Amour New York marks grand opening in Spa City
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. » Natural healing products from the Dead Sea are now available locally in the Spa City at new store Amour New York.
The shop, located at 6 Phila St., celebrated its grand opening on Tuesday at a ribbon cutting ceremony with the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce.
The business, which started online a few years ago, is the exclusive U.S. distributor for the Shemen Amour brand of face, body and hair care products for women and men.
These products are all from the Dead Sea, a hypersaline lake bordering Israel, the West Bank and Jordan that is known for its renowned for its health-giving properties.
Amour New York is owned and operated by Christine Marks of Clifton Park. “It’s been a long time coming and it’s an adventure,” she said on Tuesday at the grand opening party.
Marks started her career in hair care, then about a decade ago got into importing and exporting, she explained. “So this kind of combined both of my passions,” she said.
Marks originally got involved with the Shemen Amour line after seeing its benefits as a consumer herself. “It makes a big difference,” she said, referring to all of the natural aspects in the creation of the products, which are manufactured in Israel.
Everything comes direct from the Dead Sea, including pure magnesium bath salts and nutrient-rich black mud. “Today a lot of people are concerned about not only what goes in their body but on their body,” Marks said.
Aside from containing Dead Sea minerals and salts, the Amour products are also special because they are Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) and parabenfree, and infused with natural oils and fruit extracts.
Additionally, they are certified cruelty-free by Leaping Bunny, meaning the products are not tested on animals.
Amour New York is the flagship store in the United States for the Israel-based Shemen Amour brand. Marks wanted Saratoga Springs to be the shop’s location because of the city’s reputation as a health resort.
“The Dead Sea is the oldest health resort in the world,”
Marks said, and she’s happy to be bringing Amour’s holistic products to a place like the Spa City, which is known for offering its own healing resources.
“We wanted Saratoga to be the area,” said Marks, who grew up in the city. “We just thought it would be a great location.”
The Amour New York store is unique in that Marks wants customers to try a number of the products prior to purchase. “Customers say they notice a huge difference after using our unique products, and we are so confident that we let people try it before they buy it,” she said in a press release. “There is a great deal of scientific study behind the natural minerals found in the Dead Sea and the positive effect they have on the body.”
Amour New York aims to expand in the future, with hopes of hiring locals as product ambassadors. “The eventual plan is to expand to other locations throughout the country,” Marks said.
Now that her store is officially open for business, “We hope to be one more reason that shopping in downtown Saratoga is vibrant and unique,” Marks
said in the release. “This is an incredible community, with a long history of promoting health, and we look forward to being a small, but unique, part of it.”
Amour New York is open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, with hours expected to expand in the summer.
More information about Amour New York and its products is available online at www. AmourNewYork.com. The shop can be contacted by phone at (518) 290-7721.