How to Choose the Perfect Float Tank – DSP 187

One of the biggest decisions you have to make for your float center is what tank to choose. This is what your business is based around. So how do you go about making this decision? A lot of newer float center owners want to know what the “Best Tank” is. The reality is that there isn’t some clear front runner in float tank quality. Every tank has it’s strengths and weaknesses. It really depends on what you’re looking for and what you want to spend.

Graham and Ashkahn share what they think are the most important things to consider when choosing your float tank.

The RESTroom Float Tank

FTS Product – Float Tank Comparison Guide

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Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)

Graham: This is Graham over here.

Ashkahn: And this is Ashkahn.

Graham: And.

Ashkahn: We got an episode for you today. Unlike other days.

Graham: What happens on other days?

Ashkahn: Not sure, I’ve blacked out.

Graham: Today’s question is, actually this is one we get all the time, this is a good one to answer. “What’s the best float tank out there? What would you choose if you started up another center?”

Ashkahn: The best float tank.

Graham: Well I think the RESTroom is pretty good, just go to RESTroomfloat.com

Ashkahn: RESTroomfloat.com. That’s pretty much the only one I think you even worth considering.

Graham: So. Thanks for the question.

Ashkahn: Anymore questions? Just go to RESTroomfloat.com/podcast.

Graham: Send ’em in. Flush ’em over our way.

Ashkahn: Yeah, this is question we get all the time, that of course you think about opening a float center, this is the first immediate question that pops into your mind, “what float tank do I choose?” And it’s an understandable question to have because there are a lot of float tanks out there.

Graham: And they’re really expensive, so it’s not like a decision that you wanna get wrong.

Ashkahn: There’s, I wanna say, 40-45 manufacturers in the world right now.

Graham: Of any size, anything from 1 unit a year to-

Ashkahn: The biggest manufactures out there.

Graham: Yeah, yeah.

Ashkahn: There’s a lot to choose from, and there’s no single person in the world who’s tried them all, seen them all in person, floated in all them, had them in their center, any of that sort of thing. Everyone is just kinda seeing the slice of the pie that they’re the most familiar with, including us.

Graham: It means that it’s really hard for us to specifically answer that question. We almost have more of a protocol for being able to choose a better float tank for yourself, or finding a tank that suits you than we do for any personal preference or saying, this tank is the best one out there, which I guess just to backup a little bit, there also isn’t a best float tank.

Ashkahn: Yeah, it’s not like there is one clear front runner, there’s one company just crushing it super hard and everyone else is leagues behind them. There’s a lot of good float tanks and every float tank comes with things that it does well and every float tank comes with things that it does not do well and has quirks that you have to deal with.

Graham: Yeah there is no perfect float tank out there, is very true. And there just might not ever be, you know, if you’re buying a boat, it’s like what’s the perfect boat? You know?

Ashkahn: There’s just always design compromises. The more it’s built into the room makes it more salt-proof which is nice but it makes it harder to install and uninstall in the future. Every benefit can naturally come with a downside, it’s just part of the deal.

Graham: Yeah. Open tanks we’ve talked a lot about the pros of having this open environment and the cons of having something that’s a lot harder to maintain that precise realm of temperature and airflow and things like that in there. Even something like the style of tank, there’s not even a best style, much less manufacturer of those styles for you to choose from.

Ashkahn: So.

Graham: Don’t you feel stupid now for asking this question?

Ashkahn: Dumb question. You gotta decide somehow so what do you do? And there’s a few things that I think are worth considering when you’re looking at buying float tanks. I think it’s really easy to focus on the aesthetics and the size of the float tank, and that’s the stuff that comes really naturally to people. You can see a float tank, you see what it looks like, maybe you want the cabin style because you like the fact that it’s, you know, open door and people can get in easier, looks good.

Graham: Number of drink holders.

Ashkahn: The number of cup holders? Yeah.

Graham: Yeah.

Ashkahn: The glove compartment is- So you know it’s really easy to look at the aesthetics, decide what works well for you. And from that perspective, it’s not quite as hardcore of a decision as you may think it is. It’s not like you’re business is gonna be made or fail because you chose pods instead of cabins or whatever. We have a variety of float tanks, different styles in our float center. And our customers, they have a variety of preferences. Some like the cabin style, some like the pod, some like our open rooms, it really just is kind of all over the place in terms of what people like and what people don’t like. So it’s not like the majority of the population likes cabins over pods or pods over open rooms or anything like that. People just have their own personal preferences.

