Transcript of Video Titled “Massage Chair Industry Update – May 19, 2015”
Alan: Hi, I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com’ and today is our biweekly massage chair industry update for today, May 19th, 2015, and we’ll get right in to it.
[SCREEN TEXT: Stock Status]
Alan: Last, well, let’s talk about stock, stock, for the most part, is pretty good. Again, the Titan 8400 is still back-ordered, it was supposed to come in yesterday, I haven’t heard if it has or not, but we are expecting that chair in. The Inada DreamWave has been back-ordered in the ‘Black’ leather, but I believe they are also in stock now.
[SCREEN TEXT: Luraco iRobotics 7 Update]
Alan: The iRobotics 7, this is that chair that I talked about a couple months ago when I visited Luraco, in Texas, and it was supposed to come out three or four weeks after that date. Well, it still hasn’t come out, but I got notification that it should be out at the end of this month, and the reason it’s – the delay is not because the chair is not working, it’s because the software is still being worked on – and I’m sure that the boys, Manthan, and the rest of the engineers over there, are working hard, and making sure that everything works perfectly before it’s released to the public. So, we hope to have that chair by the end of May, which is another couple of weeks, and when we do, we’ll get it in our showroom, and we will keep you posted as to what it’s like, do a review, I’m quite excited to see this chair. I’ve kind of forgotten about it because it’s been two months, I forgot kind of what it was like to sit in it, but it’s a nice chair. I do remember it being a high quality chair, with Taiwanese-imported parts, assembled in America, with American components as well, and quality controlled and tested here in America. So, the quality control of this chair is fabulous, the product features are very, very nice. If you remember, I talked about the touchscreen, kind of like a smartphone, it has the same technology as a smartphone. And that sounds wonderful, and very progressive, because a lot of the remote controls, if not all of the remote controls of most of these massage chairs, are a little bit more archaic, more button pushing, as opposed to touchscreen, which seems to be rage right now with phones, and TV remotes, and whatnot. So, anyway, just a little, that’s a little FYI on the iRobotics 7.
[SCREEN TEXT: Osaki Intelligent & Osaki Marquis Discontinued]
Alan: I will also mention that the Intelligent, the Osaki Intelligent, and the Osaki Marquis, are both being discontinued by Osaki. You can find that chair for quite a bit less than what we have it on our website, and if you do find it, and you want me to do a price match, let me know, I’ll gladly do that for you. But that chair, those chairs are – I think the Marquis is $3795, somewhere in that price point, the Intelligent, $40, something, 95, so they’re pretty – they were quite expensive chairs. But they’ve discontinued them, and so they’re going to sell out the existing inventory, which will bring – which now is bringing the price down to, in the like – $2000 price point, so let me know if you’re interested in those chairs.
[SCREEN TEXT: Apex Ultra Now in Brown!]
Alan: Let’s see what else we can talk about, oh, the Apex Ultra. It looks like this Apex Ultra is going to stick around, and it’s here to stay, but now they have a ‘Brown’ Apex Ultra, not just the ‘Black’ and the ‘Grey.’ They’ve added a ‘Brown,’ and we’ve got a picture of it up on the website, so you can see the ‘Brown.’ One thing I noticed when I was at Osaki, visiting them a couple of months ago, when they had their Ultra out on display, it was a grey, but it looked blue to me, a light blue. And so the warning is, unless they’ve changed the color on the next shipment, if you want the ‘Grey,’ just be prepared for more of a light, baby bluish, kind of a hue to it, which kind of surprised me, but it’s a grey, it’s just maybe not a traditional grey that you might expect. Anyway, the Apex Ultra is going to be around for a while. I thought that it was just going to be a temporary thing, because of the price drop, and whatnot, but it’s going to be around, and it’ll be at $2995, which is a very, very good price. And it’s got an L-track, as you know, and the L-track is an extension of the S-track, under the butt and behind the thighs, and the Ultra has calf rollers, it’s got zero gravity, it’s got the foot rollers, it’s got airbags, all kinds of airbags, it’s a very nice chair for $2995. The Titan 8400 is another chair that Osaki has out, another model, that is $2995, but I would say that the 8400 is maybe for a taller frame, the Apex Ultra is for a shorter frame, but we will have that Apex Ultra in our showroom as well, at some point, and so I will, I’ll keep you posted about that.
