The Real Reason

Thermawood Costs More

If you have looked at thermally modified wood, you probably noticed one thing pretty quick.

It costs more.

At first glance, it can look like you are just paying more for the same wood. White Oak is still White Oak. Antique Heart Pine is still Heart Pine.

But Thermawood is not just regular flooring with a different name on it.

The difference is what happens to the wood after it is milled.

First, You Have to Compare It to the Right Flooring

A lot of people compare Thermawood to a basic 4" or 5" hardwood floor, or a cheaper engineered floor.

That is not really an apples-to-apples comparison.

A lot of our Thermawood starts with wide-plank, long-length, better-grade solid wood. When you are talking about 8", 9", or 10" White Oak in long lengths, that wood is already expensive before the thermal process ever starts.

You need better logs to get those wide, clean boards. There is more waste. You cannot just take any board and turn it into a nice wide-plank floor.

The wider and longer the flooring gets, the more selective the material has to be.

And here is something most people do not realize: when you compare Thermawood to retail pricing on 8" or 9" plain-sawn White Oak in long lengths, they are often already in a similar price range.

When I say Thermawood may only be a few dollars more than traditional wide-plank White Oak, I am talking about what we pay at the mill level, not retail.

By the time regular wide-plank White Oak goes through distribution and gets sold to a homeowner, it can be priced right around what Thermawood sells for.

So the better question is not always, “Why is Thermawood so much more?”

Sometimes it is, “I am already spending this kind of money on wide-plank White Oak. What am I getting for it?”

Thermawood Is Not Just Kiln-Dried Wood

Traditional hardwood is cut, dried, graded, milled into flooring, and sold.

Thermawood goes through another whole process after that.

The wood is heated to roughly 380–430 degrees in specially made thermal kilns, then slowly cooled back down with steam. This is not done just to dry the wood out. It is done to permanently change the wood itself.

We are not talking about heating a few boards in a shop.

You are talking about heating roughly 10,000–15,000 square feet of flooring at a time to those temperatures, then bringing it back down slowly so the flooring is still usable.

The full process typically takes around four days.

That takes specialized kilns. It takes time. It takes labor. And it takes a lot of energy.

There Is Less Sellable Wood Coming Out Than Going In

The process also creates loss.

The wood loses weight while it is being thermally modified. Some boards will move, crack, or simply not make grade after being pushed through that kind of heat.

So the mill does not get to sell every board that went into the process.

There is more waste. More sorting. More grading. More handling.

And thermally modified flooring is not being run in the same massive volume as regular flooring. A mill can turn out huge amounts of conventional hardwood. Thermawood runs are smaller, slower, and take more work from start to finish.

That is part of the price too.

But What Are You Actually Getting for the Extra Money?

This is the part that matters.

You are not paying for a fancy name, a coating, or a waterproof layer added to the top.

You are paying for real solid wood that has been changed all the way through.

The heat-and-steam process removes much of the organic material in the wood that normally attracts and releases moisture. That makes the flooring much more stable than regular hardwood.

Regular wood naturally moves as humidity changes. It expands, contracts, cups, gaps, and can become a problem when it is put in the wrong place.

Thermawood still looks and feels like real wood because it is real wood. It just does not react the same way regular hardwood does.

That gives you more freedom to use real solid wood in places where normal wide-plank hardwood usually makes people nervous:

• Concrete slabs
• Radiant heat
• Bathrooms
• Shower walls and floors
• Basements
• Coastal homes
• Large open floor plans
• Decking and siding, depending on the species

It also resists rot better than regular wood, which is a big part of why it works so well in tougher environments.

No Chemicals. No Plastic. No Fake Wood

There are no chemical preservatives added to Thermawood.

No pressure treatment.

No plastic core hidden under a thin wood veneer.

It is still real solid hardwood.

The difference is that the wood itself has been changed using heat and steam.

That is why it can do things regular hardwood usually cannot.

Is Thermawood Worth It?

Not for every project.

If you have a normal dry house, a regular wood subfloor, and you just want a good traditional hardwood floor at the lowest price possible, then Thermawood may not be what you need.

There is nothing wrong with a good traditional solid or engineered floor when that is the right fit. That is one reason we also offer regular hardwood through WeeBee Wood.

But when you want wide-plank real wood in a place where normal hardwood may cup, gap, move, or become a problem later, Thermawood starts making a lot more sense.

You are not just buying flooring.

You are buying a process that gives real solid wood fewer limits.

And for the right project, paying a little more once can be a whole lot cheaper than installing the wrong floor, tearing it out later, and doing it all over again.