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Show Highlights

Customers who color or perm their hair might not want to let it get wet while floating. While Graham and Ashkahn are sympathetic to those issues, as far as they know, there isn’t really a great solution for them.

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

Graham: And our question today is, “is it possible to keep your hair dry during a float?” Like, I assume, for customers who want to handle their hair treatment and stuff like that. I guess the most often reason why people want dry hair is they have coloring in it, or they got it professionally permed or styled or something else that either will mess up the water or mess up their hair. And the answer’s no.

Ashkahn: And the answer’s no.

Graham: Yep, absolutely not. It does seem like having waterproof swimmer’s caps will contain the water from getting in and mixing with hair color and getting back in the tank as much. So as far as the tank is concerned, swimmer’s cap seem to help out, but for anything that won’t get your hair wet at all. And we played around with different levels of tightnesses and things that really try to bill themselves as water won’t creep in, but just the process of laying in there for an hour, an hour and a half, like moisture is pretty bound to leach through whatever system you’ve set up.

Ashkahn: Yeah, it’s a tough one. There’s many different styles of swimming caps and stuff like that out there. And they all seem to let water leak in. It’s just really hard to create that tight of a seal.

Graham: So try this, try this. What you need to do is take a garbage bag.

Ashkahn: Okay, not where I thought that was going to start.

Graham: And get some Gorilla tape. And actually create a whole seal, maybe some Elmer’s glue as well. And what you want to do is you want the bag to go across your forehead and then down and around the back of your neck. And get good contact with your skin there. And just tape. It’s not going to be fun coming out, but you know, and tape it on over your face.

Ashkahn: If you just tape the bag over your entire head, that’ll give you a real nice seal.

Graham: I did not think of that, but I like the concept.

Ashkahn: And if you pump some air in there, works as a neck pillow, double whammy.

Graham: And probably stops you from suffocating if you pump air in there too, so that’s nice.

Ashkahn: Yeah, well usually you have to poke some holes to deal with that.

Graham: What have people done when they want to keep their hair dry? We have at least one customer who comes into float with us, right before they get their hair styled. So they do a monthly hair treatment and trip to their hair stylist person. I use a barber so I get confused sometimes. But anyways, to make they’re not totally messing up their hair, that they just paid a bunch of money to get styled, they’ll go into float, often the same day as their hair treatment is going to be. So they get to ride out the past month and then go in and not worry about messing up their hair for one day. So I thought that was kind of a clever way to still have it as part of your routine, despite also having a more regimented hair care routine as well.

Ashkahn: Yeah, and I do think if you get some serious swimmer’s caps, your hair is not going to get as soaking wet as it would, just being completely loose in the float tank.

Graham: Yeah maybe, I don’t know, water just slowly gets in there and all of a sudden you just have a cap that’s keeping in water as opposed to keeping it out.

Ashkahn: Yeah, I’m sure it’ll be slightly better, but I don’t think it’s something that, if there was a reason you don’t want to get your hair wet, this wouldn’t solve that problem.

Graham: Yeah, yeah. And certainly for customers out there, this is a good answer to know for them, if they are worried about messing up a really expensive do that they got. I tell them not to. That’s when you take out the Gorilla tape.

So I think this is a pretty short episode.

Ashkahn: Yeah, let us know if someone out there has a swimmer’s cap that they actually think really manages to keep your hair dry. Let us know.

Graham: A modified like astronaut helmet or something like that they can go in with.

Ashkahn: Yeah, that sounds great.

Graham: All right, if you have any other easy questions for us, go to floattanksolutions.com/podcast, and shoot them over.

Recent Podcast Episodes

How to handle floaters getting out early – DSP 134

Sometimes… floaters get out early. That’s just what they do. But how often should that be happening? And how early? Well… it certainly depends on the length of your floats. If it is happening a lot and you run hour long floats, maybe there’s a common issue that people aren’t telling you. This is where those soft skills come in really handy. It doesn’t hurt to ask, but it also might not be anything to worry about.

Graham and Ashkahn share their experiences with this and what they see as regular floater behavior and what might be a little suspicious, along with some tips to suss out exactly what’s going on if you think it’s happening too frequently.

Thinking about safety and security for offering overnight floats – DSP 133

Being open constantly does come with its challenges, even for float centers. What do you do when the rest of the world goes to sleep but you’re still operating? Doesn’t it get dangerous? What sort of precautions do you have to make to protect your business and your employees. 

Graham and Ashkahn discuss security for Float On for the twilight hours when things can go wrong as well as some of the general challenges of running a 24 hour business. 

Problems with using certain types of soap – DSP 132

When dealing with the carefully constructed micro-environment of a float tank, any tiny addition can really throw off the appearance or chemistry (just ask anyone who’s had to deal with their water turning orange or green!). The types of soaps you use in your float rooms, along with shampoos, conditioners, and lotions can and will enter your tanks, so it’s important to consider what impact they’re going to have.

Graham and Ashkahn walk through troubleshooting water chemistry problems for this question, to help solve a particular issue. 

Methods for filling weekday float sessions – DSP 131

This is a challenging issue for any service based industry. The world still operates on a 9-to-5 schedule, often Mondays through Fridays, finding people with the availability to zen out in those hours can be a challenge, but Graham and Ashkahn have been there and have some insights to the experience. They share what they do at Float On to counter this and when to accept the margins where you’re just not getting people in to float.

Thoughts on floating with a pacemaker – DSP 130

Sometimes you have customers with very specific needs or concerns about their float. In the case of medical concerns in regards to floating, there’s a lot we don’t know. Always always always have your customers discuss any serious medical concerns with their doctor. If for no other reason, if something does go wrong, even if it’s completely unrelated to their float, you’re not on the hook and have to deal with it. 

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