The spring market is being held against a backdrop of blooming azaleas and daffodils. Nature is starting afresh, and so are some new bedding players in High Point.

Bursting out in new quarters this market are a visco-elastic bedding producer, a mattress protection supplier, an Italian importer, a 101-year-old North Carolina-based bed maker, and the original “T” brand.

We start with the visco producer, Comfor-Pedic, the Seattle-based specialty sleep maker. It is cutting the ribbon on its new East Coast manufacturing and distribution facility, located at 220 Feld Avenue in High Point, two miles from the downtown market district.

The facility includes a showroom, which gives Comfor-Pedic a permanent showroom presence in the Furniture Capital of the World. If you want to check out...Read More

Given the critical mass of bedding majors in Las Vegas, does the upcoming High Point market have anything to offer in the mattress arena? The answer is a definite “yes.”

I’m looking forward to the April market for a couple of reasons. In general, I’m eager to see what new steps High Point will take to improve the market experience. And in bedding, this market should give me a chance to spend more time with bedding makers who might not have gotten so much attention in the past.

That’s the flip side of some of the bedding changes in High Point. True, Tempur-Pedic, perhaps the industry’s hottest bedding company, won’t be here. And ...Read More

What happens when you assemble an A-plus lineup of retailers, producers and suppliers, address key industry issues, celebrate retail successes, tackle challenges and provide plenty of networking opportunities?

You have the kind of rousing success we enjoyed with our inaugural Bedding Conference at the end of last month, held at the Ritz-Carlton in Henderson, Nev. (Check out BeddingToday.com for more coverage) Frankly, we covered so much ground at the conference that it will take us a while to fully report on and reflect upon the proceedings.

One of our greatest successes, according to a veteran bedding producer, was the spirit of camaraderie that came alive from the opening reception. This Top 10 producer said that kind of spirit hadn’t been seen in many years.

We began i...Read More

Would you like to join the Crusade for Better Sleep? Or would you rather be part of The Sleep Racket? Well, let’s see. The first option sounds like a noble calling. The second sounds kind of sleazy.

Alas, Forbes magazine opted for the second choice in a recent article that carried this secondary headline: “Making big bucks off your insomnia.”

I must confess a sense of weariness with these sleep send-ups from the national consumer press. They typically tackle the legitimate (and vital) issue of how to improve sleep with a prescription that is light on mattress talk. In fact, it’s not uncommon to see such articles make absolutely no mention of mattresses, a rather large omission, in our book.

The Forbes article talks a great deal about trendy sleep cures, like lavender scent inhalers and pillows with built-in speakers and na...Read More