This is the eighth in a series of 12 PBN articles focusing on the backgrounds, challenges and successes of some of the area’s most influential and interesting business women. The series began Sept. 12.
Being the boss at the age of 25 does not affect Vuré Kpea’s confidence or ability to lead a luxury medical spa company with four full-service locations in the state, she said.
Since taking the helm of her family’s business, Spa Vuré, about two months ago, Kpea has made accountability her No. 1 one goal for the year, because in the spa industry every little detail matters.
For example, if Kpea, as a co-owner, tells an employee that she will make sure the front-desk receptionist tells customers there is a discount on facials one day, it is important that she follow through.
“I’ve found that it doesn’t work when people feel like they’re not being heard … that you don’t recognize what they are doing,” she said. “I’m really making a concerted effort to listen to what [employees] need … to keep everyone informed of what’s going on” in the management of the company.
When there’s no communication it leaves too much room for fear and doubt, she added.
Kpea started working at the company as front-desk concierge. She answered phones, escorted guests to their rooms and made tea for them when she was home from college one summer three years ago.
She started working full time for the company as its marketing and public relations director after graduating from college two years ago.
Kpea said her father, Nomate Kpea, opened the first spa five years ago because “he had this vision for beauty spas that he’s had for years. … He was pretty much just waiting for God’s direction to start them.”
Nomate Kpea has been practicing dermatology in the state for 20 years. He is also founder and owner Skin Medicine USA Inc., a dermatology and cosmetic surgery practice with five locations.
Spa Vuré got its name about two years ago when Mr. Kpea decided to rename what had been called The Spa because Vuré means love, Vuré Kpea said.
“That’s a very, very powerful thing, to run a business or provide a service for people that is really rooted in love,” she said. “That is the intention [of the spa]. ... We really try to provide services, provide an atmosphere that is not judgmental.”
And because of her father’s profession, another thing that sets Spa Vuré apart is the fact that it is a licensed medical spa, which means it carries products that have prescription-grade active ingredients.
The spa uses a lot of glycolics, which is a fruit acid that eats away at dead skin, for example, Kpea said.
But there is a difference between what can be purchased over the counter and what can be used or prescribed by a licensed professional. For instance, Kpea said, glycolic acid might comprise 0.003 percent of an over-the-counter product. “When you go to the spa and [use] something with 10-percent glycolic acid you see the results right away,” she said.
And at Spa Vuré, she added, “You also have licensed professionals who tell you … what you need to look at … show you what you need to do.”
The biggest threat to her spas isn’t necessarily competing spas, Kpea noted. It has more to do with people’s mentality about skin care, because there are so many skin-care products on the market. People don’t see going to a spa as something they should invest in.
Changing that mentality is one of the most challenging aspects of being in the industry, she said.
“It’s just amazing to me the investment we put into things that are essentially dead,” she said. “People don’t realize with massages … you’re actually breaking up toxins in your body and you’re flushing them out. … Your stress is not going to group up in different places and you can actually process information better.”
And because the best way to relay the message is through the health-and-beauty providers, Kpea said she has to focus on making sure her employees are the best they can be.
That involves listening and responding to their needs, giving them a supportive environment and caring about their families, she said.
“It’s really their business,” she added. “We provide the facilities. We provide all the extras. But really, each person is responsible for the lives they change and touch.”
That connection with the employee is what makes a customer come back.
Spa Vuré’s four locations – at the Providence Place mall, Narragansett, Johnston and the newest one in Newport – each offer massages, facials, body treatments, hair-and-nail care, cosmetics, waxing, laser hair removal and cosmetic medical services, such as Botox injections. The Narragansett spa is in the same building as one of the Skin Medicine USA offices.
One of the benefits of being linked with Skin Medicine USA is that the spa company has a pool of medical professionals to pull from for the cosmetic medical services it offers. In addition, medical professionals at Skin Medicine often refer people to the spa and vice versa, when a spa employee notices a skin condition that needs care.
“We love the synergy between the two,” Kpea said.
As for the future, Kpea said her first goal is to make sure each spa is operating at capacity. She’d like to build a better pool of repeat customers, and then to open more spas in other states and possibly even internationally. The spa employs 54 people at four locations.
Kpea said she is not concerned about talk of recession.
“I’m definitely at an advantage to be a partial business owner, because I was raised in a house of entrepreneurs and I saw hard times … I didn’t see fear,” she said.
Her biggest concern is that all the recession talk will affect employees’ state of mind in a negative way.
“It’s my job to encourage everybody,” she said, and to explain that there will be people who still come to the spa. “My biggest challenge is to continue communicating.” •
To read about other Business Women, in the rest of the PBN series, click here.