[SCREEN TEXT: Ogawa Active Correction!]
Alan: Oh, last, two weeks ago when I talked about the new Ogawa chairs, I got the two mixed up, the Refresh and the Active, it’s the Active that is the one that has the greater feature set. It has rollers in the butt, and the – you know, so it has an extended roller track – but the chair can flatten out, completely horizontally, unlike the other massage chairs with L-tracks. So, we will have that in our showroom as well, when that one – when we are readily available for that, we just became a distributor for them this last week. We’ve got – I think we’ve got the Active up on the website, but we don’t have any of the features, or any of the specs, or anything up yet, so we’ll get – you can see the picture, for what it’s worth, but we will have the rest of that information up as we go. And of course, the Refresh is the lesser-priced model, which will be – which is a decent massage chair as well – we will not have that in the showroom, because it’s the Active that I’m really, most interested about, because of that unique feature of being able to have an extended roller track, and flatten out the chair to a horizontal position, which we’ve not been able to do previously. What else can we tell you about, still working on that big announcement I’ve told you about. Sometimes big announcements take time to get all the details worked out, and get everything figured out, but we’re working on that, and we will get back to you. And of course, you will be the first to know, my faithful viewers, and also, if you opt in to get my free report, and you can see that at the bottom of any page on my website, you can opt in for that, and you will be, get, – you’ll be put on our mailing list, and you will be notified, not only of upcoming sales, and whatnot – but you’ll be notified about, you know, news that we announce, or exciting things that are going on in our business, as well as you can watch the industry updates here, and this will be another forum for sharing updates, and information, and whatnot. So, anyway, stay tuned, stay, keep your ear to the tracks, and we’ll have, we’ll let you know about things that are going on.
[SCREEN TEXT: Memorial Day Sale]
Alan: If you’re interested to know if we’ve got any Memorial Day sales, wink, wink, nudge, nudge, you can call me at our toll-free number, can you see that number again, 888-259-5380. You can call me there, and I’ll gladly let you know what we’ve got cooking at the showroom. OK, I think that is about it, except for one article. I wrote an article this last week, and I have not been writing a lot of articles lately, I’ve been kind of slacking. We’re posting on Facebook, and Google Plus, and Twitter, and we are posting on the blog, but they’re mostly just health articles, and health reviews, and things. But I have not been writing a lot of original content lately, because of how busy things have been getting, and we’re just, we’re changing some things here at our business to – just to make things run more smoothly, and – anyway, but I did write an article last week, or earlier, yeah, last week, about this thing called ‘4D.’
[SCREEN TEXT: 4D Rollers????]
Alan: I thought I’d talk about this for a little bit, because I think it’s kind of funny. You may notice some chairs, I’ve noticed two particular models, and chairs, that mention this, but they say they have 4D rollers. Now, we’ve had 3D rollers, and 2D rollers, but now they say we’ve got 4D rollers, and the reason I have to laugh at this is because the 4D, they’re referring to the dimensions, in space. Now, on Earth, there’s really three primary dimensions, there’s the x-axis, the y-axis, and the z-axis. So, if you go on my article library, or my blog, you can see a picture of what the axes are, and all massage chairs do the x and y-axis motion, they go side to side, and up and down, that’s x and y. Well, the three dimension chairs – and you know about three dimension chairs, like the DreamWave, or the Panasonic MA70, or like the Osaki Dreamer, or now the iRobotics 7, and the Human Touch ZeroG 4.0 – these chairs all have 3D rollers, which means not only do the rollers go side to side, and up and down, they also can move forward, you can move the rollers forward to get a more intense, or less intense massage. Those are the three dimensions in space, there is no fourth dimension, at least not in the gross – in the gross, macro system of our planet, and so when massage chairs say ‘We’ve got 4D rollers,’ I’m thinking to myself, ‘Are you kidding me, is there some kind of funky, space-time warp, black hole that we missed, and you got to go through this hole to get the fourth dimension?’ – ah, no, it’s not. What it is, is it’s speed, the speed of the rollers can be affected, so if you’ve got rollers that are going up and down, and side to side, and you move them forward to increase the intensity, you can also increase the speed of those rollers to increase the intensity. So, that’s what they call the ‘fourth dimension,’ so don’t be fooled that some fourth dimension is some amazing, new feature that only a few chairs have. It’s a bunch of marketing hooey, and it’s just a way that they can kind of differentiate one’s chair from another. But in fact, it’s just the same as any other chair, and pretty much every chair has a speed adjustment on their rollers. Not every chair has three dimensions, but if you’re talking about a fourth dimension being speed only, well then, most chairs have that fourth dimension. Oh, that’s so crazy that we have a fourth dimension in space.
