All over the world, people define their health and wellness across many dimensions…physical, mental, financial, and appearance.

In Florence, Italy, I happened upon a riff on this last component on “look good, feel good” at the Coin Department store located on Via Del Calzaiuoli in central Firenze. Welcome to Coin’s Health&Beauty Store.

imageThe two photos tell a story about health, where we live, work, play, and shop, the mantra for public health focused on the social determinants of health beyond healthcare.

Here at Coin, adjacent to the holistic brands of Clarins and other luxury labels, is a pharmacy along with health-ful products. In this area, shown in second photo, you find over-the-counter products for both medical and appearance needs, located amidst beauty products.

Health Populi’s Hot Points:  What we see at Coin in the Health&Beauty Store is part of the larger new retail health, where there’s a blur between health and health care, and here, beauty products playing a role in wellness and self-care. This is a global phenomenon, the beauty labels like L’Oreal and others know.

L’Oreal, for example,  has identified this as a growth area, represented by its new venture in patch technology for skin health, My UV Patch, coupled with a mobile app. Watch for stretchable skin patch technology to be a growing part of the wearables category in medicine and health. This sort of product would fit nicely on the shelf in the Health&Beauty Store at Coin.

Consumers are increasingly defining the good life, La Dolce Vita, in ways where they have more control over their daily lives (in the spirit of healthcareDIY). This is an integral part of personalized health not defined by a health care system but by the individual her/himself. The phenomenon of look good/feel good has no gender boundary, either. Self-health is for every-body.

I have written about beauty and health in Health Populi – see, for example, my take on Helena Rubinstein’s health approach in Beauty, Health and Power.