Building a Wellness Business That Lasts. Rick Stollmeyer

adoption of work from home and hybrid work options have amplified people's hunger to get out of the house.Prediction #3: As business, education, and government organizations reduce their reliance on commercial office space, the demand for wellness services in those commercial zones will go down. This will harm businesses in those neighborhoods.Prediction #4: At the same time, reduced demand for commercial office space will increase commercial office space vacancies and decrease commercial rent rates, creating opportunities for new residential developments and brick-and-mortar wellness businesses to emerge.Prediction #5: Increased adoption of work from home and virtual meetings will increase the value people place on offline interaction and group activities in their leisure time. This will fuel demand for wellness services in those neighborhoods. growth of outdoor wellness activities, as well as wellness businesses located in residential neighborhoods.

       Truth #4: Sheltering at home has taught everyone to interact virtually.Prediction #6: The principal advantages of virtual wellness are convenience, cost, and physical safety. Less obvious and even more important is emotional safety; people will be able to avoid the body shame and embarrassment they may feel when they have their first face-to-face wellness experience. Millions of people will now be free to more easily sample and adopt compelling virtual experiences.Prediction #7: Most brick-and-mortar wellness businesses will become hybrid wellness businesses, leveraging their virtual extensions to reach larger audiences and draw more people into the offline face-to-face experience.Prediction #8: Brick-and-mortar wellness businesses without virtual extensions will find it difficult to survive.

       Truth #5: The pandemic has made billions of people more concerned about sanitation, hygiene, and social distancing.Prediction #9: People will be choosier about the people they socialize with. This will be a challenge for large multi-purpose health clubs and low-cost/high-volume 24-hour gyms.Prediction #10: People will be willing to pay a higher premium for wellness experiences that involve fewer people. This will be a boon for personal trainers and high-end boutiques that serve a more affluent clientele.Prediction #11: Tribalism will increase. Aggregation platforms that fill classes with last-minute strangers will be less desired.

       Truth #6: Connected devices are rapidly becoming more commonplace and affordable.Prediction #12: High-quality video feeds, heart rate monitoring, and workout machine tracking will make a high-quality connected wellness experience accessible to hundreds of millions of middle-income and lower-income people. This will help drive the resurgence of local practitioners who offer authenticity, community, and the option for hybrid online and offline experiences.Prediction #13: Peloton® and Mirror® will soon find their offerings commoditized by hundreds of thousands of connected independent practitioners, who can offer a more personal online and offline experience.

       Truth #7: People are living longer and expecting a higher quality of life in their older years.Prediction #14: Rapid advancements in medical science and public health, combined with the increased adoption of wellness practices, will vastly increase average lifespans. Most of us alive today will reasonably expect to remain active well into our 90s. Millennials and Gen-Zers can expect to live well into their 100s.Prediction #15: Wellness practices for seniors will grow massively in the decades ahead.

      What does all the above add up to? Wellness remains the largest and most important opportunity of our age; the industry will experience even more growth and innovation due to COVID-19. If you understand what is happening and have what it takes, you could not have picked a better time to launch a wellness business.

PART II Prepare Yourself for a Hero's Journey