Just 20 months ago – when Rochelle Ganoe and I first met, we were ‘almost’ like the 12 million Americans who are currently unemployed. We were ‘under’ employed in low-paying jobs that we loathed and had no opportunities.
Now we’re loving life with our own in-home massage therapy business in Jackson Hole and this blog will be sharing how we did that, along with great advice and insights about massage and its modalities – and healthy life choices in general.

Educate Yourself

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DpLjYLJiwQ
When we met, Rochelle had already enrolled herself to study Swedish Massage at theMcKinnon School of Body Therapy in Oakland, California. By October, she had disappeared out of my life for seven weeks in order to take her courses. In addition to her core Swedish Massage Curriculum, she was able to take elective classes in Reiki.
Coming back to Jackson with 100 hours of Swedish Massage enabled her to get work in a local foot massage parlor (that also does regular massage) and get a small number of private clients – simply by offering her services for free to friends. That grew into paid massage jobs which helped her to gain confidence, pay her expenses, and then apply for work at local spas. The spa work pays exceptionally well when you consider your input in time and Dollars.
Seeing Rochelle’s earnings and successes, and now realizing more and more that we wished to stay together, I also decided to do my Swedish 100 hours at the McKinnon Massage School. Therefore the following October, we both drove to Oakland and attended massage school classes at the same time. Rochelle up-graded her qualifications and credit hours by studying Deep Tissue Massage, myofascial release, and sports massage. In addition to my Basic Swedish Massage, I attended classes in chair massage, back, shoulders and neck massage, and took two practical classes in business and body mechanics for massage therapists.
Yes, it costs money to attend massage school and pay for lodging while you’re there – welcome to life. Investment and up-front funds are needed in any business. But in our view, the return on this investment (ROI) is well worth it. In real terms – it’s just not such a great deal of money. Chances are there’s a less expensive way to do it – but we just liked the idea of being in still-summery Oakland during the dull early winter months of November and December here in Jackson.
In the next issue of Massage Therapy Business in Jackson Hole – Getting Started, I’ll continue with our little success story to bring you up to speed with where we are now – and what lies ahead.
Meanwhile, reading blogs, internet posts and watching videos are all great ways to enhance your massage, and massage business learning. So I leave you with the very first of our weekly newsletters from Massage professionals of Jackson Hole.  Newsletter