Transcript of Video Titled “Massage Chair Industry Update – January 26, 2017”

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Alan: Hi, I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com’ and today is our biweekly massage chair industry update for Thursday, January 26th, 2017. We’re well in to the new year already, and things have kind of slowed down from the Christmas rush, but still news to report, and still things going on in the industry, and so we’ll cover some of those things with you today.

[SCREEN TEXT: Stock Status]

Alan: First of all, as far as stock goes, the Novo XT, which is a new model that we have, that we started carrying for Human Touch, that chair is sold out in ‘Red,’ ‘Gray,’ and ‘Cream,’ until the end of January, which is now. So, we have some back-orders, and we’ve not heard that the chairs have arrived yet, but we suspect that those chairs will be in this week, and if not this week, then next week. Also for Human Touch, the ZeroG 5.0 in ‘Espresso’ is sold out, but it will be available at the end of this week, and the ‘Bone’ and ‘Black’ colors for the ZeroG 5.0 will be available on the week of February 7th. Also, the Lavita, the uKnead Lavita, is supposed to come in this week. We have some back-orders on the ‘Mocha’ color, which is what we have been waiting for; the ‘Black’ has been in stock for a few weeks, or maybe even a month, but the ‘Mocha,’ the brown color, is what we’ve been waiting for, and that’s supposed to be in this week. The MA73, which was back-ordered on both colors, ‘Black’ and ‘Brown,’ from Panasonic, are now in stock, they arrived last week and shipped out early this week. And the Titan Executive is back-ordered until the end of February, early March, and that’s a popular chair in the $3000 price point, so we sell quite a few of them and we’ve got some back-orders, but just so that you know, that chair is on back-order until the end of February, beginning of March. So, that’s it as far as the stock status goes.

[SCREEN TEXT: Human Touch Novo XT Now in Both of Our Showrooms!]

Alan: Let’s see, oh, and speaking of the Novo XT, we now have that chair in both of our showrooms, the Utah showroom, and the California showroom. We’re just becoming familiar with it, I was out of town last week, and I did not get a chance to look at the chair too much. I had some customers come in and sit on it, it’s a nice chair. As you know, the Novo XT is an L-track with a 3D roller track. It also has a space-saving feature, foot rollers, it’s a got a fairly contemporary design, it’s a nice chair. It’s a big chair, it can handle a taller body, and anyway, I’ll get in to that as I become more familiar with the chair, and do a review on it.

[SCREEN TEXT: White-Glove Delivery & Five-Year Premium Protection Warranty Included with Novo XT Purchase!]

Alan: Also, we were notified – oh, and by the way, the Novo XT, we include on that chair – when you buy that chair from us, we include the white-glove delivery and we include the Five-Year Premium Protection extended warranty from Human Touch. So, that’s included on both that – and that chair, the Novo XT, comes in one piece, it’s a big chair, and it’s not hard to assemble – duh, because it’s fully assembled, but it can be difficult to get through a door, and that’s why they have encouraged us to encourage the customers to get white-glove service. So, we just said ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, we’ll just include it,’ and go ahead and include that on the sale, so anyway, that’s what you’ve got with the Novo XT from Massage Chair Relief.

[SCREEN TEXT: Best In Show Award at CES for Luraco. Congratulations!]

Alan: Also, I received notice from Luraco that they received the Best of Show in the health and fitness category from Twice Magazine from the CES. Now, as you know, I was at the Consumer Electronics Show a couple of weeks ago, and took some video footage, and I’ll talk about that in just a minute. But while I was there, you know, while you’re there, or while the companies are there, there’s awards given out for various and sundry categories, and from different, various and sundry publications, and entities. Well, Luraco received Best in Show for health and fitness from a magazine called Twice Magazine, and so congratulations to Luraco for that. I’ve not heard of any other ones, so I’m not sure what other awards may’ve been given out. I know that in the past, Inada has received awards. I know that Human Touch has received ADEX Design awards in the past, not at CES, but just overall, so some of these chair companies have received some fairly noteworthy awards in regard to their chairs, their design, whatever. So, anyway, I just thought I’d let you know about that. Now, the CES video that I talked about, I went and visited five different booths, the Human Touch, Infinity, two Inadas, uKnead, and Luraco, and I recorded some video footage. They’re just short clips of every place I went to, and I was kind of yelling, as I listened back on it, because it was in a – it’s in a very, the CES, if you’ve ever been there, is just a – it’s just chaos and mayhem, it’s overwhelming how big it is, and how many people attend. Well, anyway, I felt like I needed to yell in to the computer, or in to the microphone to be heard, but obviously, it comes across pretty clear, but excuse me if you felt like I was yelling in there. But anyway, I put that video up yesterday, it’s on YouTube, you can go to the YouTube channel, and I’m going to put up a blog post later today that talks about the new models that we saw there: the Inada Nest, the Luraco Legend, the uKnead Lohas, and so I’ll mention that in the blog post, but if you want to watch the video, go to my YouTube channel, which is YouTube.com/MassageChairRelief, and you can see – and I interviewed – like I interviewed Dr. Lee from Luraco, I interviewed Michael from Inada, who else did I interview, Anita from uKnead. Anyway, you can kind of watch and learn about these new models in that video. OK, and then two last things I want to chitchat with you about. You know, I have had a few comments from people that have said ‘You know, I read an article by you that said that this chair and this chair were the, you know, the best, or had this feature, and you know, you didn’t mention any of these other models that have that same feature, or that were just as good.’ And you need to understand, we put out a lot of videos over the years, and I’ve been doing these videos for almost 10 years now, and you know, things change in the industry, there’s new models, new features, better models that come out. And so, some of the articles that I’ve written, some of the videos that I’ve written over the last 10 to 12 years, they may be a little bit outdated. There’s models that have been discontinued, or canceled, or that we don’t carry anymore, and so some of these things are not completely relevant, but you do get the idea of what is available, and what we’re looking at when I do review them, or when I chitchat about them, or compare them.

