Veria offers shoppers ‘well-spring’
ARLINGTON, Texas. —Consumers increasingly are expressing a desire to live a healthier life and so one company has stepped up with a holistic approach to meet that need: Veria.
What makes Veria unique is its multipronged approach to providing consumers with a total health and wellness solution. A key component of its multi-tiered strategy is Veria Wellness Centers.
The centers will offer Veria brand products in such wellness categories as nutritional supplements, vitamins and herbal remedies, and natural baby care. In addition to national brands, the centers also will sell the Veria and Chandra line of beauty care products. While the retail locations will have on staff a registered nurse trained in homeopathic and traditional medicine, the locations will not have a pharmacy.
Veria Wellness Centers, which will range between 3,500 square feet and 5,000 square feet in size, also will offer a range of personal day spa services, including massage and facials, and will have a studio area for yoga classes, tai chi and wellness seminars.
The first such location opened its doors on Sept. 27 in Plano, Texas, in a 3,500-square-foot retail space. A second location, that is expected to also feature a healthy eatery with foods prepared by Veria, will open in Arlington, Texas, in December. And a New York center is slated to open around March 2008, according to Subhash Chandra, chairman of the Essel Group.
The longer-term goal is to open 50 wellness centers nationwide over the next 18 months and, ultimately, more than 400 across the United States.
As the retail locations expand and the brand becomes more known, Chandra said the company would be open to offering its branded products in additional outlets, such as chain pharmacy retailers and independents.
The venture is the primary consumer brand of Natural Wellness USA, a wholly owned subsidiary of India’s Essel Group. The Essel Group is a multi-million conglomerate encompassing television networks, cable systems, satellite communications and theme parks.
In addition to the products and services, the Wellness Centers will serve as an information resource through Veria television programming broadcast in the store and in-store information kiosks that provide direct access to www.veria.com.
The Web site serves as a one-stop shop offering an online wellness encyclopedia, health and wellness articles, and trailers of Veria TV programs.
Veria TV launched in early October and, in addition to airing in the retail locations, is available on DISH Network to subscribers nationwide. Veria TV, which airs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, offers original programming covering such areas as food and nutrition, travel, exercise, and alternative medicine and holistic health.