By TPN/Lusa ; A Portuguese company founded during the pandemic has begun to produce weighted blankets in Guimarães made up of grains of treated glass sand that “reduce stress” and help “fight muscle pain”.
Speaking to Lusa, Ricardo Parreira, one of the founders of Blanky, explained that the idea of exploring the market for weighted blankets, “visually similar to a duvet”, came after Pedro Caseiro, also the founder of the company had difficulty sleeping.
“Pedro worked in London (United Kingdom), had some back pain and difficulty falling asleep due to anxiety and stress ’.
In January, Ricardo Parreira and Pedro Caseiro started exploring the weighted blankets market, a product that is still relatively new to the market, as well as their development and manufacturing process and realised that “there was no unit in Europe with the knowledge and production capacity to develop this textile ”.
“We realised that there was nothing like this in Portugal or Spain and started to research more about the topic. In June, when we had most of the exhaustive research done, we started to develop the company. Fundamentally, we believe in our idea and it worked ”, he said.
After the consolidated research, the founders faced “extra challenges”, not only because they launched a new product in times of pandemic, but also because the textile industry “was not familiar with the product”.
According to Ricardo Parreira, weighted blankets are “visually very similar to duvets”, and in the case of Blanky they consist of 300-thread cotton and grains of sand from treated glass, a material that gives this textile additional weight.
“From the beginning, we wanted to produce in Portugal, but none of the factories we visited were familiar with either the product or with the production process. Right then, it was a challenge”, said Ricardo, adding that it was at the LEIPER factory, in Guimarães, that they found the answer they needed.
Despite some “challenges” in terms of production, the company from Guimarães “manages to produce six blankets per day, with a minimum of 120 units per month”.
The objective of the founders of Blanky is now to “optimise the production process” so that, “in the near future, the efficiency of the plant increases”.
