The new specialist booking platform focuses on hotels where spa and wellness are central to the stay, with Europe as its initial market-development focus
Estonia-based travel company Stay at Spa has launched a booking platform dedicated to luxury spa hotels. Rather than competing with major online travel agencies on the size of its inventory, the company is targeting travellers who choose accommodation primarily for its spa, treatments and wellness experience.
The platform features properties worldwide and is open to international travellers, including customers from the United States and the United Kingdom. Market development will initially concentrate on Europe.
Spa as the reason to travel
Stay at Spa is built around a simple distinction: on general booking platforms, spa facilities are usually one feature among many, while for wellness travellers they can determine the entire choice of hotel.
“Large travel platforms have enormous scale, and there is a good reason travellers use them,” said Taavi Tammpere, founder of Stay at Spa. “But scale also means that spa hotels are ultimately one category among many. We wanted to start from the opposite direction. Instead of building a platform where spa is one filter among hundreds, we wanted to build a platform where the spa experience is the starting point.”
That approach places factors such as treatments, thermal facilities, wellness programmes and the character of the spa alongside conventional criteria such as rooms and location.
Europe at the centre of expansion
Europe offers a particularly diverse spa landscape, ranging from historic thermal towns and medical wellness resorts to coastal retreats and high-end destination spas. Stay at Spa sees potential to introduce these properties to international travellers who may be less familiar with Europe's specialist wellness destinations.
“There are thousands of hotels where the spa is an extra facility,” Tammpere said. “Our focus is on the hotels where the spa and wellness experience is genuinely part of why you would choose to stay there.”
The platform arrives as leisure travel increasingly incorporates relaxation, recovery and wellness. Spa properties can accommodate anything from a short restorative break to a longer stay centred on treatments and wellness programmes.
Specialisation instead of scale
Stay at Spa plans to expand its hotel network and deepen its coverage of destinations and experiences relevant to international spa travellers. Its longer-term goal is to establish itself as a specialist in spa and wellness travel rather than a general hotel marketplace.
“We know what we are up against,” Tammpere said. “We are a small company entering a market with some very large and established players. We are not going to win by trying to be bigger than them. We have to be more focused.”
For Tammpere, that focus ultimately comes down to how travellers begin their search.
“If someone knows they want a luxury spa holiday, they should not have to start with a general hotel search and work backwards,” he said. “We want to start with what they are actually looking for — the spa.”
Image Credit: © AI generated illustration using material courtesy of Stay at Spa