Graham: And then price, of course, is just a big factor, you know. What’s a perfect float tank for performance? Well again, there isn’t one. What’s a perfect float tank for price? I mean that one’s even more variable, just for what you can actually afford and put into your center and what kind of aesthetics that you want and what you want the experience to be once you’re in there. Even what kind of populations you expect to have in coming in to float can really affect what dimensions you’d want on the tank and what type you’d ultimately want. So if you’re listening to this, call us and let us know and we can answer this question a little more specifically.

Ashkahn: The other factors that can vary a lot from float tank to float tank I think are some big differences in the filtration systems that different float tanks have. And that’s the stuff that’s a little less approachable at first when you’re first getting into the industry and first opening a float center.

And that just requires I think some education, you know like, listen to this podcast. Good work you’re doin’ that part. We have on our Float Tank Solutions site, there’s our water treatment section of our online apprenticeship is just free, that you can view on there. Read blog posts, do research out there, just get your head wrapped around how that works. Pumps, filters, the sanitation system, what your health department’s looking for.

Because that sort of education is gonna help you look at a float tank and be like, “hey that float tank has these bag filters that I like and I’d really like to have a bag filter instead of a cartridge filter.” Or “I need to have chlorine in my state because the health department and this float tank doesn’t even offer a chlorinated system, so maybe I wanna go with a different one.” There are some decisions like that that are a little hard to tell at first because you know a little bit about how that stuff works.

Graham: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And so, I guess with that in mind, assuming you’ve gone through base-level education, you’re kinda ready to be making a decision, you know what your budget is roughly, or what kind of range you’re looking at for tanks. I guess I’d say there’s kinda three categories of the next steps that you wanna do.

Ashkahn: Three categories of steps. Oh boy.

Graham: Yeah categories of steps. The silly walk step. Then you got the serious business step, and the more person growth step. So the three things, the three steps to take, or the categories of steps, would be to A) call the manufacturers, for the thanks you’re looking at. If you’re looking for that list of manufacturers when we said there’s like 200 manufacturers out there, whatever was that Ashkahn?

Ashkahn: There’s 300.

Graham: Download our tank comparison chart, all of that information is actually provided by the manufactures themselves. This isn’t us scraping information or anything, this is them actually sending it over our way for the public to download. Totally manufacturer-approved on every step and really goes into what types of filtration systems they have, what the cost is, photos of the tank, everything like that. So for the baseline get that, and then call the manufacturers that you’re interested in, start a conversation. And keep in mind they’re trying to sell you things, they manufacture tanks that they want you to buy, so they’re probably-

Ashkahn: Yeah and they genuinely think their float tanks are the greatest float tanks out there, which I would hope that they did, it’d be weird to have a manufacturer being like, “yeah it’s probably not the best float tank.”

Graham: “You know you should really go with, that RESTroom thing.” So call them and ask them about certain features that you’d want and if they’ve had experience in your states, stuff like that is all good questions. Also just pay attention to how quickly they respond to you, how diligent they are in their communication, because as I always like to say, especially if you get close to making the sale and are serious about it and obviously interested, and they’re still taking a long time to get back to you?

And if that’s happening when you’re trying to give them money, what do you think’s gonna happen when something breaks and you need an extra part. I’d say communication and just how you feel about the back and forth with the manufacturer is a big part of choosing a float tank. It’s almost one that people overlook too much. There is no float tank that will also be operational 100% of the time and just be totally good. At some point you’re gonna need to rely on your manufacturer and knowing that they’re responsible and they’re going to be there and have a quick turnaround on whatever you need is an important part of your tank.

Ashkahn: And the third category of steps, I’m gonna take a guess here.

Graham: I only said one so far.

Ashkahn: Oh what?

Graham: Yeah.

Ashkahn: Well it was the tank comparison guide, that was one.

Graham: No sorry that was just. Initial homework.

Ashkahn: Okay alright.

Graham: That’s step zero, step zero is get the tank comparison guide. The base category.

Ashkahn: Alright what’s the second category of steps?

Graham: The second one is to call around to different centers.

Ashkahn: Okay yeah.

Graham: That’s what you were gonna say for the third one.

Ashkahn: Okay now I definitely don’t know what the third one is then.

Graham: You don’t know what it is?

Ashkahn: I don’t know what the third one is.

Graham: Well you take number two and I’ll go into number three.

