You’re either compensating for a night you’re not proud of, or you’re actually locked in. Either way you’ve dragged yourself to a sauna at 9:15am on a Saturday. Respect. The staff hands you a paper cup to write your name on. You look over at the person next to you who is juggling two cups in one hand, and a towel in the other. At least I’m not that guy, you think. You bring the cup into the sauna with you.
Breathe in, breathe out…
Four minutes later the water is warm, and you’re holding a flimsy and structureless cup.
Sound familiar?
It was my first time there, and we were trying Othership. I was in New York visiting Jack, and we’d gone to a 9:15am class on a Saturday. In Toronto I’m in the sauna every day. 10 minutes before work to set the tone for the day… dialled.
There is no better feeling than leaving a sauna. We experienced that the whole way home. Truthfully, I had stayed out a couple hours later than Jack did the night prior. But both of us looked at each other and genuinely said “this is the feeling that I want to remember.” It’s this feeling of micro-accomplishment, clarity, starting the day off right. We asked ourselves: how do we play a part in sharing this feeling, or making it more accessible.
Is it a coffee shop – or third space – next to a sauna-house? Is it a non-alcoholic beverage designed for post-sauna consumption?
Back at Jack’s, we talked about bathrobes, and about starting a sauna hat company. Then I asked: what if we just made a water bottle meant for the sauna? There’s no good way to drink there. The water gets warm, or the bottle gets too hot to touch.
I looked over at Jack who just started to grin. He had already been working around it. He’d been wrapping a silicone wrist band around his bottle for months and pinching it there just to hold it. Pretty lame. That’s the kind of thing you do when you’ve already accepted that the right product doesn’t exist. How Jack didn’t think of this idea before me still baffles me.
We spent about six hours in his room with pen, paper and claude. A few things were settled that afternoon: no plastic anywhere, and something that felt intentionally built – not an afterthought. Jack thought of a cork shell, because a steel bottle you grip in there gets far too hot. Low thermal conductivity, natural feeling, and nice to the touch. Did we just come up with successive great ideas? This flow-like feeling rivaled that which we felt leaving the sauna that morning.
A couple sketches later, various AI-renderings, we thought we were ready for shark tank.
Naturally, we were excited to share this idea with our buddies. One friend, Eli, laughed at our idea and said every bottle he owns is fine in the sauna. Needless to say we don’t talk to Eli anymore… but in all seriousness, he was right! This is exactly the problem that needs solving - everyone’s already accepted something that doesn’t actually work. Like Jack’s lame silicone band solution. We didn’t need to reinvent the wheel, we just needed to give the wheel better rubber – or in our case, give the bottle some cork.
Jack and I have been friends since second grade, and for the last three years we’ve called each other with ideas. Lots of, lets just say, “abstract” ideas, but this is the one we’re pursuing.
Welcome to Sawn. You already know the feeling. We’re just building what belongs there.