Soothe is an on-demand, in-home massage service that was founded by Merlin Kauffman  in 2013. The company has raised nearly $50 million in funding, and massage therapists are available in some of the largest cities in the US, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, and now Boston.
I was happy to learn that Soothe is available in Boston, and my wife and I decided to give it a try last night. I logged into Soothe, and I booked an hour-long appointment with a Soothe massage therapist. It was easy to book, and I received a confirmation text. Alexis came over to our home (a suburb of Boston) after the kids went to bed. She  arrived a few minutes early and sent me a text to ask if it was okay for her to come early (it was).
My wife and I thoroughly enjoyed the massage. We don’t regularly go out for a massage, so I don’t have much to compare it to, but it felt great and relaxing. It was super convenient to have Alexis come right to our house, especially at night after the kids went to sleep. She brought the table, sheets, oils, and even some relaxing music for us to listen to while she gave us our massages.
If you want to try out Soothe, here’s a coupon code to save $30 on your first massage: GAQCB. I will also get a $30 credit when you use it, so if 3 of you use the promo code, I will get a free massage – thanks in advance!!
Congratulations to Merlin for creating an awesome service. Â I will definately use Soothe again, especially with my Pan-Mass Challenge training on the horizon.
Awesome!
My wife and I need to try it as well.
I like the idea of getting a massage after we put our baby to bed!
I was curious if the therapist brought a table — I didn’t want a massage on my coffee table – but I’d probably take it either way!
Thanks for the code and info.
Aron
RE: the table – I WAS curious and you answered it in the post. 😀
I think this is more a review of Alexis, rather than Soothe.
We thought she was great, but Soothe facilitates the whole thing.
Without Soothe making it super easy to get a massage at home, I wouldn’t have set it up.
I go for my massage every 3 wks and it does wonders to your body and soul.
I join the massage club here.
Worth the money!!
Can someone give a breakdown of how 50 million would be spent on this concept? There are no products to buy or big warehouses for inventory so I was very curious why so much funding.
Reservation platform, customer service platform, customer service people, marketing to get clients and massage therapists. Insurance, sheets and massage tables perhaps, among other things.
Here are the funding rounds for Soothe. I didn’t realize that a startup that needs no inventory and no warehousing would need such a large infusion of capital.
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/soothe#/entity
Marketing is expensive. Look at how much Uber has raised.
BTW, I have no idea why they need that much funding, but I am sure there’s a reason for it.
Can the same person be requested or is next time a roll of the dice
Roll of the dice. For 100 bucks I should be able to at least request a woman and I can’t even do that.
As far as I know, I can request the same therapist if I want.
Yes you can but not for the “be there in 1 hour” service. You can schedule in the same therapist for a future appointment if they already massaged you. Unfortunately no way to choose a male or female unless they have massaged you previously. I wouldn’t spend 100 bucks unless I could make sure a woman would massage me. I’m not going to pay for some guy to rub me down. If I wanted that I would take a ride to South Beach and get it for free. LOL
I got to choose a woman for mine, so that isn’t correct.
Also, it would be impossible to guarantee that the person you choose would be available because I could choose her at the same time hypothetically.
In that case I’d like to request Anna Kournikova. What else is there to do with 50 million besides hire her. Don’t send Richard Simmons over.
Then they need to spend some of that 50 million fine tuning some things. It says in the FAQ section “we don’t offer the ability to browse therapists to select one for your massage. We offer on demand service and have no way to guarantee a certain therapist will be available” i read this as there is no way to pick a certain person or even gender for that matter.
Maybe that is true in some of their newer markets where they don’t have many massage therapists working for them. All I know is they gave me the choice, and I would not have used the service if I couldn’t choose.
So how exactly does something like that work in terms of what you wear when the therapist shows up:
1. Are you wearing only your underwear?
2. Are you wearing shorts on top of your underwear?
3. Are you naked and only wearing a towel?
I had my clothes on when she arrived and asked about the protocol. Alexis said that it varies and all depends on the preference of the person getting the massage.
It looks like a really great service and business idea for those who are seeking a mainstream service of this kind, especially if the people providing the service are well vetted as it says. I was not even aware something like this existed rather than the non-mainstream kind advertised in various places. That does seem like an insane amount of funding as some have suggested here, but I guess they have a reason. Years ago I used to see someone posting at NP as “Merlin” and I guess it may have been the same guy. And yes it does allow you to choose the gender, when you simply begin the booking process, so some may think the FAQ question about choosing the person indicates otherwise. One thought I had though was that these days with the “new normal” you could choose a woman, for instance, and wind up having a “trans” show up, and you may not want that. I suppose it would tend to be rare if it did occur, but I can see how some customers could be quite upset about that if it was something they found unacceptable. And without question for something like this such wishes should be respected and addressed. Well glad you posted this, Elliot, and hope you build up a lot of free credits. 🙂