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Being someone that considers himself literate in the mattress industry, as my wife runs a humble mattress storage and distribution firm I totally agree that the
by mpermar 13y ago
Being someone that considers himself literate in the mattress industry, as my wife runs a humble mattress storage and distribution firm I totally agree that the prices I could see visiting on the US are way over the top. If I lived there, well, making/selling mattresses must be a profitable business from the retail pricing I could see. Mind you I was on Silicon Valley which I imagine must be very pricy.
The website is really beautiful. Well done. It almost makes you feel I have to buy this!!! I think that's the key point.
Because apart from that... well... there's a rule in business that is you get what you pay for. Even if mattress retailers are making a fortune on margins, well you guys also have margins too. And a retail price of $299..to..$499-king tells me that your mattresses are very low end.
So the website is beautiful but very misleading. Like the infographic about the cost of making a mattress. It probably should title it "Here is how a cheap mattress is marked up". Because there is mattresses and mattresses. Tons of variations, fabrics and qualities. And well.. you're not even selling mattresses or at least we don't call that a mattress here ( Spain ) but a mat instead. It is just too thin. Less than half the thickness of a regular mattress. Then of course, the fact that is made of foam only makes it worse as with that thickness it will unavoidable deform with usage. Who tells otherwise is lying or just very new to the business plainly because all foam mattresses deform to some degree.
Then there is the foam density, that I can't see anywhere in the specs. And as you can guess when you import materials the bigger the density the more expensive the foam sheets are. But hey, people today demand cheap prices. But anyways, mattresses these days tend to have lesser foam densities as people want cheaper prices. But of course that comes with the cost of deformability and that's why mattresses these days don't last that much as they used to in the past.
One thing that tells how good your marketing efforts are is that the mattress is foldable. Someone not used to mattress would think: AWESOME. Some used would think, oh no another crappy sofa-bed mat. I'd never recommend anyone to buy a foldable bed unless for an apartment with very low space and of course... for a sofa-bed!
So my summary would be: really well done making attractive a low-end product. The marketing is excellent and you definitely found a market out there. The website is beautiful but well.... you sell what you sell, tons of half-truths on it.
- anoncowherd 13y ago>> all foam mattresses deform to some degree So do spring mattresses, by the way, and aren't they the most common type?
- dangrossman 13y agoFoam mattresses tend to deform and stay deformed after only a few years of use; the foam just doesn't re-expand all the way. Spring mattresses are warranted against more than minor deformation, not just defects at the time of purchase. If you buy a name-brand (Serta, Stearns & Foster, etc) mattress and after 5 years it's sagging 4" In the middle, you make a warranty claim and get a new mattress.
- chockablock 13y agoHave you had to use your mattress warranty? When I looked into it most warranties were pro-rated, required that you followed their mattress maintenance schedule, customer had to pay for inspection, 'normal wear' was not covered, etc, etc. This article [1] claims that actual useful lifetime of a mattress is around 1/3 to 1/2 of the warranty period. (I ended up buying 2 awesome, cheap, non-brand name, made in the US mattresses from Restonic, which are still going strong after 5+ years). [1] http://www.sleeplikethedead.com/mattress-warranty.html http://www.sleeplikethedead.com/mattress-warranty.html
- bradleyjg 13y agoIf I can buy a product for 10-25% of the cost that lasts 33% as long, I've come out ahead.
- mpermar 13y agoWell, there is tons of types of springs and more importantly spring layouts. Some manofacturers will use less springs than others, and that is very important. Personally I prefer spring mattresses over foam mattresses. They last much much longer as dangrossman commented, are more reliable and also much firmer. And also you can't leave aside the weather factor because spring mattresses are way more breathable than foam-only mattresses. We, for example, avoid selling foam-only mattresses to people that live on high humidity areas because there is a high chance they will return it with humidity stains. Normally I would go for a pocket spring mattress ( I think that's the term in English for a mattress with individual sealed and padded springs ) with a decent amount of memory foam on the top. That way you get the firmness and breathability from a spring mattress plus the comfort of a nice soft memory foam layer.