Spavia franchise unit economics
Spavia franchisees run a day spa selling massage, facials and body treatments on membership. Across 44 locations revenue totaled $51,078,946 in cash receipts, a median of $1,110,481 per location, and cash flow from operations averaged 17.6% of revenue. Operating margin ran from 34.4% at the best location to −11.2% at the worst.
- Primary source
- Spavia International, LLC, 2026 Franchise Disclosure Document
- Items read
- Item 19 for sales and any profit figure; Item 20 for the location count
- Population
- 44 of 64 locations
- Our calculations
- Marked on the page with an asterisk. Method
- Last reviewed
- 26 September 2026
Disclosure-based. Not a forecast, not an offer to sell a franchise, and not advice.
Operating margin runs from 34.4% at Spavia's best location to −11.2% at its worst, on the same model and the same brand. Personnel takes 47.5% of every dollar system-wide. Product takes 5.3%. Almost everything you can recover sits in the schedule.
- Operating margin runs 34.4% to −11.2% on the same model. The median location keeps 18.4%, so there are 16 points of upside above you and 30 points of room below.
- Personnel is 47.5% of revenue, and one point is $11,105. The median location spends $527,052 on people against $1,110,481 of receipts.
- Product costs 5.3% of sales, so cost control has little to grip. Treatment and retail product runs $61,351 a location. This is a labor business, and the schedule is the lever.
- Facility takes 14.5%, three times what product does. $168,833 a location a year in rent, repairs and utilities.
- The 59 disclosed locations run from $502,703 to $2,071,431. A little over four times, top to bottom, with the median at $1,044,809.
How much does a Spavia franchise make?
The median Spavia unit reported $1,110,481 of revenue in the 2026 FDD. The brand’s disclosure document puts the profit line at 17.6% of revenue. Revenue is not income. Rent, wages, cost of goods and the franchise fees all come out before an owner is paid. The figures for the highest-selling and lowest-selling businesses are below.
How the business works
Where every dollar goes.
| Line | Total, 44 locations | Share of revenue | Median location | High | Low |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue: cash receipts | $51,078,946 | 100.0% | $1,110,481 | $2,071,431 | $563,990 |
| Personnel expenses | $24,269,629 | 47.5% | $527,052 | $1,037,649 | $150,944 |
| Facility cost | $7,428,631 | 14.5% | $162,924 | $266,707 | $109,577 |
| Royalties and advertising | $3,514,092 | 6.9% | $76,888 | $145,000 | $39,479 |
| Treatment and retail product | $2,699,423 | 5.3% | $55,191 | $168,190 | $9,721 |
| Marketing and professional services | $2,658,906 | 5.2% | $60,917 | $129,270 | $7,911 |
| Other operating expenses | $1,504,315 | 2.9% | $33,703 | $67,384 | $0 |
| Total cash disbursements | $42,074,996 | 82.4% | $933,036 | $1,589,080 | $442,298 |
| Cash flow from operations | $9,003,950 | 17.6% | $199,773 | $486,398 | −$68,175 |
Totals, medians, highs and lows as the brand reported it for the 44 locations reporting cash disbursements.
Personnel is the whole game. At 47.5% of revenue it is nine times what product costs. One point of it is $11,105 a year at the median location, so a schedule tightened by a single therapist shift a week is worth more than everything you could save on retail stock.
And the range on that line is wider than the range on revenue. Personnel runs from $150,944 to $1,037,649 across locations whose revenue runs from $563,990 to $2,071,431. Some of that is scale, and some of it is how tightly the book is matched to the roster.
Top performers
What separates the top Spavia performers
Spavia splits its locations into groups instead of publishing one average. The best group averaged $2,071,431 a year. The worst averaged $563,990. Both run the same brand, on the same agreement, paying the same fees.
Decided before you open
- Trade area and site.A 3.7× gap between bands is not an operating gap. Catchment, daytime population and what sits next door set the ceiling before the first customer arrives.
- What you spend to open.Opening costs $479,450 to $885,450, a 1.8× range inside one brand. The high end usually buys more capacity, so the cheapest build is not always the cheapest route to the top band.
Live operating levers
- Members, the operating driver.This model bills on members. The owner watches how many people join, how many cancel, and what a member spends beyond the plan. It is worth watching every week, because by the time it turns up in a monthly close the quarter is half gone.
- The gift card book.Gift cards are sold before the service is delivered. The top performers are not selling more of them by accident, they are running a deliberate seasonal push into the holidays and out of it again. The accounting follows: a gift card is deferred revenue until it is redeemed, so cash and earned revenue arrive in different periods.
- Service and retail mix.Attachment rate on retail, and the share of customers on the higher service tiers, lift what each hour earns without adding an hour or a room. It is the only lever that raises the ceiling without spending capital.
