Anyone Buy A Mattress Lately?

[TheDude]

I have been wanting to buy a new mattress for a very long time (and also upgrade the size of my bed) but it's one of those things that always get put off. I have never had a new mattress and I'm getting tired of sleeping on an ancient one. I hate to post this here, but I know I can trust the opinions and reviews you VMFers may offer. I'm looking to get some opinions on brands and how they have held up over the months and years. I'm going to try for a budget of $500-$600 (for a full size bed).

[rangerdoc]

I copied this off of Consumer Reports. I had to delete a few of the later ratings because of the limit of 25 images per post.

MATTRESS BRANDS
Tempur-Pedic $2465 84
Original Mattress Factory $855 83
Sleep Number (Select Comfort) $1835 80
Ikea $515 80
Denver Mattress $845 75
Simmons $1140 74
Spring Air * - 72
Kingsdown $1810 72
Serta $850 71
Sealy $855 70
Stearns & Foster $1440 68

[rangerdoc]

Anything of decent quality will hold up for about 10 years. You no longer have to flip mattresses as well. I enjoy the pillow top style with a bit of the memory foam. The best night sleep I ever had was at a friend's house on a tempurpedic bed. They are expensive and feel different, but once you settle in you'll never look back.

Oh, don't ever pay the list price. Shop during a sale and then get them to drop the price more. You can haggle with most mattress places, they have a huge markup. If they won't haggle just go someplace else. There is always another store willing to deal.

[rangerdoc]

Here's the list of mattress stores in order of best to worst.

Original Mattress Factory
Costco
Denver Mattress
Sleep Train
Sleep Number (Select Comfort)
Ikea
Macys
Mattress Firm
Sears
Sam's Club
American Mattress
Mattress Warehouse
Mattress Giant
Mattress Discounters
Sleepy's

[ylexot]

It's not cheap, but I love my Select Comfort Sleep Number. My back pain went away over night. Literally. I have a King Pillow top, and had a Queen pillow top before that. Never going back to standard spring mattresses brother.

[grasshopper]

Having spent over 25 years of my career working for the world's largest bedding components manufacturer, I can say that I have been around my fair share of mattresses and know in detail how they are constructed and the differences between the different types. Disclaimer: I am not in sales and never have been. I come from the engineering and manufacturing side of the mattress business.

The problem with buying a mattress is that it is very much personal preference and labeling a "Good Mattress" is very subjective. There are basically 3 types of mattress construction:

The standard innerspring mattress made of coil springs and covered with various types of filling materials. These can have a very basic covering with very little filling materials all the way up to a very plush covering with what is known in the industry as a pillow top that looks like another very thin mattress upholstered on top of the mattress.

Second is the memory foam (TempurPedic type) which is typically a solid piece of memory foam with either a thin outer covering of material or covered with thicker filling materials to give it a more plush feel like a pillow top.

The third is the air bladder (Sleep Number from Slect Comfort) which has an air bladder that is generally adjustable to the pressure you like. They also come with the basic coverings and go up to the plush models with the pillow tops and dual controls so each side of the bed can be adjusted seperately.

A lot of mattresses are made as "No Flip" now which means you don't need to turn them or flip them but there are still quite a few that still do need to be flipped and it's actually a good thing to do each time you change the sheets so it wears more evenly. It's alot like rotating the tires on your car.

Here's the problem with mattress shopping. It is very difficult to do comparison shopping since every manufacturer makes their products a little different from their competitors so they have a unique story to sell. Each of the three types listed above have people that love them and people that hate them. It really is all about the feel you like and the support you need. Support is the key here. You don't want a mattress that you sink down into so you look like your sleeping in a hammock or one that is so firm it's like sleeping on a piece of plywood. You want a mattress with a surface that has enough give to conform to your body but yet support it enough to keep your spine in a relatively straight position. This is all dependent on your body type, weight, shape and whether you sleep on your back, side, stomach or a combination of those.

