Media Spotlight: Spabreak Direct

Spabreak Direct was launched in 2002 by managing director Kathryn Colligon. Spabreak Direct quickly “became the official commercial agent for health farms and spas in the UK and was nominated as the Best Spa Booking Agent by the The SPA Traveller Awards 2011”. In December 2008, Spabreak rebranded as Spabreak Direct and launched a new website.  Kathryn says the website’s primary aim was to “appeal to the majority of women who enjoy treatments and want to socialise with friends or partners and just get away from the daily grind”.

Kathryn says the luxury and spa industry has, “changed completely during the last ten or so years. Nowadays it is not an elitist market at all so while there are still the health farms and five star venues, the majority of the spas and spa hotels are four star properties and are within the financial grasp of most people.” The luxury end continues to have its appeal as before, but is no longer dominant. “The celebrity culture we now live in has, I think, been instrumental in the development of this industry as the public follows their lifestyles with a voracious appetite through the media and so nowadays people have generally become far more interested in how they look, how they feel, where they are seen and therefore far more receptive to this emerging market than was the case previously”.

Spabreak Direct entered the social media world in 2009 by joining social network sites such as Facebook and Twitter. “We currently have around 3,500 fans on Facebook. Twitter is newer to us but the number of followers is growing. We have further plans for Facebook and Twitter in progress at the moment which we expect to be launching in the New Year”. This year, Spabreak Direct continued its technological expansion with the launch of its iPhone App, keeping spa lovers up to date with special offers in their respective areas and the latest spa news, and what of traditional communications “We haven’t to date had much to do with PRs although this may be about to change, but the little experience I have had to date wasn’t of sufficient appeal at the time. We will however be looking for a good PR once our new initiatives have been implemented. What we would be looking for is a company who can find an angle and get us exposure in women’s magazines and newspapers and general media both on and offline. We believe that our company is the best out there as it is not just viewed by us as commercially viable, we have built Spabreak Direct into a company that we are immensely proud of, our repeat business and regular testimonials prove the point!”

Editorial information on Spabreak Direct, along with thousands of other media contacts and outlets, can be found in our CisionPoint media database.

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