By Financial Taboo · Author: Xiao Tian
How long can shared massage chairs survive? This debate, which began in 2019, has never ceased.
At the height of the sharing economy concept, industry experts predicted huge market potential for shared massage chairs, claiming they would be the first to ignite the "stay-at-home economy" and break through as a leading sharing sector.
From cinemas and shopping malls to airports and high-speed rail stations, shared massage chairs appear wherever crowds gather. Yet, for some time, problems such as random seat occupation, hygiene issues, and poor maintenance have emerged, and the usage rate of shared massage chairs has kept declining.
As we all know, whether it's bike-sharing, power bank sharing, or any other product labeled with the "sharing" concept, it is essentially a "rental" business. Most shared massage chair platforms adopt custom procurement and then deploy them in the market — a "time-sharing rental" model, no different in essence.
Today, in an era where many sharing models have been disproven, this so-called "effortless profit" business seems to be approaching its end. But from a commercial perspective, beyond teaching a harsh lesson to overzealous capital, it has survived in another form.
What has died is the shared massage chair as a rental concept, not the massage chair itself. More and more post-90s consumers are bringing massage chairs into their homes.
In the hit drama "Nothing But Thirty," Zhong Xiaoqin buys a massage chair for her husband Chen Yu. Chen Yu's remark reflects the sentiment of many young people today: "I wish I could eat, sleep, and live in this chair."
The Unconvincing Story of Shared Massage Chairs
In 2016, known as the first year of the sharing economy, bike-sharing giants like ofo and Mobike ignited a wave of sharing concepts. In the first half of 2017, the crowded sharing track attracted massive capital. According to IT桔子, the sector raised a total of 10.433 billion yuan that year.
It was also during that year that shared massage chairs quietly emerged. Some industry insiders believed shared massage chairs were an underestimated category, claiming that massage was not only a consumption upgrade but also a genuine need in waiting scenarios.
Data shows that in 2017, 15 newly registered companies appeared — five times as many as in 2016. 2018 was the peak of capital inflow to the shared massage chair sector, with 29 newly registered companies, nearly double the figure of 2017.
Investor enthusiasm in the shared massage chair industry grew in tandem.
In 2017, the shared massage chair sector raised 240 million yuan; in 2018, it raised 260 million yuan. Brands such as "First-Class Cabin Internet," "Yunxiangyun," "Le Moba," "Qila," and "Shuangke" received backing from venture capital institutions, including well-known names like Zhenge, Meihua, and Jishi Capital.
Unfortunately, the sharing economy began to cool in the second half of 2017. Bike-sharing led a wave of bankruptcies that also hit shared cars, shared basketballs, and shared umbrellas. After excessive deployment, rent hikes, declining foot traffic in cinemas, and small manufacturer closures in 2018, the shared massage chair industry entered a period of consolidation.
Take the listed company Rongtai Health as an example: In March 2016, Rongtai spotted the sharing economy opportunity and created the brand "Modong Massage" through its subsidiary, enjoying some early dividends.
According to the company's financial reports, in 2017, Modong's experiential massage service revenue reached 233 million yuan, accounting for 12% of total revenue, with a net profit of 23.24 million yuan — indeed delivering positive results.
But the market quickly shifted from explosive growth to fierce competition, with new entrants like Le Moba and Shuangke springing up rapidly.
In 2017, Rongtai's gross margin was 42.04%. However, by 2018, while revenue rose to 366 million yuan, costs also surged to 280 million yuan, bringing the gross margin down to 23.38%, and it has continued to decline since then.
As the industry faced harsh headwinds, financing was naturally affected. By 2019, there were no significant financing rounds in the shared massage chair industry, and the concept was no longer a hot topic among investors.
After 2020, the capital environment became even tougher, and the shared massage chair field fell completely silent. Most companies' financing progress stalled at the Series A rounds from two or three years ago. The last public financing announcement in the industry was in April 2018, more than 37 months ago.
Times have changed. As the collective ebb of the once-revered sharing economy shows, much of the charm of shared massage chairs has faded.
Why Don't Shared Massage Chairs Make Money?
Why is it that despite being placed in busy malls, stations, and airports with huge foot traffic and a seemingly reasonable business model, they still fail to generate profit?
Batch after batch of entrepreneurs have failed and left, while batch after batch of newcomers, dreaming of quick riches, have jumped in. They all did a similar calculation: a single shared massage chair could generate monthly revenue of 600 to 1,000 yuan, and in premium locations, the payback period might be as short as three to five months. But upon dissecting the business logic, the reality is quite different.
On the supply side, shared massage chair operators typically adopt two models: direct operation and joint operation.
Direct operation means the brand pays rent to the venue for placement points and keeps all the revenue. Joint operation means the brand and the venue share costs and split income according to a certain percentage. For example, the venue may bear all costs while the brand provides operational services and takes a cut, or the venue simply provides space and takes a contractually agreed percentage of the massage chair revenue.
