The city of Bath has not been immune from the recession as UK unemployment recently soared to over 2 million in the first time since 1997. One of Baths key businesses – tourism on which the local hotel industry is dependent fared best in England in terms of England according to a recent survey of 18 locations in total. Although revenue per room fell by approximately 6%, occupancy rates remained at over 66%. This is thought to have been supported by the fact that more British holiday makers took short breaks or holidays in and around Bath rather than going abroad.
In such economic times the recession has had an impact on us all, whether it has been from an employment to savings, we have all seen the impact of the catastrophe of the financial market, through its naive investments in the American sub-prime housing market, and a question we are all asking is who ruined Britain?
The University of Bath has a long established tradition of strong links with industry, with global businesses such as motor manufacturers placing important research with the university. Approximately 140 companies work with the university helping lead key research to help generate jobs both locally and globally, with successful spin-out companies being a key success. Also over a 1000 organisations take students on their year long placement which forms a component of the 4 year degree course.
With over a hundred 100 pubs and bars in the city looking after the cities million visitors a year, their business is key to the local economy. While there has been some evidence of promotions on both drinks and food, most of the cities well established venues have not suffered the scale of downturn that they feared. While there have been pub closures these have been primarily outside the city centre. With a weak pound and stronger euro and dollar Bath licencees are keen to catch the year round tourist trade.
The recession has also delayed the 43 acre Western Riverside development, a major regeneration project which is to comprise of over 2000 homes, and also offices. The development will provide a major influx of much needed jobs in the construction sector and the local economy as the developer is still committed to moving the project forward.
Investment continues in Bath with the recently opened new bus station which is the first part of the £360 million pound Southgate development which will transform the southern area of Bath, formerly occupied by the old dairy and engineering buildings and the old Southgate centre. There will also be a multimillion pound investment in improving the railway station to create a transport interchange. Incorporating parking for up to 860 cars the development with its mixed usage, retail, leisure and housing is anticipated to provide approximately 400 jobs during construction and approximately 1000 jobs when all six phases are complete. The purpose of phasing the development is to minimise disruption, and it also allows the utilisation of the phase when complete.
With the announcement that the London to Bath railway line will be electrified it is believed that this will greatly improve access to Bath for both commuters and tourists alike. The new trains will be faster allowing easier access to both London and South Wales, and it is hoped that this will encourage more businesses to consider Bath as a prime business location with excellent facilities and a well educated workforce.
One area where companies are faring better is in the small to medium size private companies, who can control their finances and have the flexibility to make changes to accommodate the current financial climate, providing they are not solely reliant on bank funding which is still proving hard to come by for many small companies.
More and more people are increasingly looking online for job opportunities online such as activbath and even the possibility of working for themselves, there are an array of new opportunities out there just waiting to be explored and many can be achieved for very little investment.
Although there are many positive business factors immanent in Bath, a turnaround from the current recession, will still take some time, possibly a couple of years, but hopefully with the 2012 Olympics to be held not far away in London, this should bring the city a well needed boost to the economy with many global visitors wishing to visit this historic city of European heritage status.

