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David Perry

Forget trendy sleep cures, let’s tout a new mattress

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 nasal pillow systems and a variety of pills from the $2 billion a year sleeping pill industry.
But the article does actually talk about mattresses too, and that’s good to see.

It says that Sealy’s Stearns & Foster unit is selling “a $10,000 mattress fit for a princess afflicted with insomnia. It is topped with latex and stitched with real silver threads.” (Sealy says that bed actually tops out at $7,000 in king). And the article notes that Hypnos offers a king-sized mattress “filled with layers of silk, cashmere and lamb’s wool and topped with a $20,000 sticker.”

In addition, Forbes includes Select Comfort and Tempur-Pedic on a list of publicly traded companies that offer sleep-related products. And it talks about the mattress upgrade at Marriott hotels, where guests will be treated to “a fat mattress” fitted with a goose-down stuffed duvet. That trend is gaining popularity in the hospitality industry, and it’s a big plus for the mattress industry, obviously.

It’s great to see mattresses get some ink in an important national sleep story like this. And yet this article spills much more ink on wild and wacky sleep cures. Does anyone really think a $4 Insomnia Relief Scent Inhaler is the silver bullet for insomniacs?

I don’t know why we can’t get the national media to take our products more seriously. There are, I would think, a great number of consumers who are sleeping on old, worn out beds. The first thing they should do to improve their sleep prospects is to buy a new bed.

That just seems like elementary, and obvious, advice. And imagine what a boost our industry would get if more sleep-deprived consumers would think about getting a new bed.

This is no racket. It is a crusade for better sleep. And the crusade should start with a new bed. How about this for our slogan: First, Get the Right Bed.  (to add public comments click on "Add your Comment" below, or to email Dave directly click here.)