Transcript of Video Titled “Massage Chair Industry Update – May 22, 2013”

Alan: Hi, I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com‘ and today is our May 22nd edition of the massage chair industry update. We’ve got some stuff to cover today, quite a bit of stuff to cover.

[SCREEN TEXT: Stock Status]

Alan: First of all, we’ll go over stock with you. The Inada ‘Black’ leather Sogno is out of stock until June 17th. The IT-9800 in the ‘Black’ and the ‘Brown’ is back-ordered, but they should be in this week. The Human Touch chairs are good. Panasonic, the MA70, which was originally supposed to be just back-ordered until June is now back-ordered until July. Osaki, the ‘Brown’ is back-ordered on the 7200H until the end of the month, and the ‘Taupe’ and the ‘Ivory’ of the 7075R are back-ordered until the end the month, which isn’t that much longer, another week or so. The OS-4000, they have lots of ‘Cream,’ but all of the other colors are out of stock until next week.

[SCREEN TEXT: New Osaki OS-3000 Design]

Alan: The OS-3000 – you know, we’re going to talk a little bit about that in a minute, but the OS-3000, they’ve completely remodeled it, if you remember – well, we’ll talk about it now. The OS-3000, originally was a very similar look-alike to the OS-4000, except the 4000 had a couple of extra features. Well, my experience has been that whenever you have two chairs that are very, very similar, most consumers will buy the higher-priced one with greater features, and I think that’s what’s happened here. So, Osaki has reevaluated that OS-3000, and they’ve come out with a new model. They’re going to call it the OS-3000, but the pictures are very different. It’s a nice-looking chair, it doesn’t have the shoulder airbags. It looks more like a traditional chair, a traditional massage chair, with some nice little lines and designs on the side of the side panels. We will have those pictures up this week, and you can take a look at it, and get an idea for it. The price point, I believe, is the same, the color selections should be the same, but I’ll have more of that data up as we get more information on it. So, the Osaki OS-3000 has a new body design, it will not look like the OS-4000, it has a new design all its own.

[SCREEN TEXT: Luraco Visits Massage Chair Relief]

Alan: Luraco, the ‘Black’ iRobotics 6 is out of stock until June, but the ‘Caramel’ and the ‘Brown’ are in stock. I might mention that we had Manthan from iRobotics, or from Luraco, come by. He flew from Texas in to visit me, and to visit one of my customers, to update the firmware for the chairs, and to add in a new ‘Stretch’ program, which I love. Before the ‘Stretch’ program was just the ottoman going up and down, now it’s the the ottoman and the chair back working simultaneously, which is how most ‘Stretch’ programs work. Manthan came and kind of checked over my machine to make sure everything was working right, very nice fellow. His flight was delayed to Salt Lake from Dallas because of tornadoes, and of course we know that this last week has been a nightmare for tornadoes, particularly in Oklahoma, and our hearts go out to the folks in Oklahoma. Manthan came, and he fixed our chair – or not fixed it – but he upgraded our chair and checked it through, and made sure everything was working right. He went to one of my customers here, locally. I’m really impressed with their customer service. Thanks Manthan, for coming out and visiting us, and thanks for taking care of our chair, Luraco does a good job of that.

[SCREEN TEXT: Free 5 Year Ext. Warranty on ZeroG 4.0 Until Father’s Day!]

Alan: Human Touch, from May 17th to June 24th, are offering a five-year extended warranty for the ZeroG 4.0. So, if you’re going to get a ZeroG 4.0, and you live in the continental United States or sorry, in any of the United States, you will get a full five-year extended parts-and-labor in-home warranty with your chair purchase, which is a great deal.

[SCREEN TEXT: Price of Inada YuMe Drops $700 to $5299!!!]

