Simmons encore focuses on a less-motion story
By Larry Thomas, Bedding editor -- Furniture Today, September 30, 2001
When Simmons unveiled its first single-sided Beautyrest sleep sets early last year, the company essentially bet the farm on the radically redesigned flagship line. And we all know the bet paid huge dividends, propelling then-No. 3 Simmons into at least a tie with No. 2 Serta in the market share derby. It also created a whole new category of mattresses, as most other producers scrambled to develop single-sided models of their own.
So, what does Simmons do for an encore?
It's certainly not betting the farm again. That's hardly necessary. But the new-and-improved Beautyrest line certainly intensifies the company's efforts to take mattress buying out of the commodity realm. The new line, to be officially unveiled during the High Point furniture market, keeps the single-sided design and the support foam on the bottom of the mattress that makes the no-flip feature possible.
However, many other elements have changed, including the well-known Marshall Coil innerspring unit, whose coils are now an inch taller. There's extensive use of memory foam and latex foam cushioning, and every model above $899 in queen has solid white, European-style terrycloth ticking.
Simmons officials say these changes are anything but cosmetic. All of them are aimed at increasing what the company calls "motion separation," or the lack of movement felt by one sleeping partner when the other rolls over.
Even the terrycloth ticking acts as a motion-deadening device because of its ability to stretch and conform to the sleeper's body, said Kurt Ling, vice president of the Beautyrest brand.
"We want to engage the consumer about the need for no motion … and how that contributes to better sleep," Ling said. "That's the focus of our merchandising. Non-flip is really a maintenance decision."
Ling said Beautyrest's new tagline, "Better Sleep for the Two of You," goes to the heart of the message, as does a new hangtag claiming the new models are "clinically proven to provide better sleep."
That clinically proven claim is sure to draw fire from competitors, but Simmons officials say they spent about $250,000 on a research project to support the assertion.
The project, coordinated by Cornell University professor (and sometimes Simmons spokesman) Dr. James Maas, studied 20 couples who spent seven nights on their existing mattress followed by seven nights on a new Beautyrest of the same size.
The couples wore a motion-sensing device on their wrists called an Actiwatch, which Ling said demonstrated that participants moved fewer times — and therefore got a better night's sleep — on the Beautyrest than on their mattress.
"We were blown away by the results," Ling said. "Some of these people were sleeping so poorly that you wondered how they functioned during the day. Nearly all of them said they slept better and felt more refreshed after sleeping on the Beautyrest."
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