[SCREEN TEXT: Chromotherapy???]
Alan: Well, anyway, that’s just me, I’m just sounding off on something that kind of bugs me, and you know, and I mentioned this also, this thing called ‘chromotherapy,’ I have to laugh. Chromotherapy is a legitimate therapy, I mean, it’s used by practitioners around the world, and it’s a fairly – it’s not, there’s a lot to it, it’s more than just lights, there’s frequencies of lights, and degrees of lighting, and wavelengths – and I mean, there’s a whole bunch of things that go in to chromotherapy. It’s not just shining a red light on you, or a blue light on you, even though that may be nice, or not nice. Well, this chromotherapy in the massage chairs refers to these chairs that have lights on the sides of their chairs, or somewhere on their chairs, and if you turn the lights off in the room that you’re in, you’ll get this ambient blue, or red, or whatever light. I don’t know if it’s that therapeutic, to be honest. I haven’t had anybody come to me, and say ‘Oh my gosh, that red light, on the outside of my massage chair, is unbelievable, I’m so healthy now because of that red light.’ I’ve never heard anybody come back, and give me, you know, physiological improvement proof, from chromotherapy, but it is a marketing thing, so if a chair’s got chromotherapy, ‘chromo’ means light, ‘therapy,’ of course, means therapy. I don’t know how therapeutic it really is, I think it’s kind of a – I don’t know, I think it’s just, like another marketing thing – and that’s just my opinion, and forgive me if I’ve offended anybody. And if any of the massage chair manufacturers, or distributors, are listening to this video, or watching this video, please make a comment, and tell me the facts about it, and about the 4D, for that matter, as well. There may be a physicist at one of the massage chair companies that really has a grasp on the fourth dimension. But anyway, you know, that’s just my opinion, I’m just throwing out opinions now, but I think – don’t be taken by it, don’t think ‘Oh my gosh, I’ve got to have chromotherapy, and I’ve got to have a chair with 4D’ – well, you, you know, you probably do already, you probably are going to get a chair with 4D. If you get the 3D, you’ve got the 4D, because that speed, which they consider a dimension, is in any pretty much every chair anyway. So, but anyway, that’s enough of that, I’ll get off my soapbox, I just don’t want anybody to get ripped off, or think that they’re getting a lousy chair, because it doesn’t have 4D, or it doesn’t have chromotherapy. And that’s just – that’s, again, that’s just my opinion, that’s my feedback, and that’s my – and that’s that. So, anyway that’s it for this week. I hope you found something of worth here. If you have any questions, feel free to call me, again, on my number here, 888-259-5380. I’m always available to talk, and if you can’t get a message – if you can’t get through to me, leave a message, and I will call you back – as pretty much all my customers know. Or, feel free to email me, or if you have comments to make on the YouTube video, or on our blog, please feel free to share your feelings, or your questions, or thoughts, or your experiences. I have found many customers that know more about their chairs than I do, because they spend all day learning the chair, and they find the subtle nuances about their model, in their home, and they teach me about chairs. So, if there is something about a chair that you know about, that I have not talked about, or if something that I’ve – maybe you feel that I’ve said in error – please feel free to share it, I’d love to have the feedback, and have the forum to discuss these things. Well, I guess that’s it. I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com,’ I will see you again in two weeks. Bye bye.
Click on the following link to watch this Massage Chair Industry Update on our YouTube channel.
