The value of growing and making your own spa products

Making your own products for your own treatments might seem a daunting task but it is perhaps the best test of passion for service through the healing arts and commitment to environmental and social responsibility. 

In the Vision Spa Retreat model these together make a venture both 'soulful and sustainable'.

This is the positive challenge that I believe Nicolay Kreidler's concept of 'eco-centric spa treatments' presents. It gives the  innovative spa a number of potential advantages by encouraging a constantly evolving, interactive, and responsive way of doing business.

• independence - a business that is not beholden to the proforma products and protocols of common, large, and non-local vendors

• interdependence and community support - a business motivated to use local sources for product ingredients or product suppliers

In marketing lingo, this also offers:

• A unique selling proposition - product lines and services that cannot be found anywhere else or be copied

• Variety of revenue streams - inevitable when a spa is fully involved in determining the source or creation of products and services

• Up-selling opportunities - inspiration to increase revenue by offering new and interesting add-ons to enhance treatments

The key is to appreciate and promote the value of providing a service that is utterly appropriate to it's context (i.e. region authentic). This would mean taking into consideration and highlighting to advantage: geographic location, specific client needs, seasonal variations, local availability, and local culture.

The incongruities of a Japanese-style spa in a Midwestern town, a coconut-papaya wrap offered on a snowy day in the mountains, simulated dawn chorus accompanying an airport chair massage, and so on, may simply distract us from the unique possibilities inherent in our actual contexts and personal preferences.

Not that it is not fun to dream and play by providing alternative realities but I'd like to suggest that you miss a great opportunity to celebrate and support your own heritage or interests while you are busy following fashions and fads imposed from the outside. 

If you adore all things Hawaiian you might just be able to carry that off far from the tropics; if you've spent years in India studying yoga and ayurveda the same is possible; but wherever you are and whatever you do, it is most likely to succeed if you can make it your own and bring your heart and soul to it.

A spa that encourages staff to be and do what they love will not only keep them engaged and interested but will also pass on that energy to the customers.  This requires a shift in approach that cannot help but encourage  responsibility, integrity and authenticity - not just as words but as real actions. 

A spa like this would be:

• creative and responsive - thriving on involvement and innovation in continuous consultation with clients and staff

• passionate and innovative - never formulaic but exploring possibilities and expanding knowledge on an ongoing basis

When you endeavor to keep things as local as possible, this inevitably affects sustainability factors by:

• reducing packaging

• reducing large-scale processing

• reducing preservation needs (shelf-life)

• reducing transportation costs

• reducing uncertainty about what goes into your treatments

To be sure, this approach does not serve those vendors who are invested in capturing a market based on media-campaigns to promote national and international trends.  But good quality specialized products could always be included, and those who supply good quality bulk ingredients will also always be needed.

Sensara recognizes this when they say they aim to create 'products perfectly aligned to the client's vision, mission and values, as well as any global, regional or local brand, competitive, concept, cultural, image, marketing, merchandizing or therapeutic considerations.'

The 10 LOHAS marketing trends for 2009 identified by the Natural Marketing Institute (NMI) are an unsurprising good fit to the sustainable spa sector.  LOHAS consumers - a marketing sector named for people seeking 'life-styles of health and sustainability - according to NMI are now interested in:

1.small steps, big changes - sustainable, moderate, consistent, practical

2.shifting from isolation to affiliation - shared community living models

3.being here now - ecotourism, slow cooking, experiential consumption

4.acknowledging that everything is connected - fusion of personal and planetary perspectives

5.cleaning up - detoxification programs for personal health, non-toxic products

6.inclusivity - what was once alternative is now becoming integrated or commonplace

7.root causes - not just evaluating consequences or treating symptoms but looking for deeper sources of malaise

8.beauty - no longer contrived but transparent, timeless, authentic

9.energy 2.0 - conservation of personal and planetary energy resources

10.heirlooms - buy less to buy better - artisanal, traditional

Typically, LOHAS consumers are not taken in by false advertizing; they ask searching and demanding questions about their purchases or products or services.  The end-point seller (in this case, spa) will need to be able to answer them.  When it comes to body care products, at the very least, they want to know if they:

• do what they claim to do

• are made from truly safe ingredients

• come in recyclable packaging

• were produced through non-pollutive and resource conservative means

• have if necessary been tested for safety without harm to animals

• were made by workers who were fairly compensated and well treated.

There is kudos to be gained from meeting some or all of these criteria and the ability to prove it is becoming even more of a requirement for body care product makers who enter this market. A look at organic life-style advertising media (say Organic Spa Magazine) will reveal some of the contenders. 

If you are the owner of a spa (especially a small spa with local focus) and have introduced ideas like those described above, or wish to, I invite you to contact me with your story for possible feature on this website. You'll find an email contact below or in the left-hand side bar.

In the next of this series of six related posts, I summarize the problems of certification of body care products.

Natural, organic? Spa products under scrutiny

In the post after that, find some ideas for the actual process of making your own.

How to make your own 'soulful and sustainable' spa products on site.

For the previous three posts  in this series on spa products and the powerful potential they have for enabling sustainable spa culture see:

Spa treatment menus: authenticity and audacity
Eco-spa-chefs: cooking up a better future for organic spa products
Savvy and creative spas who grow their own spa products