These days, there are plenty of good day spas thriving in the world. Because people are more familiar and more particular about overall relaxation integrated with beauty treatments, day spas have truly come of age. So fast has been the emergence of the spa industry that currently, there is a new trend on the rise.
Mobile spas are starting to proliferate and operate actively in most markets. Conceptualized and developed on the principle that clients are more at home and comfortable having spa services provided right at the coziness and privacy of home, mobile spas are truly patronized well. In fact, mobile spas are most in-demand in busy markets across the United States, Canada, Australia, and Europe.
Clients are ultimately enjoying and taking advantage of mobile spas. For them, day spas that are brought to the comfort of their own homes are really a pleasure. No wonder, mobile spas have been welcomed by the market with warm and amiably open arms.
If you are an entrepreneur and you want to enter into the day spa business, or if you are already into spa operations, you should consider getting into the mobile spa business. Because clients are raving about the idea and the concept, you can always be sure you will have a huge demand for your spa services. There are other logical and appealing reasons why you should take your spa business right to the doorsteps of clients.
* Mobile spas require little cost. Because you will not pay higher rents for business sites and establishments, you will not incur much for operating expenses. Utility bills, maintenance, premium-rate insurance, and business tax implementations can be waived or at least significantly minimized.
* There is much flexibility and freedom. You will work on your own schedule and not be boxed within set hours and enclosed areas. There is an ongoing excitement everyday because routines are broken down. Everyday, you could take your business to different places.
* The business income could become unlimited. Because your mobile spa is your business, your efforts will dictate your profitability. In other words, your earnings and revenue potential can be limitless, depending on the number of calls and service orders you receive.
* Business risks can be somehow limited. Your mobile spa can be a part-time business if you like to retain your present job for security purposes. Once you establish your clientele and have your own niche and a bunch of loyal patrons, you can decide whether you will like to go full time or maintain the part-time status.
* You can realize several tax advantages by claiming legal business expenses from your gross income. Thus, your supplies, vehicle expenditures, and home office supplies can be declared as official business expenses.
* Lastly, there is a potential for total career satisfaction. When you get into the mobile spa business, you are outright building a business based more on your level of efforts, skills, and expertise. Try putting up and operating a mobile day spa and experience for yourself why many clients and entrepreneurs are all getting more into it.

I will be taking you on a journey to start your own Home- based day spa business. I have been doing this research for a year and 6 months. We are now operating a home-based day spa and mobile day spa. I will be glad to direct you and answer any questions you may have in being successful.

Contact your Chamber of Commerce and your zoning regarding any licenses you may need to conduct business in your home.

Register in a beauty course to get your license. If you want to offer Massage Therapy services it will take about 6 months to complete the program and if you want to offer skin care and nails, there is a program called Full Specialist and it’s about another 6 months. Once you have your licenses I can guide you on starting and running your successful business.

*Write a business plan…yes you will need it!Guess what???

*Sign up to American Day Spa Magazine, Massagemag.com, Massage journal.

Set up your office: Fax Machine, Scanner, Printer and Computer or your laptop. Have an external drive to back up your file.

*Call a few skin care company to get FREE samples from them. Tips— You can use those Free samples on your client and don’t have to invest any money on product until your business starts working. Try ASTARA, DERMALOGICA, Darphin, BIOELEMENTS, BIOFREEZE, glymedplus.

NB: You will need your license to receive Free samples from those companies!!

Let’s get started!1-Start a blog for free (blogger.com)2-Open a Facebook, twitter,myspace Account. Add people from the same industry as you and you can copy on what they are doing. 3-Think about a name for your business and what kind of services you’d like to provide4-Make some Free business cards on (vistaprint.com) you only have to pay for shipping.5- Think about your niche. Who are you going to target for your day spa? Find @ least 3 NICHE.

ADVERTISE!!!!! on yahoo local, google local, yelp, facebook, twitter, myspace. Write an article on articlesbase, Offer your services to local hospital, nursing homes, hotels. Drop your business cards wherever you go, church, grocery shopping, school, dental clinic. Write a column in your local newspaper on some beauty or wellness tips for free advertisement and you will become an expert to your community. Host some free spa parties to get known by your community. Please don’t just hand your business card, it does not work. Make sure you take their contact information. Volunteer at your church, promote your business in their weekly flyer.

Starting Budget around $500Do not spend more than that. Wait until you have clients, then you can start adding some more equipments/ product. You will need: Massage Table, Sterilizer, Massage Oil, Steamer, Magnifying glasses, sheets, an old pillow to use as a bolster, candles, Relaxation CD, Alcohol, Waxing supplies, Basalt Stones, Sponges, Nail polish, Skin care products (Cleanser, exfoliant, toner, Hand Sanitizer, mask, moisturizer)You can use witch hazel instead of toner. Aromatherapy oils can be purchased at GNC. If you are offering Manicure and Pedicure you will need a Nail care station.

