A year since the COVID saga began, most of us are by now sure which end of the risk spectrum we fall. Either you're super careful about where you go & who you meet, or you're happy to get spa treatments & attend indoor parties every week. Whatever your personal choice, we at Barressential have endeavoured to create a haven of safety in Colombo for our clients.
We know temperature checks aren't enough.
We've followed the science since the start of the pandemic and having informed ourselves, we've used our social media to communicate the science in as easily digestible a manner to the public. Using the knowledge we've gained, we set up processes to mitigate the risk of exposure within our workout space. Asymptomatic patients that spread the disease has been a cornerstone problem for this pandemic. By the time someone reaches our front door with a fever, it may already be too late. Instead of relying on just a temperature gun, we use a pre-screening questionnaire for each client before each class. Questions include whether anyone they've met has experienced a cough, fever (and the likes) in the last 48 hours, their vaccine status and whether they've recently travelled to hotspot locations.
This data helps us be at least one step ahead and prevent any exposures within our studio space.
2. We've invested in state of the art industrial level sanitisation equipment.
We don't clean our equipment once between clients; we clean them thrice. Whilst we've always had our clients wipe down their equipment after use, we now ask them to wipe it down beforehand as well (for peace of mind).
We use electrostatic sprayer technology and industrial-grade sanitiser on all equipment, floors, cubbies, and high touch surfaces between classes. This technology ensures that every part of the studio is wrapped with disinfectant - preventing any pathogens from hiding in nooks or crannies!
3. Ventilation is the name of the game.
The primary way COVID19 spreads is through small particles that hover in the air for even 20 minutes after an infected person leaves the space. This airborne transmission is the main reason why the WHO asks people to refrain from meeting indoors. To that end, we no longer conduct our classes in AC closed-door rooms. We keep the doors open, and we've installed fans into our studio rooms to keep the air flowing. We use extractor fans to pull air from the rooms to the reception space, where there's ample fresh air circulation.
We keep at least a 30-minute break between classes so fans can run in all the rooms and no-one enters an exercise studio without it having been adequately ventilated from the previous class.
4. We still operate at 30% capacity.
In a year where small businesses found themselves caught between a rock and a hard place, we pride ourselves in not ever valuing profits over safety. Though the government allowed gyms to operate at 30% below capacity, we've operated at 70% below capacity since re-opening in June 2020. We reduced our in-studio Barre/Pilates classes to a maximum of 5 people from pre-Covid 14 people and our Reformer classes to 5 persons from 7 in 2019. Reduced class capacity means we have more than six feet distance between each client during a class.
5. Mask up
With community spread a reality and the Sri Lankan vaccination program still not reaching the required 70-80% coverage, we fully believe in masking. If you workout, you're going to exhale heavily. Having unmasked people breathing each others air (even in our ventilated rooms) is not safe. Following global best practice guidelines, we have mandatory masking or face shield policy in our classes. Our clients play an integral part in keeping their fellow gym-goers safe: selflessness is a hallmark of this pandemic.
Whilst we hope that with vaccines, the end of this pandemic is in sight - we also know that whilst most of our population is unvaccinated, prevention of spread remains the most important thing any of us can do. A spreading virus can mutate, and a mutated virus can evade the vaccines, rendering them ineffective and placing us back at square one.
Staying strong and healthy is essential when we are up against an insane virus, so working out should be an integral part of your weekly activities. At Barressential, you can leave the worry outside and enjoy your Barre, Pilates or Yoga class, knowing that our team is working extra hard to keep you safe.
Keen to get started? We have new client offers available at LKR 3,000 for two weeks of unlimited Barre & Mat Pilates (click here to purchase) AND LKR 6,000 for two weeks of unlimited Reformer Pilates (click here to purchase).
Check out our schedule here