Intro: Coming to you live from the Business RadioX studio. It’s Franchise Marketing Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of Franchise Marketing Radio. And this is going to be a good one. Today I am speaking with the founder and CEO of Sabai Thai Spa, Nuttha Goutier. Welcome.

Nuttha Goutier: Thank you for having me here. I’m very happy to share the conversation with you and the listener.

Lee Kantor: Well, I’m excited to learn about Sabai Thai Spa. Can you tell us a little about it?

Nuttha Goutier: Yes, Sabai Thai Spa is a Thai inspired concept. That file with myself and my husband took over 20 years ago in 2005. It’s through my vision to bring the Thai inspired concept here in Canada There that when people walk in on the first step, they’re coming in, they will feel like a tiny spot to Thailand without getting on an airplane. The five senses were taken care of. The sight, the sound, the touch, the feeling and the taste, and all five senses were taken care of. This warm greeting, it just makes it more warm. It feels like as you visit someone at home that bring you back, you know, to Thai to Thailand house, traditional Thai house, the over 2500 years ago. And then just the whole journey become more like a journey explorer. Experience that stay with them is not just transition of just clinical style spa, right? Is that what I want to bring is an experience and a journey and cultural. The warm, the welcoming, the truly care for others. And that’s what my vision for over 20 years ago.

Lee Kantor: So what are some of the things that are are different that are going to happen at the Sabai Thai spot? That wouldn’t happen at another type of spa.

Nuttha Goutier: It’s a spa in in here in North America it’s more like clinical, right? It’s just you went to clinic or super, extremely luxurious spa. And for us it’s just boutique spa. That totally different. It’s just the site that you come in the first step that you feel like you’ve been transported is just the warm teak wood feeling and just the custom music that we actually we have our own music that you come in, that follow your heartbeat and have the Thai accent into it. Just a high hospitality of Thai cuisine greeting and also the the smell of aroma of Thai herb that you’re coming in. And the touch is the a technique of signature tie style technique that we have in our treatment and the taste of ginger tea. That’s the whole experience. It’s just quite different than the regular spa. So with the modern comfort.

Lee Kantor: So a Thai massage will be different than a Western massage?

Nuttha Goutier: Yes, the technique of massage is different in Thailand. It’s over 2000 years ago. We do a lot of pressure points combined with stretching, breathing exercise. While you get a massage as well. You get a lot of mobility, movement on your body and stretching and the long stroke with massage. The massage itself is quite different technique already, but the theme, the whole journey, the whole experience are quite different.

Lee Kantor: And and you use something called a hot herbal compress that’s used in a Thai massage.

Nuttha Goutier: That is the hot herbal compress. Is it the system itself so separate serve itself. Type massage is usually just a pressure point combined with stretching with meditation like lazy man yoga. Easy to say. Like, you know, you’re just laying there like someone doing yoga and stretching for you and massage.

Lee Kantor: And then at what point did you decide to franchise this concept.

Nuttha Goutier: After 20 years in a business? I really like to share what we have done here in Canada for 20 years. My first goal is to share that journey, to share the experience. When I opened it, people really, really appreciate it. And all the customers coming in, they’re just like, wow, this is what we need. We need to see them everywhere, need that. You know, it just I feel belonging. I feel truly cared for. I able to reconnect to myself. It’s a space that that’s so unique that we need everywhere that make me thinking to open more location We got a lot of consumer really want to see more. And my goal before is to open the space to create a sense of community, because I would like the people that work in there is feel belonging their friend because they see each other more than a family when they work together, long hours and years and years. That’s my main thing that I want to do, is to create a space that people feel belonging, feel like home and joy full at work and enjoy. And that’s what I would like to see. And I’m so happy that we able to do that. And now because of that, it just it I just want to see more of that to create the community everywhere we go for the customer, for the staff and for the community, for the community itself.

Nuttha Goutier: We involve with the local community. We help a lot with school, the location, local organization, event, charity, reality, it just you name it, we’ve done it all. And also we every massage we plant three, every product we sell, we, we plant kelp in the ocean to clean ocean to plant tree. It’s just something that. Because where I grow up, I grew up in northern Thailand, in the middle of nowhere, that we don’t have power, no running water, no electricity, and then the center of the community of truly care for others so, so strong, and people will come in and help you to build a house without asking. People will come and help you to harvest your cough, your rice, your farm. It’s just people just showing up and then caring and helping it just so strong. And when I come here, I want to bring that sense of community everywhere. People are working the local, the community and also make people feel good every single day is I think it’s a good thing to do, right?

Lee Kantor: Yeah. Now, Have you started selling the franchises? Are there other franchises out there?

Nuttha Goutier: Yeah, we have two franchises now that in construction, and they will be opening soon, and we have a few more in dropping coming up. And this is just the almost a year now after we launched our franchising. We spend a longer time to preparation and go to our protocol, the training. We try to have robust training on, you know, like a train, like a training marketing sale and everything. Just what we have done in 20 years. We have done a few protocol and marketing and training and just 22,005, 2008, 2013, 2017 that when I literally go into a system, okay, how can we system, system everything. And we did that one on 2017. The planning for our corporate growth, right? We plan to open more, but because of Covid hit, we pull out all those expansion on a Covid year. But we did open a template location in 2020. That’s the model that we set. Either way, we go the direction of corporate expansion or franchising. This is a model, right? We calculate on that foot traffic for the staff, for the customer, the flow. And then the whole concept is all done in the 2020 with the Covid years.

