Steam Shower Stores brings 21st-century saunas to the UK
One of the many lessons learned from COVID19 is that it’s important to stay focussed on mental and physical wellness. Fortunately, this doesn’t have to be difficult. It just means finding ways to incorporate wellness into your everyday life. Diet and exercise are obviously key to this. They can be boosted by recognised wellness treatments such as having saunas regularly.
From Finland to the UK
Finland is far from the only place where saunas are seen as an integral part of the culture. It is, however, the place that’s most commonly associated with them and for good reason. In Finland, home sauna are as common as garden sheds in the UK. They’re not just places to go for a health boost. They’re places to go for “me time” or “we time” as you prefer. It’s as common for people to take saunas on their own as it is for people to share them.
In the UK, by contrast, saunas were more of a niche interest. They were something you enjoyed at a gym or spa, when you had the time. Very few people were prepared to commit the money or space to have one in their garden.
Since COVID19 hit the world, however, interest in saunas has been continually increasing. It’s now reached a point where Andrew Ellis, founder and CEO of Steam Shower Store now feels so confident about long-term demand that he is now extending his range of outdoor saunas.
As he explains “At first, I thought the upswing in interest was purely a result of COVID19 and that it would disappear when life got back to normal. I do still think it was COVID19 that really brought the benefits of saunas to mainstream public attention in the UK. What I got wrong was thinking that it was a trend. Now that people are aware of just what saunas can do for them, they’re much more willing to invest in them.
Investing in better health
Mr Ellis credits the surge of interest in saunas to the internet as much as COVID19. He says “Based on what I’ve seen, COVID19 understandably led people to research what they could do to maximise their mental and physical wellness. The internet did the rest. It enabled people to find out not just what saunas could do for them but what having a sauna routine actually meant.”
In hindsight, Mr Ellis believes that the main reason it took so long for saunas to go mainstream in the UK was that they were largely associated with beauty rather than health and wellness.
He says, “The beauty industry uses saunas for a reason. They really are great for your skin, hair and nails. Firstly, they help get toxins out of the body. Secondly, they speed up the delivery of nutrients where they’re needed. They are, however, definitely not just about beauty and people needed to learn that before they were willing to invest in them.”.
The main selling point of outdoor saunas is that the heat relaxes the mind but stimulates the heart and hence the lungs. That means taking a sauna delivers very similar benefits to exercise without the physical activity. If you have a traditional sauna, you also get the benefits of steam. This is an amazing cleanser both inside and out.
Bringing saunas into the modern world
Mr Ellis also credits the internet with educating people on saunas in the 21st century. He says “Even now, when people think of saunas, they probably think of traditional Finnish saunas. These can be great experiences but they’re not necessarily what people in the UK want. Fewer and fewer people want real-fuel heaters and some people don’t want steam either.”.
Fortunately, there are modern alternatives to suit everyone. You can now get saunas that use electric heaters to produce steam and infrared saunas which don’t use steam. You can also get hybrid saunas that offer different options to suit different tastes. These are especially popular and Mr Ellis believes are likely to be the way of the future.
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