You are ready to get started. Start telling people about your business. Go with the Flow! Be patient!

PS: Don’t leave you day time job yet and don’t let any strange in your house if you are home alone.

Purchasing a sample or template for your day spa business plan can be extremely valuable, but only if there is a well-done and customizable financial model spreadsheet that comes with it. To know if the financial model youâ??re working with makes the cut, look for the following elements. Multiple Revenue StreamsAs the years go by, you may expect to move customer from one service to another (for example, increasingly sell massages, while at first customers only purchased facial treatments). To do this, the financial model must let you play with multiple revenue streams by letting you choose as many as possible and alter the sales mix between them over time. Automated Financial StatementsThe financial statements themselves require some accounting knowledge to put together, and the model should not require you to create them from scratch or even have to adjust them much at all. A well-made financial model will let you make adjustments on worksheets about your assumptions of costs, revenues, and debt and equity you will raise, and then populate the income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement automatically. For a model to be robust it must allow for a change made in one place to automatically effect all the other sheets and statements.Startup CostsThe model should give you the opportunity to lay out the startup costs you have identified, such as for your furniture, booths, sinks, supplies, inventory, and improvements to the location itself (leasehold improvements). The model should know which costs are depreciated over time and which must be expensed at the time they are incurred, so that you donâ??t have to learn this on your own or set up your own depreciation schedule. Debt or Equity Finally, the model should let you choose whether you will fund your day spa through debt (loans) or equity (stockholder investment). It should allow you to choose interest rates, a repayment schedule, and use a combination of both debt and equity if you choose. This should serve the purposes of most day spa entrepreneurs without complicated customization.

Creating a business plan for your spa is hard work, and, while there are ways to shorten the process by working from a template, the work cannot be eliminated. No matter what you find online, a free spa business plan will still need extensive customization to become your spa business plan. Beware that in some cases it may end up being better for you to start from scratch if youâ??re working with a poor sample or template. If It Looks Too Good To Be True…If the plan you are downloading says it is ready to use out of the box, it is not likely to help you get funding. Look out for any claims that describe the business planning process as this easy. The problem with this is that every business plan is about a specific company, specific people, and a specific location and market situation. Deep research into the local market, customers, and competitors must be done by someone able to visit their spas and speak with customers directly. There is no alternative to this kind of work, so beware of any claims that say the plan will be ready to go right away. Also, serious investors want to see original thought in a business plan. If they can find the language of the plan through a Google search, they may question your ability to come up with own ideas specific to your company and situation. MotivesFinally, remember that business plans are not generally donated. A well-done business plan can help the right entrepreneur achieve funding and success in their business, so why would the creator of a business plan give it away for free? Consider that, if the plan is a really good one, then it would be a bad idea for the spa entrepreneur who wrote it to give it away, allowing their competitors to find it and potentially use the knowledge within against them. If, on the other hand, it was created by someone who never actually started a spa business, then the marketing and operations ideas within the plan have not been tested in real conditions and may be misleading for you to read.

Starting a business can be a scary time for any entrepreneur.But besides overcoming your fear and taking the first step, it is important that you have the right resources available to help you make the decisions about your new business.There are some important pieces of advice that any new spa owner should pay attention to if he or she wants to have a profitable business that customers will flock to.Choose the location of your spa carefullyFirst, you will want to make sure that you consider the location of your spa.  You will want to put the same amount of the thought into choosing the location for the spa as you would with any other real estate decision.The location of your spa will have a big effect on the number of clients that you get and how much they are willing to spend.By choosing a good location for your spa you can also save yourself a considerable amount in advertising costs because if your spa is in a well-known or easy to find location clients can just easily tell their friends where it is located or you may even get a larger number of walk in clients.Buy the best quality equipmentOnce you actually get clients to come your spa, making sure that they have the best possible experience during their visit is essential.In addition to choosing the right staff to assist your clients, choosing the right equipment will also have a big impact on how the client feels about the visit.You don’t necessary even have to spend top dollar on the equipment for your salon.There are a number of wholesalers and other reputable bulk dealers that can help you get everything from used equipment to high end products for your spa.  Spend a lot of time on research before you beginIt is also very important to plan your business well before you begin.Setting up a business plan is very important but also getting ideas on how to run your business is also helpful.spabusiness.info is a great resource for helping you to research your new spa business.This site has many articles on how to create and market your own spa.The tips even include information on how to create your own spa products in the event that you would like to create your own brand of bath products to sell in your spa.If you would like to read these articles about starting and running a spa business go to http://www.spabusiness.info.

