The growth rate of the hose instability is derived for a beam with Gaussian radial profile, using the spread mass model of phase mix damping. It is found that the maximum growth rate of a convecting wave packet is 49% larger than that derived for a beam with the Bennett profile, and the inverse group velocity (dz/d tau) is also increased by about this amount. A general discussion of spread mass models is presented along with an explanation of the regurgitation phenomena seen in their numerical treatment.