Office space and the cost of doing business

(4) Here is where the large part of cost is for massage therapy and why you are seeing fewer and fewer independent massage therapists available.

In my own experience, I have literally been given utility closets to work out of as a rental offering for the *cough, cough* meager monthly rent of $400-500 per month (prior to 2023) in a small city or non-metropolitan area.

This can seem very reasonable for a commercial office rate depending on your area but when it comes to commercial rent, there is no "average' or acceptable amount. It is literally what the landlord thinks they can get out of a potential renter so the market for office space can be unwieldy at best and a cash grab at worst.

The only people who don't experience this are people who have friends or family that can lock down real estate for them or therapists that can afford to financially float an office at a deficit until they can get enough volume of clients to rotate through their schedule and allow them to start paying back the financial deficit, or have sponsors (usually spouses or parents) floating their personal bills.

The fact is that many independent therapists who find an office space (that does not require they sell a kidney to afford it) are also working full time jobs to help support their part time office.

Remember, a BUSY therapist is only looking at being able to rely on 12 hours of paid time per week because of client preferences in scheduling times. This means that the higher the commercial rent, the higher the service must cost to allow them to afford their office and be able to pay bills without having to work a second job and further limit their own availability for appointments. (This is the massage therapy self employment catch-22.)

iIf we use the 80/20 rule, for every 1 booked appointment, there need to be 6 established clients. For 12 booked clients per week, you need a minimum of 60 reliable clients in your contact book. To make a month of solid 12 per week bookings, you must factor in that most folks will book either every month or more often, once every 3 months and this means your client base must be a minimum of approximately 240 clients. How long do you think it would take to build a book of a minimum of 240 reliable clients in your contact list of people who will pay you for services, regularly?

Its not impossible but it isn't realistically possible for therapists starting out with a brand new practice who also need to cover commercial rent as a solo practitioner. This is complicated by the fact that the time spent working another job is time that cannot be devoted to marketing and sales for the practice. The end result is that therapists quit the profession in their first 2 years because is impossible to get started coming out of the gate from school or, if they are skilled enough to warrant their own practice with any confidence, they are there trapped in the 'hours in a day = unpaid work for marketing time vs full time job to help pay for the rent on a part time office time' catch-22. Honestly, if it were as simple as just being good at selling, we would all be working at insurance companies making compound wealth opportunities instead of this.

As consumers of massage, what we are left with are either marginally skilled or poorly compensated therapists (who are employees of other businesses and aren't given reason to be motivated, or even able, to offer better services.) If you think massage is expensive, consider that you are receiving an expensive back rub in most places because the therapist is being paid less than $30 (or less than half of what the insurance company is paying) for your $80 to $120 appointment.

Exploitation and predatory employers are rampant in the massage industry. Here are your examples:

Hand and Stone commission payment to therapist: approximately $25/hr. Minimal cost of massage: $85 Profit to HS? $60 in their pocket x the number of therapists working at any given time. Meanwhile, they will often "encourage" the therapists to provide labor (house keeping, laundry, staying on premise for a shift) without payment in direct violation of labor laws. They get away with this because it is only a "suggestion" and terminating you is simply a matter of saying you weren't productive enough with your volume of paid appointments. Massage therapist will also not receive full time employee benefits, medical insurance or job protections and no ability to increase their pay rate.

Massage Envy commission payment to therapist: approximately $20/hr OR minimum wage at end of week, depending on which is the higher amount. Minimal cost of massage: $80. Profit to ME? $60 in their pocket x the number of therapists working at any given time. What if you are receiving minimum wage (current rate of $16.20 an hour) while they are pocketing the additional income from the hours of massage you worked just short of your commission payment instead?

Your minimum wage payout will be $453.60 for 28 hours (usually avoiding the 32 hour threshold that makes them full time employees). If you had 5 appointments at $80, that is $400 they received from customers for your work. Their total cost to pay you that wasn't paid by clients? $53.60 for the week. If you make continue making less appointments than the guaranteed weekly minimum wage payout, you will be terminated for being non-productive. Meanwhile, massage therapist will not receive full time employee benefits, medical insurance or job protections and no ability to increase their pay rate.

Chiropractors: I have literally heard of chiropractors in my area paying their massage therapists as little as $15 an hour (part time, of course) while receiving $60 up to $100+ (insurance reimbursement) for rthe massage. $15/hr x 4 hrs = $60. 3 possible massages during that time = $180 - $300. Potential profit for chiropractic office: $120- $240 PER 4 HOUR DAY OF MASSAGE EMPLOYEE LABOR. Remember, massage is a bonus income for them and not their business focus. Meanwhile, massage therapist will not receive full time employee benefits, medical insurance or job protections and no ability to increase their pay rate.

Spas: Typicallly pay 50/50 commission split. Their 50% split will include provision and replenishment of your supplies, laundry service, uniforms, office rent overhead, built in client list and any employment taxes and unemployment insurance required. Your job is simply to show up and do the work assigned to you. But now some are paying even less on the commission or requiring that the therapist provide and replenish their own supplies or uniforms! Meanwhile, massage therapist will not receive full time employee benefits, medical insurance or job protections and no ability to increase their pay rate.

"But you get tips!"

If you work in a medical setting like a chiropractor office, you will not receive tips because it is not customary or approved of. I suspect it is because the chiropractor's don't get tips so do not see the importance of you getting tips and will not encourage it. (in spite of their questionable compensation for the therapist in most cases.)

If you work at a spa, tips are recommended but not required and with the rise of high volume, cheapest price faux spas (Hand Stone, Massage Envy), you aren't gauranteed any tips, or how much those tips will be based on the client's generosity, not necessarily your skills. I call the franchise spas "the Walmart Spas" because they follow the Walmart model of undermining independent businesses and eliminating them without giving anything meaningful back to support the community. The Walmart and Amazon legacy is nothing that supports the people who make their profit possible.

 
Consumer subsidized wages: And honestly, aren't you tired of seeing the tip jars or begging bowls everywhere you go now? They are there because the business is relying on YOU to subsidize the wages of their employees because they won't pay them fair wages instead. To their employees, they justify their unfair or sub-standard wages by saying "But you get tips!" as if tips were a reliable source of income.

If you do utilize massage therapists, please tip them or give them gift cards so they can buy groceries, or coffee or whatever. If a business were paying their employees a fair and liveable wage, tips wouldn't be necessary to begin with in any industry.

And don't forget, for all THESE characters, they are probably taking a lion's share of your payment for that massage (and multiply that by the number of therapists working at the same time on any given day.) They can afford to pay a fair wage even with prime real estate as their commercial rent. They just choose greed instead. Don't let them give you an "oh poor me" story. If they weren't making a profit, they wouldn't keep the business. The question is (like Walmart and Amazon) how much profit and at whose expense?

Massage therapists deserve to be taken care of too. If they have to pay for their own disability, medical insurance, unemployment and retirement funding, etc because the employer refuses to give that to them, where is the money for that supposed to come from? Their tips?