Nominated for the European Health & SPA Award 2020 as Best Italian SPA Manager and awarded with a brilliant for his Aufguss Show, among the best SPA treatments in Europe.

Nicola Gozio represents an Italian excellence in the world; visionary professional, he is always looking for new technologies, raw materials and exclusive treatments to bring an innovative experience to the SPA.

We interview him to discover the Aufgussmeister secrets. Here is what he told Studio Apostoli.

SA – Describe your current position. Who are your customers? What are their expectations?

I am a professional Aufgussmeister, SPA & Wellness Manager and an expert in wellness paths and sensorial treatments. In addition to working as a freelancer with various structures and professionals in the sector both in Italy and abroad, for 3 years I have been in charge of Management and treatments at the “Sauna World” at the Hotel Quelle Nature SPA Resort, a 5-star structure in the Gsies Valley (Bolzano).

On an area of 3500 square meters with 10 saunas, 7 swimming pools and various themed relaxation areas, we offer our guests who come mostly from Italy, Germany and Central Europe, the maximum experience of Luxury Wellness. Our facility is located in a beautiful and picturesque valley just a few kilometres from the Austrian border, a peculiarity that has allowed the Steinmair family, who now gave the reins of the management to their son Manuel, to expand in only 3 generations what was originally a small guest house with only 7 rooms, making it an awardwinning 5-star facility with 70 rooms, a staff of 70 employees and all the modern facilities for a luxury holiday.

All this without losing sight of the traditions of the Gsies Valley, the uniqueness of South Tyrol and a family management.

SA – Tell me about Sauna Management, what is this visionary figure inside the Spa at Hotel Quelle?

NG – Since the beginning of my experience at Hotel Quelle, I was very stimulated to work with the current owner, Manuel Steinmair. To be professionally confronted with a young but experienced person who has spent his life at the Hotel since he was a child, allowed me to count on the complete support of the property to bring my modern idea of well-being.

With its avant-garde structure, according to experts one of the best in Italy, an expert pilot was needed to get the best out of it. Hence the choice of the property to support the sister Julia Steinmair and Andrea Haberer in the management of the Beauty Spa with a figure with professional skills who would take exclusive care of the well-being of guests within the world of saunas of the Hotel Quelle, therefore a real figure of Wellness Manager.

SA – Can you describe better what this approach to well-being means?

NG – Our structure mainly combines the Wellness aspect with an active holiday approach. Hotel Quelle, both because of its idyllic location and Barbara Felderer (Fitness & Hotel Management)’s care and passion for managing the excursion programme, attracts many people who combine sport, good food and relaxation with our Beauty and Spa treatments. From these elements we have begun to incorporate the sauna trail into the various experiences of the hotel. The Steinmair family has immediately invested resources to incorporate all the elements into the cabins and give the hotel guests a new concept of wellness.

Our offer includes 7 different swimming pools and 10 saunas each with a different theme: mill sauna, classic Finnish sauna, pine wood sauna, herbal sauna, etc. up to our main attraction, the Infinity sauna show where I mainly perform my Aufguss rituals.

SA – Aufguss rituals, what’s the difference with the traditional sauna?

NG – The Aufguss, unlike the traditional sauna, is a real wellness ritual. During the Aufguss ceremony, the Sauna Master places balls of ice filled with essential oils on the brazier. Through the use of music, towel and special ventilation techniques, he then brings the steam generated by the melting of these spheres to the guests, sitting inside the sauna, as a kind of pampering and caress, generating a true multi-sensory attraction and experience.

It starts with classic rituals that I perform in the early afternoon, without music, with classic ventilation techniques and the use of real fresh herbs on the brazier instead of essential oils. We move on to more modern Aufguss with the use of relaxing music, meditative Aufguss with the help of ancestral instruments until we reach the Aufguss Show where I stimulate the well-being and pleasantness of the guests with a real wellness experience. In this type of Aufguss in our Infinity sauna the 50 people who can take their place live a real Show.

