There must be times when Chris Sternberg misses the 18 years he spent working at Papa John’s International Inc., the pizza company, where he worked his way from assistant counsel to communications chief to general counsel. These days he’s a general counsel in an industry that seems to be fighting for its life against a veritable regulatory onslaught.
He works in the indoor tanning industry, where there are few in-house lawyers. He’s the general counsel of Sun Tan City, the second-largest chain in the country, with 280 salons as well as 25 Planet Fitness franchises. And he’s also the legal adviser to the industry’s trade group, the American Suntanning Association (ASA), which represents 1,000 of the 9,500 facilities that operate in the U.S. (with another 10,000 businesses such as day spas, hair salons and fitness clubs that offer tanning as an ancillary service). They’re all part of an industry with annual revenues of $2.9 billion, according to IBIS World.