Running a spa is an extremely exciting business to run.Not only can it be very profitable but there are also a million ways that you can make your day spa unique.The way you structure your new spa business is completely up to you but it is important to create a plan if you want to be successful.Creating a business plan will also help you to financing from a bank or private investor for your new business.Things to cover in your business planYou should make sure to review exactly where you are going to acquire all of the items that you need for your business.You should thoroughly research where you want to rent space for your business, the employees that you will need to run your business and the sources for your equipment.Another thing that you may want to consider is if you want to create your own spa product line.spabusiness.info can help you if you want to create your own product line for your day spa.This site has articles that will not only help you learn how to setup and run your business but will also explain to you exactly how to make your own professional spa and bath products that you can sell.In addition to thinking about sources for the items that you will need to get your spa business up and running, you should also carefully outline the services that you plan to offer in your spa.Your business plan should go into detail about exactly what your spa has to offer.You should think about what type of clients would use your services and exactly what the prices should be.For example you for plan to offer full day visits to your clients you should think about what the options should be for their visits and how much they should cost.On the other hand, you should also take some time to see what other spas in your area are offering as they will be your competition.If you want to get clients to patronize your spa business, it is important for them to feel like they are getting value by coming to your salon.If you want to learn more about running a profitable spa business you should visit http://www.spabusiness.info for more tips and articles.

Variations in the spa business make it an interesting possible venture for a person looking to go into business for themselves. A spa can be a day spa, a resort type spa, a hot tub distributor and a spa attached to a hotel. The spa can include hair care, massage, nail care and body care. Your interest and the money you have available will be factors in choosing which business you should pursue. The Internet is an excellent source for finding what kind of businesses are for sale and where they are located. A potential buyer can also check out this same question with solid business brokers. By doing this, the buyer can quickly get a feel for what is available and the capital needed to complete the sale.

The other way to get into the business is to start a brand new business. This will cost somewhere near what you would pay for a similar type of spa business, except for the value of their existing clientele. The advantage to the existing business purchase versus the brand new start-up is the existing customer base and the immediate cash flow. There are many types of spa businesses and the cost of the one you would like to own will depend on the type you choose. A resort type spa for example will probably cost far more than a day spa or a distributor of spas. The services that you offer will also show up in the cost of the spa. Service usually means the need for employees to provide the service. Employees have an on going monthly cost that does not go away whether you are busy or not. Other services may be equipment dependent and therefore you have the equipment cost and the maintenance expense.

A distributorship will have its own unique costs and expenses. A show room is almost mandatory to run the business correctly. You cannot sell spas without demonstrating them. This will entail a building set up to do just this and a different set of employees to pull off this type of business. Salesmen and people persons are going to be important factors in all of these businesses. Solid sales people are a necessity in selling spas to the public. This is a luxury item, not a necessity of life.

Which spa business for you and how to find them

As stated above the Internet is a great way to start looking for businesses that are up for sale. This will give you a good idea of the difficulty in finding one that is in the area of the spa business that catches your fancy. These listings will also let you know if there are businesses in your local. Talk with spa owners and business brokers to get an idea of the opportunities that are available in the spa business. Visit day spas and resort spas to see how they are run and the services they offer to their clients. Ask them if they know of any businesses for sale. You never know where you will get a solid lead. The business broker will have answers for some of your questions and will know where to find the answers he does not know off of the top of his head. An experienced broker may have already helped with the sale of the type of spa business that you are favoring. This part of the discovery process is like being a good detective. Let the facts and the leads get you where you can see the answers to your growing question list. Spending the needed time on this part of business buying will help in many ways. You will become better versed on what is available and the prices that different businesses command. You will also soon discover whether you can buy an existing business or have to start one from the ground up. This will help to determine the money needed and how you can come up with the purchase price or start-up price.