Darkening the sauna, the atmosphere is enhanced with lights, lasers, smoke machine, music diffused by our audio system via subwoofer that makes the experience even more involving, freestyle ventilation techniques and often the idea of living a real theatrical performance with the help of costumes and scenery. I also offer more specific and delicate treatments in other areas of the Spa such as the Turkish bath, where I perform Gourmet Peeling, Hammam and Savonage using unusual and special raw materials, natural soaps and very precious oils.

SA – You have been recently nominated for the prestigious European Health & Spa Award 2020 as best Spa Manager in Italy and you have won the recognition of a brilliant in the best Spa treatment category in Europe thanks to your Aufguss Show in sauna. Can you tell us about the path that has led you to become one of the best Wellness excellences in the world?

NG – This was a challenge that I launched to my owner at the beginning of our collaboration. Since that day, for 3 years, I have concentrated all my energies to make this challenge come true and a few weeks ago at the Gala held in Baden (Austria), all our efforts were rewarded with great satisfaction.
I started from the solid structural basis of our sauna world and the management of the Steinmair family, enriching all this with my visionary idea of Wellness. The sauna stimulation of all our 5 senses was the starting point on which I based my work, trying to create a modern connection between our hearing, touch, taste, smell and sight with what are the 5 pillars of wellness: nutrition, purification, balance, health and spirit.

During the award ceremony it was particularly exciting to hear the jury, who stayed in the various facilities anonymously, emphasize on the sidelines of the award as the best Italian Spa Manager, how my professional management within the Wellness area, the attention to the psycho-physical well-being of the guests, the passion, transport and emotion transmitted during the rituals affected them so much that they were in difficulty with the classic evaluation criteria to be able to judge such a visionary experience of well-being.

SA – How do you collaborate with your Staff to improve the service of your Spa?

NG – Since the beginning I have tried to make the people around me part of my project. The success of my work depends on many external factors and a great help has been to find within the entire Hotel Staff people who carry out their work mainly with great passion. All this means that inside the Spa there can be guests relaxed and rewarded by the holiday and this is of great help to me to complete the regeneration process thanks to my treatments. The other key aspect, which I believe is the main aspect of our achievements so far, is to be in the best mental condition to do my job.

My task is to convey an emotion to the guest who participates in my treatments and who spends his/her time in the Spa and in order to do this I have to be completely in tune with all external factors before entering the sauna. For this I would like to thank the Steinmair family and the entire sauna team that allows me to carry out my treatments, transmitting all the passion I have for this job and trying to get to the heart of the people who participate in it.

SA – You grind kilometres every day both in Italy and abroad to carry out your profession, you are a person who never stops and you always set yourself great professional goals to achieve. Can you tell us what your next goals will be?

NG – In my collaborations with Italian structures, the future goal will be to continue along the path undertaken in recent years by importing the culture of sauna, treatments and psycho-physical wellbeing from Northern Europe. Abroad the starting point is very solid and there now we focus on the spectacularisation of events so the direction will be in that sense.As far as the projects at the Quelle Hotel, we are starting to consider some interventions to link even more the high level of wellbeing to the integration in the territory of the Casies Valley.

In the future, therefore, I have in mind to design some exclusive treatments that, through raw materials and perfumes, send our guests back to the local life, that is, the one that in my opinion makes us unique and differentiates us in the panorama of hospitality and well-being at the highest level. After closing the European Health &
Spa Award chapter, I started working a few weeks ago on objectives that I hope will one day place our world of saunas among the excellences and innovations in the world of wellness.

The future challenge will be not to be influenced by structures ready to put on the table large investments to emerge but to bring an Italian structure, South Tyrol, with all the commitment put in the last 70 years by Steinmair Family and all their staff to compete as Wellness excellence in the world.

Nicola Gozio is a professional Aufgussmeister, SPA & Wellness Manager from Italy. Born in the province of Brescia, after graduating in Industrial Economics he specialized in the SPA & Wellness world, deepening his studies in the field of wellness of the highest level. Member of AISA (Italian Saunas and Aufguss Association), he has been working for years with various structures both in Italy and abroad, combining the managerial aspect with the experience gained in Show Aufguss competitions.