Alan: The YuMe price, Inada announced last week that the price of their YuMe was going down from $5999 down to $5299. Now, the YuMe is a nice chair, I really like that chair. It’s a much more simple chair, a smaller chair, than the Inada Sogno, a wonderful chair, a very firm massage, good neck traction feature. It has the rocking motion, which we’ve not seen in a chair before. They also innovated that Thera-Eliptical-Kneading of the calves. Instead of just having compression on the calves, now it has kneading, this chair has kneading on it, and it’s a pretty cool feature. That chair has been dropped in price down to $5299 we’re happy to announce. That chair was already a pretty good percentage – well, when I say pretty good percentage, about 20% of Inada’s sales – now I suspect that will jump up quite a bit with the price drop, and I think the interest in that chair will go up quite a bit as well.

[SCREEN TEXT: Inada YuMe Stars on TV Show “The Middle”]

Alan: By the way, there was a press release out earlier this week that the YuMe was on a TV show called ‘The Middle,’ on the May 8th episode. Apparently it was a Mother’s Day gift that was being looked at by one of the characters of the show, but you know, the Inada Sogno was once in the show ’30 Rock’ as Tracy Morgan’s chair. He had a red Inada Sogno, which we thought was pretty cool. Well, now the YuMe is in this show, ‘The Middle,’ and they’re getting some good press from those television appearances, no doubt. Oh, by the way, any other massage chair – Omega, Cozzia – they all have good stock as far as I’m aware of.

[SCREEN TEXT: iRobotics 6 Has 24V DC Motor]

Alan: Luraco sent me a little email saying that their motor is a 24-volt DC motor, whereas most of the other chairs, if not all of the other chairs, are a 120-volt or 240-volt AC chair. So, the DC – you know, I can’t remember from college, it’s been so many years ago – but the DC I think is a more efficient-running motor, if I’m not mistaken, and it sounds like that’s the kind of motor that Luraco is using in their chairs. The AC is, I think, a less efficient-running motor, but most chairs have a 120 or a 240-volt AC motor. I may be wrong on this, so if anybody wants to correct me on my understanding of the efficiency of these two different types of motors, let me know. I still plan on going down to Texas to visit Luraco and to visit Osaki. I was supposed to do that at the end of May, and well, we’re getting close to the end of May and I don’t think I’m going to be able to make it. Hopefully early in June, or some time in June, I’ll get down there. I would like to go and visit Luraco’s manufacturing area, you know, to verify once and for all that they do make a good percentage of their chair in the United States. I’ve been getting a lot of push back from other people that tell me the chair is not really a 60% American-made chair. Well, that has been a source of some concern for me, and it should be for all other retailers if that is, in fact, not true. I believe that it’s true, I don’t believe they can, you know, register this product with the Department of Commerce, or the Federal Trade Commission, or whoever it is that they register their products with, and not be true to what it is that they’re stating. So, I am looking forward to going down and seeing some of the tooling, the assembly, of course, and how they manufacture some of the parts that they say they manufacture here in the U.S., I think that’s pretty cool. I’ll also be visiting Osaki, and checking out my friends there, and seeing how their operation works, also in Texas. I will make videos of all of it for your enjoyment and perusal, so stay tuned for that.

[SCREEN TEXT: Father’s Day Specials! Call 888-259-5380]

Alan: Father’s Day is coming up, I can not publicly, you know, make mention of any specials that we have because some of our massage chair companies do not like discounting on their chairs. We will have a showroom special for Father’s Day and feel free to call our showroom at 801 – well actually, call the toll-free number, 888-259-5380, 888-259-5380 – and myself or someone will chat with you and let you know what the Father’s Day Specials are. We’ll make sure it’s a good special, worth your while to get something for Dad on Father’s Day. By the way, I might mention that our primary massage chair shopper is a male, is a male, you know, in the 44 to 54-year range, you know, a Baby Boomer kind of you know, target. So, if that sounds like your dad, or you, you know, give me a call and we’ll hook you up with a Father’s Day special.

[SCREEN TEXT: Floor Models for Sale!]

