Trend-Averse Spot Spa Spotted The Green Beauty Trend Long Before It Was One

Seventeen years ago, Nell Rueckl plunked holistic wellness destination Spot Spa down in Minneapolis as natural offerings were only beginning to bubble to the surface of the beauty industry. Much has changed since that time, but Rueckl hasn’t. She doesn’t stray from products and services that perform (vampire facials aren’t on the menu). She isn’t wowed by trends or celebrities. “The beauty industry moves so fast, so it’s just best to do what works,” says Rueckl. “It’s a harder road because you’re not feeding everybody what they think they need right away, but I think it’s a better road because you end up with integrity-based services and products.” Beauty Independent chatted with her about tried-and-true brands, fair play as a small business, social media, community events and what’s next for Spot Spa.

What was your career path prior to opening Spot Spa?

In 1993, I started working at the Aveda destination spa in Osceola, Wis., for a few years to cut my teeth. It was actually a profound experience. You’re working full-time there, so you’re always booked, always meeting new people. Then, I moved to the Twin Cities and practiced out of my home for a while. I had a full clientele out of my two-bedroom apartment. My second bedroom was my massage room, but I wanted to have a bigger community, too, a health community that I was working with. I didn’t want to be working alone. It’s always been in my blood to run my own business. It’s just how my brain works. Basically, I wanted to start small because I felt it was really important to maintain the integrity of the actual services being performed. A space came about and I jumped on it.

Where did Spot Spa get its name?

When I opened, the reason we called it Spot is because it was so small. My clients always commented how they preferred to come to a home setting, so I wanted it to be where people felt like they were coming to a home setting instead of a machine. Spas and day spas can really feel like a machine. We were underneath a bar for 13 years. We had three rooms and a steam room. Then, we came up to the street level. Now, we have four rooms and a pedicure station and then the retail.

How have the services and products evolved since the spa opened in 2001?

We were tiny. The first five years, it was me and a few people at Spot Spa. We carried Dr. Hauschka skincare, which is an awesome line with a lot of integrity. Then, when we opened the Uptown Minneapolis location in the fourth year. We just continued with Dr. Hauschka’s line, and we got Arcona Skin Care, which has been also a great complement to Dr. Hauschka products because it is more active. So, I was able to deal with people who were struggling with their skin and more acne-prone. With all that said, we just tried to maintain integrity of services and products. And, then, we grew step by step. It’s not that we were ever really doing anything different, we’ve just gotten more expansive.

How many brands does Spot Spa carry today?

Six major lines, and other supplementary lines that we cherry-pick from. Arcona and Dr. Haushcka are our main lines. Then, we’ve got One Love Organics and Good Karma. I also carry Meow Meow Tweet, RMS, Nell’s Remedies, Ilia and Sun Potion.

What do you use in nail services?

We have 9-free product, which is pretty cool. We do offer gels for those who need it, but we don’t encourage it. I just hate it, but we had some people that just they’re getting married, and they cannot handle a chipped nail or whatever. The 9-free polish that we have is so great, though. We have people that have completely switched from gels to the 9-free because it’s a chip-resistant polish. The one that we use in our back bar is Dazzle Dry, which is a terrible name, and that’s why we don’t have it on our shelf because it doesn’t fit our brand, but it does fit our service. It’s the best-wearing 9-free polish that I’ve gotten my hands on yet. Berkeley came out with a study about a year-and-a-half ago that, if you’re the practitioner using gels, it shows up in your urine in two days. So, I’m very very careful. We don’t offer gel pedicures because it’s not necessary. If you’ve got to have it on your hands and you’re only going to do it once in a while, this is what we have to do. I have to kind of pick my poison. A side note on natural nails [is that] people consider gel nails natural nails. I do not. Some people would think gels are natural because they’re not acrylic. That’s how twisted the industry is. Gel is toxic. Gels are 3-free, but you have to use acetone to take them off, so that’s when it becomes toxic. The acetone is really the scary part, not the polish.

