Something in the world of floating have you stumped?
Show Highlights
Some people have special ways that they prepare for floating, and how it’s approached depends entirely on the person floating.
Graham and Juliet (Ashkahn’s still missing) talk about their different approaches to floating, whether it’s sneaking in to float whenever they can, or planning entire days around floating to make sure it goes off without a hitch, they share their perspectives.
Listen to Just the Audio
Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)
Graham: Alright, welcome everyone. I am Graham.
Juliet: And I am Juliet.
Graham: That’s right. We got a Juliet in the studio again. And for those of you who aren’t familiar, she was just on stage at the Float Conference giving a wonderful talk, which will be coming out soon through the Float Conference website. She went on a three month float tour with us around the country. And she’s responsible for a lot of our blog posts and content going into our free product. So pretty important person here at Float Tank Solutions. And she’s also an avid floater, which means she’s going to be helping us go through some questions that are geared more towards the floater specific side of things and a little less technical.
And today’s question for us from you is, “How do you get yourself ready for a float?” I assume yourself they mean like us. And do you have advice to give to customers? So yeah, what do you do? How do you prepare yourself for a float?
Juliet: Typically avoid caffeine. I like if I’m floating later in the day, I like to get in a walk or light exercise. Just get my body to not be so tense while I’m in the float.
Graham: Have you exercised before hopping in the float tank?
Juliet: Yes.
Graham: That’s a very unpleasant experience.
Juliet: I don’t like it, no.
Graham: Yeah, I went on like a really long run, well, a joggle – juggling while jogging – and then I went to float and I just had to have the door open, like, I was so hot, even after taking a cold shower, I was miserable. Okay, so don’t do that, don’t drink caffeine.
Juliet: Right.I don’t know. I look forward to my floats. And I try not to over-hype myself. I think that’s a big problem for some of my floats sometimes, but, I try to create a very present mindset for when I get into a float, so that it’s not such a big deal, and maybe that’s a difficult thing to tell customers to do, but I also think it’s a generally good idea.
There … I don’t know. I’m rarely in a space where I don’t think that a float is a good idea.
Graham: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I hear ya.
Juliet: But, depending on where I’m at in the day, it can really change the trajectory of the float once I’m in the tank. And, I guess, just being open and prepared for that, and letting people know that, I think, for a float center, is probably a good idea, you know. It’s going to take you where it’s going to take you, right?
Yeah, and I try to treat it, I try to treat floats with a little bit of respect, I guess, and be mindful of them, because there are days where, it’s like, I can’t float because I just shaved my legs, or things like that, so I’ll plan like even a couple of days around a float sometimes, so.
Graham: Maybe it’s just as the result of being an owner, and, like, I have this guilt that I’m taking floats that are in prime slots, or when other people would take them, you know? So I tend to just sneak my floats in at the last minute. Like, my, largely my preparation for a float is checking the schedule to make sure that there’s at least one tank free before I walk down to Float On. Which, also living 5 minutes from Float On is a huge boon in this case.
Juliet: Right, yeah, I have to go across town in order to get it.
Graham: Yeah, I guess, like, only when I acutely really like need a float, like I’ve hurt my back, or just been feeling really sore or something like that, I’ll really plan ahead. Or if I’m trying to do something like 10 days of floating all in a row, just do kind of a recenter or something like that, I guess I treat it a little more like this, more of a journey, or like, more sacredly, or something like that.
Juliet: Sure.
Graham: And, often, I’m just “Floating always sounds like a good idea,” so, it’s really just like, “Oh, is there a tank free that I could just hop in right now, because I have some free time?” And that’s kind of how I hit my once a week sort of habit is just like that.
Juliet: Yeah.
Graham: Which is fine. I think that my habits are just very different from my customers, which also sometimes, I guess it doesn’t make it too difficult to still give them good advice on what to do to prepare.
Juliet: Right.
Graham: Do you bring fresh socks?
Juliet: I try to plan around my outfits so that I don’t even have to wear socks.
Graham: I wear sandals when I go to float, it’s like my thing. I really don’t like putting back on socks that are, like, that you’ve been wearing the entire day, you know. I thought that was a good pro tip.
Juliet: I really enjoy being able to wear just like something very casual and drapey. I’ll wear a lot of dresses on my float days, which is awesome. Just get like a … For people who don’t wear dresses, muumuus exist. I recommend it. Maybe just robes, float robes, that you plan to take with you for the rest of the day. Acquire a look is what I’m saying.
Yeah, no, and I do, I plan days around this, so it’s like, I have my float outfit, I wear float shoes and go in and I have my float time, and then I’ll get out and enjoy the rest of the day.
Graham: It’s one of the tips we give to customers, too, for sure. You know, it’s like, half of the tips are things to avoid, kind of like we covered, it’s like don’t shave your legs the day of, don’t drink a bunch of caffeine, you know, don’t get into a big fight with your landlord before heading over to float, ideally. You know, it’s kind of like take it easy before and after your float is also the advice, you know. Make sure you don’t have anything that’s going to put you in this immediately stressful place right before coming in.
And similarly, try not to have any commitments right afterwards, where, you know, regardless of your mind state, you might have to just go and immediately do something. I’d almost say, just, I mean, for me, open time is one of the best things after a float, you know. I would rather do that than even plan for, like, “Oh, I’m gonna go watch this concert,” or do something even if I might enjoy it, just because, once I get out, I don’t even know what kind of mental state I’m gonna be in, you know. Sometimes I want to lounge, sometimes I want to go on a walk, sometimes the concert would sound like an awesome idea, but, yeah, I kinda don’t even want to guess ahead, you know.
