Pillow programs continue to grow
By David Perry -- Furniture Today, February 12, 2007
Las Vegas — It's no surprise that a market loaded with new mattress lines also offers an assortment of sleep accessories.
Bedding buyers will find new pillow programs, as well as new offerings of sheets and top-of-bed programs, at this Las Vegas Market.
Sleep Innovations, based in West Long Branch, N.J., is making its Las Vegas debut in temporary space. The supplier of specialty sleep beds and accessories is showing in the Cashman Center, space 4281.
Industry veteran Bob O'Connell, who has joined Sleep Innovations as vice president of sales, says the company has a strong initial offering. Its Comfort line of memory foam mattresses and pillows will be selectively distributed.
"Our buying power and size, along with our fully automated fabrication facilities, allows Sleep Innovations to manufacture the highest quality products at import prices, while maintaining our 'Manufactured in the USA' moniker," O'Connell said. "What makes Comfort different from all other competitors is our ability to target key retail price points, with significantly better quality materials, while providing profit margins that only the imports to date have been able to achieve."
He said Sleep Innovations has the tools to be a standalone memory foam supplier, or to be a complement to other memory foam lines already in retailers' stores.
Moving to a new showroom this market is Leggett & Platt's top-of-bed division, which offers down and feather pillows, comforters and feather beds from Westex International, and comforter ensembles, sheets, mattress pads, protectors and pillows from Southern Textiles.
The top-of-bed division is showing with Fashion Bed Group, also an L&P company, in space 1326 in the World Market Center's Building B.
At this market, Southern Textiles is showing new patterns for its Elite line, including a micro-plush mattress and pillow protector, 750-thread-count sheet sets and a lightweight Newport down blanket.
RejuveNite, a division of Latex International, is returning to Las Vegas with new dual-comfort pillows, including the Melody, Harmony and Bliss models, which combine the company's signature Talalay latex with materials like memory foam and down.
That producer also is touting its ComfortMatch pillow personalizing system, which it says enables retailers to personalize the consumer's sleep experience, promote better rest, and boost their profits.
Knickerbocker is rounding out its premium line of bed support products with its new LazerBeam model. Company officials say the complete line, which also includes the BedBridge and the BedBeam, enables retailers to offer consumers products that will give them the right support at retail price points ranging from $49 for the new LazerBeam to $199 for the BedBridge.
Some of today's bedroom suites don't provide the support required by the sleep sets placed in them, Knickerbocker officials say. "If a bed frame or support system provided with a wooden bed fails to provide rigid support, the mattress and boxspring are compromised," said CEO Richard Polevoy. "These new products provide the assurance that the consumer's increased investment will provide peak performance and last longer."
Protect-A-Bed is showing with Reverie in its new WMC space, B-925. The company is showing its full line of mattress and pillow protection products, including its new Elite Mattress Protector, a two-sided product.
Showing again in Las Vegas is DreamFit, a sleep accessory producer based in Vinemont, Ala., where the company has a 100,000-square-foot manufacturing facility.
DreamFit is showing its line of sheets that are "Guaranteed to Fit and Stay On" today's high-profile mattresses. Queen-size sheets retail from $59 to $199. Sheets are offered in thread counts from 200 to 420.
DreamFit's patented design extends into its complete line of mattress, health and comfort protection products, The Essential Mattress Protector, HealthGuard, and the All Seasons mattress pads. Queen prices range from $69 to $129 retail.
The company has a good-better-best program in pillows, in engineered fiber, natural feather and luxury foam. Retails range from $10 to $99. And it also has a new top-of-bed program, with 10 pieces in each ensemble. Queen retail prices range from $249 to $499.
"DreamFit sees a real opportunity to create a store-within-a-store with our retail bedding partners and capitalize on the bedding consumer's desire for convenience and innovative solutions to the real issues surrounding today's bedding," said Bob Pearce, director of sales and marketing. "This is a win-win proposal where the bedding consumer wins with enhanced comfort, protection, function and fashion, while the retailer is rewarded with enhanced bedding department profitability."
