What is your plan for evacuation in your float center if there’s a fire? What if there’s a tornado? Earthquake? Blackout? These are important things to figure out when operating your small business. If you have staff, it’s a good idea to review your emergency policies regularly. Make sure that your practices are in place in writing and you review them personally.

Graham and Ashkahn share their thoughts on how best to handle these things in a float center while making sure to consider specific issues not present in other industries. 

Ashkahn and Graham talk about Ozone in this episode. Everything from different types of ozonators to the efficacy of it as a water treatment system compared to other systems. 

Ozone is very effective, but there are concerns about its use that aren’t present in other types of water treatment, and fortunately the guys give us a lot of information on what to consider when putting together our own systems.

Graham and Ashkahn delve into the wild world of credit card processing. There’s a massive industry of businesses that exist between when your customer swipes their credit card and when it goes into your bank account. The industry seems to be designed to be confusing and some companies only perform certain tasks, making it very difficult to compare services. 

The guys give their advice on how to handle finding the right credit card processor for float centers and what to look out for when you’re on the hunt.

There are tons of anecdotal stories about pregnant people having great experiences with floating, but what are some of the things you should consider if you’re going to encourage floating while pregnant.

Graham and Ashkahn share what they’ve heard about it and how to frame the conversation with an expecting parent while still covering your bases from a liability standpoint. 

A lot of small businesses have a romanticized idea of what “shares” in a business actually mean. Float On did, once upon a time. What does it mean to give shares of your company to someone? Is it a good way to reward a valuable and dedicated employee? Are there other, more appropriate rewards that you can offer instead? 

Graham and Ashkahn review this question in detail, sharing many questions that any float center owner should consider before offering an employee ownership of your company.

Do you need a business plan if you’re not building a business from the ground up?

Graham and Ashkahn chime in and give a solid “maybe” as a response. It depends on a lot of factors, for sure. Do you already have financing? Are you maintaining the existing business model or revamping it? 

What’s the best way to clean the inside of a float tank? And what sort of product should you use? 

It turns out that this deceptively simple line of questioning has a major explanation involved. Ashkahn and Graham share what they’ve learned at the World Aquatic Health Conference about surface disinfectant and the best way to protect your float rooms. 

Most float centers run a tight schedule with narrow margins for the transitions between floats. Oftentimes relying on their customers to take reasonably timed showers to fit that schedule. If a single customer takes a shower that’s a bit too long, it can throw of the schedule for the rest of the day!

What if showers were in a separate room? Then customers could shower as long as they want! Ashkahn and Graham explain why this is an extremely bad idea. 

Float centers, more so than some other brick and mortar businesses, tend to be desperate for maximizing the efficiency of their space. And float rooms would have so much extra space if they didn’t have to deal with a door swinging in and out all the time. Why don’t float centers do it this way instead?

Well… Graham and Ashkahn explain exactly why centers don’t do this already, along with the vast majority of other buildings being made currently. It’s likely a code violation and even if it weren’t, it’d probably be unnecessarily hazardous to travel through your center that way.