Think back to your favorite massage or spa treatment. What set it apart from others? Did your session room have an aroma? What color were the walls? Did you return for another treatment? Do you remember feeling pampered and nurtured during the session?
If you are looking for a way to set yourself apart from the competition, try enhancing your treatment room ambience with precious and rare essential oils like rose, neroli, orchid and chamomile. You can blend your own massage lubricants with hard-to-find essential oils to create a one-of-a-kind ambience for your session room.
Quality & Rarity
What makes an essential oil rare is the demand for the oil versus the production of the oil. If 10 billion consumers want citrus oils, the demand can easily be met because there is an abundance of citrus groves throughout the world.
However, some rare oil-bearing plants only grow in distinct climates and atmospheres, so less of the plant matter to make these essential oils is globally available. Rare oils oftentimes take a lot of plant matter, sometimes thousands of petals, to produce 1 ounce of oil. The demand for rare oils like jasmine is much higher than the production each year, so farmers sell their rare oils for top dollar, and not everyone gets to experience them.
Clients usually have their eyes closed during a massage, so offering them the finest-quality ambiance with aromatherapy oils will elevate their mind-and-body experience. Select ingredients like rose, neroli and chamomile for your clients, and they will return for more.
Lavender essential oil is popular; however, if this is the only essential oil you offer, then you can easily be replaced and perhaps by a less expensive therapist. Lavender essential oil is a staple in many spas and massage practices, so to add to one's session room ambiance, try blending lavender with a rare essential oil like blue orchid or chamomile. If you're a therapist on a tight budget, try blending high-end organic oils with less expensive, fresh, organic citrus oils like American orange.
Complementary Scents
When taking your client on a journey with scent during a massage, be sure to choose complementary smells throughout the treatment. Here are some suggestions:
• Before clients arrive, mist the air with hydrosols so they are greeted with a fresh, calming aroma. Alternatively, you can use a diffuser with 2 drops of chamomile, 2 drops of neroli and 6 drops of Mandarin essential oil to create an inviting ambiance for your client.
• Scent hot towels with neroli hydrosol and use at the beginning of a relaxing massage to de-stress your client.
• Next, create a complementary massage oil with 3 drops of neroli, 1 drop of cedar, 3 drops of cinnamon and 15 drops of Mandarin essential oils diluted in .5 ounces of grape seed or evening primrose oil.
• Finally, place 3 drops of Mandarin essential oil and 2 drops of chamomile essential oil onto a cotton ball and cup it in your hand 3 inches from your client's nose. Tell your client to deeply inhale.
By offering neroli and chamomile oils in a massage, you will bring to your clients the feeling of deep, euphoric relaxation. The cinnamon and cedar in the massage oil create a warming sensation that helps to ease muscle pain, while the citrus oils are added to enhance a blend with a comforting sweet aroma.
Stay Client-Focused
While creating a unique ambience, set personal and team goals to give your clients the best atmosphere possible. Skimping on luxury ingredients can hurt you in the long run. By scenting your valuable clients' surroundings with the best during a massage, you can easily earn their repeat business.
Massage clients usually remember how great their body felt and how nice their treatment smelled, not about what the wallpaper looks like. Focus on your clients' total body experience when thinking about how to enhance your session room ambience to see the best return on money invested. Scent can trigger memories of a great spa experience, so design a signature smell they have to seek you out to get.
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