The last time a Eurovision Song Contest entry was performed in Swedish was in 2012 with Finland-Swedish Pernilla Karlsson's "När jag blundar", competing for Finland.

In preparation for the 2025 competition, Melodifestivalen producer Karin Gunnarsson [sv] contacted KAJ in 2024 to see if they would participate; at the time, the trio had just released an album, which meant they had to write a new song to compete.

[9] The lyrics of "Bara bada bastu" are in the Vörå dialect, an Ostrobothnian variety of Finland Swedish, and also contains a few words in Finnish, including the expletive perkele.

[15][16] KAJ expressed a desire for Saijonmaa to be featured in their performance for the Melodifestivalen final, and she ultimately appeared in a pre-recorded segment alongside competition hosts Edvin Törnblom and Keyyo.

[3][16] Skowronski and Strandberg revealed that an early demo of "Bara bada bastu" contained a line about "dropping the soap", which was ultimately cut.