Authenticity & Healing: Soma Massage Journey with Amber Briggle & Manon on The Healers Café

in their brains, and return back to just the foundation of their breath, right, and unlock their jaw, actually connect with their feet, you know, expand their diaphragm and open up their hips. It’s just going to help clear the brain, right? And just kind of clear the way for everything else in life to fall into place. And so that’s really what we’re trying to do as massage therapists, and it’s really what we’re trying to do at Soma massage therapy. And so Soma, of course, being Greek and Latin for, you know, body and feeling, that’s really kind of where that came from. But I kind of like that double entendre, of like it’s both it sounded sciency, but also kind of new agey. So that is how I came up with the name for my business.

Manon Bolliger  04:50

Yeah. Okay, so then, so you were initially trying to fulfill a demand, right? You had more. People wanting you, and then what? So what? What happened? Or, how did you come across? This, the model of franchise, how did because that’s, you know, I mean, a lot of therapists, you know, have, well, financial issues, but they also have financial blockages and the idea that you know they don’t deserve more, and that type of thing. So there’s a lot actually to get through. But so how come you didn’t have that issue, or did you overcome it?

Amber Briggle  05:34

I mean, we I think, well, I want to touch on a point. You said there about how we feel like we maybe don’t deserve it. And I don’t know if that’s necessarily a massage therapist thing or if that’s a woman thing, right? Like 85% of massage therapists are women, and I think we’re kind of conditioned growing up to not ask for what we want. We get seen as pushy, demanding, bitchy, right? And so I wonder, I wonder if we’re kind of like culturally conditioned as women and men, because a vast majority of massage therapists are women. I wonder if that’s also kind of the label that’s put on them, on us. Getting back to your question, How did I overcome that, sort of like, I just, I just pushed, I just pushed through it. I just, I saw that my clients had a real need for more massage and more time on my table and and I couldn’t. I could only give my clients what I could give safely and ethically and energetically, right? And so I saw that they that, you know, that first degree needed more than I could give. But then they’re also referring their friends to me, so that second degree and then out and out and out. And I knew that, if I could just create a space where I trusted the massage therapist, I was, you know, I was overseeing everything that, you know, that I knew that I could provide them that really, that quality of touch and that quality of care that they that they deserved. It’s a lot of, it was a lot of trial and error. Honestly, I did not go to school for business. I think probably a lot of your your followers, probably also don’t have a background in business, but we have a drive and a desire and a passion to help and to serve. Right? I’ve been a massage therapist since 2004 so it’s been 21 years. I’ve been in this field, and every step of the way. It’s just been kind of scaling up, and I certainly made my fair share of mistakes. I mean, we’re, it’s a little bit like baby proofing your house, like, you know, Something’s coming. So you’re like, you know, you don’t like, you don’t baby proof your house the moment you get pregnant. You like, you start doing the things as they pop up. And that was kind of me, I was kind of scrambling. But over the years, I’ve gotten pretty good at this, and I’ve grown now my business to we have two locations. Our main location grosses over a million dollars a year. We see 1000 people a month, and we’re starting to our franchise journey now, because I can’t I would love to have 500 Salma massage therapies across the country. And imagine if we see at our one location 1000 people in a month. If we had 500 or 1000 locations nationwide, like how many more people we could be serving and healing, I do not have the bandwidth to manage that many people that is insane, that is absolutely insane, and so I, and yet, I wanted to continue providing this really high quality care that we provide at Soma. And so I decided, rather than taking the money that it would cost for me to open another location, I would take that money and invest it in a franchise model. And that’s not something that I that I knew much about a couple of years ago. And so I wanted to make sure I was doing it in a sustainable and responsible way. So I hired a coach and a consulting firm who walked me through it, and like extracted all of this knowledge that was in my brain over the last 20 years and actually put it down on paper. So we can duplicate our success. We can duplicate our customer service. We can duplicate our philosophy of massage, our no tipping model, right? Like you’ve never tipped your physical therapist or your chiropractor, what we’re doing is adjacent. Why would you be tipping us right and and taking that sort of, that medical, therapeutic, rehabilitative aspect of massage therapy and kind of blowing it up nationwide. And so it wasn’t necessarily like, I didn’t ever, I didn’t, you know, as a kid, I never thought, Oh, I’m gonna grow up. I want to be a massage therapist, no, like, I want to be an astronaut or a journalist. That’s what I wanted to do, right? And then, you know, and then I kind of fell into this. I think probably a lot of your followers, probably many of them, not all, but many of them probably also kind of fell into this with like these modalities and and for me, it’s just been a matter of a desire to continue meeting the the needs of my clients. And that is and so I just pushed through. It was, it was really kind of an act of service to them, wanting to create that, that healing, safe space for as many people as possible. And I just, I screwed up a lot in the past, trying to figure this out. Now, I’ve got a really solid model, and I did. Developed. I want to emphasize this point too, that that Soma massage therapy we had been around pre covid, it was really, actually during and post covid that we really blew up as big as we did. So when we closed in March of 2020, I had two locations and maybe 13 massage therapists. We closed, I reopened. I had one location, I had four massage therapists, one by one, they quit because it was just so demanding on women, especially during the pandemic. And 14 months later, when, from the moment the day we had closed, or 14 months later, I had reopened in this new facility that we’re at now, where I’ve got twice as many treatment rooms. I’ve had, got 25 massage therapists. We’re back up to two locations. We gross over a million dollars a year. All of that happened kind of post covid, right? And when, when a lot of a lot of businesses, especially those of us who are physically touching people, like we don’t have products to sell, we’re physically touching people, a lot of us just had to give up our businesses, right? And we had to close them. So, so I see the success that we’ve experienced at Soma, and I really want to be able to bring that to as many people as possible, to help them grow sustainable and successful businesses, while at the same time healing, providing that healing touch to as many people as possible across the country. It was just a I just needed to do it.