Context you underwrite around
- The reporting screen.44 of 64 locations are behind these figures. Locations open less than the full year, brand-owned, or not meeting the reporting criteria are excluded, so the numbers describe locations that cleared that screen, not the system as a whole.
- What the disclosure leaves out.Item 19 publishes no attainment figure. Anything below the sales line has to come from the franchisor or from owners you call.
How much locations differ
Forty-five points of margin between the best and the worst.
| Measure | Operating margin | Cash flow at the median revenue |
|---|---|---|
| Best location | 34.4% | $382,005 |
| Median location | 18.4% | $204,328 |
| Average | 17.6% | $195,445 |
| Lowest-selling location | −11.2% | −$124,374 |
Margins as the brand reported it.
Moving from the median margin to the best is worth $177,677 a year on the median revenue base. That is the prize, and on these cost shares it is almost entirely a personnel and throughput question.
The same arithmetic runs the other way. A location at the lowest-selling margin loses money on revenue that would earn $204,328 at the median. Since facility cost is fixed at around $163,000 and product is trivial, a location in that position is carrying a roster its bookings leave unfunded.
Monthly, so you can read your own season.
| Measure | Monthly | Annualized * |
|---|---|---|
| Average | $93,173 | $1,118,073 |
| Median | $87,067 | $1,044,809 |
| High | $172,619 | $2,071,431 |
| Low | $41,892 | $502,703 |
Monthly figures as the brand reported it across 59 locations, with 25 of them, 42%, above the average.
Spavia lists all 59 locations individually with their annual sales, from $2,071,431 down to $502,703. Find your own position in that list and you know your quartile precisely, which is a better starting point than any system average. It is the number to read your margin against, since the cost shares above move sharply with volume.
What the money side covers
Royalties and advertising take 6.9% of receipts.
Across the 44 reporting locations, royalties and advertising came to $3,514,092, or 6.9% of cash receipts, with the median location paying $76,888 and the range running $39,479 to $145,000.
That line behaves the way a percentage fee should, it scales with you. Everything above it in the cost stack does otherwise. Facility cost sits near $163,000 whatever you bill, and personnel only falls if you cut the roster. So the fee is the least of your worries on a soft month, and the first thing to model on a good one.
Questions we get asked
Does Spavia disclose profitability?
Unusually fully. You get cash receipts and six disbursement categories across 44 locations. Totals, medians, highs and lows. An operating margin at each of those points. What it leaves out is depreciation, interest, taxes and owner compensation, so cash flow from operations sits above your real return by whatever those come to.
Which number should I measure my spa against?
The median location at $1,110,481 of receipts and 18.4% operating margin, then each cost line as a share of your own revenue. Personnel against 47.5% is the one that matters. It is nine times the size of product cost. The distance between the median margin and the best in the system is worth $177,677 a year.
Where is the recoverable money?
The schedule. Personnel at 47.5% of revenue dwarfs everything else you control, and one point of it is $11,105 at the median location. Product at 5.3% and other operating at 2.9% are too small to repay much attention, and facility cost at 14.5% was fixed when you signed the lease. Match therapist hours to booked hours and the margin follows.
How much does a weak month cost me?
More than it looks. Facility cost runs near $163,000 a year at the median location whatever you bill. Personnel adjusts slowly. So a soft month drops most of its shortfall straight through to cash flow. The lowest-selling locations in the system runs a −11.2% margin, which on median revenue would be a $124,374 annual loss.
Who does bookkeeping for a Spavia franchise?
Memberships and prepaid packages bill ahead of service, so a good deal of your balance is treatment you still owe. Gift cards add a third pile with rules that vary by state. On the cost side, split personnel between front desk, massage therapists and estheticians, at 47.5% of revenue it decides your year. A single wages line will hide whether a soft month was a booking problem or a staffing one. Map your accounts to the six system categories so you can read yourself against the system without rebuilding the numbers. Averan provides bookkeeping, controller, and fractional CFO support for franchise owners and has Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisors on the team.
- No cost lines. Wages, rent and cost of goods are not broken out, so margin cannot be rebuilt from the document.
- No attainment figure. The filing does not say how many locations reached the average it publishes.
Questions worth putting to Spavia
The filing answers what it answers. These are the gaps an owner or a buyer should close directly.
- Is the profit figure in Item 19 before or after owner pay, and how many locations sit below it?
- What separates the highest-selling locations from the lowest: trade area, years open, size, or the owner?
- How long does a new location take to reach the average you publish, and what does the build-up look like month by month?
- What do the fees add up to as a share of sales at the average location, once minimums and technology charges are counted?
- How many Spavia locations closed, were sold, or changed hands last year, and why?
Run your own numbers.
The Franchise Finance Diagnostic runs the same checks on your own numbers. It scores where you stand and compares you with Item 19 of your brand’s FDD. It works out what one location earns and spends, and builds a 13-week cash forecast. Checks whether you are ready to open another one. It is free and it runs in your browser.
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