How we tan

The tanning process is simply our skin’s natural defence mechanism against UV light. The body essentially creates its own natural SPF through tanning.

Your natural skin colour is determined by skin pigment – melanin. How much melanin you have is determined by hereditary factors.    

When your skin is exposed to UV light (from the sun or a sunbed), cells deep in your skin call melanocytes initiate a process to produce melanin. This causes a browning effect as it rises to the skin’s surface, resulting in a tan. This is your body’s way of building up protection to UV light to help avoid burning.

Everyone will react differently to UV rays – darker skinned people produce more melanin meaning they tan quickly whereas some very fair skinned people cannot produce enough melanin to tan in UV light.

If the natural tanning process is rushed, you may get sunburnt. The best tanning results are developed gradually over a number of sessions. It’s important to know your skin type so you can understand how your skin tans. 

Nothing last forever and this holds true for your skin. Your skin sheds itself daily and every month your epidermis will completely regenerate. Your tan will fade as your skin gradually sheds and needs to be maintained with regular sessions.

0.3 Compliant

All of our sunbeds are 0.3W/m2 compliant. This basically means that our sunbeds deliver the same tanning effect as the mid-day Mediterranean summer sun.

By using a 0.3 compliant sunbed, your tan will be deeper and longer-lasting, the tanning process will be kinder to your skin and the risk of over-exposure or burning is effectively eliminated

UV Light

There are three components that make up UV light:

UVA – penetrates deeper into the skin and is responsible for most of the natural tanning process.

UVB – mainly affects the outer layers of the skin. Sunburn comes from overexposure to this part of the spectrum. The natural sun emits a higher amount of UVB compared to sunbeds, meaning your risk of burning on a sunbed is far lower than in the natural sun.

UVC – this is the strongest component of the spectrum and therefore the most dangerous. The earth’s atmosphere shields us from UVC; however a tiny amount does get through. Sunbeds do not give off any exposure of UVC.

A sunbed tube emits on average 0.8% UVB, the rest being UVA. There is no UVC emitted from a sunbed tube.