The man once known as Los Angeles’ Nightclub King is betting big on the wellness industry.
Sam Nazarian, who made his name in hospitality with bars and clubs in Los Angeles and buzzy hotels such as the Delano, Mondrian and SLS, is creating a new wellness-focused collection of hotels, residences, and preventive medicine centres called the Estate.
The project is co-founded with motivational speaker and author Tony Robbins, with investors and partners in musician Marc Anthony and Richard Attias, chief executive officer of the Future Investment Initiative Institute, a nonprofit run by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.
The Estate is being developed by Nazarian’s SBE Entertainment Group. It comes four years after he sold the remaining 50% of his hotel businesses to French hospitality giant Accor in a cash-and-asset-swap deal that valued the business lines at US$850 million ($1.11 billion).
There are plans for 15 hotels and residences and 10 longevity centres by 2030. The first centre, set to open late next year at Reuben Brothers’ Century Plaza in Los Angeles, will take up nearly 13,000 sq ft of commercial real estate. Diagnostics will come from Fountain Life, a company founded in 2019 and also backed by Robbins.
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Hotels and residences in St Kitts, northern Italy, Switzerland and the UK countryside are slated for 2026. Nazarian says it will be the biggest network of luxury properties committed to preventive medicine, more than double the properties the Well has announced in its pipeline.
The hotel in St Kitts will be on the gently sloping northern part of the island. It will have 100 suites and 90 residential units, four restaurants, an 18-hole golf course, and a helipad. On the grounds, there will also be a 50,000 sq ft preventive medicine centre and anti-ageing medical spa.
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The Estate is the latest entrant in the so-called healthspan, a lucrative and growing segment in the wellness space estimated to be a US$5.6 trillion industry. Healthspan is an increasingly vital part of what many start-ups promise: a longer, better life for a price. Robbins and Nazarian will hold an event on Wednesday in Miami to announce the brand and meet with private and institutional investors over the next twelve months.
“Our top trend for 2024 is the astounding speed in which medicine is rewriting the wellness market,” says Beth McGroarty, research director at the Global Wellness Institute. “A new kind of pricey, concierge preventative medicine is emerging fast. New medical-wellness longevity and prevention clinics are becoming the most powerful, fastest-growing new business genre.”
The Estate is launching at a time when luxury hotels are increasingly adding biohacking technology to their offerings. When the Emory opened in London this year, it dedicated four floors and 21,500 sq ft of space to wellness club Surrenne, which includes partnerships with doctors. Continuum in New York has a 25,000 sq ft gym facility that opened in May and offers a wide range of tests, including blood panels for US$10,000 a month.
McGroarty says that new and expanding medical-wellness resorts and longevity clinics are offering full menus of advanced diagnostic testing (biomarker, genetic, hormonal, full-body MRI exams) to identify issues before they become a problem.
This is essentially what is on offer at the Estate’s urban centres. Its standalone Century City longevity centre will cost roughly US$35,000 a year for a membership that includes testing such as full-body MRIs, heart and lung CT scans, DEXA scans to assess bone density, and telehealth consultations with doctors.
“Before you even head to a hotel, you can have your bloodwork or MRI done in an urban centre by us — so you know what to focus on during your stay,” says Nazarian, speaking exclusively to Bloomberg about the Estate. “We think the consumer is going to demand that brands foundationally have a component of not just wellness but preventive medicine, so you can learn more about your health in a luxury environment.”
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Nazarian stresses that he is not building medical hotels; he is building luxury hotels with a functional preventive medical component. He is bringing in names like Andalusian celebrity chef Dani Garcia of Bibo to create food and drink menus — he wants guests to enjoy themselves and not feel restricted. “You can have an amazing cocktail, but in the meantime, get that MRI you’ve been wanting to get or get spa treatments with Clinique La Prairie when you’re here,” he says.
He mentions luxury hospitality brands such as Aman, Auberge and One&Only as potential competitors. Nazarian declines to give a room rate but says it will be competitive with top-tier hotels, which charge more than US$1,000 a night at a starting rate.
“Sam’s at a stage of life now at 49 where he doesn’t just go party anymore. He knows today’s luxury is a lifestyle — it’s longevity, it’s health, it’s vitality, it’s strength,” says Robbins. Due to the pandemic, he continues, people are more health-conscious than ever and want actionable information about their health markers and how they can live longer healthier lives.
Nazarian says he saw this for himself when he went to try Fountain Life’s diagnostics in October 2023 while working to create the Estate with Robbins. He says doctors found an aneurysm. “It required a four-hour surgery to remove, but it saved my life,” he says.
And although nobody wants to discover a medical ailment, Nazarian is betting many will pay for the peace of mind to find out while enjoying a wellness-focused luxury hotel stay along the way. “When I started, I was 25 and my customers were my age or a bit younger,” he says. “Now that consumer is my age, and they’ve grown up with us. They’re very interested in this.”