The other problem with mattress shopping is getting opinions from the retail sales staff (which I find are generally not very educated on mattresses and just want the sale) and opinions from friends or family. I could tell you that I love sleeping on a nice innerspring mattress and don't like a TempurPedic, which is true, but that doesn't mean that's the right choice for you. It's best to do a little research into the differences and go for a trial run in the stores. When you do go shopping, lay down on the beds. Don't just sit down on the edge, lay back and say oohh, that feels good, actually lay in it like you would to sleep and stay there for a few minutes. If you're married or have a girlfriend, have them do the same. You need to know how the mattress reacts with two people in it. Some are very bouncy and some, like the TempurPedic have what is called a dead feel with very little bounce. Also see what the warranty is and who honors it. You won't get much help 8 years from now on a 10 year warranty on an off brand from a fly by night store.

I can say that buying a mattress is an important purchase and you should do your homework and shop around. $500-$600 is not much for a nice mattress. Most people have a hard time considering spending in the thousands for a mattress, but you should consider how important good sleep is to your overall health and how much time you spend in it.

I appologize for the long winded story but there is a lot to buying one. I have worked with all the majors' Serta, Simmons, Sealy, Select Comfort, Tempurpedic and all the others. They are all customers of ours and they all have some very good products and they all have lower end as well.

Hopefully that helps a little.

[Husky44]

Wow, I love this place. More knowledge on VMF about more stuff than you can find on Google, and it's all from guys with cool cars!

I can't add anything intelligent to what Grasshopper said above. I can just share my experience. Been sleeping in the same bed with the same woman for 27 years now. We went from el-cheapo inner spring mattresses to a couple of different designs of waterbed, to uber-high-end pillow-top inner spring (was pretty good) to Tempurpedic.

Got to sleep on a buddy's Sleep Number one time--I couldn't stand it, but probably never got it dialed in right. Spent two months living with some folks who had a Tempurpedic in their guest bedroom, and fell in love. Do my best to not have to sleep on anything else. Definitely made my back pain go away.

They're expensive, but IMHO they're worth it.

[TheDude]

Thanks for all the information! I'll be hitting some mattress stores soon to see what feels good, but there's a few Sleepy's around me and it's a shame to see them at the bottom of the list!

[ScottsGT]

I've had the same king size for the past 17 years. And it is a no name we bought at an independent mom and pop mattress store. To top it off, I'm about 340 lbs. for an inexpensive, no name it has held up well.
Tom, got a question for you. I've always been told that a no name like mine is just as good as the high dollar name brands, made the same, just different padding tops, edging, etc... Granted, we bought the high end no name mattress and it was around $800 if I remember correctly. Any truth to this?
I'm feeling a replacement coming this year.

[grasshopper]

Originally Posted by ScottsGT

I've had the same king size for the past 17 years. And it is a no name we bought at an independent mom and pop mattress store. To top it off, I'm about 340 lbs. for an inexpensive, no name it has held up well.
Tom, got a question for you. I've always been told that a no name like mine is just as good as the high dollar name brands, made the same, just different padding tops, edging, etc... Granted, we bought the high end no name mattress and it was around $800 if I remember correctly. Any truth to this?
I'm feeling a replacement coming this year.

That's generally true. The inner springs themselves are only made by a handful of companies and I can pretty much assure you we made the springs in your mattress along with all the filling materials. Some manufacturers other than the big names might use thinner or lower quality filling materials which can make them feel cheaper. It is rare for the springs themselves to wear out these days. A lot of people will experiencce what is called "body depression" in their mattress. This is when you notice a dip or depression in the area you sleep. This is normally the filling materials on top of the springs that is compacting over time and not the springs taking a set. This is more common on the really plush pillow top mattresses.

Edit: One thing I might add about lower cost mattresses is that they will normally have a lower coil count in the mattress to save money on wire. The high end mattresses have higher coil counts which provides better surface coverage and many times have proprietary patented spring designs that the low end mattresses wont have.

[quicknick_2]

We love,love,love our sleep number bed. I don't know how I lived without it.