Yorkshire spas and beauty salons reopen for facials and massages but no saunas or steam rooms

Across Yorkshire beauty salons and spas are reopening their doors and offering more treatments, but are warning customers not to expect their visits to look and feel exactly like their pre-lockdown experiences.

Spas and beauty salons in England were able to resume close contact services on August 15 with strict safety measures in place. Treatments and services now allowed include eyebrow treatments, face waxing, sugaring or threading services, facial treatments, advanced facial technical (electrical or mechanical) treatments, eyelash treatments, make-up application, dermarolling, dermaplaning, microblading, electrolysis on the face. Beard trimming is also allowed.

From August 15 all staff offering close contact services, including barbers and hairdressers, have had to wear a face mask as well as a clear visor, following evidence from the scientific advisory group for emergencies (Sage) aimed at protecting customers and staff from respiratory droplets caused by sneezing, coughing, or speaking. Hands-on facial massage may be administered with gloves, which might alter the experience.

Filiz Özakinci, co-owner of Studio Sister beauty salon in Leeds, said: “Working with a mask and a visor has proved extremely difficult when intricate work is involved, but we appreciate that it’s the right thing to do to be safe and we’re used to wearing PPE in our line of work.

“It’s the other restrictions that have made returning to work a lot harder than usual – we now have to allocate more time between clients for extra rigorous cleaning so this means we can’t fill our diaries with the same number of clients as before.

“The hardest thing has been the loss of clients who, for a number of reasons, are yet to resume their beauty treatments with us. Overall, we hope that as time continues and we show our commitment to keeping the salon a fun, friendly but safe environment then business will build back up to pre-Covid times.

“Lockdown has been a tough time for the beauty industry but we’ve remained positive throughout.”

At Rudding Park Spa near Harrogate, head of spa Sarah Johnson, said: “The most important challenge we faced initially was ensuring our therapists were comfortable as they worked. This involves them wearing face coverings and visors to protect both themselves and guests whilst continuing to ensure we continue to provide an exceptional guest experience. With extensive research, we found comfortable visors from Versoshield which the therapists find easy to wear and ensure we provide the treatments in a safe environment.

“Health, hygiene and thorough pre-treatment consultations have always been a priority within the industry, with high standards instilled from day one of any training programme. Our spa therapists have adapted really well, as this comes as second nature.

“The current biggest challenge is the on-going sauna and steam room closures (we are anticipating an update imminently), the benefits of which I believe outweigh any considered risks including improved circulation, reduction of muscular tension, and easing of pain."

Sarah said that the wellbeing and social benefits of a spa visit have been clearly missed throughout lockdown. “Guests are definitely taking advantage of the opportunity to experience the power of touch to improve their health and wellbeing. The most popular choice by far is a new treatment, the Brighter Body Boost which is a combination of a deep cleansing body exfoliation followed by massage using exotic Elemis frangipani monoi oil. Guests are also placing increasing value on the feel good factor of enhancing their appearance, taking advantage of maintenance treatments and signing up for our nail and beauty loyalty programme where we have seen membership numbers double since re-opening.”

Gillian Venning, director of Sales and Marketing at the Doubletree by Hilton Harrogate Majestic Hotel and Spa, said that its new spa was open under very strict procedures, guided by the UK Spa Association. The spa policy advises that staff call all visitors 24 hours prior to the spa appointment to ensure that neither they nor anyone they live with have symptoms. On arrival a host meets and guides visitors through the arrivals stage avoiding interaction with other groups to maintain the social distancing plan. Guests are allocated a personal lounger and dining table set with everything they need.

It has been a worrying time for many beauty salons and spas, with months in lockdown leading to concerns about their survival. The National Hair & Beauty Federation (NHBF) today released the results of a state of Industry survey of UK hair and beauty salons and barbershops. Two thirds expected business to remain slow based on their forthcoming bookings for the next three months with 35 per cent worried about how little business they have coming up - and 41 per cent could not say if their business would survive until Christmas.

Government guidance says businesses must operate an appointment only system and keep a record of clients and visitors for 21 days to assist NHS Test and Trace. When taking bookings, the salon should ask screening questions. If the client has any of the symptoms, however mild, they should stay at home and reschedule their appointment.

Business Companion, in partnership with the National Hair and Beauty Federation (NHBF), has published a bulletin for the health and beauty sector, setting out practices that minimise the spread of COVID-19 including supporting NHS Test & Trace; best-practice cleaning measures; toilets and washrooms for staff and customers; safe use of water systems, ventilation, laundry and waste, and the correct use of PPE, face masks and face coverings. It advises that, in the event of a customer reporting infection,Test and Trace will be interested in those people that the customer has been ‘in close contact’ with during the 48 hours prior to developing symptoms and since developing symptoms. Close contact means having face-to-face contact with someone (less than one metre away); spending more than 15 minutes within two metres of someone; or having recently visited a setting with other infected people (which might include the salon).

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James Mitchinson