By Lauren Jade Hill
Overlooking the shores of Lake Geneva in the mountain town of Montreux, the pioneering medical retreat Clinique La Prairie has found great success in bringing together the science of cell therapy and holistic wellness with the luxury of a five-star hotel and spa. We speak to Clinique La Prairie’s CEO Simone Gibertoni to find out what the future holds for this famously progressive brand.
What makes Clinique La Prairie unique in terms of its philosophy?
Clinique La Prairie is basically made of two souls. In Switzerland there are a lot of hospitals with outstanding doctors, and you can find a lot of wellness and leisure spas around the world, but you don’t find a place like Clinique La Prairie, which combines a hospital with over 50 practitioners and a wellness and leisure spa with over 20 therapists and five-star accommodation. Our reputation attracts the best doctors in Switzerland and therapists who come from around the world to be here.
We have a very strong scientific base; throughout the medical spa industry, Clinique la Prairie is the strongest in bringing all three axes together: a strong leisure part, a strong wellness part and our medical focus. The spa’s mountain setting is another aspect that makes Clinique la Prairie unique, and so does the amount of technology we use. We invest more than $1,000,000 each year in research and development.
How do you want Clinique La Prairie to evolve?
First of all, I have to say I’m proud to have a very strong management team. A new team has been in place for the last few months and together we’ve decided to approach the future by first revitalizing the Swiss clinic. We already have exceptional results and almost 70 percent of our clients come back, but we want to improve even more by refining the wellness programs. We just launched the Master Detox and we will launch two more new wellness programs this year, along with a program that gives people the chance to experience Clinique La Prairie in a weekend.
A very important project we are working on at the moment is the development of a new center for aesthetic medicine. We are coming back to the original focus of Clinique la Prairie, which is the medical side; the new center will be ready to open in a couple of months.
What long term plans do you have for the brand?
We have two big projects in the medium to long term. One project is that we want to become more of an ongoing health consultant to our clients, so people don’t just benefit from our expertise when they come for one week of the year. Clinique La Prairie will be able to follow their wellness throughout the year through a concierge service. As a part of this project, we are working on food supplements to help clients sustain their regime when they’re away.
Another major project is to open a city based Clinique La Prairie in Asia; Singapore is one of the possibilities. Located in the center of the city, this wellness clinic will contain a spa with strong aesthetic and medical expertise and consultation, which follows the progress of clients in the region after they’ve been to our Swiss hub. Even further in the future, we might open two or three wellness Clinique La Prairie clinics: one in the US, one in Asia and one in the Middle East. The experience at Clinique La Prairie is very exclusive, with six staff for each guest, and this is a characteristic we’ll keep in the future.
Keep up-to-date on Clinique La Prairie’s new wellness programs by going over to laprairie.ch.
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