Nuttha Goutier: And then in 2022 we opened two locations to test our system. You know, one we planning with someone with fully experience, fully trained and then get them to follow the system and we try another one, okay. Hire someone new and young and haven’t done anything, never done any management system before, and just pluck those two in and get them to follow the system right. Actually, we test it out and both work beautifully. And then when 2022 is confirmed that our system is ready for franchising, and after that, we go through with the franchisee consultant, strategic planning and uh, enhancement of uh 20 2017 protocol that we have done. We improved that whole system again, just the back end support, marketing support, accounting support, HR support and sales support. All the learning elements, support that we spend about two years just preparation for growth, that we want to be a strong support and we want to be a good franchisor. You know, we want to do something, do as good as we can, and we nail those down and then lay it November 2020 for that when we launch our franchise opportunity.

Lee Kantor: Now, what is the ideal franchisee, um, look like to you? What type of characteristics or traits should an ideal franchisee for Sabai look like? Are they hands on or is this an investment they can do passively, or do they need to be there at the spa?

Nuttha Goutier: We have two options. One is owner operator that who wants to run in and answer the phone and be in the spa. And the other model is for investors who want to get multi-unit operator and open. 310 2040. And we have those two systems for them to choose from. For us, because I have done for 20 years, the owner don’t have to be there if they follow a system. We have a management training that people can send people to take a management course with us, and then they can just, you know, we help them to how to hiring, how to do training and how to do all the paperwork and maintain and managing people. I work on the business on my first year that I’m in the business already. That’s why when after I working on the business for so many, many years under, I think actually first a few months, because at that time I want freedom. I said at that time it’s just not too young still, you know, 20 something. I just opened the first location. I just want to travel to Thailand. I want to go for a hike 2 or 3 hour a day, you know, want to go yoga two times a day? And I actually put the people in place.

Nuttha Goutier: I have the manager in. I hand the key over to them, I trust them, I believe in them. I have very, you know, believe in people. Right. And I always thinking about system. How can I get people to do this without me being in there? I always okay, you know, they have to do certain thing. They have to wear a uniform the the way, the greeting, the way answering the phone and all the way to follow up the customer. The whole journey, thinking about the whole customer journey. And actually I done that without the business planning. I didn’t go to business school it just because I would like to have freedom. At that time, I just created the whole system, the protocol, uh, in 2005, just for me to have freedom of running a business, I still want to enjoy it. Running business. I want to be the owner that have freedom and enjoy my time, and also able to take time away from work. It creates my flexibility of working hours for myself.

Lee Kantor: And one of the things that’s unique to your spa system is the idea of membership.

Nuttha Goutier: Um, we have, uh.

Lee Kantor: A person can be a member, and I’m sure they can go in and order different services a la carte, but being a member has some benefits, right?

Nuttha Goutier: Yes. And of course, membership. They have all the perks. You know, they get a membership rate to get the discount rate on the product, and frequently the mainly is when you commitment to be a membership. It just the commitment of being a self-care that people will come more often. Our goal is not just transition. Our goal is look at the whole of that person. We want them to be healthier, better, a better version of themselves and enrich their life and promote the longevity. That’s that’s our whole value. We want to see our customer to become a long life journey. Healthy, right? They come in legally. We recommend them, you know, to to have a good routine and come back to the spa every week to get massage. It’s possible. Routine is is a need. It’s a must thing to do. Uh, we have customers that book every Monday. The rest of the year, people book every two weeks the rest of the year. Some people book once a month the rest of the year. We want to see people come back legally. When people come back legally, they feel really connected to themselves and they know what truly mattered, what actually body needs, what actually body will tell you. Actually, I need a massage legally to calm my mind, to feel good, to loosen up the muscle. Untie the knot. And then after, when they’ve done that, they go home. They feel good at the moment. But when they go home, they become better version of themselves. Better dad, better mom, better partner. And also a more clarity at workplace as well. And then after that they’re thinking, oh, I have to eat more healthy and go for a hike or walk or get exercise legally, become routine and then they become more healthy overall.

Nuttha Goutier: Just health. And for health and wellbeing, for a PBA membership, usually we have option that people can just sign up for legal and monthly membership, or people can prepay the membership of, uh, 6 or 12, or some people even get 20 or 30 or 40. Right. And just like I’m just here we go pay membership. I’m planning to come to some people come two times a week, right? And they said, okay, just just get me pack it up. 20 membership. And that seemed to help to remind them to come more often. And also we have the legal price that people want to try it out. They can come in and try it out and and a lot of times what I learned in the North America here, people very ambitious, right? People have a go getter ambition and they want to do a lot of things so busy. And they did not take the moment for themselves. And they get overwhelming, overstressed and then also feel guilty to take care of yourself in here. I don’t know why so many times. No, you don’t need to feel guilty to care for your health and well-being. If you look after yourself, get massage legally, care for you, you probably extend your life for 10 or 15 years. It’s worth it. But during the whole journey, you’re healthy. Preventative of future sickness too. It’s a good thing to do, and you have to treat like you have a meeting and go to your condo and book it for yourself. It’s just the past. That past is a healthy past that everyone needed.

Lee Kantor: Now, in addition to massage, you also do some skin care treatments as well.

Nuttha Goutier: Yes, we do facial and we also have our own skincare line called smile. Essential that people can have that home with them after massage or facial, that they can continue for self care at home.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more about the franchise opportunity or learn more about the spa. Is there a website that they can go to?

Nuttha Goutier: Yes. sabaifranchise.com or sabaithai.com. or they can reach out to me on my LinkedIn Nuttha Goutier, N U T T H A, last name G O U T I E R.

Lee Kantor: And then Sabai is spelled SABAI.

Nuttha Goutier: SABAI. Yes, Sabai.

Lee Kantor: Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Nuttha Goutier: Thank you so much for having me on here. I’m so glad and be honored to be here.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Franchise Marketing Radio.