100% Human-Written Articles by a Sauna Expert of 35+ Years
I’m Janni Jalo and this is my website. Home Is Where The Sauna Is is my passion project and a one-woman production.
It was in December 2023 when I realized that Americans and the rest of the English-speaking world are truly interested in saunas.
And not just the fake infrared kind but real saunas!
That was very exciting for me since I’ve been saunaing for over 35 years in Finnish style saunas, have built an outdoor sauna with my dad, and have an indoor sauna as well.
During the years, I’ve handled several sauna heaters and even given one a makeover I was really pleased with, using heat resistant spray paint.
Back in 2023 I didn’t yet know I’d soon be sharing my sauna knowledge publicly to everyone since I thought there was no need for more online content. As sauna dates back thousands of years, surely the Internet (and AI) had already been fed enough sauna stuff?
Boy was I wrong!
As I began googling sauna-related topics (which I hadn’t previously done because I personally didn’t have to as my sauna education started in the womb), I was genuinely shocked by and in disbelief of what I found.
These examples are just the tip of the iceberg:
🔶 “Infrared saunas are the healthiest saunas.” In reality, infrared heat rooms are the least studied “saunas” with the shortest track record, so there’s no evidence for a claim like this.
🔶 “Finnish sauna is a dry sauna where humidity is kept very low.” Argh, so many blatant lies in this claim! Finnish sauna is most known for plenty of incredible steam (löyly). Nothing dry or stale about that!
🔶 “Saunas are great for weight loss and burn tons of calories.” No, they’re not and they don’t; I’m personally very tired of these claims, but luckily I’m seeing a promising trend: many sources that previously said sauna burns up to 800 kcal in a few minutes (yeah, right) have since removed those claims.
🔶 “Saunaing kills your sperm and makes you infertile.” If this was true, Finnish people would’ve already died of extinction! It’s mostly sauna-naive men who have seen temporary sperm loss, so what does that teach us? Don’t be naive but learn how to sauna!
🔶 “Infrared sauna lowers your cholesterol.” No, it certainly doesn’t!
🔶 “Your outdoor barrel sauna doesn’t need a roof.” Seriously, even legitimate sauna shops sell many of their barrel saunas without a roof (!), which is baffling to me; I guess they somehow magically keep water and snow out (in reality, not gonna happen)
At some point, I had seen enough and had no choice but to start writing about saunas myself. I’m a language professional and writer by trade, so in many ways, this new career move suited me perfectly.
I’m also bilingual, with both English and Finnish at native level, so I have access to the best sauna information in the world (= Finnish materials) that I’m more than happy to share in English.
Briefly on the topic of English and human-written content: I was 14 years old when it struck me what I wanted to do in life: nothing lit me up like the English language did, so I knew that whatever the future had in store for me, English would be at the core of it.
The way English sparked joy and brought purpose to my life felt almost other-worldly. To this day, English feeds my soul in a way nothing else can.
In my 20s, that love of English embodied into a Master’s degree after five years of university studies. A few years later I became a Certified Content Marketer.
Because of all this, I write 100% of my articles myself instead of relying on others, let alone on AI that has been trained with the poorest quality sauna information that the Internet is full of, as proven by the sauna claims above!
“Americans Try to Sauna But Don’t Know How”
You might wonder WHY there’s so much incorrect sauna information circulating online.
It’s because there’s a huge gap between nations and groups of people that sauna a lot and those that have only recently started saunaing; the latter group is authentically fascinated by saunas, their relaxing effect, and other health benefits, but they simply don’t know how to sauna.
This was confirmed when I read what the President of the International Sauna Association (ISA), Risto Elomaa, had to say about sauna culture in America: people in the US “try to sauna but don’t know how” and usually in saunas that are built “badly or even worse.” Ouch!
Unfortunately, those claims are very true, but it’s mainly because of so many fake saunas on the market, such as infrared heat rooms and plastic booths with steam generators. Luckily there are good saunas too such as sauna tents.
Because of this huge gap in sauna knowledge, I want to debunk incorrect sauna information and show you how to get the most out of saunaing.
Just Sauna Articles or Other Home-Related Content too?
On Home Is Where The Sauna Is, my approach is “saunas first” since proper sauna information is considerably more lacking in the English-speaking world than other home-related content.
But since I’ve worked as a writer many times in the past too, there was a time when I used to write home-related articles that gained a lot of traction and that readers loved and I enjoyed writing.
An example of such an article is when I shared the events of one of the most exciting days of my life: a house I bought was brought to our property on a truck. The best part was when they placed the house on its foundation, carrying and moving it with a crane!
The crane kept beeping because the load was too heavy, weighing almost 26,500 pounds. I was so nervous the narrow lifting slings would snap, but fortunately all went well. Phew!
So, I’m open to writing about special home topics and meaningful DIY home projects, for instance, even if saunas always remain the main focus.
Sauna Products & Recommendations
It’s important to me that Home Is Where The Sauna Is always stays informative, fresh, and ad-free; I don’t like the idea of pushing products that few people actually need and that aren’t even related to my topics.
That said, I don’t always endorse sauna products either, but give my honest take, based on both my experiences and real information: sauna hats, for example, aren’t really a thing despite their recent popularity!
If I had flimsy values, I could be recommending ALL sauna products, including sauna hats and infrared “saunas,” but instead of trying to make the most money possible, I want to be known for my integrity.
That’s why I only recommend products that I either own myself, have used before, or would buy myself if I needed a replacement for a current sauna item.
Whenever there are such recommendations in my articles in the form of affiliate links, I always disclose that information in the same spot, right after the table of contents.
In the future, I wish to offer shipping for such sauna products that are sought-after but hard or impossible to find in the US and Canada.
If you made it this far, thank you for reading my story and welcome to this home and sauna haven I’ve taken as my mission to create!