I have the money or I can get it

You have to be able to say the above in order to buy an existing business or start one up. The cost in this niche business will depend on the selected area of the spa business. Once you have selected the spa business you wish to own, then you must find one for sale or start one up. Both of these will have prices that you can afford or can get financing for. Raising the total price may take some creative financing on your part. The current owner may be willing to accept terms to enable the purchase. Other areas that may loan you the money you need are the bank, relatives, loan from a business lender and a loan on assets you own.

One way or another you will need to come up with the total price. If the current owner is involved, be prepared to pay a premium for the business. Most owners have a cash price and a higher terms price. The problem with this is can you afford the business and still have enough capital to run the business. If the answer is yes, then all is okay. If this is not the case, maybe the potential buyer may need to pass for the time being. Knowing when to pass by an opportunity may be just as important as making the decision to buy.

Maybe in this business, you can select a less costly avenue to get into the spa business. You have several ways to go and if one road is closed then there may be another way to go. The point of this is do not strap yourself financially to buy a business and make success more difficult or impossible to obtain. A buyer must make realistic judgments. Viewing these decisions through rose-colored glasses can be a serious error.

Conclusions

The multi-faceted spa world offers several types of businesses to consider owning and running. Some take a large capital commitment and some are far more reasonable in their money requirement. The choice is yours based on your interest and the money you can bring to the table.

An area not previously mentioned is the franchise spa company. This area should be looked at as a possibility. There are some advantages to being connected to a spa company with a nationwide reputation and advertising campaign.

Financing in this business category is not much different than what is needed in other business purchases or start-up cost. Some versions are capital intensive and some do not take anywhere the same money commitment. Finding the right business for you in the correct segment of the industry will take study and comparing the chances of a successful ownership.

The suggestion is to talk with business brokers to see what they have for sale and the money needed to make the purchase. They are a great source of good information and current trends or developments. The experience they have and the sources they can call upon will be of help in getting answers to your questions. Knowing answers will help you make far better decisions and thoughtful changes in your plans.

The following special bargains, extras and additions will help you successfully increase your spa business sales:

1. Offer a voucher.

Place a special link on your website or phone in a special code they received within a direct mail piece to redeem their voucher.

2. Offer a buy one spa product get one free deal or a buy two spa products and get one free deal.

You could use this kind of deal to get more people to purchase spa products from your spa business.

3. Offer a special lower price if your clients buy two of your products packaged together.

4. Offer a spa industry publication as a bonus.

Offer a spa industry publication that is either available exclusively through your day spa or that is hard to find as a bonus with purchase.

5. Offer a free consultation as an add-on or bonus.

Depending on your spa products & services, you could offer to consult your spa clients on their skin treatment needs.

6. Offer a free 1/2 hr massage.

You could offer a limited time 1/2 hr massage on their next visit… obviously you would look for opportunity to up sell them or add services to complete a package.

7. Offer a private makeup class with your distributor or supplier as an added bonus.

Increase the value your clients place on your day spa by holding educational events and evenings… telling them how much it would be worth if you were to charge for the information or class separately.

8. Offer a free-trial.

You could offer a free 5 day trial of your spa products. Or a five day supply.

9. Offer a free sample.

You could mail your clients or prospects a sample of your spa or cosmetic products.

You could also send them a free instruction DVD to compliment the products.

10. Offer free home care instruction booklet.

Create a powerful incentive by offering a home care instruction booklet that complements your spa products as a bonus.

It’s not a good idea to be always offering freebies, although it is good to come up with incentives from time to time to keep your clients interested, which ultimately builds client retention. And the most important part it builds spa business revenues.