The énergie Group is to extend its crowdfunding push after the company was asked to present at a Crowdcube investment event.

The franchise gym chain shot past its £500,000 target on Crowdcube in the middle of May and decided to overfund up to the original deadline of 31 May. Now past the £565,000 mark, énergie has announced that the closing date for investors has been pushed back to midnight on 12 June.

énergie Group chair and CEO Jan Spaticchia said: “We have been asked by the team at Crowdcube to present at their investment event on 9 June and as a consequence of this, together with the significant number of business plan requests we have received over the last 48 hours, we have agreed to keep the campaign open until midnight on 12 June.”

The gym chain, which has 93 fitness clubs trading across the UK and Europe, was swamped with interest from investors eager to grab a slice of the 3.23 per cent equity originally on offer against a company valuation of £15m. Further equity has since been released to enable the overfund.

The fund was driven by a number of high-profile investors, chief among these being serial entrepreneur Lara Morgan, who bought a £100,000 stake in the business. Morgan, who founded toiletries distributor Pacific Direct before later selling her majority stake for £20m, is an avid triathlete with a passion for fitness.

Besides Morgan, énergie is understood to have attracted investment from a number of high profile leisure industry figures, including former ukactive CEO David Stalker. The high-profile industry endorsements came just weeks after it was announced that original énergie investor and leisure grandee Steve Philpott had joined the company’s board. Philpott and the rest of the énergie board, including Spaticchia, have all reinvested via the Crowdcube listing.