[This is a sponsored article with OGAWA Malaysia.]
With 25 years under its belt, you’d be excused for thinking OGAWA Malaysia can rest on its laurels, carried by the strength of its branding. But that’s not the case for the team, who are now embarking on a gradual rollout to upgrade their physical stores across Malaysia.
Massage chairs have traditionally been a try-before-you-buy experience, and the new OGAWA concept stores have chairs and other products positioned strategically around, paired with the new rose gold and white aesthetics that now are the primary colour elements of the spaces.
OGAWA’s familiar green logo has also gotten a facelift to prepare for 2022, fading out the green for a chic white.
In terms of the offerings you’d see under the new concept’s banners, expect to find a range of the signature massage chairs, from massage sofas to their current flagship, the OGAWA Master Drive AI 2.0.
Besides the chairs, you can also browse the selection of their popular beauty and lifestyle devices on display.
PROMO: Ogawa is currently running a Christmas sale until December 31, 2021. Look out for discounts up to 50% (on selected products only) and 0% installment plans up to 68 months (applicable to selected products only).
Facelift and new concept aside, OGAWA’s true strength is that they have completely embraced end-to-end servicing. This means that everything from the research and development (R&D) of their products to delivery logistics, to post-purchase customer service, is handled in-house.
Doing it this way allows the OGAWA team to have full control over every step of the customer journey, and more importantly, the quality of the products and services is under their purview.
The most recent culmination of their internal R&D is the OGAWA Master Drive AI 2.0, which you’ll see prominently featured in all their new stores.
The star of the show
AI can be a rather overused industry buzzword when it comes to massage chairs; most of the options on the market above a certain range would definitely include “AI” as a feature. Instead, what a discerning shopper should look out for is how the AI is used to elevate the experience.
AI done right should provide a customised and highly customisable regime that suits any user who places themselves into its hands. The Master Drive AI 2.0 is OGAWA’s offering to this market, and it comes with a plethora of features.
We visited OGAWA’s new Concept Outlet @ Pavilion Bukit Jalil and tried it for ourselves. Our first impression is that this is a super solid, premium chair. It comes with 5,184 massage combinations, but don’t worry, you don’t have to personally navigate all of them.
Instead, you can make use of the in-built Health Tracker and Scanner™ which is supposed to detect and analyse your body’s individual needs in real-time and then recommend the most fitting massage program.
The AI will continue scanning your body throughout the first and subsequent massages, and tailor the programs to match your current state to find what suits you best at different times.
The chair gives you an encompassing full-body massage experience, from the sides and back of your head down to the soles of your feet. This is made possible by the massage S+L-track, air compression bags, thermo rollers that can heat up according to preference, and additional AI sensors to provide more accurate positioning and pressure.
Besides using the screen or the navigator console on the right armrest, you can also activate the chair using Voice Command Control, in English, Mandarin or Cantonese.
Another fun feature is its Face Recognition, which you can use to access your personal profile stored on the chair to go through your customised massage regime.
Besides the features highlighted before this, there are 2 standout programs on the chair which are the M.6 Deep Tissue Auto Program and the M.6 Sweet Dream Auto Program.
A joint research conducted by OGAWA and Universiti Malaya found that the former helped improve blood circulation by up to 81.32%, and the latter increased participants’ sleeping quality by up to 88.73%.
Running down a global track
OGAWA has received external recognition of their offerings, including winning the Most Promising Brand Putra Brand Awards, Reader’s Digest Trusted Brand – Gold Award, Sin Chew Business Excellence Awards, Malaysia Health & Wellness Brand Awards, and more.
The team is looking to continue to deliver their brand mission of bringing wellness to all globally, and they believe their new store concept is a key part of this goal.
As a Malaysian homegrown brand, they now have over 1,000 retail outlets and counters in more than 20 countries, and it seems that they are well on their way working towards their expansion to bring their products worldwide.
- You can find out more information about OGAWA on their Facebook page, Instagram or website. Read more about their Christmas promo here.
