Holymama Reviews 

The shop has an inviting atmosphere, filled with the soothing scents of nature. I was impressed by the variety of herbs, teas, and natural products available.

The staff members are genuinely passionate about their offerings. I was seeking herbs for energy and focus, and they provided several excellent recommendations, including ginseng and rhodiola. Their expertise really made a difference in my selection process.

I also appreciate their emphasis on quality. Everything I purchased feels fresh and potent.

In brief –

• Holymama (HM) preaches about empowering mothers - we had the complete opposite experience
• HM changes their online Ts&Cs when the going gets tough and hides behind the latest version – they’re not worth the website they’re written on
• Having paid 100% upfront for our retreat, we received a worthless 2 year credit note for 70% of the value when HM cancelled our Mother&Baby Bali retreat. This credit expired before they rescheduled the event over 4 years later
• HM are not ATOL protected and consumer protections in their HQ country of Spain are weak. Our pre-payment was not held in escrow.
• HM posts on social media that “making money isn’t hard”, yet refused to refund what they owed us, despite remaining a going concern
• Having independently visited the Bali hotel where our retreat was scheduled, it did not appear suitable for young children with steep stairs, open balconies and an open pool.

The background –

Following the challenging birth of our first child, my wife was desperate for some respite and stumbled across the HM ‘Mother&Baby’ Bali retreat. Regrettably, we fell for the glossy marketing and paid €4k upfront, 6 months in advance of the retreat in March 2020. There were some early warning signs with the company providing erroneous dates and struggling to explain which room we had actually booked.

Clearly we do not blame HM for scrambling to deal with the unprecedented impact of COVID-19, which led them to abandon our retreat last minute, as travel shut down. However their response was unprofessional – HM refused to acknowledge that they had cancelled the retreat and encouraged us to use our travel insurance to claim compensation. HM changed their Terms & Conditions mid-Pandemic to include “force majeure”, “cancellation of flights” and “global epidemics”. They then told participants that they would receive a credit note, less a fictional “30% deposit” to cover HM’s losses. We had separately booked additional nights at the same hotel, which gracefully honoured our credit for 3.5 years until we had the opportunity to use it, so we can only assume that HM lost nothing on their accommodation reservation.

After an extended period of privately trying to reason with HM, it was becoming clear that they would not willingly refund the money they owed us. We attempted to re-charge the payment via our credit card and HM’s payment facilitator Stripe, but these companies would only review the now updated online Ts&Cs provided by HM. HM also made false claims such as “the customer tried to cancel” and misled them on dates to avoid a fair resolution.

With only a partial credit note, we repeatedly asked when the replacement retreat would take place, but nothing was scheduled in 2021, 2022 or 2023. Even then we would have to pay more to cover the full cost of a retreat due to the arbitrary 30% haircut on our original payment.

HM is not ATOL protected. Consumer protections in their home country of Spain are weak making legal challenges unpredictable and potentially costly. HM may feel vindicated that consumers have no recourse when they fail to deliver, but we believe that this just shows their true colours. Aside from essentially stealing a material amount of money from us, they have caused significant emotional distress for my wife when she was at her lowest point post birth. This directly contrasts with their (seemingly disingenuous) online marketing.

We have chosen not to share our (ongoing) experience for over 4 years, with the positive hope that they would ‘do the right thing’, but reading other reviews, this looks naïve. We now hope that by sharing this black & white account, others will not suffer the experience we have had.

The women you meet at these retreats are lovely, the food is great and staff generally nice. The accommodation is absolutely below standard. What is complete nonsense and fake is the ‘holy mamma’ - she’s disinterested, unable to make genuine connections with people, shambolic and fake.

I paid over €3000 for a weeks retreat, she blew up at the women after a morning yoga class (literally we’d just come out of deep relaxation), she was shouting that one woman had complained that her massage was late (it was late and in a different location than she was told), Claudia shouted that she should be charging is more for the experience and that we were ungrateful. To go on a ‘luxury’ retreat and be screamed at that you’re not paying enough was a disappointing end. She later apologised but did all she could to blame the people attending her retreat!! Be wary of anything this woman organises. She’s neither wise nor a great leader nor a great business woman sadly.

Very interested to read these reviews. I’ve been conned by this woman. Claudia Spahr who owns and runs this business does so under false pretences. She falsely advertised, mis sells products and withholds deposits and in fact keeps entire retreat fees. She owes me over 2500€ and has now blocked me on social media and is ignoring emails. She is a crook and a thief and I wonder whether the business is in fact going under as she takes customers money and then sells sub standard rooms, cancels retreats and is never heard from again, unless of course she is promoting herself as a Goddess on social media. It’s a joke. DO NOT BOOK THIS WITH YOUR PRECIOUS BABY 😢 once you pay your fees, she will likely cancel and you will not see you mr money again. I run my own retreats and cannot believe this woman is allowed to operate. She is unethical, has no morals and customer service is non existent.

The retreat is unsafe for small children and overpriced.
The villa has zero security measures for small children: many stairs, unsecured pool, unsecured electricity plugs, sharp corners, rocks and other hazards. There're almost no toys (I'm talking 3 that I saw) unless you bring your own, and when the child minders are on site (when you do yoga), they clear all toys when they leave. In theory fine, but it's marketed as a child and Mama retreat.... So expected more here.

The breakfast is serve yourself cereals, nothing for smaller kids. Coffee machine.... No! Make your own manually.
Some rooms have no windows, no bathroom and are singles... BUT with a huge price tag!

For the standard it's simply too expensive, however not a bad place if you're ok with lower end youth hotel type of service for this price.

Yoga was great, child minders amazing and loving. The food is incredible (but don't expect much in terms of quantity).

The people working for/with the owner are all great. Evening activities are very much personal taste, I thought cringe! But hey, others loved this part. We all agreed on the above points however.

I was really disappointed with my HolyMama experience. I had saved all year to attend the week long retreat in Ibiza, so was very disappointed to find out on arrival we weren't in the villa I had booked, nor was I in the equivalent room I had booked - I was in one that was approximately 600 euros less on the website, and there had been no communication prior to my arrival about this, nor on arrival itself - it took me asking the facilitator about this and no apology or compensation was given.
As a breastfeeding mama, the breakfast and coffee in the morning was below par / non existent until we had brunch after the yoga. Doing yoga was very hard on an empty stomach whilst nursing. The yoga itself focused more on breath-work than movement which felt disappointing. And the accommodation felt dirty. Not what I expected considering the price tag that's attached to this retreat.
I wouldn't go back and wouldn't recommend sadly.

Not a happy experience, lacking in so many areas, overpriced and in parts unacceptable, tried researching and could find no review sites beforehand - hence set it up here to allow others to post honest reviews too.
Some great people working in the team but from yoga teaching, to rudeness of ‘Holy Mama’, to no show of pre-booked transfer, to not having noted pre retreat questionnaire re health issues ,to not adequate available foods for babies. Other mums were great, some people really needing a break and they need to ensure safe nurturing genuine environment for attendees.
Adult food great and chefs to be commended. I did send a post retreat feedback – but that’s not be acknowledged either.
We could have been unlucky but there were other persons in agreement on the same retreat just not willing to vocalize.