One Contract, Many Amenities: Senior Living Vendors Bet on Streamlined Model

On the surface, dining and salon and spa services may not seem to go hand-in-hand, but two major senior living vendors have developed a partnership to bring the two together in the name of overall resident wellness and quality of life. It’s a service bundle meant to reduce the burden on providers as they step up their game to meet increasing resident expectations around amenity services, and PS Lifestyle believes it could be the start of a larger industry trend.

Over the past seven years, PS Lifestyle has integrated its salon and spa operations in more than 500 communities in 31 states. Meanwhile, Sodexo Inc. serves more than 15 million consumers daily at over 9,000 client sites in North America, including corporations, health care, long-term care and retirement centers.

Together, the companies plan to combine their respective expertise and provide key quality of life amenities under one contract for senior housing providers: Sodexo’s dining and facilities management services and PS Lifestyle’s salon and spa, shop, magazine and enrichment offerings.

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“It’s not just food, and it’s not just hair,” John Polatz, CEO of PS Lifestyle, tells SHN. “It’s the experience, and it’s the quality. All of this matters a lot. …We’re now offering a single-point solution for a major combination of amenity service provisions, as opposed to a community needing to take on multiple vendors under multiple contracts.”

In streamlining these services, the partnership aims to provide positivity over the course of a resident’s day, from the time he or she eats breakfast in the morning until he or she heads to the salon for a pedicure in the afternoon.

“We’re impacting wellness on a comprehensive level no one else is doing today,” Polatz says.

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Polatz cites a changing demographic of those residing in retirement communities as a primary factor in the partnership. A younger cohort of seniors could mean higher demand for services like hot stone massages or gel manicures, for example, or a greater desire for high-quality dining experiences.

The consolidation trend in the senior housing sector, too, plays a role, Polatz says. Just as operators are deriving efficiencies and economies of scale through consolidation, Sodexo and PS Lifestyle’s partnership will offer customers similar efficiencies that may someday include even more service solutions.

“There’s much more room under this tent for other beneficial amenity services,” he says. “This is the beginning of a conversation for the industry.”

Written by Kourtney Liepelt

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