Manon Bolliger  11:15

So, yeah, but so did you in your the state you were in? Did you have to wear hazmat suits and all that stuff.

Amber Briggle  11:24

Yeah, good question. So I’m in Texas, so there, actually, there was no pandemic here in Texas.

Manon Bolliger  11:28

Oh, right.

Amber Briggle  11:30

No, we did.

Amber Briggle  11:32

We did reopen. We were closed for two months, and we reopened. And that’s it felt like forever, but I know in a lot of places, they were closed for longer.

Manon Bolliger  11:41

We were a year and a half.

Amber Briggle  11:42

Oh, my goodness. Where are you located?

Manon Bolliger  11:44

In Canada? Oh, goodness, travel. And people were terrified, yeah, you touch, because in Bowen college, you know, it’s touch, not the same degree of touches as massage, yeah, you know, half the people were asking, you know, are you enforcing the mandates for those thoughts? Because I’m not coming unless everybody is has taken that others would say, do you have Are you accepting people who have taken those shots? Because we don’t want to be shed on right? So, like so, like, so much to deal it was so

Amber Briggle  12:24

there was a lot, there was a lot to navigate. And we just, we, we followed, we’ve we followed the law. So we did. We stayed closed for those two months. It was painful, but we weren’t closed for 18 months. That’s, that’s Wow. That would have just, oh, absolutely been awful. And then when we reopened, we followed the best medical guidelines put out by the CDC here in the United States, it’s like our they, they, we followed what we what we knew at the time, right? Not every massage place would do that, but we, I, I saw a responsibility of my team that I needed to create a safe and healthy space like that is what we do as healers, right? We safe and healthy, and you wouldn’t go to like, your doctor would wear a mask. Your nurse practitioner would wear a mask, like we can’t keep six feet apart away from you, so we’re going to wear a mask, and you’re going to wear a mask too. And and we did lose business over that. We did lose business. People would refuse to wear a mask, or they’d wear a mask that only covered their mouth. And I’m like, your nose is part of your respiratory system too, so I don’t know what he did. And we did lose business over that. And it was painful because I had just hemorrhaged money over two months. We didn’t have anything like, I said, to sell other than physical touch. And then one by one, my staff kept leaving. It was it was a mess. It was an absolute mess. But I stuck to it, because my my values are, you take care of the people first. Take care of your people first, and then the profits will fall into place. And so i i followed what the CDC recommended, which was, make sure you’re masking Now, I understand that that was controversial, and that may be controversial for your listeners too, but I was trying to do my very best, and what the science was telling us at the time was to wear the mask, and so I required that. I did lose business, but I did also gain a lot of business. At that time, I was very transparent about our about our safety protocols, including, you know, this very expensive air scrubber that I had installed. I didn’t have the money for it, but I never want to be that business owner or that boss who thinks that my paycheck is more important than someone’s safety. And at the moment, you start having an outbreak in your facility. Your therapists are calling out sick, your clients don’t want to come in anymore, and no one feels safe, right? And so it’s very transparent about that, and we end up actually getting gaining a ton of clients during that time because they were going to their other Massage Studio that was that wasn’t following CDC guidelines, where they weren’t taking the time in between to fully sanitize their their studio, and they