Brass Monkey has patented the technology and created the products in the UK.
When Dan Bosomworth returned from an annual Wim Hof excursion into impending COVID lockdown, the Yorkshireman converted a chest freezer in his garage into a silicon sealed, rudimentary ice bath as a "meditation and therapeutic tool" for daily practice.
Hailing from a marketing agency background, Bosomworth soon hit upon a “what do people want, give it to them” mentality in a then untapped, cold plunge market.
His company, Brass Monkey, was launched in 2021 and is now an ice bath leader in the UK consumer and commercial market with an anticipated turnover of £7m thanks to patented ice creation technology and hand-built products.
However, the self-funded start-up initially met with a frosty response. “Our biggest challenge was how to get expert advice," says Bosomworth.
“In 2020, going to a refrigeration engineer saying we wanted to build an ice bath and needed some help and advice on components and chilling, people hung up on us.
“But we came across a guy called Bob, who was in the middle of handing over his refrigeration business to his son. He said he would help us figure it out and helped build our first 500 cooling engines.”
Bosomworth launched Brass Monkey with his brother Dale before another brother, Dean, who was based in Speyside, Scotland suggested creating a cheaper price point using barrels. “He spent many months figuring out which surfboard resin would work best on a reconditioned whisky cask,” says Bosomworth. “It was then how to connect a water chiller.”
Dan Bosomworth, right, sold his advertising agency and launched Brass Monkey with his brother Dale, left.
Brass Monkey is a premium, software-led company, with their cold plunge barrels and home ice baths costing nearly £6,000 and £12,000 respectively. A third range in the commercial space is where Brass Monkey evisages 80% of future business lies.
“We never came at it with a drop shipping mentality which is now flooding the ice bath market,” says Bosomworth. “We wanted to make sure we were generating ice and we wanted premium materials.
“It plays to the spirit of the company, which was founded on the simple idea of when we are challenged we’re changed. It means we have to elevate our game repeatedly.”
The company, which employs around 50 staff, uses cloud based software, meaning that it can control every product on the market through Wi-Fi. “We can see performance and see when there are cooling or flow rate issues as well as foreseeing problems," says Bosomworth.
“If we want to sell into another market, we can’t assume things will go well and we have to assume problems, so let’s not make our lives difficult by travelling to deal with problems.”
The mission of the company, the founder says, is to liberate access to cold water.
“Who invented ice baths? he adds. "If you go back through time it was popularised en masse by the Greeks and Romans, who had frigidarium [cold room of a Roman-style bathhouse].”
And the cold water benefits? “If you look at the responses that we have physiologically on a hormonal level, there’s a 250% increase in dopamine and our biology is primed for it.”
Celebrities such as Shirley Ballas, pictured, and Joe Wicks are Brass Monkey advocates. ·colin matthews
Brass Monkey’s investors have also seen the benefits, with Bolton-based equity firm Pitalia Capital putting in a seven-figure investment and founder Anil Pitalia, a cold plunge advocate, even trying one of the firm’s ice baths on the workshop floor.
The capital has helped Brass Monkey move into a 10,00sq ft space near Wetherby, with production shipping £650,000 worth of ice baths in a good month.
Bosomworth admits that the start-up’s challenges have come “whenever we wandered from our values”, not least when they decided to buy chiller components from a third party.
“It was a six-figure commitment for a lower price point rather than making it in house,” he says. “Sensors failed and it was shoddy construction. We are still writing off the cost today.”
Their success has also seen a “painful response” from the market with replica copycats in the last few years. “It was a case of rather than fight with the masses, do we elevate and push on over a plastic product?”
The premium and luxury set-up of the company also means that Brass Monkey’s products are prohibitive for a lot of consumers. Thus, the company’s move into the commercial space has proved beneficial as gyms move into wellness options.
Ice bathing has exploded from a niche recovery hack to a $330m global industry.
Brass Monkey is rolling out a monthly rental proposition for independent gyms as a regular income generator, while it has inked deals with Canary Wharf’s Arc, a social contrast therapy club, David Lloyd Clubs and Village Health & Wellness Club, as well as Virgin Active in South Africa.
Nearly four years on from exiting his DIY cold plunger, Bosomworth is now part of an industry which is projected to reach $550m (£413m) by 2031.
“There was no evidence to say this was a good thing,” he smiles. “But we needed to be at the top end and the one people talked about. We wanted to become that brand, like Dyson is now with hoover. That was the instinctive goal.”
Behind the brand: Founder Dan Bosomworth on
Design and logos
I got out of the chest freezer one day and the name hit. If the url was free I would then buy it.
The name and logo are some of the things people labour on but it was one of the easiest things we did. I spoke to an Israeli designer and sent him a rough scribble and the logo was designed with the monkey calm under pressure and it was how to build resilience. That’s how it always felt for me in the ice and my job was to keep calm and harness the benefits from it.
The Brass Monkey logo.
I wanted a logo which summarised and told that story. It acts as a gaze point to keep your eyes open with the logo sitting at the end of the ice bath. The important part is the nervous system knowing what’s happening to it and this is deliberate and having no need to panic.
