What? Brand the spa interior?  What does that mean?  Well, don’t look at me, I didn’t know either until after Rome was built.  You see, first you create the brand in your head, your brand has a heart, it has emotions, it has color, your brand has all the feelings and emotions you want your spa guest to experience–both intangible and tangible. 

• Spend hours with magazines, books, and the internet looking at interiors.
• Look at colors, designs, and feelings that emote your brand. 
• Visit other spas and visit hotels, especially boutique hotels.
• Start files of information of your likes and your loves.
• Then pretend you are at the front door of your spa, walking in the door.
• Take your plans and slowly walk from room to room-What do you see? How do you feel?

The next step involves sitting for days and days with your interior designer.  And if they are not a spa interior designer, they need to have experience with a similar type structure–preferably commercial.  Building a spa is such a unique structure that not just any interior designer can know the right questions to ask.  Your interior designer can guide you through the colors, the feel, the space concepts and branding the spa interior.  The interior needs the same branding as the brochure, the bags, the uniforms—it is all one spa experience from the treatment to the walls. 

What is your spa brand?  What are your spa colors?  If your spa had a name, what would it be?  If your spa had one emotion, what would that emotion be?  By starting to answer questions, you start to plan and brand your spa interior.

You have started to envision your over the top spa with all of the water features, when you start to ponder the locker room.  You start an amenity list like the one below, but it keeps going and going and going.  Unless you have built a spa before, the locker room area is where you need to attach yourself to fabulous spa consultant that knows what they are doing.

PARTIAL LIST OF LOCKER ROOM AMENITIES

Free-standing (on counter) soap dispensers

Sufficient space for clean/soiled linen; refuse disposal

Finishes to be durable, natural materials that are easily cleaned

Women’s- Body Lotion, Mouthwash w/cups, cotton balls, swabs,

hand soap, sealed brushes, combs in sanitizing solution, Makeup

remover, tissues, trash receptacle

Other:

Wall mirror

Wall lights

Faucets (on sensors)

Soap dispensers (on sensors)

Amenity trays for cleansers

Consumables: razor, shaving gel, q tips, tooth brush, tooth paste,

mouth wash, paper cups

Trash bins

Tissue dispensers

The locker room area is where your clients can see the dirt, the housekeeping, the attention to detail, the defects, the surprises, the down and dirty.  The locker area requires an expert, because if one thing is not done correctly, your spa will not recover from this defect.  Why, you ask?  Because, think of the time that the client spends in the locker room.  Think of all the things that they have to break.  Think of the baseboards to clean.  Think of the mold in the steam room.  Think of the slippage in the water area.  Did the drain slant the right way? Is water pouring out of the shower?  Did they order clear glass for the shower doors instead of opaque?  What brand of steam generator do you purchase and why?  Are the fixtures commercial?  Is there a place for towels? 

The amenity list for the locker area is so endless that you need an expert to guide you through the process.  Don’t wait another second–it will be the best money you have ever spent.  Need a recommendation?