Wellness has gone beyond a trend; guests now expect that hotels will accommodate and enable their healthy-living lifestyle. At the same time, there is still no consensus on how wellness should be ‘delivered’ to guests. In this slideshare, we’ll look at the key drivers behind wellness, the psychographic of wellness devotees, the 7 key pillars of wellness and how hotels around the world are responding to our changing demands.

2. Foreword
"Wellness is not just a trend. There has been a collective shift in consciousness towards things
that give us the ability to live a longer, happier and healthier life. The shift is progressive and
encompasses all sectors and demographics.
Healthy living has now become the lifestyle expectation of the younger generation. Nowhere is
this more noticeable than in the hospitality industry where operators have been forced to
rethink their entire business strategies through a wellness lens. What wellness means remains
up to the individual.
Fortunately, our industry has the capacity to observe and engage guests personally, allowing us
to better understand their wellness needs as individuals, and in so doing, raise the standards of
hospitality."

3. Is health the new wealth?
With chronic disease being the leading cause of death in Western countries, and consumers
understanding that they have the ability to influence their risk level, wellness is something worth
investing in. Depending on which country you live in, your wealth level can significantly impact
your health outcomes. In the U.S., the richest 1% of the population live, on average, 15 years
longer than the poorest 1%7.1
Maintaining fitness, abstaining from smoking and maintaining a healthy diet don’t necessarily
cost more yet factors such as education and proportion of income required for health insurance
are clearly putting the poor at a disadvantage. For affluent consumers, wellness has seized our
attention, giving rise to a range of experiences and products for those with the means and
desire to take their health to the next level.
Conspicuously living well has become a lifestyle choice, albeit a somewhat privileged one,
represented three ways:
1. Exclusive fashion products
2. Fitness services with restricted access
3. Transformative travel experiences
1 “US Health & Inequality.” The Lancet, 2017, www.thelancet.com/infographics/us- health.

4. How social media and
wellness interact
So what’s causing all the sudden wellness activity on social media? The Wellness Institute
points to our ‘Age of Loneliness’ as one reason we feel the need to increase fun and socialness
in our daily activities.2
Posting on social media makes wellness more fun. We see people sharing their journey in the
form of ‘before and after’ photos, daily diet/exercise logs, photos of their green juices, 3-minute
workout videos, gym selfies, and even weigh-in photos.
There are 2 dominant motivations for joining online wellness communities
• With social media, there’s a sense that we can reinvent ourselves – as professional athletes,
yogis, or nutrition experts. We see this evidenced through the record number of people
signing up to marathons and other amateur sporting events. (Five times as many people are
running the London Marathon than when it started in 1981.3)
• A study from the University of Pennsylvania has shown that we benefit from having fitness
buddies as they can provide the necessary motivation to push ourselves. 4 Backing this up,
#fitfam (short for ‘fitness family’) is one of the most popular fitness-related hashtags on
Instagram.
2 “Global Wellness Institute Releases Report from its Roundtable on Wellness.” PRWeb, 6 Apr. 2017, www.prweb.com/releases/2017/04/prweb14221742.html.
3 Cave, Andrew, and Alex Miller. “Marathon Runners Sign up in Record Numbers.” The Telegraph, Telegraph Media Group, 13 Apr. 2016, www.telegraph.co.uk/investing/
business-of-sport/marathon-running/.
4 “Online Peer Networks Can Motivate People to Exercise More, Penn Study Finds.” Online Peer Networks Can Motivate People to Exercise More, Penn Study Finds
| Annenberg School for Communication, Annenberg School for Communications, University of Pennsylvania, 7 Oct. 2015,

5. 7 Pillars of Wellness
for Hotels

6. 1. Diet
Food designed to make you feel good
Many luxury hotels have begun to recognize that the
way to make their guests feel good is not by offering
indulgent meal choices and cocktails, but by offering
foods that are vibrant, nutritious, and won’t leave
them with a headache the next day.
Personalized nutrition
Spa retreats have been offering their guests
personalized meal programs for decades, but the
practice of catering to specific diets has recently
become more common at luxury urban hotels as well.
Sustainable food choices
More and more, menus are inspired by the location,
using local, seasonal produce. At Hyatt, healthy,
sustainable menus take kids into account too.
They’ve been partnering with sustainable food
pioneer Alice Waters since 2012 to create organic
kids’ food menus.

