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Why did we open a massage chair store in the middle of a pandemic?
Some may call us bold while others may question our sanity. And they may be right! Read on and it should make a bit more sense.
For the past couple of years, Chris and I were running a company called Engage Wellness Services. Serving businesses in New England – primarily MA, RI, southern NH and northern CT – we were bringing massage chairs into offices to massage the staff. Sometimes it was part of an employee wellness initiative and other times it was an appreciation event. Regardless, we’d haul in a couple of chairs and by the end of the day we’d have upwards of 80 people who received massages. Smiles abounded. The comments we received about the quality of massage were consistently positive.
Employers liked us as we were easy to work with. We had the schedule arranged before we got there and we stayed all day to make sure everyone had a great experience. What they really liked, however, was that they could now offer massage to everyone in the office. Our hands-free massage meant that there was no touching by a stranger so people who felt uncomfortable with a traditional massage therapist now had a way to participate.
In our travels we came across the InBody 570 Body Composition machine. Knowing that employee wellness programs often included “biggest loser” contests, nutrition seminars, fitness challenges and biometric screenings, we felt the InBody 570 would be an excellent addition to these events. As a result, we bought a machine and began offering that to our clients. Some of our favorite visits were to those companies whose employees made significant, positive changes to their body composition – and we had the data to prove it to them!
So Engage Wellness Solutions was doing pretty well. We weren’t fully booked but we were getting there. We even sold a handful of chairs. And then COVID-19 came along. Offices emptied out. Office perks became virtual and unfortunately we couldn’t come up with a way to deliver virtual chair massages. It should come as no surprise but business for Engage Wellness Solutions quickly dried up.
So we’re now faced with the proverbial life gives you lemons – what are you going to do? Fortunately we got to know the folks at Infinity Massage Chairs pretty well and learned that 80%+ of the massage chairs they were selling were going to homes. We also recognized that stress levels at home had jumped dramatically as families were dealing with work-at-home, home schooling, day care, social distancing, gyms closing and worst of all – no place to get a safe massage!
Enter LAIDBACK, a place where you can buy a massage chair for your home (or business) AND you can get a safe massage.
So that’s our quick story. If we’ve learned one thing about massage chairs over the past couple of years it’s that the difference between a premium massage chair and the ones you find at the mall or airport or nail salon is huge. And the only way to truly understand this is to try a premium massage chair. At LAIDBACK. Soon.
Chris & Dave
