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Innovation


panel, opportunity


to


Hemingway, a recurrent major


in


celebrity topic was mental


Mariel spas’


wellness,


given that in places like America, 50% of people suffer from stress and one in eight from depression. And with the “science of happiness” an increasingly hot, global topic (happy people are proven to have better physical health, earn more, etc.).


A presentation on the latest in brain science also suggested that spas could become places where creativity best gets done, given that stress is the #1 threat to the brain’s “innovative learned


that


thinking” a


center. combination of


Delegates stress-


reduction and mindfulness approaches can actually “re-wire” clients’ brains and create peak performance thinking conditions. (So, if spas have been perceived as places of escape from work/thinking, a new opportunity to reimagine them as creativity/thinking “labs” arises.)


Wellness “diabesity” Coaching: pandemic, Given the traditional


global health


education is clearly not working, while medical studies show coaching is the superior model to elicit long-term behavioral change. While there are already roughly 100,000 coaches in the U.S., the profession worldwide remains at the early, chaotic stage. Integrating wellness coaching represents a major, logical industry opportunity, but spas need to rewire their traditionally short-term thinking - to focus on long-term client results and programs.


Employee Wellness: With employer-provided healthcare costs


spiraling out of control


(in the U.S. they will double in ten years), and hundreds of studies showing employee wellness programs reduce costs and boost productivity, two in three larger businesses worldwide have now embraced a formal


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employee wellness strategy. And with stress- reduction the #1 employer goal worldwide, spas are a very natural “fit” for the workplace wellness industry.


Technology, Gadgets & Gaming: New


technologies, and the industry opportunities they present, were a major topic:


from


Google’s head of retail explaining that spas need to better embrace all the spawning, cheap,


easy customer-communications


technologies available, whether incentivizing people to “check-in” at places like Facebook or of


foursquare; facilities,


creating YouTube treatments and products;


videos or


ensuring easy online booking. Opportunities in the new worlds of wellness gaming and gadgets (biometric monitoring devices to mobile apps), and in other new online spa- client engagement platforms that forge more ongoing, supportive connections, were also a hot topic.


Empowering Willpower: The latest from the willpower science was presented, revealing that a) willpower is a limited brain resource (like a muscle that gets fatigued) b) creating habits


works best c) tackling multiple


behavior changes too fast leads to failure, and d) glucose is critical for the brain to exercise self-control - severely questioning “crash,” short-window lifestyle change or dieting models. Spas have a new opportunity to square their


regime-changing programs


with self-control to become the place where truly sustainable health changes and weight loss get accomplished.


Reaching Younger People: Numerous medical experts argued that the industry needs to focus far more on children, and reach people far younger, given that lifestyle behaviors (diet, exercise) begin cementing by age 2, and a global childhood obesity surge is


underway (there are 155 million overweight (and 45 million obese) children worldwide. Community: Medical experts also explained how, despite (or perhaps because of) our “wired” world, people are suffering


from


loneliness at unprecedented rates, and that isolation is a disease that can lead to serious health problems and early mortality. Spas have a major, natural opportunity (as trusted places of “touch”) to address this problem creatively.


Dr. Joseph Hutter, a Fellow at Intermountain Healthcare and a panelist on the Aspen Institute session, summed up many of these industry ways: “Spas have got to stop selling a checklist of isolated services, and start offering a total way to live. And when they become more complete and accessible wellness advocates, educators and providers, this industry could go from being mere enclaves, to beachheads of innovation.”


New Research: With last year’s delegate poll revealing that “training/education” was the industry’s #1 obstacle to growth, for 2012 the GSWS sponsored SRI International’s “Spa Management Workforce and Education: Addressing Market Gaps.”


It was the key


piece of research unveiled this year, and the findings represent a real industry wake-up call.


95% of industry leaders face challenges in hiring spa managers/directors with the right qualifications.


While there are 130,000-180,000 global


spa managers today, there are only 4,000 students currently enrolled in some form of spa management education program.


www.globalspaandwellnesssummit.org 29


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