7. 2. Exercise
Today’s fitness enthusiast has no shortage of options
when it comes to instruction and facilities for all kinds
of physical activity. Hotels should seek to offer a
range of options that feels continuous with guests’
day to day lives. Current trends are:
Group fitness classes
Group fitness classes have been steadily rising in
popularity, particularly with women. Classes such as
spin, barre, boot camp and high intensity interval
training (HIIT) are some of the most popular.
In-room fitness
The hotel room is an underutilized space when
it comes to fitness, but Hilton has tapped into many
people’s preference for working out in private by
offering in-room equipment and fitness videos.

8. 3. Sleep
According to the National Heart, Lung and Blood
Institute, “after several nights of losing sleep—
even a loss of just 1–2 hours per night—your
ability to function suffers as if you haven’t slept
at all for a day or two.”
Mattresses of distinction
With a feather topper and high thread count
sheets being the expected standard now, hotels
are distinguishing their mattresses through
technical features, such as how the mattresses
disperse heat, and eco-friendly materials, such
as organic mattress covers and alternatives to
traditional flame retardants.
Sleep packages
A growing number of hotels are now offering
complete packages that include features such
as color-changing mood lighting that energizes
and relaxes, evening tea, aromatherapy
amenities, and sleep doctor consultations.

9. 4. Temperature
Knowing the right temperature for each guest, at
each time of day, is key to providing guest
comfort. But how does temperature contribute to
wellness? Extreme heat or cold affects our
moods and our ability to concentrate, but
sometimes they can also be used to combat
illness or contribute to our mental wellness.
Infrared saunas are the most Instagrammable
wellness trend at the moment, with Gwenyth
Paltrow and Lady Gaga both being social
advocates of the treatment. The saunas claim to
treat conditions from arthritis to inflammation in
addition to helping burn calories.

10. 5. Air
While chronic respiratory diseases are not as
commonly discussed as heart disease, worldwide
there are 235 million people affected by asthma.
It is the most common chronic disease among
children.5 Allergies are another significant global
healthcare challenge.
Since much of our exposure to toxins comes from
the buildings we live and work in, air purification
systems are becoming more commonplace in
homes and businesses. The MGM Grand Stay
Well rooms include an air purification system that
incorporates several types of filters to trap odors,
germs and pet allergens. An aromatherapy
system using essential oils is also included to
help guests relax naturally.
5 “NCD Alliance.” Chronic Respiratory Diseases | NCD Alliance, ncdalliance.org/
chronic-respiratory-diseases.

11. 6. Light
Light is one of the most important external factors
affecting sleep, specifically it’s timing, intensity,
duration, and the wavelength of light. Some studies
even suggest that too much exposure to light at
nighttime can lead to depression.
Clock radios and glowing power buttons can interfere
with our sleep by removing the total blackness that is
ideal for a good night’s rest.
Tablets and smartphones emit blue light from light-
emitting diodes (LEDs) which are particularly good at
suppressing melatonin.
Considering that many guests at a given hotel will
be traveling from a different time zone, hotel rooms
might plan to include features that help their circadian
rhythms adjust.

12. 7. Mental wellness
Mental health has garnered increasing public
awareness in recent years. The Global Wellness
Institute highlights loneliness as a cause for concern
and it now trumps obesity as a predictor for early
death.6
Hotels supporting guests’ mental wellness
• The Park Hyatt New York is supporting mental
health by hosting meditation classes with MNDFL,
New York City’s premier meditation studio.
• Boosting the creative spirit, The Morgans Hotel
Group provides mindful coloring books and a
complimentary download of the Buddhify app.
In many ways, providing mental or spiritual support
can be one of the simplest aspects of wellness to
support, while still being a valuable part of the guest
experience.
6 “Global Wellness Institute Releases Report from its Roundtable on Welln.” PRWeb,
6 Apr. 2017, www.prweb.com/releases/2017/04/prweb14221742.htm.

13. Read the full ebook
The Business of Being Well +
Full interviews with industry CEOs +
Top wellness trends
localmeasure.com/resources

14. About Local Measure
Local Measure is the leading customer intelligence
platform in the tourism and hospitality sectors. Local
Measure’s clients include many of the world’s largest
tourism and hospitality brands. The company merges
local content, social media and mobile technology, to
provide customers with live access to operationalize
customer data, rich content and analytics at a local level.
For more information about Local Measure, visit
www.localmeasure.com