Bathhouse on Pace for $120M Revenue as Social Sauna Model Scales

Inside a converted 1930s soda factory on North 10th Street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, a line forms every Saturday morning. It's not for brunch. It's for a three-hour sauna session at Bathhouse, one of a growing number of urban sauna social clubs that are turning thermal bathing into a lifestyle category. For a deeper neighborhood lens on how operators are calibrating culture, ritual, and premium positioning, see our related Brooklyn field report on authenticity versus scale in urban sauna.

A New Category Emerges

The sauna social club model has proliferated in major cities over the past three years. Part traditional bathhouse, part wellness studio, part community gathering space, these aren't luxury spas. They're membership-driven, culture-forward venues designed around the ritual of heat and cold, with food, drink, and social programming layered on top.

The format varies, but the core elements are consistent: multiple sauna types (Finnish, infrared, sometimes steam), cold plunge pools or outdoor cold water immersion, rest areas designed for conversation, and a bar or cafe serving non-alcoholic beverages, broths, or light food.

We're not competing with day spas. We're competing with coffee shops and yoga studios. This is about how people spend their Saturday, not how they treat themselves on vacation.

The Business Model

Most operators use a hybrid membership-plus-drop-in model, with monthly memberships ranging from $150 to $300 and single sessions priced at $40-$75. The economics work well for operators: thermal facilities have high upfront capital costs but relatively low variable costs per session, and utilization rates tend to be strong once a community forms.

Bathhouse, which opened its original Williamsburg location in 2019 (in the former Brooklyn Bottling Company building) and expanded to an adjacent space in 2023, told CNBC in March 2026 that it sees roughly 1,000 customers per day across its two New York City locations and is on track for $120 million in run-rate revenue by year-end. Paris's new premium contrast club Sant Roch just validated a tighter version of the same model at much smaller footprint, clearing 85%-plus occupancy in month one by deliberately capping its sauna at roughly half its physical capacity.

Notable Venues: Bathhouse (New York), Sauna House (Asheville, Charlotte), Loyly (Helsinki), Vabali Spa (Berlin), Sense of Self (Melbourne). The category is growing on multiple continents.

The Talmadge Origin Story

Bathhouse's co-founder Travis Talmadge did not set out to build a wellness brand. He started his career in investment sales. In a feature published by Hamilton College, his alma mater, Talmadge recounted the moment that changed his trajectory: a friend invited him to a Russian bathhouse in New York City, where he did a sauna and cold plunge for the first time.

I walked out of there and felt a sauna high. I was walking on clouds. I slept great that night. I was hooked from that day forward.

Talmadge, a 2009 Hamilton graduate who majored in economics and photography/fine arts, went on to co-found Bathhouse with partner Jason Goodman. The original Williamsburg location opened in 2019 inside the former Brooklyn Bottling Company building, and an adjacent expansion followed in 2023. Two Hamilton classmates joined the company as it scaled: Jordan Hummel '09 leads real estate, and Henry Ciocca '09 serves as general counsel.

The personal story has become a piece of the commercial story. Bathhouse does not sell amenities first; it sells the feeling Talmadge describes, that first post-sauna high, and builds memberships around people who want to chase it. The company has signaled plans to add roughly eight more locations across seven additional states, with Los Angeles, Nashville, Philadelphia, and Chicago named as near-term targets. For a deeper look at how operators like Bathhouse are building at this pace, see our analysis on how modular saunas are changing the game for commercial builders.

Cultural Drivers

The trend draws from several cultural currents: the normalization of cold exposure through influencers and podcasters, the post-pandemic hunger for in-person community, the growing longevity and biohacking movements, and a generational shift toward experiences over material consumption.

As the category matures, expect more sophisticated programming, branded product lines, and expansion into secondary markets. Bathhouse is also hosting the 2026 Aufguss USA Nationals at its Brooklyn and Flatiron venues in May, which pulls the global competitive ritual circuit directly into the U.S. social sauna scene. The sauna social club may be one of the most promising new formats in urban wellness. For a look at how the model is scaling into mid-sized American cities, see our profile on Sauna House's franchise expansion. For the unit-economics breakdown behind performance sauna programs (labor ratios, utilization math, and the revenue-per-square-foot comparison against a traditional treatment room), see our analysis on the business of Aufguss.