Ashkahn: This is a really good step because float tanks have quirks and they might not reveal themselves until you actually have a float tank running in your float center for a little bit. And the manual from the manufacturer’s not gonna tell you this sort of stuff, and you’re not gonna see this in their feature list, but when you get a float tank center in your place, there’s always maintenance that comes with it.

There’s always a certain amount of weak points or things that break or just small annoyances or whatever. And it’s really hard to tell those, even if you’ve only had the float tank for like a month it’s really hard to tell those. It’s like owning a car. All of a sudden you find out that everyone who owns this car has this one issue that pops up after 10,000 miles or whatever it is. Float tanks I think are very similar to that.

So a really really good source of information is finding a float center that has the float tank you’re interested in, if you’ve narrowed it down to one or two different choices. Find one that’s had it for at least a year and call them up and ask them about what their experience is like with it.

Graham: And ideally even two to three years is really nice. Again some issues with both float construction and with the tanks themselves just don’t even come up until year two or year three.

Ashkahn: And keep in mind when you’re talking to people remember what they say and check the manufacturer’s website and stuff because if it’s a few years old they might have fixed some of those things by then which is nice, but people are gonna be very very happy to vent to you about everything that’s wrong with their float tanks like you’re calling someone and just giving them license to be like, “oh yeah let me tell you about what was going on the other day.”

And they’ll be super honest and give you a lot of really good information and it’s a really nice way of finding out. If you call four or five different centers and they all say the same thing, that’s a pretty good indication that that’s kind of an ongoing issue with that specific manufacturer’s, or at least that model of float tank. Really kinda good straight to the source type of information.

Graham: Yeah. Definitely. And you can get some of these as just references provided by the manufacturer after you call them, so ask them for a list of different float centers you can call around to for references.

Ashkahn: Yeah they’ll tell you the ones that gonna tell you the best things.

Graham: Yeah, yeah exactly. So also do your own homework and look up what other centers have those tanks. Sometimes it can be a little harder to find, especially if it’s a smaller manufacturer but ideally some mix of those. Who the manufacturer recommends you call, and if they don’t have good references that you can call that’s probably a warning sign right there, you know?

So definitely check the references, find your own references and some of them, there’s not a long of really old manufacturers so if you’re looking for a manufacturer that’s been around over 10 years, there’s a handful right?

Ashkahn: Yeah there’s a short list.

Graham: Yeah very short list. And same thing, some of the manufacturers might not have even had units in center for a year yet, or for two years, or three years. And if that’s the case just go into it knowing you’re a little bit of the guinea pig. Right? That’s also good information to have, if this manufacturer’s really young, and you’re gonna be getting one of the first 10 or 20 units.

I mean that’s fine it’s just, the newness might come along with some kind of discount because you’re expecting there might be hiccups that they’re working out, or something like that. Another thing to pay attention to. Again not that it disqualifies anything, everyone starts somewhere, there’s some great new units coming onboard all the time.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: And number three.

Ashkahn: Right, right. I’m excited.

Graham: Go float in the tanks that you want.

Ashkahn: Oh I see.

Graham: Yeah. Go use them yourself, right? Find out what it’s like from the customer perspective. So that’s the three, dealing with the manufacturer, figure out whether you like the tanks personally and you want to enjoy them from that customer standpoint, and whether you think your customers will, and then find out what’s it like behind the scenes running them.

Ashkahn: And the nice thing is pretty much every float tank out there can provide a decent float. No one’s building float tanks that just do a horrible job, not having someone have a good float experience in them. It’s just how hard it is to maintain to float tank to make it have that good float or how much more construction do you have to do in your room to make up for some things that it maybe doesn’t have. It’s kind of everything else that goes around it, but it’s definitely a great way to experience it and get some hands on knowledge.

Graham: And that is one of those things where dimensions might actually play into it a little bit, especially if you plan on having athletes, like basketball player come in or something like that and you’re floating in a short tank versus a much bigger one. There’s those kind of surface level things that we were mentioning at the beginning are definitely something, although it’s again the very obvious stuff that you get when you go into the tank yourself and your kind of using it from the perspective of a future client, or just whoever you plan on having come in and target with your marketing.

Ashkahn: Right.

Graham: And that’s it.

Ashkahn: Cool great yeah. That was all three categories]

Graham: There was no category four.

Ashkahn: It was just zero through three instead.

Graham: Proper listing there yeah.

Ashkahn: Alright well if you guys have more questions for us, you can hop over to floattanksolutions.com/podcast.

Graham: And we’ll talk to you tomorrow.

Ashkahn: Yeah. Bye.

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