Our History

“In House Massage” was created out of the dreams of its creator, Roger Fontaine, massage therapist, in July 1999.

The choice of the name “In House Massage” came from the idea of providing massage services in the workplace and having the employers perceive of the service as being their own ‘inhouse’ massage service. It’s from this idea that the name was born. The practical application of the company name to on-site massage services never got off the ground. The emphasis on the home-based clinic evolved out of the competition in the industry and the lack of interest by employers to provide the ‘setting’ and ‘time’ within the working hours to make on-site massage services possible.

The clinic was later renamed in spring 2001, to “ACTIVE HEALING THERAPEUTIC MASSAGE CLINIC” , to reflect the initiative and inner-motivation needed by the client to make the therapy successful.

There developed an alternate application for the ‘inhouse’ component of the business name, and that was to offer massage services to individuals who are ‘shut-ins’ ; those who are unable to leave their homes to receive healing manipulative therapies in external centres. These shut-ins cover the range from those who are physically disabled from birth, injury, or aging; or who may be in recovery from surgery.The difficulty which arose in marketing to these individuals came from the historical bias which existed with the provision of after-injury and hospitalization services being provided by ‘government-funded’ support to physiotherapists and occupational therapists. There has been little place for massage therapists offering after injury and after-hospitalization services to clients unless they were clients before their injuries or were referred by a friend or relative who uses our services.

The name change to “ACTIVE HEALING THERAPEUTIC MASSAGE CLINIC” was precipitated by the need to become more visible in the yellow pages of the telephone advertising directory. The choice of name was the result of brainstorming after which my wife and I concluded that the ‘Healing” component of my therapy was what I wished to emphasize and that the success of the therapy and healing depended upon the “Active” participation of the client especially with regards to post therapy stretching.