Transcript of Video Titled “Massage Chair Industry Update – May 19, 2015”
Alan: Hi, I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com’ and today is our biweekly massage chair industry update for today, May 19th, 2015, and we’ll get right in to it.
[SCREEN TEXT: Stock Status]
Alan: Last, well, let’s talk about stock, stock, for the most part, is pretty good. Again, the Titan 8400 is still back-ordered, it was supposed to come in yesterday, I haven’t heard if it has or not, but we are expecting that chair in. The Inada DreamWave has been back-ordered in the ‘Black’ leather, but I believe they are also in stock now.
[SCREEN TEXT: Luraco iRobotics 7 Update]
Alan: The iRobotics 7, this is that chair that I talked about a couple months ago when I visited Luraco, in Texas, and it was supposed to come out three or four weeks after that date. Well, it still hasn’t come out, but I got notification that it should be out at the end of this month, and the reason it’s – the delay is not because the chair is not working, it’s because the software is still being worked on – and I’m sure that the boys, Manthan, and the rest of the engineers over there, are working hard, and making sure that everything works perfectly before it’s released to the public. So, we hope to have that chair by the end of May, which is another couple of weeks, and when we do, we’ll get it in our showroom, and we will keep you posted as to what it’s like, do a review, I’m quite excited to see this chair. I’ve kind of forgotten about it because it’s been two months, I forgot kind of what it was like to sit in it, but it’s a nice chair. I do remember it being a high quality chair, with Taiwanese-imported parts, assembled in America, with American components as well, and quality controlled and tested here in America. So, the quality control of this chair is fabulous, the product features are very, very nice. If you remember, I talked about the touchscreen, kind of like a smartphone, it has the same technology as a smartphone. And that sounds wonderful, and very progressive, because a lot of the remote controls, if not all of the remote controls of most of these massage chairs, are a little bit more archaic, more button pushing, as opposed to touchscreen, which seems to be rage right now with phones, and TV remotes, and whatnot. So, anyway, just a little, that’s a little FYI on the iRobotics 7.
[SCREEN TEXT: Osaki Intelligent & Osaki Marquis Discontinued]
Alan: I will also mention that the Intelligent, the Osaki Intelligent, and the Osaki Marquis, are both being discontinued by Osaki. You can find that chair for quite a bit less than what we have it on our website, and if you do find it, and you want me to do a price match, let me know, I’ll gladly do that for you. But that chair, those chairs are – I think the Marquis is $3795, somewhere in that price point, the Intelligent, $40, something, 95, so they’re pretty – they were quite expensive chairs. But they’ve discontinued them, and so they’re going to sell out the existing inventory, which will bring – which now is bringing the price down to, in the like – $2000 price point, so let me know if you’re interested in those chairs.
[SCREEN TEXT: Apex Ultra Now in Brown!]
Alan: Let’s see what else we can talk about, oh, the Apex Ultra. It looks like this Apex Ultra is going to stick around, and it’s here to stay, but now they have a ‘Brown’ Apex Ultra, not just the ‘Black’ and the ‘Grey.’ They’ve added a ‘Brown,’ and we’ve got a picture of it up on the website, so you can see the ‘Brown.’ One thing I noticed when I was at Osaki, visiting them a couple of months ago, when they had their Ultra out on display, it was a grey, but it looked blue to me, a light blue. And so the warning is, unless they’ve changed the color on the next shipment, if you want the ‘Grey,’ just be prepared for more of a light, baby bluish, kind of a hue to it, which kind of surprised me, but it’s a grey, it’s just maybe not a traditional grey that you might expect. Anyway, the Apex Ultra is going to be around for a while. I thought that it was just going to be a temporary thing, because of the price drop, and whatnot, but it’s going to be around, and it’ll be at $2995, which is a very, very good price. And it’s got an L-track, as you know, and the L-track is an extension of the S-track, under the butt and behind the thighs, and the Ultra has calf rollers, it’s got zero gravity, it’s got the foot rollers, it’s got airbags, all kinds of airbags, it’s a very nice chair for $2995. The Titan 8400 is another chair that Osaki has out, another model, that is $2995, but I would say that the 8400 is maybe for a taller frame, the Apex Ultra is for a shorter frame, but we will have that Apex Ultra in our showroom as well, at some point, and so I will, I’ll keep you posted about that.