didn’t feel safe, and they saw what we were doing. And so they came to to someone massage therapy. I also came. Lot of massage therapists at that time, either their clinics had closed or they didn’t feel safe at where they were they were working. So, you know, I’ve done a series of webinars on, like, you know, who’s your target market, what’s your differential advantage? Like, what are your What are your values? They all kind of like, it’s like this Venn diagram, right? And, you know, people can go to our YouTube channel and watch all that, but it really, kind of helped me really define, I mean, I knew who we were. It just really kind of solidified who we were and the type of client that we’re trying to attract, and we’ve been a very successful business ever since. And I know, you know, some of your followers may not agree with me on the masks, but that was the stance that we took, and it ended up being a very, very positive outcome. It kept it kept my clients and my team safe, and it helped us grow, actually.

Manon Bolliger  15:45

So yeah, yeah, it’s very interesting, definitely different stories over here. Yeah, too. You know when, when, like, when things are exaggerated, like as they were in Canada, where it becomes so insane that you realize that it doesn’t make sense, you know, yeah, and people are are more skeptical about it. And, you know, there’s some people in fear, and they’ll just stay in fear. And despite all the studies that show that masks are actually not that helpful. I mean, you know, it doesn’t, it doesn’t quite make sense. I mean, over a open wound, yes, but not in the way we use them, you know, put them on, take them off, sit down, eat, you know, whatever role and this very six feet. And, you know, I think then it’s very hard to to enforce for those who see through it, you know. And now that we know what’s happening with the CDC and all the stuff that the lies and the total corruption, you know, I wonder, like, I guess if you see it earlier, you’re it’s hard. You have to be authentic in your business, right? And and I think what I’m getting from what you’re saying is, as long as you’re aligned with it, and you are aligned with this, then the people will join the business that are aligned with that view and matter, right or wrong? In that sense, it’s what’s happening now, right, right?

Amber Briggle  17:23

And you know, and you and I may disagree on on the safety or the validity of masks, but I think we can both agree, like, as you just said, you know, when you when you define who you are, and you stick to that, then you’re going to attract the right, the clients who are attracted to you. You can’t be everything to everyone. You’ll be talking about both sides of your mouth, right? You have to be consistent. You have to say no. You have to have some guardrails and some boundaries. And that those were the boundaries that I determined was going to be best for my business. And it certainly I mean, like I said, we lock it into the moon after covid, right? Because, you know, and had I chosen a different model, I don’t know, you can’t run a parallel experiment, but it’s possible, I would have attracted different clients, and we would have gone somewhere else, right? So we may disagree on the validity of the masking. However, I think we both agree on, you know, you stick true to who you are exactly, and you’re going to attract the right employees, the right clients, you know, and you can build your business off of that,

Manon Bolliger  18:26

yeah? Well, I think

Amber Briggle  18:28

that’s definitely one compromise on your values. Yeah,

Manon Bolliger  18:30

exactly. I think, I think that is really the and people can tell that in a business, you know, you’ve you’re coming from an authentic place, whatever your belief is, you know, and yeah, you’ll attract who you attract. That’s how it works.

