SteamSpa
Thermasol
Amerec
Steammist
Probably the most confusing factor when cross comparing brands of equipment is when a company promotes and talks about it’s product in a way that makes it’s features sound completely unique and exclusive. What you have to pay close attention to is the difference between a company that has trademarked a term that describes one of their features and uniquely brands it to the company vs. a company that has invested a lot of money in engineering a feature that is truly innovate and functional and PATENTED. Remember that if a feature talked about was really that unique and different than the competition in what it can do then there would be a patent behind it. Some brands do have things patented and most do not.
This brings us to the conclusion that many generator brands are quite similar. Ultimately one very simple buying strategy could be to just try to get a brand that has all the amenities and features desired for the lowest cost. Generally we see this on the newer companies in the industry as in their R&D phase of designing their equipment they looked at what was the best functional features that other companies were offering and rolled them into their equipment.
Perfect example would be while Thermasol has been around longer than SteamSpa and for a while had an exclusive on specific amenities and features, SteamSpa came along and offered the same ones but decided to charge a lower price. The lower price wasn’t charged due to a cheap product it was just that Thermasol knew they could charge a lot more for something exclusive to the industry.
Similar situation with Amerec’s Warm Start function which allows for instant steam to come out within 60 seconds instead of traditionally having to wait for 20 minutes or longer like some other older generation brands on the market. While Amerec also is much older than SteamSpa and a few other steam companies, SteamSpa decided to offer their QuickStart steam function which essentially will do the same thing. However the big difference is that you don’t need to purchase a whole separate control panel and pay extra for the feature like Amerec is requiring one to do versus what you just get included automatically in the SteamSpa.
In other words I am trying to point out the obvious here that it’s not always a good thing in health equipment industries to be the big dinosaur on the block. A lot of times I see the same thing that the old guys just can’t keep up or in some cases have no interest in continuing to stay relevant and competitive.
I see very often a common mistake here in multiple product categories just as much in the Steam Generator one that sometimes people just assume because a company has a big brand name recognition it always means that the products and service produced will be the best quality. Mr. Steam is a classic example of a company that has probably one of the biggest name recognitions and yet does not rank even in the top four generator brands when it comes to home residential users. A lot of people don’t know they shifted and focused their business many years ago more to catering to have a strong presence in the commercial facility sector. When it comes to commercial applications (Gyms, Spas, etc.) they are for in the top three.
I always advise the people I consult with here through my site as well as offline that when dealing with any equipment in any product category we must try to analyze the market of brands from an apples to apples comparison. So for example we could easily look at 5 generator brands and write down all the features and or unique aspects they offer keeping in mind though that many companies try to create the illusion of differences using trademarked marketing language. When line all the aspects of the various brands and equipment up this way then factor in pricing its very easy to see differences. This is by no means of course the end of research and isn’t enough to make a purchase decision. Personal preferences, needs, budget, factor into the equation. Also we still need to obtain more info on the company itself and component quality and as much customer feedback as possible (with the latter there is so little online which is one reason people come to me for help).