The Secret to a Profitable Aesthetic Practice or Medical Spa

IAPAM's Jeff Russell As the Executive-Director of the IAPAM (International Association for Physicians in Aesthetic Medicine) I receive many calls and emails from physicians looking at entering the aesthetic medicine industry. The most common request is for Botox training, many believe by only offering Botox, they will be on their way to vast riches. The reality is that you certainly need to offer Botox treatments (it has been the number one non/minimally invasive cosmetic procedure for years), but it is highly commoditized. Which means, you don’t make much money!

Any if you are going to add aesthetic’s to your practice, it should be for the money. If you take a Botox treatment and the patient requires 40 units of Botox, by the time you incorporate the cost of the product & consumables (needles, gloves, saline, gauze, ice pack, office time) you have a cost of $240, but the going rate for Botox is $9/unit, so you’ve made $100. Typically a patient comes back every 4-6 months, so you’ll make $300-400/yr off of one Botox patient. Now lets take a chemical peel treatment, which your cost is $20 (product cost & consumables), but you charge $120, your profit is still $100, but you see this patient one a month instead of 3 times a year. In a year, your profit is $1,200/yr vs $300-400/yr for one Botox patient. Ideally, your Botox patient is also a chemical peel patient as well! See where I’m going!

The key to a profitable aesthetic medicine (or medical spa) practice is not only Botox training, but in learning the most popular (& profitable) aesthetic procedures (i.e. skin care, chemical peels, microdermabrasion, skin rejuvenation with IPL, laser hair removal, leg veins, Botox and dermal fillers and now hCG/Medical Weight Management). I worked with a great team of physicians who learnt this valuable secret (albeit the hard way) many years ago. We took their practice pearls and created the Aesthetic Medicine Symposium 4 years ago, and this year launched the magnificently well attended hCG/Medical Weight Loss Training for Physicians (providing physicians and their staff all the training, contacts and resources they need to add medical weight management to their existing medical practice, medical spa, or start a weight loss center).

I hope these tips will help you create a more profitable aesthetic medicine practice or medical spa!

Jeff Russell