[SCREEN TEXT: Ogawa Active Correction!]
Alan: Oh, last, two weeks ago when I talked about the new Ogawa chairs, I got the two mixed up, the Refresh and the Active, it’s the Active that is the one that has the greater feature set. It has rollers in the butt, and the – you know, so it has an extended roller track – but the chair can flatten out, completely horizontally, unlike the other massage chairs with L-tracks. So, we will have that in our showroom as well, when that one – when we are readily available for that, we just became a distributor for them this last week. We’ve got – I think we’ve got the Active up on the website, but we don’t have any of the features, or any of the specs, or anything up yet, so we’ll get – you can see the picture, for what it’s worth, but we will have the rest of that information up as we go. And of course, the Refresh is the lesser-priced model, which will be – which is a decent massage chair as well – we will not have that in the showroom, because it’s the Active that I’m really, most interested about, because of that unique feature of being able to have an extended roller track, and flatten out the chair to a horizontal position, which we’ve not been able to do previously. What else can we tell you about, still working on that big announcement I’ve told you about. Sometimes big announcements take time to get all the details worked out, and get everything figured out, but we’re working on that, and we will get back to you. And of course, you will be the first to know, my faithful viewers, and also, if you opt in to get my free report, and you can see that at the bottom of any page on my website, you can opt in for that, and you will be, get, – you’ll be put on our mailing list, and you will be notified, not only of upcoming sales, and whatnot – but you’ll be notified about, you know, news that we announce, or exciting things that are going on in our business, as well as you can watch the industry updates here, and this will be another forum for sharing updates, and information, and whatnot. So, anyway, stay tuned, stay, keep your ear to the tracks, and we’ll have, we’ll let you know about things that are going on.
[SCREEN TEXT: Memorial Day Sale]
Alan: If you’re interested to know if we’ve got any Memorial Day sales, wink, wink, nudge, nudge, you can call me at our toll-free number, can you see that number again, 888-259-5380. You can call me there, and I’ll gladly let you know what we’ve got cooking at the showroom. OK, I think that is about it, except for one article. I wrote an article this last week, and I have not been writing a lot of articles lately, I’ve been kind of slacking. We’re posting on Facebook, and Google Plus, and Twitter, and we are posting on the blog, but they’re mostly just health articles, and health reviews, and things. But I have not been writing a lot of original content lately, because of how busy things have been getting, and we’re just, we’re changing some things here at our business to – just to make things run more smoothly, and – anyway, but I did write an article last week, or earlier, yeah, last week, about this thing called ‘4D.’
[SCREEN TEXT: 4D Rollers????]
Alan: I thought I’d talk about this for a little bit, because I think it’s kind of funny. You may notice some chairs, I’ve noticed two particular models, and chairs, that mention this, but they say they have 4D rollers. Now, we’ve had 3D rollers, and 2D rollers, but now they say we’ve got 4D rollers, and the reason I have to laugh at this is because the 4D, they’re referring to the dimensions, in space. Now, on Earth, there’s really three primary dimensions, there’s the x-axis, the y-axis, and the z-axis. So, if you go on my article library, or my blog, you can see a picture of what the axes are, and all massage chairs do the x and y-axis motion, they go side to side, and up and down, that’s x and y. Well, the three dimension chairs – and you know about three dimension chairs, like the DreamWave, or the Panasonic MA70, or like the Osaki Dreamer, or now the iRobotics 7, and the Human Touch ZeroG 4.0 – these chairs all have 3D rollers, which means not only do the rollers go side to side, and up and down, they also can move forward, you can move the rollers forward to get a more intense, or less intense massage. Those are the three dimensions in space, there is no fourth dimension, at least not in the gross – in the gross, macro system of our planet, and so when massage chairs say ‘We’ve got 4D rollers,’ I’m thinking to myself, ‘Are you kidding me, is there some kind of funky, space-time warp, black hole that we missed, and you got to go through this hole to get the fourth dimension?’ – ah, no, it’s not. What it is, is it’s speed, the speed of the rollers can be affected, so if you’ve got rollers that are going up and down, and side to side, and you move them forward to increase the intensity, you can also increase the speed of those rollers to increase the intensity. So, that’s what they call the ‘fourth dimension,’ so don’t be fooled that some fourth dimension is some amazing, new feature that only a few chairs have. It’s a bunch of marketing hooey, and it’s just a way that they can kind of differentiate one’s chair from another. But in fact, it’s just the same as any other chair, and pretty much every chair has a speed adjustment on their rollers. Not every chair has three dimensions, but if you’re talking about a fourth dimension being speed only, well then, most chairs have that fourth dimension. Oh, that’s so crazy that we have a fourth dimension in space.