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Amber Briggle  19:57

Exactly. Yeah,

Manon Bolliger  19:59

and circumstance. Can be different. You know, usually when Americans find out what happened, especially in British Columbia, they’re, like, appalled. You know that? You know it’s, I mean, they’re still enforcing it now, interesting, wow, yeah, and it’s like they’re, that’s quite crazy, because the rest of the world has dropped it, you know, and certainly to children, it’s been dropped some of them, you know, it’s been dropped in some countries, two, three years ago because of the the side effects. So it’s very interesting, you know, it’s like, how much do you trust we’re in a system, right? But, and you have to, as a business, you have to find your way in the system. You know it, there’s a lot of a lot of considerations, right, like,

Amber Briggle  20:49

and I think, I think something that really came out of, as I’m looking at this from the business owners perspective, something that I think came out of those lessons that we learned collectively through covid, at least here in in Texas, was that you don’t have to compromise safety and and profits, right? Like you can have both. And I think, I think a lot of elected officials got a lot of grief from chambers of commerce and small business owners and whatnot, like we can do this safely, please, just give us the space to do that. And I think, I think that was a really important lesson that I mean, no business owner wants to, no responsible business owner, right? Wants to, yeah, wants to take shortcuts and wants to compromise their values and wants to put people at risk, like the moment you the moment you put your profits in front of the people, the whole thing falls apart, right? And make the smart decision that makes sense for your business and for us, what we saw was, we’re in close contact. There’s a pandemic happening. This is what we’re going to do to keep people safe in that and I think, I think every responsible business owner needs to make those decisions that make the most sense for their business.

Manon Bolliger  22:02

Yeah, right, yeah. And we’re talking about masks when we’re talking about the shots in I don’t remember, but in Texas, was that mandated or no, you

Amber Briggle  22:14

see, no, I don’t know. It wasn’t mandated. I didn’t mandate it for my team either. Bolliger, autonomy is super important, right? And the moment you start getting shots, you can start mandating things. So I was not a fan of these vaccine requirements. However, I, you know, I didn’t require my team to to get a shot, but I did want them to test regularly, like, you know, if you had a scratchy throat, like, I want you to go test and make sure you’re not, you know, bringing that to work or anything. So we had our workarounds, we made our compromises, but no, I It wasn’t. It wasn’t mandated in Texas, and I never mandated at my business either.

Manon Bolliger  22:48

Yeah? Well, here, here, it was mandated, right? Goodness, wow, yeah. And that, that, I think, is also where a lot of people drew the line. It’s because Bolliger autonomy can’t prove, typically, that it’s effective, right? And now we find out that they didn’t even test for effectiveness, you know, like, oh, well, that’s interesting, you know? Why would you know? What was this for? Right? Anyway, we don’t have to go down that path, but it’s as a business owner, so you have to consider so many things right, like but, and, you know, we say the the law, sure, but what happens when there’s when it goes further than what feels you know, I don’t know if you call it morally right. You know, like for me to insist you know that one of my practitioners has to do something that I don’t feel that there’s enough evidence that it works or that it’s helpful, would be inauthentic to me, right? These are like, anyway, we certainly went through a lot in Britain, yeah, yeah. I was looking often at the states going, Oh, my God, you know, I wish we had a little more freedom here. Yeah, anyway, but it’s a, it’s a great story that despite all of this, you know, it’s still you, you, you have to come to terms with what you’re comfortable with as a business, and that’s what grows it, and that’s what attracts your

