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Serenity, stat!

From the quirky to the quackish, stress-relief "remedies' vie for the desperate consumer's dollar.

By SCOTT BARANCIK
Published February 15, 2005

Mellowing out at work

[Times photo: Dirk Shadd] Body Fields USA's $1,750 Magnopro includes a mat filled with copper coil and a control box. To use it, a worker places the mat on a chair, plugs it in, and sits on it for 15 to 30 minutes. A separate pillow delivers electromagnetic pulse fields to one's body part of choice.

[Times photo: Dirk Shadd] Nelson Bach USA says two sprays in the mouth of its homeopathic potion give you 15 minutes of inner calm. Rescue Remedy contains a blend of five flower essences and 27 percent alcohol.

[Times art] Users helped develop the calming environments on iSerenity.com, which bills itself as a free sound machine on your computer.

One company wants to spritz its flower essences into your mouth. Another wants to wrap you in pulsed magnetic fields. A third wants to tickle your eardrums with sounds of the ocean, rain or a babbling brook.

Three wildly different approaches, one goal: to strip away the job stress some say is killing us, and make money doing it.

Stress is as common to the workplace as a paper clip. Experts call it a leading cause of illness, absenteeism, presenteeism (that's when you show up for work but might as well not have), accidents and even violence.

Just how much it is costing the U.S. economy per year isn't clear. Recent estimates range from $3-billion (Cigna Behavioral Health) to $400-billion (CPA-turned-yoga-guru Bruce Van Horn). The nonprofit American Institute of Stress in Yonkers, N.Y., puts the figure at $300-billion. By comparison, the Fortune 500 companies earned combined profits of $446-billion in 2003.

A precise estimate isn't needed anyway. Corporate America has accepted the premise that workplace stress boosts health care costs and other expenses. And its readiness to pay for solutions has spawned an industry of stress-fighters.

The mainstream approach today is to adopt an Employee Assistance Plan. EAPs typically provide workers with short-term counseling or addiction treatment. Many health insurance companies run their own plan, like Cigna.

However, a growing number of entrepreneurs with unconventional approaches are clamoring for a piece of the action.

Spritz. Spritz. Totherescue!

Rescue Remedy is one such alternative. Though distributor Nelson Bach USA has pitched this homeopathic potion as a salve for everything from fear of flying to jittery pets, the Wilmington, Mass., company recently repositioned it as a solution to workplace stress. Famous customers allegedly include actor Jennifer Aniston, who, if the celebrity magazines can be trusted, might wish it were available in bulk.

Two sprays in the mouth are said to give you 15 minutes of inner calm. Brand manager Curt Finckler said he keeps one on his computer monitor and one in his car's glove compartment.

Founder Nelson Bach concocted Rescue Remedy roughly 70 years ago from a blend of five flower essences, each supposedly with a special stress-smacking power. According to a company brochure, these include rockrose (for courage in the face of shock), clematis (for focus), impatiens (to tolerate and cope calmly with irritating problems), cherry plum (to restore self-control during difficult situations) and star-of-Bethlehem (to neutralize the effects of trauma).

According to small print on the container, Rescue Remedy also contains 27 percent alcohol, about the same as creme de cacao, or some mouthwashes.

Where's the proof that it works? Other than some customer testimonials on its Web site (last names purged), Nelson Bach USA doesn't offer much. However, sales of Rescue Remedy's 20-milliliter spray bottle ($14.89) are brisk at the Rollin' Oats health food store in St. Petersburg, according to general manager Mike Asher. National sales last year totaled nearly 800,000 bottles, Finckler said.

Thanks for the info,ma'am

The Web site iSerenity.com was created with the cubicle-dweller in mind. Billed as a sound machine for the computer, it offers 31 aural-visual environments that supposedly help workers "relax and focus, making them more productive," according to a promotional e-mail from spokeswoman Rebecca Modena.

Owner Larry Barasch, a full-time engineer in Menlo Park, Calif., said he initially created the site for himself. "I worked in an office environment with cubicles, and I was getting a little too close to my neighbors. You hear everything ... (and) you've got one annoying person who drives you nuts."

Visitors to the free site, which is supported by advertisers, number 15,000 to 20,000 per month. Barasch said many of the environment ideas come from users, such as an editor who asked for a "shower" option because that's where he often gets his best ideas, and the parents who requested "vacuum cleaner" and "blow-dryer" to soothe their newborns.

Customers provide negative feedback, too. A nurse complained that an electrocardiogram image Barasch used to illustrate his "heartbeat" environment upset her because it depicted a patient suffering cardiac arrest. Several users said "typewriter" drove them berserk because it lacked a carriage return.

He later added the return.

Barasch was honest about the Web site's effectiveness as a stress-buster. He said the only evidence was anecdotal, such as a Dutch air-traffic controller who swears by it. "If you've got to do something tough, like laying people off, iSerenity's not going to help that much," Barasch said.

But in the world of marketing, things are not always what they seem. Barasch admitted that Rebecca Modena, his spokeswoman, was just an alias, and that he has no employees.

"I apologize for that," he said. "I have a limited understanding of PR, but one thing I have noticed is that I get a better response when I masquerade as a woman."

Isn't a martinicheaper?

"Your brain brightens," said Body Fields USA spokeswoman Karen Thorne, describing how she feels after using its Magnopro product. "You feel more aware, and yet there's a relaxed calmness." At its highest setting, Thorne added, the $1,750 system makes her feel like she just downed a martini.

Magnopro includes a mat filled with copper coil and a control box. To use it, a worker places the mat on a chair, plugs it in, and sits on it for 15 to 30 minutes. A separate pillow delivers electromagnetic pulse fields to one's body part of choice. The stress-relievingeffects are said to last six to eight hours.

Thorne is limited in what she can say about Magnopro, she said. "We can't make medical claims" in the United States. "Here, we can only market this for stress relief and as a health system." She acknowledged that Americans, who have bought roughly 300 units since the product was introduced in March, are skeptical.

Nevertheless, the claims tumble out, supposedly based on extensive research in Europe. Thorne said Magnopro's Australian owner used it to skip knee surgery, and that it reverses arteriosclerosis, speeds the healing of wounds and stabilizes blood sugar. One setting refreshes the brain by imitating REM sleep. "Animals jump on it, because they realize how good it is for them," she added.

But when it comes to extreme trauma in the workplace, Thorne was realistic.

"If you have a boss who is really demeaning, you're not going to be able to get rid of the stress by lying on the mat," she said. "You're going to have to get rid of the boss."

--Times staff researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this report. Scott Barancik can be reached at barancik@sptimes.com or 727893-8751.

[Last modified February 15, 2005, 01:16:18]