Twenty-two and a half billion dollars.
That’s what the North American spa industry generated in revenue in 2024, according to ISPA’s most recent study. Third consecutive year of growth. Visits up over three percent. Revenue per visit climbing. By every macro measure, wellness is having a moment — and the moment shows no signs of ending.
So why are so many individual properties still struggling to fill their books, retain their teams, and justify what they’re charging?
Because industry growth is not property growth. It never is. The $22.5 billion doesn’t distribute evenly. It doesn’t flow to every spa that opens its doors and offers good treatments in a clean space. It flows — disproportionately, decisively — to the properties that have done the harder work of alignment. The ones where the brand promise and the daily guest experience are the same thing, not two separate conversations happening in different departments.
I wrote about this growth moment for Spas of America. Here’s what I think it actually means for the properties navigating it right now.
The spas winning aren’t the loudest ones. They’re the clearest ones.
The piece covers four areas where the industry’s growth is being captured or lost. The first is marketing, and the shift happening here is more fundamental than most properties realize.
Guests are no longer booking spas primarily for pampering. That framing is aging fast. What’s driving bookings in 2025 is purpose — stress relief as a genuine health strategy, recovery as a performance tool, self-care reframed as a lifestyle choice rather than an occasional indulgence. The properties capturing that shift aren’t the ones posting more on Instagram. They’re the ones that have gotten specific about what they stand for and who they’re for. A spa that can tell a clear, emotionally resonant story about what a guest will feel differently after visiting, not just what treatments they’ll receive, is playing an entirely different game than the one running seasonal promotions.
Clarity of positioning isn’t a marketing exercise. It’s an operations question. Because a property can only deliver consistently on a promise it has actually defined.
Longevity is real — but it’s also a trap for unprepared properties.
The second area is longevity services, and the growth here is undeniable. Infrared therapy, cold plunges, IV wellness, guided recovery, circadian lighting, and younger wellness travellers are actively seeking these experiences, and properties that haven’t engaged with this direction are already behind the conversation.
But here’s what I keep seeing in the field: properties rushing to add longevity features without first asking whether their core guest journey holds together. A cold plunge in a facility where the arrival experience is confusing, and the team hasn’t been trained to talk about recovery in any meaningful way, isn’t a longevity offering. It’s equipment. The two things are not the same, and guests, especially the high-value guests, longevity programming is designed to attract, know the difference immediately.
Innovation without foundation is just overhead.
The staffing crisis is a guest experience crisis. Full stop.
The third area is the one most spa leaders know is urgent and fewest have actually solved, staffing. ISPA’s data makes the pressure visible: recruitment is difficult, burnout is real, and compensation expectations are shifting. But the reason this matters beyond HR is simple and worth saying plainly.
A burned-out team produces inconsistent service. Inconsistent service produces weak guest experiences. Weak guest experiences produce poor reviews, and guests don’t return. No marketing budget recovers from that loop. No amount of longevity equipment compensates for a therapist who is exhausted and checked out by Thursday afternoon.
The properties getting this right are treating staff wellbeing as a guest experience strategy, not a gesture, not a line item in a wellness benefits package that nobody uses, but a genuine operational priority that shows up in scheduling, recognition, access to the facility’s own offerings, and a culture where people feel like they are part of something worth being part of. That culture becomes the guest experience. There’s no separation.
Technology should amplify human connection. Not replace the need for it.
The fourth area is technology, and the headline here is that the conversation has moved well past whether to use it. AI-driven personalization, booking intelligence, virtual consultations, and recovery tracking. These tools are maturing fast, and they’re becoming expected in the upper tier of the market.
The distinction that matters is integration. The properties using technology well are using it to make human connection more precise and more personal, to know more about a guest before they arrive, to anticipate what they need, to follow up in ways that feel thoughtful rather than automated. The properties using it poorly are using it as a shortcut around the harder work of actually training their teams to have real conversations with guests.
Technology that sits on top of a disengaged team doesn’t produce personalization. It produces the illusion of it. Guests can tell.
What does the $22.5 billion actually measure?
The ISPA number is real, and it matters. It means the demand is there. It means the cultural shift toward wellness as a genuine lifestyle priority, not a trend, not a phase, is accelerating. It means this is exactly the right time to be doing this work with seriousness and intention.
But it also means competition is intensifying. The properties that will capture the next wave of growth aren’t the ones that add the most features. They’re the ones that close the gap between what they promise and what a guest actually feels every visit, every shift, every season.
That gap is smaller than it looks and harder to close than most property teams expect. But it’s closeable. And when it closes, everything else, the marketing, the longevity programs, the technology, finally has a foundation worth building on.
Read the full article on Spas of America → The North American Spa Boom: Trends Driving $22.5B in Growth
If this resonates with what you’re navigating at your property, I’d welcome the conversation. Let’s connect.