Amber Briggle  24:20

right, your target market, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Don’t compromise on your values. And that’s just, we just stuck to it. And again, we lost, we lost business, but we got plenty more and those. And I, you know, when I, when I have a new massage therapist join our team, it is very quickly, within the first couple weeks that they’re here. They’re like, Oh my god, your clients are amazing. The clients here are so good. I’m like, Yeah, that’s intentional, right? Like, I work like that. I really put, I put our values out there, and you’re going to attract the right people, and that goes for any business and any and any person you know, just put yourself out there, be authentic, don’t waver on your values, and you’re going to attract the right people, which will then help you kind of double down on those where to get challenged.

Manon Bolliger  24:58

So, yeah, it was. What would you say are unique aspects of the soma massage, like or of the running of your operation, that you’d say that’s the secret sauce that’s different?

Amber Briggle  25:12

Yeah? Oh, I’m so glad you asked that question. I did a whole webinar on this. Actually check it out on our YouTube channel. We so one of our biggest factors is we have a no tipping model. I’m not sure what it’s like in Canada, but here in the US, we’re really tip heavy, and people are getting tip fatigue. And I’ve always as a massage therapist, even when I was a solo practitioner in my early days living in Bolliger, I never took tips because I, you know, like I said, you’ve never tipped your physical therapist a chiropractor. Why would you be tipping us? It puts us in the service industry, instead of in the healthcare field, where we belong, right? And I felt like, I felt like I was validated during covid too, because, like, the very first things to shut down were, like, hair, nails, bars, restaurants, like places where you tip, right? You got to stay open physical therapists and chiropractors, and I’m like, worth touching people too. Like, let us, let us stay open. So we have a no tipping model. I feel like it takes the stress out of the whole experience, both for the client who shouldn’t have to balance their checking account when you’re like, elbow deep in their piriformis, it also takes the stress away from the massage therapist, because when the economy tanks and your clients keep coming back, but they can’t afford to tip as much or at all, and you’re counting on tips, then it’s been your paycheck suffers, right? So I would rather just pay my team a living wage, right? And roll that cost into the cost of massage and just take the stress out of it for everybody. So that’s one of the things. We take HSA a health savings account here in the United States and flex payments so you can use your we don’t bill insurance, but we can provide you itemized Super Bowls and receipts so that they can request reimbursement. We provide full 60 minute sessions. So a lot of massage places might only give you 55 minutes because they’ve got to check you out, and you’ve got to change, and they got to turn the room over. So, you know. But we’ll do when you book a massage at Soma, instead of it being a 60 minute appointment, it’s usually a 75 or sometimes a 90 minute appointment, depending on how much of a buffer your particular therapist feels that they need in between sessions. That way everyone can move at an intentional, leisurely, grounded pace, you know? And we’re taking care of we’re making sure that our clients get the full session, but we’re also taking care of our therapists, right, who need that time to trade and ground and center and check that text message from their kid and have a granola bar and get back to it. Right? We have talked a lot about our people first philosophy that we really, we really make sure that we’re taking care of our therapists and our clients and also our community. Because if we want our clients to be healthy and balanced and thriving, that needs to extend beyond our doors, right? They need to be living in a healthy and balanced and thriving community. And so we go hard for our public schools like I’d rather give $500 to the PTA than to Google for some sponsored ads, right? And we really invest hard in our local community, our nonprofit so that they can, in turn, like, invest back in us. We are we go above and beyond for our customer service, which is all written in our ops manual, which we provide to our franchisees. We just, we really, personally. I think that one of the biggest things too, is we really just personalize every session. When you come in part of that 75 minute hour massage, right? Is that you are, you have the ample opportunity to speak with your practitioner that day and your therapist and let them know, you know, hey, I know we’ve been working on my right hip, but I sneeze and something went out on the left side of my neck, and we need to be working on that today. And and then they can dig deeper. So what, what did you do between last session and this one that made that imbalance in your body? Right? And really, kind of get down to it, so they can kind of come up with, for lack of a better word, a treatment plan for that session. And then they get on the table, and you might throw the whole thing out the window with their consent, of course, because you’re noticing that there’s something else going on, maybe in their hamstrings, right? And so really taking the time to kind of personalize every session so that every client who comes has has their needs met. We don’t charge more for deep tissue versus Swedish, because we never know what we’re going to be getting until we get our hands on you. We want to make sure we can meet you in that moment. So I could go on and on, but people can, can I again, if you go to our YouTube channel at my Selma massage, I did a whole webinar on differential advantage where I kind of highlighted some of the things that make so much

