Estonian sauna companies started to see orders flying in shortly after the coronavirus pandemic was declared, as consumers focused increasingly on their wellbeing, industry executives said on Thursday.
The sauna makers turning lockdown into a success
The maker of high-end handcraft saunas Iglucraft said it sold in March-to-May around 50 saunas - as many as in the whole of 2019.
They're not the only ones.
Siim Nellis, chief executive of sauna stove maker Huum has seen sales roughly doubling from a year ago during the lockdown.
The sauna industry explains the growth on an increasing focus on wellbeing and free time people are spending in their homes, not because of the theory that heat kills the virus.
Estonia, which has so far recorded at least 66 deaths due to COVID-19 and around 1,840 infections, has started to ease the lockdown measures this month and opened last week with Lithuania and Latvia the first "travel bubble" within the European Union.