PAUL AND CHASITY HESTER Be Medispa
“ We called ourselves a spa with a medical degree, and we wanted it to feel different when paitents walked in.”
SPA INDUSTRY FOUNDERS BY JAMISON STOIKE
PAUL AND CHASITY HESTER Be Medispa
WHEN PAUL HESTER, M. D., and his wife, Chasity Hester, PA-C, founded Be Medispa in Lexington, Kentucky, in 2004, it was the first medical spa in the state. Botox had been approved for cosmetic use in the U. S. only two years earlier, and“ medical spa” was a term that was virtually unheard of outside of global metro areas. So small was the market segment— and so effective was Be Medispa’ s search-engine-optimization— that Hester remembers a time when Googling“ medical spa” returned scant, globetrotting results:“ It was us, then a place in New York City, then a place in Japan,” he laughs.
A longtime Lexingtonian, Hester originally practiced family and emergency medicine upon completing his medical residency nearly 30 years ago. Though he loved the work, he wanted to do more“ to help people understand how to prevent chronic disease rather than just manage it, and I wanted to be part of a new environment for medicine,” he
says.“ We wanted to offer holistic, not piecemeal, care,” adds Chasity Hester, who also serves as the practice’ s clinical director.“ From the start, we’ ve focused on building lasting connections with patients. That commitment to people is still what drives us today.”
The Hesters sought advice from the small number of physicians practicing in a true medical spa setting to get a sense of what their own practice could look like.“ We called ourselves a spa with a medical degree,” Hester notes,“ and we wanted it to feel different when patients walked in.” The result was a small, hands-on practice that emphasized metabolic health and non-surgical aesthetic procedures as way to feel, look and be healthier.
Though the early days were challenging—“ like most early medspa practices, we were suffering financially because nobody knew how to use us or what we were doing,” says Hester— Be Medispa has survived, thrived and won national recognition among physician-owned medical spas. Along the way, it became a key contributor to the massive growth of the medical spa sector within the broader spa industry. When asked about the role they’ ve played, though, both Be Medispa founders are humble, saying“ it happened while we had our heads down.”
“ We called ourselves a spa with a medical degree, and we wanted it to feel different when paitents walked in.”
— PAUL HESTER, M. D.
FOUNDER’ S PLAYBOOK l ADVICE FOR YOUR YOUNGER SELF:“ Journaling. Be a good recorder of every step you take as a business.” l PERSONAL MOTTO:“ I was a football coach, so it has to be‘ clear eyes, full hearts, can’ t lose.’” l BIGGEST MENTOR:“ My professors at Berea College when I was a teaching assistant. They shared their classes with me, their techniques, they’ d give me positive feedback and advice.” l ALTERNATE CAREER:“ I’ d be a coach. Football is my thing.”
The spa community is fortunate to have leaders who have elevated the spa experience and shaped the industry ' s evolution.
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