Blitzkrieg PT

1200 individually wrapped coils
13 Gauge Steel
3″ Visco
2″ Latex
4″ Really Soft Super Foam

If you saw these specs on a mattress, would you know if it was the right mattress for you? Probably not. You must lie down on the mattress for ten or fifteen minutes to begin to evaluate the support and comfort of any mattress. Always try a mattress on your back, then on your side and finally in your natural sleeping position. At each position, check your spinal alignment. Any bowing of the spine should be a red flag. On your side, if you feel any pain or pressure in your hips, it is too hard.

A brand new European luxury sedan pulls up and a very well dressed lady emerges with her son. She is dressed in designer fashions head-to-toe and is using a $200 phone. Her teenager is sporting an outfit along with name brand shoes that is easily $250+ at retail, even on sale. The mobile service for her phone and her son’s matching phone (and I would assume husband and other siblings) could easily be a couple of hundred. That 60″ HD TV they just bought probably cost them $2,000 and of course another couple of hundred a month for satellite and Internet services for their home.

Let’s assume that you are constantly hot, or even constantly cold in bed. Are there any solutions for you?

Actually, there is.

Sleep Inc.™ and Amerigon® have teamed up to produce the YuMe™ Bed – A Climate Controlled Bed. Currently available exclusively through Mattress Firm®, this bed allows you to control the temperature of each side of the mattress from 60°F – 109°F.

It is an 11″ preconditioned foam mattress topped with 1″ of ventilated visco elastic foam infused with coconut oil. The climate control unit actually blows air, set to your desired preference up through the mattress.

No topic gets me more fired up than the rumor that Tempur-Pedic® mattresses make you sleep hot. There are seemingly hundreds of sites dedicated to this topic and when it gets time to offer a solution, you guessed it, its a visco elastic knock off.

First off, I sleep on a Tempur-Pedic and have for almost 6 months now. I live in a very warm climate where triple digits are the norm throughout the Summer. I am also extremely hot natured. I would start perspiring with a brisk walk through the house. I am actually cooler on my Tempur-Pedic than I was on the innerspring mattress I had before. The reason you ask? It makes perfect sense.

Its that time again, the mother of all mattress sales – Labor Day. There are some stores that will do as much business the week of Labor Day as they do in a single month. Why? Its a combination of things. End of Summer, back to school, 3-day weekend and everybody and their dog will be advertising a mattress sale. This is a perfect storm for posting big numbers. Here is some advice for the coming weekend.

Shop Early – I will not rule out the possibility of some additional savings on the weekend, but more than likely any price reductions have already been made. The stores do get crowded and if you are serious about getting the RIGHT mattress for your body, get to the store when it is not crowded. Wouldn’t it be better to enjoy the long weekend at the lake instead of the store?

A few folks have written wondering how to know when its time to change your mattress. So here are a few things to consider.

1. Crater Lake – If there is a giant hole in your mattress or two valleys on either side of a ridge in the middle, it may be time to change. Innerspring mattresses are notorious for developing body impressions where you sleep. If it is still under warranty (1.5″ for most manufacturers/10 years) measure from the natural mattress surface into the deepest valley. If it is greater than 1.5″ and still under warranty, file a claim. This may get you a new mattress set for very minimal cost.

I was forwarded several links that purportedly were from unbiased sites that discuss complaints about Tempur-Pedic® mattresses. They wanted me to take a look and provide some feedback.

Before I start the process of debunking the so-called complaints, the first thing you should look for on any site that purports to reveal “the facts” is to figure out their point of view. If the answer to every “problem” just happens to be another competitive product, that should pretty well locate the creator of the site. In fact, if the site was created primarily to push people towards a competitor, you must realize that the “reviews” and “advice” may be tainted. Let’s move on.

Let’s Make A Deal

I have heard many versions of the following story.

A customer heads out to the nearest furniture discounter or liquidator. They see a $4,000 handmade mattress on sale for $800. It is a massively thick super pillowtop that feels great.

“What a deal!” – they think to themselves and pull out their credit card to purchase the mattress.

A year or two later, the mattress of their dreams becomes their reoccurring nightmare. They are tossing and turning and waking up with back pain every morning. Their beautiful super pillowtop now looks like Crater Lake. Since they bought at the local furniture liquidator/discounter, there is no warranty and no exchange. They are out $800 and can’t sleep. But they got a really good deal!

Independence Day Mattress Sale!

The birth of our country (4th of July) is another good reason to have a massive mattress sale. I did a quick review of various chains to see what was being offered.

Two chains are featuring $1000 off a name-brand mattress. No telling what type of quality it may be. Another is offering free delivery over $599 and free memory foam pillows with a purchase. Some offer 50% or 70% off, they don’t say off of what, so who knows if this is any real savings. Another large chain is advertising two name brand queen sets in the high $300s. My expectation is that these are the bare minimum in comfort and quality at those price points.

If you are tired of waking up with a sore back, or tossing and turning all night, now is your chance to change all that. Tempur-Pedic® is currently offering up to $200 off all flat sets. Their entire line is available at these lower prices at any authorized Tempur-Pedic dealer. They are also discontinuing the Classic and Deluxe models which will save you a few more dollars while they last.

Tempur-Pedic minimum pricing is set by the manufacturer and they rarely offer discounts like these. If you have ever considered getting one, now is the time to act.

Well that didn’t take long. Sealy greatly improved their line and now Simmons is releasing their new mattresses for 2011. In a similar fashion, I thought Simmons got lazy with their mattresses. You had two supports – hard and soft. There were no handles and no edge support until you were at the World Class level. As a salesperson, and even a customer, you got the feeling that they really didn’t care.

