<b>By Our City Staff

Greggs, the High Street baker feeding pasties, pies, sausage rolls and doughnuts to the nation, is to launch a chain of gyms for loyal customers.</b>

Management aim to open a gymnasium in every town and city, and will offer free membership to its most regular customers who need to fight the flab.


<br>
Greggs has often been accused of contributing to the national obesity epidemic by selling fatty snacks on an industrial scale to a greedy public.

But the firm will fight back with its new £200 million fitness push, which will be trialed with a gym in Ipswich this winter.

The first Greggs was opened in Newcastle in 1951, and now it boasts more than 1,500 outlets across Britain, targeting those with an aversion to salad and healthy foods.

The business is now looking at snapping up an unnamed fitness chain and rebranding it as Greggs Gyms.

<center><a href="http://www.suffolkgazette.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/greggs-fitness-e1470251127436.jpg"><img src="http://www.suffolkgazette.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/greggs-fitness-e1470251127436.jpg" alt="greggs gym fitness" width="800" height="600" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-4211" /></a><I>Pie in the sky: Greggs customers to get free gym membership</center></i><br><br>

A retail expert said: "This will be a great PR exercise for Greggs - and probably the only exercise that any of its customers have taken.

"But Greggs will be clever. It will offer free membership only to those whose new loyalty cards are filled up within a month period. And none of them will ever go to the gym, so it won't cost Greggs a penny."

Nobody from Greggs was available for comment, but insiders expect the share price to rise from tonight's 1,036 close when the Suffolk Gazette story is digested.

<a href="http://www.suffolkgazette.com/buy-us-a-beer/">Please support my running costs by clicking here and buying me a beer!</a>
[olimometer id=1]

<i>Join our vibrant social community by <a href="http://www.facebook.com/suffolkgazette">liking us on Facebook</a> or by <a href="http://www.twitter.com/suffolkgazette">following us on Twitter</a>. Or both!</i>