U.S. mattress sales rose 0.2% in units, 7.7% in dollars last year

David Perry -- Furniture Today, May 15, 2012

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The U.S. bedding industry recorded just a 0.2% unit sales gain last year but saw a 7.7% jump in the value of wholesale bedding shipments, the International Sleep Products Assn. reported.

In its final report on 2011, the bedding industry's trade association said the specialty sleep segment significantly outperformed the innerspring segment.

Specialty sleep mattress units soared 24.3% last year, while innerspring mattress units recorded a 1.9% decline, ISPA said. The dollar value of specialty mattresses jumped 29.5% last year, compared with a 2.6% gain in the dollar value of innerspring mattresses.

Those strong growth performances gave the specialty sleep segment another year of market share gains. In units, specialty sleep saw its share rise from 11.2% in 2010 to 13.8% last year. In dollars, specialty sleep grew its share from 25.2% in 2010 to 29.4% last year.

ISPA noted that the overall growth last year was not enough to restore all of the ground lost during the bedding recession.

"In 2011, the mattress industry continued the upward trend started in 2010, and posted increases in both unit shipments and wholesale dollar value," the association said. "U.S. mattress producers shipped 34.9 million units in 2011, an increase of just 0.2% over 2010, and the second yearly unit increase since 2005. Remarkably, the value of mattress shipments showed a 7.7% increase in 2011, the second yearly increase in dollar value since 2007.

"Even with the healthy increase in dollar value registered in 2011, this figure was slightly above the 2008 total sales value, and below (7.6%) 2007 sales, which to date is the industry's highest sales year. Unit shipments in 2011 were slightly below the 2008 total shipments, and well below (20.2%) the 2005 figure, which to date is the industry's highest unit shipments year," ISPA said.

Average unit prices for all mattresses and foundations increased by 7.5% from 2010 to 2011. The average unit price for specialty mattresses increased last year by 4.2%, to $559.23, and for innerspring mattresses by 4.7%, to $210.47, ISPA said.

ISPA's final report on 2011 performance is based on the reports of the 18 companies participating in ISPA's monthly Bedding Barometer reports, and a mail and phone survey of other U.S. bedding producers.

The report reveals that the companies participating in the Bedding Barometer surveys had a 10% dollar gain last year and a 2.1% unit gain. Those companies accounted for about 76% of the industry's dollar total and about 66% of the unit total.

In contrast, the other bedding producers, a group generally consisting of smaller bedding makers, posted a dollar gain of just 1.3% last year and saw their units decline by 3.1%, the ISPA report said.