Juliet: Yeah, yeah, no, I totally get that. And I think that that lines up pretty well with customer experiences, too, because I think that this is kind of a treat for most people.
Graham: You mean my experiences are universal?
Juliet: Yes, sure. Let’s go with that.
Graham: Yeah, any other little tips for customers, or tips for float center owners to give their customers to prepare?
Juliet: No, I don’t think so. I think that’s it.
Graham: Don’t come in just super sloshed.
Juliet: Right, yeah, yeah.
Graham: Yeah, it’s just all the kind of basic stuff, you know. Once you’ve been open for a week, you kind of have your spiel down for all the little things to avoid. I guess the last thing is making sure people actually pay attention to those, because, often, you’ll be saying things, or your brochure says something like, “Don’t drink caffeine beforehand,” and what the person is thinking, “I get to float tomorrow,” and they’re absolutely not paying attention to your warnings.
So, reiterating that, you know, we say it in our brochure, we say it in our email, we do it during call-aheads, when we’re calling to people just reminding them of the little things that they should do to prepare, so, don’t think that just because you say this in one place that people will internalize it and actually prepare accordingly.
Juliet: Right, yeah. It takes, what, seven times in order for something to get stuck in your mind, sort of a thing? Repetition.
Graham: I don’t know, I’ve only heard that like three times, so it’s hard to remember.
Juliet: Yeah.
Graham: Cool. Well, if you have your own questions, or your own answers, I guess, if you want us to come up with questions, just go to floattanksolutions.com/podcast. And, yeah, we’ll do whatever you want. Just write in your demands there, just don’t hurt us.
Alright, bye, everyone.
Juliet: Bye.
Recent Podcast Episodes
How to Build your Mailing List – DSP 325
Graham and Ashkahn consistently emphasize the importance of mailing lists, but today they dive in deep to talk about how to build a mailing list, giving their best tips and tricks to collecting emails and how to make sure you’re getting the right people signed up.
How to Deal with Employee Conflict – DSP 324
Graham and Ashkahn address the unenviable task of dealing with disagreements between staff members as a small business. This is an area that Float On has needed a lot of help with in the past. The best practices of Human Resources aren’t very intuitive in interpersonal relationships, so hiring a professional is almost always a good idea.
Float Tanks in the Military – DSP 323
The military is famously tight lipped about the research it does in general. No less so than when researching seemingly benign practices like float tanks.
Graham and Ashkahn give their scoop on what they know about the military’s use of float tanks in their research and training programs.
Best Cleaning Practices without Burning Out Employees – DSP 322
Every float center has to compromise somewhere on how much cleaning to do between transitions. Where do you draw the line and how do you make sure that you’re keeping your employees happy without sacrificing sanitation?
Graham and Ashkahn remind everyone that “perfect” sanitation doesn’t exist and that making solutions collaborative in a work environment can do wonders for morale and problem solving in situations like this one.
Good Website Copy for Float Centers – DSP 321
Most websites you visit are filled with words. And that may seem simple, but if you build a website, you’re going to have to be the one to come up with those words. How do you decide what to put up there and how much is too much? What should you focus on?
Graham and Ashkahn tackle the elusive web copy problem for float centers and provide some helpful tips for anyone who’s feeling a little overwhelmed at the concept.
Latest Blog Posts
Timeline for Opening Up a Float Center
Opening up a float center is a lot like climbing a mountain. Even if you can see the peak, it’s a lot further away than you think, and when you finally get there, the journey and the destination usually end up being different than previously assumed.
In this post we’ll lay out a general process and timeline of what you may encounter on your path, from initial idea to actually operating a center.
Can you have volunteers at your center?
So you’re thinking about using volunteers in your float center?
Before we clarify what a “volunteer” actually means, we’ll first explore why a float center might be considering them in the first place. While it can be a way to provide floats to people who are otherwise unable to pay, the impulse to bring in volunteers can also stem from a desire to get some sort of free labor (later in this post we’ll dive into why you can’t actually do this, but it’s important to recognize that the instinct is understandable, especially when you have someone lined up and willing to work for free).
In addition to a desired boost in overall productivity, it’s also a way to invite more people into your center to experience what you do. Some customers actually want to help out and see what happens behind the scenes at a center.
Floating and Athletics, a Strong Relationship
One of the beautiful things about the float tank is that it serves to rejuvenate the whole person. — the body, mind, heart.
Broadly speaking, it’s a tool for homeostasis, an ideal environment that supports balance, health, and growth. This piece will look specifically at floating and athletics. For anyone who defines themselves as an athlete, or as a general pursuant of athletic endeavors, the float tank can be a powerful asset.
In this post, I’ll discuss individual athletes who float and how to look at this from a marketing perspective. I’ll also discuss past and present research, and share some thoughts on how the relationship between the athletic and floating communities might continue to unfold.
A Skeptic’s Guide to Floating
I think it’s time we addressed the giant metaphorical elephant in the salty metaphorical room — there are lots of exaggerated and untrue claims about the benefits of floating being spread around the industry.
Some are anecdotal, some are only half true, and some are just patently false. Floating has historically had a strong oral tradition tied to it — the practice has survived through word-of-mouth, one passionate floater teaching another everything they know. The unfortunate thing about this is that the information disseminated can’t be reliably tested or shared with others on a broader scale. You can’t use “my buddy Chris” as a source for a health benefit of float tanks in a newspaper article, much less for a research paper.
Now that we’re becoming a bit more mainstream, we thought it would be nice to add some clarity to what we should and shouldn’t be telling people about these difficult-to-understand, saliferous containers.
