Business of Zen: Wellness trends hit pitfalls, find homes in Springfield

Licensed massage therapist Andrea Mouser thought she was following God’s plan when she brought Watsu to Springfield. It’s a form of Shiatsu massage, where Mouser cradles her client’s head in the crook of her arm and massages and manipulates the body while navigating through warm water.

Watsu brought pain relief to Mouser after a debilitating car accident.

“So many people with conditions are helped by this,” said Mouser, the owner of Aquatic Fire Healing Arts.

She approached the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Score mentoring service early on and was encouraged to proceed cautiously and complete a business plan. Blinded by the passion for something she said became a part of her, she ignored the warnings. Her three-year quest to bring Watsu to the residents of Springfield ended this summer.

Score mentor John McKearney said it is as much his duty to tell entrepreneurs to delay opening businesses as it is to guide them through the process of starting and running them.

“I would not be fulfilling my obligation to Score by encouraging someone to start a business who shouldn’t,” McKearney said. “It really begins with the viability of the idea.”

Despite the challenges faced by Mouser, other entrepreneurs are pushing the wellness envelope and investing in techniques foreign to the Ozarks. Between introducing sensory deprivation pods that are meant to provide mental clarity and spiritual awakening to the practice of cupping made famous during the summer Olympics, Springfield is being introduced to some worldly wellness options.

Wanting Watsu
Mouser said she was trying to do the impossible. The requirements to effectively conduct a Watsu session are specific: a pool at a depth of three and a half feet at temperatures over 93 F. The pool was not something that could be found; it needed to be built.

“The people at Score were skeptical and rightly so,” she said. “If you’re so close to it and you’re so passionate about it, you almost don’t see the reality of the situation.”

She forged on despite the warning from Score. After a $20,000 investment in classes and travel expenses to Colorado, she became one of two Watsu practitioners in Missouri. The practice is popular on the coasts and in Italy and Brazil.

“In a lot of international countries, water is a healing modality in and of itself,” she said. “They have this in a lot of hospitals, but they tend to be on the East and West coasts. They have teams, which are actually a part of the medical staff: people who do Watsu and aquatic bodywork. I tried to get a hold of people here and just couldn’t get it to take.”

She had high hopes for success, but recently called the experience an expensive lesson. She signed a three-year lease on a property where she thought she could build a pool – and then ultimately could not – as well as the headache of scheduling around classes and in a pool that was too deep and too cold for her purposes. At one point, she put clients in wet suits to try to keep them warm and would run back to her office for regular massage work drenched, having too little time to commute.

She decided to let go of her dream.

“It was a difficult decision to make. I feel like I lost a part of myself,” she said. “It’s a beautiful form. I don’t love it any less. I just had to adapt and move on.”

She now has clients traveling up to five hours away to her 636 W. Republic Road office for her unique offerings like visceral manipulation, lymph drainage massage, raindrop therapy and cupping.

Her schedule is always full. “I have a very successful business now, but, unfortunately Watsu isn’t a part of it,” she said.

The Zen of the float
Then there are the float tanks.

Matt Blystone was introduced to a float tank when living in Portland, Ore. He met a guy opening one of the most prevalent sensory deprivation spas in the nation, Float On. After experiencing what Blystone calls profound psychological and physical benefits, he felt driven to bring floating to the Ozarks and opened Theta Float Spa.

Float tanks were developed in 1954 by John C. Lilly, a writer, physician and neuroscientist, to see what sensory deprivation would do to the human brain. Touted for helping a slew of conditions including posttraumatic stress disorder, it increased in popularity until health scares in the 1980s only to see steady growth since then.

Blystone partnered with fellow floater Jeff Simmons and three others for the $85,000 investment into Theta Float Spa to bring a few 5-by-9-foot float pods to town. The partners contributed sweat equity into their 1339 E. Montclair St. spa, handling construction and waterproofing, to keep costs low for the business that has existed less than a year.

It operates by appointment only as they build clientele. Blystone said the summer caused a bit of a lull, but things are picking up.

A challenge in the floating business is getting clients to return for more visits. The first float is not always pleasant. Theta Float Spa set up packages for multiple floats. It also sells memberships to reduce the price of floats, which typically is $1 per minute.

“If you go and you try to meditate, you’re going to suck at it. The first time that you float, it’s not going to be amazing. The more you do it, the better it gets,” he said.  

Blystone wanted to continue to float in the Midwest without having to drive to Kansas City. His company is  building a regular customer base, which Blystone declined to quantify.

“I would say that less than 1 percent of people that come in say it’s not for them,” he said.

Cup on, cup off
Cupping, a form of Chinese medicine using suction made famous when swimmer Michael Phelps was seen sporting round bruises at the Olympics, can now be found in massage therapy clinics in the Ozarks.

“Phelps really opened the door for us,” said Tania Reavis, a doctor of chiropractic medicine at Wellness Concepts Clinic LLC. “I joke and say that we treat you like an Olympic athlete here.”

Reavis said clients describe the glass cups suctioned to the skin as feeling like kisses from an octopus, and the practice is often incorporated into massage therapy and acupuncture sessions to relax tense areas. The standard cupping fee is $40.

Although it can stand alone, Reavis said it is used for cosmetic as well as musculoskeletal reasons in the office. The service is sporadic with customers.

The practice of cupping can cause bruising, but Reavis said it rarely causes pain.

Over 50 patients are seen at the 1200 E. Woodhurst Drive clinic per day for services including traditional Asian medicine and chiropractic therapies.

“We have a little bit of a waiting list,” she said.