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Strong Spring Air portfolio generates sales momentum

By David Perry, Executive editor -- Furniture Today, July 14, 2002

Only one bedding producer managed to post double-digit sales gains last year, according to the market share report we published a few weeks ago. And that producer — Spring Air — says it is having an even better year this year.

We checked in with Spring Air President Jim Nation the other day to get his views on why there is so much spring in Spring Air's business. He attributed the group's success — a 10% gain in 2001 and an overall increase this year of "just under 20%" — to a variety of factors: a portfolio of products, a quick response to the one-sided bed phenomenon, a strong foam-encased offering, a strong partnership with key suppliers and good marketing.

It all adds up, he said, to a great position for Spring Air: "We're the hot line. Our foam-encased, NeverTurn line is selling like crazy."

Spring Air brought out its foam-encased, single-sided bed line in March 2001, immediately racking up monthly gains of 15% and higher. Nation said Spring Air worked closely with Foamex, a key supplier, to develop the new foam-encased line, which offers benefits such as more support, more comfort and more edge-to-edge sleeping surface.

Most of the foam-encased models are one-sided, a construction that Spring Air was quick to embrace when it became clear that one-sided beds were making substantial gains in the marketplace. Today, Spring Air does a higher percentage of its business in single-sided beds than any producer except Simmons, which launched the single-sided boom with its gutsy introduction of one-sided beds in 2000.

Spring Air saw an opportunity, and seized it.

Another key to success, in Nation's view, is Spring Air's development of a portfolio of brands, each with different specifications to offer market differentiation. "Our people are getting used to selling our portfolio," he said.

The Nature's Rest line, for example, features latex foam, a hot component nowadays. The high-end Chattam & Wells line, which generated about $30 million in sales last year according to our market share study, is "the only head-to-head Stearns & Foster killer in the marketplace," Nation asserted.

And Spring Air Also has done well with its new Four Seasons line of environmentally friendly beds and collateral marketing materials. This green marketing move is right for the times.

Spring Air does not force any one line on its dealers; it offers them choices that they can use to build their business, Nation said.

While Spring Air always has been strong with furniture stores, the producer has done "an exceptional job" lately with department stores, a channel of distribution that has its challenges but still packs plenty of clout, Nation said.

Those successes mean substantial momentum for Spring Air, which continues to occupy the No. 4 position in the bedding industry but obviously is making significant gains on the competition.

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