Whether it was a reaction to Sealy, or just a long overdue wake up call, Simmons is back with a vengeance. Foam encasemnt starting at the Beautyrest Classic level and even handles on several models. Why is this so important? If you have ever tried to move or reposition a Simmons mattress, those buggers are heavy.

If you have an antique bed, and I’m not talking about something grandma bought at Sears, but an old bed that was built back when hand craftsmanship reigned supreme, there is a chance that it may need a customized mattress size.

Long ago there was a size called Three Quarter Bed (3/4 mattress). It was wider than a twin, but not quite as wide as a full. I did not run into this often. But if someone mentioned antique or anything else along those lines, just to be safe, I would ask them to confirm the size.

Its that time again – Here come the mattress freebies!

Free Gift Card!
Free Stuffed Animal!
Free Sheets!
Free Memory Foam Pillow!
Free Box Springs!

For regular readers of this blog, you know my position – Don’t fall for the hype. There is nothing free in this world. If you are getting something for nothing, you are paying for it somewhere.

Forget the trinkets and trash and focus on finding the right mattress for your body. Once you do, locate comparable mattress sets and compare prices for the complete package, including all add-ons (delivery, frame, mattress protector and even gifts with purchase – GWP). If the store offering the free stuff is actually less, fantastic. But more times than not, the store that does not have the freebies will be less. Take the money you saved and go out and buy yourself that cuddly stuffed animal.

If you have visited this blog much, you know I don’t give out praise unless it is truly warranted. I must say the 2011 Sealy Posturepedic line of innerspring mattresses is one of the best lines I have seen in over a decade.

Sealy has long been the leader in mattress sales, but I, like many others, have believed that the product just wasn’t living up to the name in recent years. The complaints that had plagued so many mattress companies had finally caught up to Sealy. Excessive body impressions, motion transfer, squeaky boxes, creaky edge support and noisy coil systems, were among the feedback I received from consumers over the years. On the floor, I could see firsthand the results by customer preference. The Sealy mattresses of the past were simply losing the battle and no matter how many cosmetic “red lights” were added, they needed a major change.

Since the dawn of time manufacturers have used the powerful and famous to help sell their products and services. It really should be no surprise that the mattress industry does the exact thing. Through either licensing arrangements or celebrity endorsements, an otherwise unknown brand can piggyback on a famous name.

Without giving specific examples, let me give you a fictitious example. Imagine the Purple Hippo Mattress Company is losing market share and has a bad reputation among consumers. They sign a licensing deal with a famous celebrity and re-brand their mattresses as Big Celebrity Mattresses!

You visit your local mattress store and start trying mattresses. You find one you like and start asking a few questions so you can compare it to other similar models. Hank, your friendly mattress salesperson, proudly tells you it has 1,000 coils!

Of course being the bright person you are, you realize something doesn’t sound right about that number. Your instinct is correct. Hank just quoted you the Coil Density, not the actual coil count.

I’m not sure who first started this practice, but coil density refers to the number of coils the mattress WOULD have, were it not foam encased. It truly is a worthless number in my opinion and causes more confusion than necessary. And I have found in my travels that most salespeople don’t necessarily explain or fully disclose the difference. I will let you decide whether or not they are being deceitful in this practice.

I have noticed that many manufacturers are gravitating towards the Marshall coil system – or a variation of it. A Marshall coil is a unit with individual coils that operate independently. The benefit to you is that it is a much more conforming feel, and far less motion transfer – you will not feel your partner move.

I think this is a wise move. The old offset and Bonnell systems, that had the coils “laced” together, did not conform well at all. In order to get the most conformance, you had to pile on comfort layers. This only made the body impression issue worse for consumers.

True Story – I’m visiting a store and a lady comes in for her college age daughter. She is driving a luxury vehicle that would easily retail over $50k. Not that we should ever make judgements based on cars, clothing or jewelry, but I found it interesting.

She doesn’t want to spend over $300 for a queen set, delivery and frame – tax inclusive. Adding delivery, frame and tax to the equation, means the mattress set needs to be in the $200 range. The delivery will go to a remote college campus that is not regularly served by any retail chain, so the delivery cost will be greater.

If my mattress has a 10 year warranty, why should I replace it after 8 years?

I know there is at least one mattress chain that is pushing the change every 8 year meme with their customers. The concept has been used successfully before, most notably by the oil change industry,where they have greatly reduced the times between oil changes. The 8 year campaign is designed to reduce the time between mattress purchases.

They use scare tactics including the threat of dust mites and bacteria to make you run out and replace your “old” and “dirty” and “bug-infested” mattress. The reality is that dust mites are everywhere in your home. If you are using a water proof protector to keep your mattress clean. And washing your linens as needed, you could sleep on the mattress 20 years without incident.

Improving the Mattress Shopping Experience

1. Get rid of the Discounters – For some reason it seems that everyone who once sold used cars suddenly decided to enter the mattress industry years ago. Nothing is more frustrating to consumers than having to “haggle” over mattress prices. Thankfully the Internet, and more competition is slowly making this antiquated selling process go the way of the dodo. A trained monkey could discount. There are much more important things to helping someone get a good night’s sleep than “taking another $100 off that set, if you buy right now.” Consumers are getting smarter and realizing that if the retailer can suddenly cut the price in half, then just maybe they were already priced too high. And most likely, you will never, ever get a good value in a place that only emphasizes discounting an inflated price.