Manon Bolliger  29:34

different as well. So I love the no tip thing a lot of our clients do they do, and I think it makes sense. I mean, in my profession, even when we do bow and therapy, which is the physical component, we don’t take tips, you know. So there’s always a joke when, especially guys get off the table, and there’s all this change. We don’t take tips. See. But yeah, I think it Well, for one, it’s like it changes from service to actually health related, absolutely with Bolliger therapy, where you’re doing even less, you know, because you you do a few moves and then you leave the body respond. So it’s kind of a different type of approach to somatic work. It, yeah, it works way better if, if it you put everything behind so that people can relax into it without, you know, I’ve had massages where it’s like, oh my god, like I, it’s, I feel so great now. Where did I put my wallet? You know? Like, you know, no, like, it’s like, yeah, let me pay for this first, and let me enjoy it. And, right?

Amber Briggle  30:51

And you shouldn’t have to figure out, like, how much can I afford to tip them without offending them so that I can come back into like, I need to. I just, let’s just take it. You don’t worry about that with your chiropractor. You just go and see your chiropractor once a month, because that’s what you need to do. And we found actually this, this, this unintended but beautiful consequence of this no tipping model is that the vast majority of our clients really see this as as as maintenance work like they come before they get hurt, right? Like, get your teeth clean so that you don’t get a cavity, right? Like, you go to see your chiropractor, that you don’t throw your back out like you like, these are the things that you do to keep your your body healthy. And when you can massage back in that field, instead of, you know, getting my nails done and getting a drink brought to me, that’s a treat, right? But if you put us back in the healthcare field, where we belong as healthcare practitioners, that that provides that steady flow of these very loyal, consistent clients who come back month after month for years at a time, yeah,

Manon Bolliger  31:54

and also it makes a difference, like, it’s not about not paying what’s due. It’s It’s also nice to know that who’s running it is taking care of the practitioner so that they’re not, you know, waiting how much tip am I going to get? They know that’s kind of taken care of. Yeah, they’re happy. And so, no, it’s, I think it’s a it makes sense, especially massage, where that isn’t a thing, yeah. So I think that’s a great

Amber Briggle  32:22

advantage. I like, I know, and I’m very transparent with with therapists, when they when we do that initial phone interview, I’m like, we, we don’t take tips. That’s weird, but this is why. And some people are, for some people, they’re like, that’s, it’s a deal breaker. And you know what? That’s, that’s fine because that they don’t, they don’t belong at Soma, right? They belong somewhere else, but other people, they’re like, I’ve never thought about it that way. That makes so much sense. And we have. Therapists have been with us for years, which is kind of unheard of in this industry. A lot of therapists will kind of bounce, you know, once a year, from studio to studio, looking for better money or better management. But I just, I take care of my team, and they stick around.

Manon Bolliger  32:59

Yeah, and what, what can a therapist expect as a wage? I mean, like, per day or per How do you work that out?