What makes a brand successful enough for you to keep carrying it?

That’s a good question. One, it has to move and, two, we want to see results, and we like to work with it. We don’t sell stuff we don’t like.

How do you find brands to stock?

I get a lot of people asking about new brands, and I get a lot of samples. I find it very difficult to buy into new brands because our two lines are so effective that I don’t need the redundancy. Otherwise, we would be confusing our clients with too many options. I need to have stuff that works. Arcona plays really well with others, so we can mix and match different lines if we need to. There aren’t that many robust lines out there that are that effective. I could buy a bunch of stuff and have fun by having all these things, but, honestly, there’s a green beauty company opening like every month. They’re great — there’s a few that I think are really cool that I’d like to try out — but I really respect other spas.

What do you mean by respect other spas?

I’m just a small business owner. So, if other spas are carrying a green beauty line — I’ll carry the rake, they carry the shovel. Together, we will be successful. If we both have to carry the rake and the shovel, we’re diluting our market. So, I’m a very conscious neighbor as well.

How do you feel about big-box stores selling green beauty products?

I have to be thankful that it’s out there for more people, but we have knowledgeable people on the floor, and the clients that come back and give us feedback. It’s so much better to buy product from a store like ours than [big-box chains].

How has the landscape changed since Spot Spa began?

I don’t have to try as hard to get people to cross the bridge because people are coming in educated. There’s so much more knowledge out there and acceptance out there of what people do and don’t want to put on their body. It’s easier for us to say, “This is non-toxic.” They’re grateful for it. There are a lot of people coming in pointing out different ingredients we have in our products and requesting products that have or don’t have certain ingredients in them. That is a really pretty big difference. That consciousness has really only changed in the last four or five years.

How would you describe your clientele?

They’re all really grounded, good people. If you want demographics, we have a nice mix of men and women. We actually have a really broad spectrum of clients [affluent and not] because our services are accessible. We don’t price ourselves out. That’s a really important thing for me, to make sure people can come and see us.

On Tuesdays, you throw special community nights. Explain those to us.

We do community acupuncture and community reflexology on Tuesday nights. We just took a slower night and use a bunch of the rooms. We try to get people that want to do shorter services on those days. Acupuncture is $65 for a private session but for community night it’s $25, which is an awesome deal. Very rarely are you in the room with someone else, but sometimes you are. The thing that’s nice about the community acupuncture is that acupuncture has benefits cumulatively. So, if you can get in more regularly, and it’s more accessible, you will have more healing.

What is the Learning Bar?

The Learning Bar is cool. We try to do one or two a month, and they seem to keep filling up, and we have a lot of people who want to teach them. The events range anywhere from a deep healing scenario to how to detox your makeup bag. We also do a facial event. So, you’re getting a facial at a bar with other people. You’re getting a mask and a quick hydration, but you also get all this education: here’s where your skin is at, here’s what we recommend, and this is what we did. Some of it is more clinical like the facial events, and some of them are things like how to make your own scarves and heal your heart. The Learning Bars really range.

Why are the events important?

It just gives us something to have fun and talk about. Most of them are put on by our practitioners or our close circle, so it gives people a chance to spread their wings and spread their talent, too. Community is such a big thing right now, We have this great space in Uptown — we have two stories — we have a space separate from the treatments that we can play in. We have so much to offer in teaching. Nowadays, people are hungry for learning about green beauty, healing and wellness.

Where are people finding out about Spot Spa?

Our social media brand is really strong, but our community brand is also really strong. We only ramped up our social media a few years ago, and I do think that’s helped the growth, but we’ve got clients who’ve been coming for a decade or more, and we remember these people.

What advice do you have for someone who may want to open up their own beauty business or spa?

It’s a labor of love, and details matter. My biggest thing is don’t chase stars. Do what works and what’s stood the test of time. So, I call it, “Don’t chase stars,” because you’ll waste your energy trying to reinvent yourself all the time.