Spa Trend #1: The New “P” Word

By Susie Ellis, SpaFinder Insider. While our SpaFinder 2010 Top Ten Spa Trends List has been published and can be accessed in our newsroom, I haven’t yet had a chance to share some of the “behind-the-scenes” information and photos. So here we go.

Goodbye, pampering. Hello, prevention. Well, not so fast. It’s more like, move over, pampering; hello, prevention. Against the backdrop of a global health care crisis, prevention is poised to be the new “it” word of the spa industry in 2010 and beyond. But rather than replacing established industry concepts like pampering and wellness, it’s a sharp (and smart) refocusing of the conversation. Pampering, after all, speaks to the goal of most spa-goers of stress reduction and relaxation, and that in itself is preventive. Prevention has moved front and center on the world health stage, and the spa industry’s role in prevention-focused health regimes will be greatly emphasized and more forcefully promoted in 2010. For years, of course, spas have been “doing” prevention; i.e., focusing on exercise, nutrition, stress reduction and Eastern stay-well medical paradigms like Traditional Chinese Medicine or Ayurveda, years before new, cutting-edge hospitals unleashed “integrative health centers,” interweaving traditional medicine with many of these established spa approaches.

A global spotlight exposing how expensive, inefficient, and unsustainable the “wait-to-get-sick” health care model really is—new evidence that stress contributes directly to 80 percent of all disease—along with mounting evidence that the cornerstones of the modern spa industry are medically proven to forestall illness and promote longevity, are driving this trend. (And within the spa industry, the old, oft-maligned “P” word, pampering, will actually play a key role in the prevention focus, as basic relaxation and de-stressing are now known to have such a powerful impact on people’s health.)

Watch for the words prevent and prevention to be used more frequently. Examples already include Germany’s Brenner’s Park-Hotel Medical Spa’s PREVENT program, combining comprehensive examinations with personalized therapies, nutrition, and fitness, and the Pritikin Longevity Center and Spa (recently relocated to Miami, Florida), which for the first time will be covered by Medicare in 2010.

The analogous trend on the beauty front is the ever more intense focus on anti-aging treatments: a continued explosion of treatments, diets, and products (of course, sunscreen) that get aggressive early to prevent problems and avoid costly, invasive actions after the fact.

Had an interesting conversation a few days ago with Dr. Daniel Friedland a champion and author of a book on Evidence Based Medicine. He told me that recent research has shown that the first step people need to take before they can expect to have any success with lifestyle changes often promoted by their doctors is….stress reduction. Spas? The number one reason people go to spas is to relax and de-stress. So we really, truly are step #1!

** Follow me on Twitter http://twitter.com/susieellis ** If you wish to be put on a list that automatically sends my blog posts to your email, just let dulcy.gregory@spafinder.com know and she will add you to that list. Thanks so much!

My twitter address: @susieellis