[SCREEN TEXT: Chromotherapy???]
Alan: Well, anyway, that’s just me, I’m just sounding off on something that kind of bugs me, and you know, and I mentioned this also, this thing called ‘chromotherapy,’ I have to laugh. Chromotherapy is a legitimate therapy, I mean, it’s used by practitioners around the world, and it’s a fairly – it’s not, there’s a lot to it, it’s more than just lights, there’s frequencies of lights, and degrees of lighting, and wavelengths – and I mean, there’s a whole bunch of things that go in to chromotherapy. It’s not just shining a red light on you, or a blue light on you, even though that may be nice, or not nice. Well, this chromotherapy in the massage chairs refers to these chairs that have lights on the sides of their chairs, or somewhere on their chairs, and if you turn the lights off in the room that you’re in, you’ll get this ambient blue, or red, or whatever light. I don’t know if it’s that therapeutic, to be honest. I haven’t had anybody come to me, and say ‘Oh my gosh, that red light, on the outside of my massage chair, is unbelievable, I’m so healthy now because of that red light.’ I’ve never heard anybody come back, and give me, you know, physiological improvement proof, from chromotherapy, but it is a marketing thing, so if a chair’s got chromotherapy, ‘chromo’ means light, ‘therapy,’ of course, means therapy. I don’t know how therapeutic it really is, I think it’s kind of a – I don’t know, I think it’s just, like another marketing thing – and that’s just my opinion, and forgive me if I’ve offended anybody. And if any of the massage chair manufacturers, or distributors, are listening to this video, or watching this video, please make a comment, and tell me the facts about it, and about the 4D, for that matter, as well. There may be a physicist at one of the massage chair companies that really has a grasp on the fourth dimension. But anyway, you know, that’s just my opinion, I’m just throwing out opinions now, but I think – don’t be taken by it, don’t think ‘Oh my gosh, I’ve got to have chromotherapy, and I’ve got to have a chair with 4D’ – well, you, you know, you probably do already, you probably are going to get a chair with 4D. If you get the 3D, you’ve got the 4D, because that speed, which they consider a dimension, is in any pretty much every chair anyway. So, but anyway, that’s enough of that, I’ll get off my soapbox, I just don’t want anybody to get ripped off, or think that they’re getting a lousy chair, because it doesn’t have 4D, or it doesn’t have chromotherapy. And that’s just – that’s, again, that’s just my opinion, that’s my feedback, and that’s my – and that’s that. So, anyway that’s it for this week. I hope you found something of worth here. If you have any questions, feel free to call me, again, on my number here, 888-259-5380. I’m always available to talk, and if you can’t get a message – if you can’t get through to me, leave a message, and I will call you back – as pretty much all my customers know. Or, feel free to email me, or if you have comments to make on the YouTube video, or on our blog, please feel free to share your feelings, or your questions, or thoughts, or your experiences. I have found many customers that know more about their chairs than I do, because they spend all day learning the chair, and they find the subtle nuances about their model, in their home, and they teach me about chairs. So, if there is something about a chair that you know about, that I have not talked about, or if something that I’ve – maybe you feel that I’ve said in error – please feel free to share it, I’d love to have the feedback, and have the forum to discuss these things. Well, I guess that’s it. I’m Dr. Alan Weidner from ‘Massage-Chair-Relief.com,’ I will see you again in two weeks. Bye bye.
Click on the following link to watch this Massage Chair Industry Update on our YouTube channel.