There are many ways to succeed in today’s spa business. Taking unnecessary risks isn’t one of them By Vivienne O’Keeffe I recently heard about a day spa owner planning to put a new $95,000 laser treatment machine into service mere days after a brief training program and taking delivery of it. Shaken by the obvious perils of inexperienced technicians zapping spa guests with advanced targeted devices, and having written and spoken...

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Spa customers want experiences that are both customized and predictable. A quality management system can help you deliver both By Vivienne O’Keeffe Imagine a situation where a guy walks into a hair salon for a cut. He is welcomed with a steaming cup of his favourite beverage – a double double cappuccino – and along with an excellent cut, gets a complimentary head massage. Delighted, he tells all his friends about this wonderful salon and almost...

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The key to the customer experience is supporting your employees and sharing your vision By Vivienne O’Keeffe   It was every spa’s nightmare: a client suffering a medical emergency. As bad as the experience was for the customer felled by a seizure, it was certainly no picnic for the staff caught in a haze of frenzied interactions between paramedics and the client’s family. I don’t mean to diminish the harm caused by any physical impairment. But...

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Spa, heal thyself. We’re great at getting toxins out of our clients. Now let’s get them out of our workplaces. By Vivienne O’Keeffe You’d think an industry singularly focused on helping people survive the deleterious effects of modern living would itself be a model of health and harmony. Instead, factors including increased demand, stress, fatigue and exhaustion are eating at the heart of many of today’s spas – and doing so at a time when the...

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Smart companies are using new insights into neurological connectivity to market health and beauty products. Luckily, spas have a built-in advantage. By Vivienne O’Keeffe When he started his wine store in Ireland some 50 years ago, my dad knew all about neurological connectivity. Of course he never called it that because the term didn’t exist. What he did was greet his customers by name, shake their hand or pat their back, and hold the...

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If the 2017 Global Wellness Summit was any indication, we’re finally catching on. By Vivienne O’Keeffe   Freedom from preventable disease Feeling victimized by the pervasive bad news and constant chirping that seem to characterize life today? It’s hard not to be. But after coming away from the annual Summit of the Global Wellness Institute (GWI) in Palm Beach, Florida – and its theme of disease prevention – my battered outlook has...

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