Alan: OK, What else can I tell you, oh, I’ve got some floor models for sale. I’m going to be making room for some other chairs, and so we’re going to be clearing out some of our floor models. I have the IT-7800, the IT-9800, and the IT-8200 that we’ll be selling. Most of them, I think, have some warranty on them from that first year, but I’ll be selling them at very, very good prices. So, give me a call, again, at the toll-free number that I mentioned earlier, and I’ll tell you what the pricing is for those three models. I also have a ‘Creme’ Sogno, another ‘Creme’ Sogno, for sale. We’re asking $6999 for this one, so if you’re interested in that – of course, you know, the Inada Sogno is our top-selling chair, it’s also the most expensive chair out there – but we have this one. It’s about three months old, sorry, about two-and-a half months old for $6999, which is $1000 off its list price, so it’s a good deal. Give me a call, again, at the toll-free number, and I’ll get you hooked up with that one.

[SCREEN TEXT: Recent Blog Post Articles]

Alan: I wrote some blog posts since our last massage chair industry update. There’s some good ones in there. One I wrote was called ‘5 Tips to Help You Decide Which Chair to Get, and you know, for people that are getting started in massage chair shopping, it can be confusing and a little overwhelming. There’s so many models, so many companies – good companies, bogus companies, good features, you know, fluffy features, whatever – but I wrote an article about five things that you can kind of consider looking at when you’re looking to buy a massage chair. It’ll kind of help you maybe narrow it down right off the bat, and then you can start looking at particular models. I also wrote an article comparing the YuMe to the Panasonic 30007. Now, this was an email that I received from a customer inquiring about the differences, and so I go over it in bullet point. It’s very succinct and very well delineated for you to take a quick look at and see the differences between those two chairs. That was an interesting question to have that. Of course, that turns in to a blog post, when you ask me a real good question and I answer it, and it’s worthy of putting on the blog, this was a good question.

[SCREEN TEXT: Massage Chair Warranty Reviews]

Alan: I also started a series of articles reviewing the different warranties of the different massage chair companies. Last week, I did Panasonic. That was part one of an eight-part series because we carry eight major brands, eight of the major name-brand massage chairs. I believe I’ll be doing Inada this week, so stay tuned for part two. They’ll be eight, probably one a week of the different warranties for the different companies. What I’m doing is I’m going through the warranty, and I’m not just saying, ‘OK, it’s three years, parts-and-labor or one year, parts-and-labor, in-home.’ I’m going through it and I’m stipulating with some things that maybe, you know, need to be stipulated so that there’s no question about what the real coverage is. Like, to say ‘three years, parts-and-labor,’ what does it really cover, because they are really – even though they’re comprehensive warranties – they are still limited in what the companies will cover. So, I like to go through the warranties and make sure that it’s pretty clear what is and what is not covered, how long it’s covered for, you know, whatnot. I’ll go over that with you in the last article I wrote, the first one of this series, it’s on the Panasonic massage chairs. OK, how are we doing here, so we talked about Father’s Day, we talked about the extended warranty, the Human Touch, the ZeroG 4.0, the visit from Luraco, the used chairs that we have for sale, the YuMe price drop, and stock status. I think that should just about do it. It’s a fun time for massage chairs, the companies are making some changes, you know, new models coming out. We’re getting in to the summer portion, which is typically a slower time for massage chair sales. Often, you know, this is maybe the season where some companies are coming out with new models. They want to have new models out in the summer and fall before, you know, the fourth quarter when sales really pick up. So, we’ll kind of keep our eyes peeled for new models, like Osaki has its new OS-3000. I’ll let you know if there’s anything else on board, you know, before, you know, hopefully let you know before it’s, you know, fully public knowledge. Anyway, if you have questions, you can feel free to give me a call on the toll-free number, you can always email me, you can visit us on our Facebook page. Please feel free to ‘Like’ this video, ‘Like’ us, share us on YouTube, or Twitter, or Facebook. Follow our channel on YouTube. I put out new videos every week, not just the massage chair industry updates, but feature reviews for particular models, massage chair models. So, subscribe to the channel, and you’ll get those regular updates every time I put out a new video, and like I said, we try to put out one or two a week. That should do it for this week for our massage chair industry update. I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com.’ Thank you for visiting us today, and we look forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks again. Bye bye.

Click on the following link to watch this Massage Chair Industry Update recording on YouTube.