It is precisely these models that create a gap between theory and reality. Maintenance costs and utilization rates are the factors most easily overlooked.
Regarding maintenance: without regular inspections and upkeep, shared massage chairs typically show significant wear within just a few months. Replacing synthetic leather, switches, and electronic components — costing anywhere from a hundred to a thousand yuan — is not cheap, not to mention labor and shipping costs for off-site repairs.
Regarding utilization: like many other sharing economy products, shared massage chairs were a hype-driven concept. The actual rigid demand for using them in public spaces is highly elastic.
First, shared massage chairs are essentially chairs, not massage services. The venues where they are placed — places with strong needs for waiting and resting — primarily need seats. Turning ordinary chairs into massage chairs is not simply a matter of replacing existing seats, nor should it involve broadcasting mandatory consumption "noise."
Second, the consumer market lacks adequate education. For reserved Chinese people, paying 9.9 yuan for 10 minutes of full-body massage in a public setting — with the inevitable involuntary "ahhs" and "ohhs" — can feel like a socially awkward scene. This explains why many young people who might be willing to try prefer to stand rather than sit.
Finally, hygiene and safety concerns directly deter some users. Since massage chairs come into contact with skin and are often not thoroughly cleaned or disinfected, hygiene is a major issue. Moreover, this industry is dominated by small and medium-sized enterprises, leading to inconsistent product quality.
For businesses, shared massage chairs are an asset-heavy industry. In theory, they could seek profits by reducing marginal costs, but the problem is that the industry is highly fragmented, and no small giant with industry consolidation capabilities has truly emerged.
Thus, as massage chairs age and components wear out, large-scale offline deployment only amplifies losses. This explains why the idea that shared massage chairs can be profitable is largely a myth.
Post-90s Buyers: A Unique Segment in the Massage Chair Market
It is an undeniable fact that, for a long time, massage chairs have been kept out of ordinary Chinese households due to their bulk and high price.
Looking back at the development of shared massage chairs, the "sharing" craze coincidentally met the Chinese consumer's underlying need for massage and accelerated the rise of China's massage chair industry.
From a macro perspective, with per capita disposable income rising, the average household disposable income is expected to double from $6,000 in 2020 to $12,000 by 2030. In terms of price, the "luxury" tag of massage chairs is gradually fading.
At the same time, the Gen Z consumer group (post-90s and post-95s) is rapidly rising. Young people who enjoy better material conditions have a higher starting point for consumption and are a key force driving consumption upgrades.
Today's young people are turning "health preservation" into action. "Applying the most expensive face mask while staying up the latest night," they buy various vitamin supplements and fitness courses — living a paradox of hard work and anxious self-care.
The proliferation of shared massage chairs has, to some extent, served as a catalyst. Through extensive advertising, they have cultivated young people's habit of using massage chairs, bridged the gap from trial experience to purchase, and facilitated the transition from public to home use.
On the other hand, data from the seventh national census released on May 11 showed that, compared with 2010, the population aged 60 and above reached 18.7%, an increase of 5.44 percentage points. China is entering an "aging society" era.
Behind the aging society is an unprecedented societal emphasis on health. According to a report by iiMedia Research, more than 75% of China's population is in a sub-health state, distributed relatively evenly across all age groups.
Among them, nearly 150 million people in China suffer from cervical spine diseases. A survey by the Cervical and Lumbar Disease Prevention and Treatment Committee of the China International Exchange and Promotive Association for Medical and Health Care revealed that 82% of the country's elderly over 60 have cervical spine diseases, and the rate among those aged 50–60 is 71%. Residents' health needs have shifted from traditional, single medical treatment to disease prevention, health maintenance, and health promotion.
Whether driven by the post-90s "punk health" mindset, the aging population, or the needs of the sub-healthy group, these multiple factors point to a huge consumer market.
According to projections, maintaining an average annual growth rate of 10% over the next three years, the domestic massage chair market size will reach 40 billion yuan by 2025. Last year, China's massage chair market was estimated at 15.03 billion yuan, an 8.2% year-on-year increase. Compared with Japan's household penetration rate of 27%, China's figure is only 1%. It is foreseeable that home-use massage chairs, as common health products, are likely to become popular household appliances in the future.
Stepping away from the "sharing" playbook, or rather not confined by it, shared massage chairs provided consumers with a "consumption upgrade" experience and are an "outlier" in the sharing economy. When everyone sneered at the "sharing" economy, surprisingly, shared massage chairs might be the only category that genuinely advanced its underlying industry.
As one investor sighed, "We spent five years and burned through half a billion yuan to learn a profound lesson: 'Sharing' as a model might really not suit massage chairs. However, with consumption upgrading and the early arrival of an aging society, massage chairs have found their way into millions of homes."
In the short term, the shared massage chair business model has collapsed. But in the long run, the industry's potential has been unlocked. Whoever runs fastest will be the first to taste the sweet rewards. (First published on TMTpost APP)
