Is it time for a spa menu refresh? A guide to crafting a new spa menu that pleases your customers and boosts your bottom line.
New year new spa menu? Absolutely!
As the calendar flips to a new year, many spa and wellness businesses are considering ways to refresh and revitalize their offerings and service menus.
From analyzing your current performance to revamping your services and effectively marketing your new offerings, here’s a step-by-step guide for crafting a spa menu that pleases your customers and boosts your bottom line.
First, take a dive deep into your data
A key ingredient in this transformation is your data. Understanding your business’s performance through data analysis is an important element of creating something that works. If you’re using a good spa and ancillary revenue software, you should have access to a lot of data about your business that can tell you everything you need to know to improve operations and customer satisfaction with a new spa menu.
For example, which treatments and services are bringing in the most revenue? Which ones are bringing in the least? To whom do these offerings appeal by customer segment? Are certain groups going for some treatments and not others? Which group spends the most and at what time of day/month/year?
Look at your inventory data to see which products are selling the most and which are selling the least. Are the best-selling products associated with the best selling treatments and are there products that sell well but are not particularly well spotlighted in treatments and services? Who is buying these products and how could you highlight them even more.
Look at the profit margins and returns on investment. Are there some treatments that are costing significantly more to perform than they are bringing in?
Next, reduce, reposition & reinvent
Once you know what is selling, it’s time to move things around and decide what to cut, what to reposition, and what to create for your menu to reinvent it. Ask yourself if there are customer segments that are underspending and how you can appeal more to those groups, as well as what you can add to appeal to your biggest spenders.
How can you move menu items and products that are not selling? For example, could a treatment that isn’t selling be repositioned with different wording, a new way of highlighting the benefits, or the addition of a different product? Could it be positioned for a particular audience, like locals, business people, or people of a particular age group? Create add-on and upsell options with the products people aren’t buying. Before you start discounting unsold stock, elevate it. Offer hand massage, foot scrub, and mini facials using the oils, scrubs and serums that aren’t moving as upsells to existing treatments. Add a glass of sparkling wine and you have a nice little bonus offering. Incorporate a muscle balm as an upsell to a massage that adds no extra time to the treatment.
Create packages and bundles with unsold stock, and give them away as gifts for loyalty program members or for customer special occasions like birthdays. Including an item as a gift with another purchase may increase interest in that item once people try it. Discounting should be a last resort as this can devalue a brand.
Remove the treatments that aren’t selling, that can’t be repositioned, or that you have already tried repackaging in the past from the menu.
Create new menu items based on industry trends and developments and the ideas that you’re excited about. Don’t cram the menu. Shorter menus of items that your service providers excel at are better than longer ones, and it’s easier for guests to choose from 10 items than it is to choose from 50. And enough add-on and upsell options can make for an extensive menu based on your key products and services.
Now market your new menu
Send out messages to your customer base about your new menu and promote it on social media. Consider inviting your loyalty members and best customers to an event showcasing new items. Offer mini versions of new treatments and services and samples of products over snacks and tea or wine, and send guests home with a swag bag of that product that didn’t sell! Get people excited. And don’t forget to train your staff on the new services and products.
If you’re excited about your new menu, people will feel that and get excited with you. Have fun and get creative.
Spa Executive is published by Book4Time, the leader in guest management, revenue and mobile solutions for the most exclusive spas, hotels, and resorts around the globe. Learn more at book4time.com.