We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Venise Dixon a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Venise , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about how you went about setting up your own practice and if you have any advice for professionals who might be considering starting their own?

I had just finished massage therapy school in 2007. I wasn’t quite ready to fully jump out and quit my full time job as a Program Manager in engineering, but I wanted to sharpen my newly graduated massage skills. Therefore, I decided to open a part-time solo mobile massage business in 2007. My customer base consisted of family, friends and referrals. In 2013, I invested in a business coach, found two rooms for rent inside a hair salon and hired my first therapist/receptionist. This experience helped me shape my vision, and customer experience for Indulgence as a health and wellness space versus a spa. Later that year, I opened Indulgence Massage & Bodywork as a brick and mortar business, (now known as Indulgence Health) in 2014. Hiring reliable and trustworthy therapists and receptionists has been one of my biggest challenges. Another challenge was learning the operations and back office part of owning a spa or brick and mortar business in general. From all forms of business taxes, to personnel, and supplies and products, it was all foreign to me. Knowing everything I know now, I’m not sure I would change or do anything differently because being married with young children during those days were the main drivers of how I chose to slow roll my jump into a new career and entrepreneurship. For anyone considering starting their own practice, I would recommend shadowing, or looking into a mentor, or business coach either privately or via the many state backed business programs. I also recommend applying for as many grants and business support programs as you can.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Indulgence Health is the realization of my dreams. I earned my engineering degree in 1996 and began working in Corporate America. After several years of working, I would come home each night feeling like I could, should, and needed to do more to create a lasting and positive impact in my community. I was always fascinated and drawn to natural ways of healing, therefore I decided to explore my interests in alternative healthcare as it’s sometimes called in the US. In 2005, I went to school for massage therapy.

I wasn’t ready to quit my full-time job upon graduation in 2007. I also didn’t want to waste my newfound skills therefore, I started a part-time solo mobile massage business mainly working on family, friends and referrals. In 2013, I rented two rooms inside a hair salon and hired my first therapist/receptionist. This experience helped me shape my vision for Indulgence as a health and wellness space versus a spa and in 2014 I moved from 2 rooms within a salon to a 4-treatment room business. I renamed the business from Indulgence Massage & Bodywork to Indulgence Health.
I founded Indulgence Health to be more than massage therapy, it’s a health and wellness space and apothecary offering services and products dedicated to helping my community heal inside and out. Indulgence Health offers services such as therapeutic massage, Manual Lymphatic Drainage, spa detox treatments, life coaching, skincare and Reiki energetic healing. The herbal remedies, teas, and aromatherapies combined with our services help to naturally relieve underlying pain, stress, anxiety, inflammation and other health concerns. The skincare products, and an eclectic collection of accessories and products to support the wellness journey of our clients. We also offer dance classes, and healthy lifestyle events. As an herbalist, I create some of the herbal remedies I sell such as the herbal tea blends, CBD Oil extracts, and tinctures. One of the things that I am proud of are my staple products -my tea blends: FLOW- Lymphatic tea blend, Let It Go – Stress tea, HOT Azz Digestion Tea, Sleep Well Tea, and FOCUS CBD extract. Helping people heal through touch, creating herbal medicine with my hands are gifts from GOD that I don’t take for granted. Having clients tell me how the FLOW blend has shrunk their cysts, or helping with their inflammation lets me know my vision of helping others is being realized.

Have you ever had to pivot?

The pandemic created challenges for Indulgence Health due to stay at home orders, lockdowns, and changes to everyone’s way of life. I had to close our physical location for 2 months, and immediately began the process of pivoting. While we couldn’t offer in-person services for 2 months, I did put our physical spa products online, which included our herbal remedies, teas, tinctures, and aromatherapy products that are usually a part of the spa experience. This lack of in-person experiences allowed the time and space to create herbal remedies as well as create and promote our new online store. Realizing the need for connection and mental health support, I hired a virtual counselor/life coach to the team.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

From 2014 to 2016, I was experiencing a revolving door of massage therapists and receptionists. I wasn’t working full-time yet in the business, just evenings and weekends. During the daytime I had employees committing time fraud, stealing supplies and sometimes stealing money. I would catch one, fire them, replace them and the cycle would start over. I eventually reached the point in 2016 where the 1-2 good employees were leaving for various reasons, and I fired all the others. It was a dark time in my business journey, but I knew I couldn’t let this be the end of my dream. I stayed in prayer asking for guidance, protection, and physical, mental, and emotional strength. Next, I changed the hours to match my availability, and hired a virtual receptionist. I stayed working in this manner for about 4 months. Eventually, things began to improve, and I hired my first employee after the 4 months. I was able to build my team back up and I eventually quit my job and began running my business full-time.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.indulgencehealth.com
• Instagram: @indulgencehealth, @indulgencegirl
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/IndulgenceHealth
• Linkedin: Venise L Dixon
• Twitter: @IndulgenceMB
• Youtube: @indulgemb