Amber Briggle  33:09

I mean, it really, it really varies on the area that you’re in. Cost of living in Texas is a lot less than it is, like saying, like California or CIA. So, so we, you know, we work with, with our franchisees on setting their price point to reflect what the market can can support in your area, and then and you, and you pay your therapist a living wage kind of based on that. So you kind of reverse engineer like, what do I? What do my, what do my margins need to be to stay in business, you know, and you factor in payroll and overhead and, you know, insurance and all this stuff, and then you kind of set your price point on that, so it’s really going to vary from location,

Manon Bolliger  33:50

location, yeah, good. Well, our time actually is, is up. I can’t believe that’s a whole half an hour

Amber Briggle  34:00

before we go. No, before we go. I do. I do want to mention, because I said it a couple times, we are franchising, and if any of what I’ve said resonates with with you or any of your listeners, I would love to speak with them more. They can find us at mysoma massage.com there’s a tab at the top of the page for franchising. You don’t have to be a massage therapist to own a salon massage therapy franchise. The dude who owns the lube oil filter place probably isn’t mechanic. He just likes cars, right? So, like, you don’t need a massage therapist, right? I’ve done a lot of the messy, dirty work beforehand over the 20 years I’ve been doing this. So we have a really streamlined, really, really great business model. I’d love to speak with you, and if it’s not right for you, but you know someone that that this might be a good opportunity for them. Please send them my way, because if they become a summer massage therapy franchisee in the future, then you for sending us the referral, would get either $1,000 cash or your free massages, which is pretty great. So so please send them my way, because I’d love to really blow this business model up and just. Totally redefine the massage therapy industry as a whole and just base it off of what we’re doing, which is pretty great. So yeah, thanks for having me get that plug in. I appreciate

Manon Bolliger  35:08

it no absolutely, and thanks for sharing your knowledge with us.

Amber Briggle  35:13

Oh, that was a great time. Thanks for the time today.

Manon Bolliger  35:15

So what I want to focus on from this interview is really the focus on the client and and changing, changing what’s expected. For example, you know, in massage, people expect to to pay a tip, so changing that, and yet making sure that the practitioner is paid as if they had been tipped, as in that’s taken into consideration makes the the the practitioner happy, because they’re fine and they don’t have to worry they’re covered. But the experience for the client is quite different, so in that you don’t have to think, oh, what you know exactly all the things that she said, right? So that’s an sort of an industry shift that you know, that you can test out in the market, if you’re doing something that’s a little bit different than other people, and that makes sense, and that is with your client in mind, that can make a big difference. Also shifting the hour thing. You know, how many times I’ve looked when I have these massages or something, which I don’t do regularly, but when I have one, it’s like, yeah, 10 to the hour. Okay? You know it’s a 50 minute massage, but they call it an hour, that type of thing. It’s, it’s, it just to shift that, you know, and actually give an hour and do the extra 15 minutes or whatever’s needed when there’s no stress, because there’s no financial stress, then you know, as a patient or as a client, rather, that you’re going to get what you what you need, because the focus is not on the funding, it’s really on what’s needed and on your return visits. Because now you’re going to look at it like something that is focused on you and your well being. So I think it’s very interesting realization tidbits. So if you’re starting your own practice, or you want to do a franchise, second layer or second level, yeah, it’s really seeing what is the difference that you can offer people. So I know with Bolliger college, one of the things that that I did, which made a big difference, because it made people think I would book three visits in a row, and I would tell them that they can cancel, like 24 hours ahead, for you know, so that it’s fair to The practitioner if they felt that they were very near 100% better, and so what that did is let the patients know that I’m expecting, that they’re going to get significantly better, and also that they and I’d say Things like, I enjoy cancelations, which is true, because that means that they’ve gotten better and they’ve canceled. And that’s pretty well. The only outside of you know, something, an airplane that didn’t arrive, or a car that broke down, those are pretty well the only cancelations we’d ever have. And so people waiting in the waiting room would hear, Oh, absolutely, I’ll let her know, or I’ll let them know why you canceled. So glad that you’re doing so much better. So again, that changes a little bit the spirit of people that are in your waiting room and going, Wow. You know, they actually do care, which, obviously we, we do care. So anyhow, so just to think a little bit out of the box really helps.

ENDING: 

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