[SCREEN TEXT: Call Anytime at 888-259-5380]

Alan: But if you have any questions, or any requests, about particular reviews, or particular chairs, feel free to give me a call, you can reach me, or one of staff members, at 888-259-5380, which is our toll-free website number, and that’ll get forwarded to me, or to my staff in California. But anyway, just wanted you to know that, you know, things change, of course, and sometimes you might watch a video or read an article that seemed like – you know, you think I may have just written it – but it may have been written years ago, and things change.

[SCREEN TEXT: Tracking Information for Your New Massage Chair]

Alan: And the second thing I wanted to talk about as white-glove delivery, and I think I’ve talked about this before, but it continues to be a concern for some people. When you order a massage chair from us, we send you the tracking information. If you order white glove from us, it’s different as far as the tracking goes. The tracking information that you get, it gives you information for the pickup from the massage chair company, or from us, if you’re buying a returned chair, pickup from the company to the terminal near where you live. It does not mean, when it says that the chair has arrived, it does not mean that you have received it, and that it’s arrived at your home, it means that it’s arrived at the terminal. Then, the company, the shipping company, will call you to arrange a delivery time. Now, if it’s white-glove delivery, it’ll still show that it’s delivered to the terminal, and you might think ‘Well, where’s my bloody chair? I haven’t received it.’ Well, the white-glove agent then is contacted by the terminal, they communicate about a pickup time. The white-glove agent, which is a local agent that does the delivery in your home, if you get that white-glove service, the assembly, and they will go and pick up the chair, and then they will call you to arrange a delivery. So, that sometimes, can take days, some of these white-glove agents are very slow. We do white glove for our local customers here in Utah, and in California, and our delivery guys, when we get the chair, they will call our customer within 24 to 48 hours, and get that thing delivered, but not all white-glove agents are like that. Sometimes it takes days, sometimes a week. And then also, sometimes where you live, may be not on the – you know the, I don’t know, the regular route of these companies, so they may have to arrange a day where they come out to – you know, whatever the town is, where you live. It may be in the middle of nowhere, and so they don’t come out there every day. So, you can’t say ‘Well, I’d like it on Monday, or Tuesday, or Wednesday.’ They may say ‘Well, we’re there Tuesdays and Thursdays, or Wednesdays, or whatever.’ And most white-glove agents, this leads me to another point, most white-glove agents do not deliver on a Saturday or Sunday. So, if you have questions about this, when they contact you to arrange a delivery, you can talk to them, and say ‘Hey, is there any possibility of doing it on a Saturday?’ Well, very few do it, but they might, you never know. They’re local agents, all around the country, you don’t know what they do, or when they work exactly, and some guys are hungrier than others, and want to, you know, deliver whenever they can. So, anyway, just so that you understand, just because the tracking information shows that the chair has arrived, does not mean that it has arrived to you, it means it’s arrived to the terminal, and then you still have to deal with white glove, if you’ve ordered it, which could take up to another week. I had one customer who ordered a chair, it took a month for them to get their chair. That’s hugely embarrassing to me, and it was a white-glove delivery, but that’s because the white-glove agent just took their bloody time, and by the time the customer – well, and then of course, we don’t hear about it until the customer calls and complains to me – and then it’s just franticness, trying to get that chair delivered, and find out why the white-glove agent hasn’t called. And again, there’s various and sundry agents around the country, some are on the ball, and do things right away. Others, they take their sweet time, and may not, I don’t know, may run their business a little differently, and not do it right, you know, promptly. So, anyway, just a heads up for white glove, and regular delivery, those are a couple pointers for you that you may want to, you know, put in the back of your head for when you order your chair.

[SCREEN TEXT: Please ‘Thumbs Up’ Like This Video!!]

Alan: Well, you know, I think that’s just about it for this week, eh? You know, it’s been, it was a great fourth quarter, very busy, we got some new models, I still don’t have those up on my website yet. I’ve got to get the Infinity Altera up there, and I haven’t done that. I think the Lohas from uKnead is not ready yet, but and then we’ve also got the Legend, which will not be out until probably the end of third quarter, maybe even beginning of fourth quarter, and then we also have the Inada Nest, which will not be available until April. So, I won’t have those chairs up on the website until it gets closer to their availability. But if you have any questions, feel free to give me a call. I’m always available, and if you don’t get a hold of me, leave a, you know, leave a message, or whatever, and I’ll get back to you. But anyway, I hope you found this video helpful. If you did, please feel free to thumbs up ‘Like’ us on our YouTube channel, and of course, feel free to share this video with any of your friends or family or colleagues on your social media platforms, whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, LinkedIn, whatnot. We do appreciate you helping us spread the word about massage chairs. Well, I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com,’ and I will see you again in two weeks. Bye bye.

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