Anna Bjurstam, vice president of Spa & Wellness at Six Senses Hotels Resorts Spas and owner of Raison d'Etre, discussed spa retail revenue in an exclusive column for Spa Opportunities.

How to boost spa retail revenue, by Anna Bjurstam

What is the number one thing that almost all spas fail at? Retail sales. Why? We are not sales-focused people – instead we are therapists and service providers who often shy away from selling. Industry leaders have passed on the subject of poor sales revenue over the years and the results remain the same.

What do we do if we do not know how to swim and want to learn? We acquire the information needed to learn, decide on strategy and then train. In the spa world, we have yet to take that first step in acquiring the right information. This is why we are giving away anything from 5-30 per cent of our revenue.

There is a vast amount of information out there but there are basic steps as well as more advanced strategies to take to increase sales.

If we start with the basic plans to increase sales, they are about visual merchandising – to simply set up the retail area in a scientifically proven way to make it easy for the guest to take a purchasing decision. Roughly 90 per cent of spas today makes it incredibly complicated to allow guests to make a purchasing decision. However, I have seen some amazing turnarounds at spas I’ve worked on by just implementing adequate signage, grouping product categories together in one place and adding a volume table and a sales shelf. This can be a one-day job for two people – and a lot of fun.

The more difficult challenge is to get spa staff to start loving sales. At Raison d’Etre we have developed a course called “Engage & Enhance”, which teaches a strategy for sales that first involves genuinely engaging with the guest. Once staff have done this, they can readily encourage guests to buy products – thus the enhancement of sales figures is easy – as long as the client engagement is genuine.

Although we have learnt how to enhance the guest experience in a spa, this is not enough. Goals have to be set, daily performances of each staff member must be tracked and they must all engage and be willing to carry the strategy forward. I have seen a 100 per cent increase in retail sales in three months at spas adopting these measures.

If we want to be good at retail we need to do the work and we have yet to take the first step.