter 2009, a 15.2 percent increase.

More good news came in the form of Life Time's attrition rate, which was 8.5 percent in first quarter 2010 compared to 9.8 percent in first quarter 2009. Trailing 12-month attrition through March 31, 2010, improved to 39.3 percent. For the year ending Dec. 31, 2009, attrition was 40.6 percent.

Memberships grew 2.3 percent to 613,882 on March 31, 2010, compared to 599,919 on March 31, 2009.

“In the last year and a half, it seems like we all here have probably worked harder than ever before to achieve the modest numbers that we are getting,” Akradi said during the call, “but we believe we can continue to do this, and we wanted to prove we can get these members and maintain them when unemployment is still persisting around 10 percent. I don't want to get carried away in thinking we can do this all the time, but right now, we're feeling bullish, and we are going to continue to do more of the things we've done so that we can bulldozer through.”

From the beginning of the year to late April, shares of Life Time stock increased by nearly 40 percent.

During the first quarter, Life Time opened two new clubs, one in January in the Cleveland suburb of Beachwood, OH, and the other in March in the Kansas City, MO, suburb of Lenexa, KS. Life Time also opened a Pilates, yoga and personal training boutique in February in Scottsdale, AZ.

Life Time plans to add another boutique center during the third quarter in Minneapolis and will open its third club of the year during the fourth quarter in the Denver suburb of Centennial, CO.

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