On October 19th Carmen Barasona and the Barasona Design and Communication team attended the celebration of the fifth and final block of the HIWC. Under the title “The concept of spa, profitable line of business in hotels”, the block has been started with a roundtable on the harmony between the development of the spa concept, respect for industry standards, the importance of team training and how it achieves r maximum profitability.

The rest of the speakers at the round table, moderated by Sudre, have been Virginia Lara, Director of The Spa at the hotel Mandarin Oriental of Barcelona,who explained that “the goal of the spa in Mandarin Oriental hotels is to offer an experience, which is what customers are looking for today”; Jean-Eric Knecht, President Elegance Groupe International (France) and Enric López, Director of the Master’s Degree in Strategic Management of Tourism Companies “e-tourism” of the EUTH-CETT-UB. All of them have delved into the importance of training spa staff in order to achieve maximum customer satisfaction.

After the round table, following the model of the other four blocks already held, four parallel sessions have been organized that have covered different aspects of the spa in the hotel venues: efficiency and profitability; the design of an attractive and cost-effective proposal; team selection and training; and new technologies. Participants in these sessions included Roger Allen, Ceo of Thermarium Spa Management; Elena Bogacheva, founder and President of SWIC (International Spa and Wellness Council), in Russia; and Larisa Marinica, Director of Amrita Spa in Istanbul, Turkey.