N.C. mattress road trip reveals good FR attitudes
David Perry, Executive Editor -- Furniture Today, July 2, 2007
Call it an FR Road Trip: Three instructive stops at bedding companies in my neck of the woods in North Carolina.
Our journey starts at Sealy's headquarters in Archdale, just a few minutes from my home in High Point. As I drive through the pleasant, grass-lined Sealy complex, I see the Sealy FR Test Center standing off by itself. It is an impressive facility, the only one maintained by a major bedding producer — a sign of Sealy's leadership on the critical fire-safety issue.
Mike Murray, Sealy's vice president and legal counsel, puts the FR test center in perspective for me by noting that Sealy has "invested millions of dollars in research and development to create new technologies that make our beds even more flame-resistant. For example, we're the only bedding manufacturer with its own, on-site FR Test Center, which allows us to test new products and FR solutions immediately, day-in and day-out. In fact, we've tested more than 3,000 beds since we built our Test Center in 2004."
Murray is playing a key role at Sealy as that producer educates its retailers about the new federal mattress flammability standard, which just went into effect.
Just down the road from Sealy, in Thomasville, I spent an enjoyable hour with longtime friend Neal Grigg, president of Carolina Mattress Guild, a company that began producing FR beds long before it was required to do so. He speaks candidly about the issue, saying that he doesn't think the higher prices that FR protection brings will hurt sales. "Bedding is a necessity purchase," he notes.
And Grigg says the industry can market FR beds without scaring consumers. "The industry has talked about the fact that we are producing a safer product, an improved product," he says. Those are good talking points.
My final stop was the Restonic plant in Fayetteville, a couple of hours away, where I met key executives Randy Bancroft and Laurie Tokarz. Bancroft showed me around the factory while Tokarz introduced Restonic's new FR lineup to visiting dealers, some of whom had questions about the new FR standard.
Bancroft estimated that he has devoted more than 600 hours to the FR issue, mostly in meetings. "If I save one life, it's worth all of the hours we've put in," he said. I like that attitude.
What kind of attitude do you have on our new FR bedding?
Contact David Perry at dperry@reedbusiness.com
