Editor’s note: This article was first published in February 2012, as a news piece. The Paris nap bar’s prices (12 and 27 euros), services and plans to open more venues describe that moment.
As every Spaniard knows, the siesta is a free “product” in our country. In other words, it’s a service we can grant ourselves. We can nap on the sofa after lunch, in the car seat, and so on. In some countries our siesta wasn’t well regarded, because it was seen as something for lazy people. That idea is slowly changing, and the siesta is becoming a very profitable business outside Spain, where a few entrepreneurs are monetizing it.
The first to import the siesta business were the Argentinians: the first “siestorio” opened in Buenos Aires, a venue where customers pay to sleep for 15–30 minutes in a relaxed setting. What’s more, customers leave satisfied and ready to come back. Now Paris, the French capital, has opened its first venue devoted to the siesta, and with some added value. It’s called a “nap bar”.
France is one of the places in the world where napping is frowned upon, so the entrepreneurs behind this nap bar have to sell discretion. They’re located in a business shopping centre, so their main customers are employees and executives from companies working nearby.
They slip into the venue discreetly, because they don’t want anyone at their company to know they indulge in a practice considered taboo.
Among the extra services these entrepreneurs offer are manicures, pedicures, massages and anything else that can go with that moment of relaxation.
Customers are delighted with the service, and in fact they pay up to 12 euros for a basic service (just a 15-minute nap) and 27 euros for a fuller one (a 40-minute nap). You can also have a cup of tea there.
Executives tend to come back, because they feel they concentrate better and perform better at work after a nap, as if it were a kind of natural doping.
The nap bar has been so successful that its owners are already thinking about opening new venues outside Paris. Will we ever see this business in Spain?
Further reading
- Business ideas for 2012
- Business trends for 2012–2015
- 9 business ideas you can run from home or without premises
Featured image: Ju-lef98, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
