HELSINKI, FINLAND -- Fitness sales (home and commercial) for Amer Sports Oyj, the parent company of Precor, were EUR52.6 million ($73.7 million) for the third quarter 2010, a 7 percent increase from the same time last year.

For the Americas region, fitness sales were EUR35.3 million ($49.5 million) in third quarter 2010, an increase of 1 percent from the same period a year ago. Despite the improvement, sales were still lower than the EUR55 million ($77 million) the company had in third quarter 2008.

For the year to date, sales for Amer Sport’s fitness group was EUR145.2 million ($203.5 million), an increase of 4 percent for the same period last year when sales were EUR135.2 million ($189.5 million). Sales in the Americas for year to date actually dropped 1 percent to EUR100.6 million ($141 million).

“Commercial business tends to be up in all regions,” Heikki Takala, president and CEO of Amer Sports, said about the fitness part of Amer’s business during a conference call last week with analysts. “However, the premium equipment home sales, consumer sales continues to be slow and sluggish.”

When asked whether the confidence of institutional fitness customers had increased, Takala said that he has now seen a couple of quarters with stable sales and a slight improvement.

“The confidence is returning little by little, but we can say that it’s still not at a reliable level where we can see that it’s clearly picking up,” he said. “That’s why I was quoting some volatility is likely to continue. However, we do believe…the bottom has been reached, and we expect stable market conditions.”

Overall for Amer Sports, net sales were up 5 percent over a year ago. Amer Sports owns the Salomon, Wilson Atomic, Suunto, Mavic and Arcteryx brands in addition to Precor.

(Editor’s note: Conversion of euros to U.S. dollars was based on the currency rate as of Nov. 2, 2010.)

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