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David Perry

Some answers for critics of one-year warranties

I’ve stirred up a bit of a hornet’s nest with my recent suggestion that we should shorten bedding producers’ warranties to one year and let retailers sell extended warranties. (See recent column)

Reaction has ranged from glowing — “Great column about shortening warranties! I could not agree with you more.” — to glaring: “If warranties are shortened to one year, what message are you sending the consumer?”
This week, I’m sharing with you some of the comments I’ve gotten, and my reactions.

Let’s start with the critics. Addressing the topic as consumers, two bloggers objected to the idea of shorter warranties. One wrote: “I personally always look for the longest warranty on a high-ticket purchase. I view this as the manufacturer displaying pride of workmanship. I display the same attitude no matter what I purchase, whether it is a small appliance or a vehicle.”

Comment: Warranties can be merchandising tools; they don’t guarantee product life or product comfort. If you look at warranties closely, you must have noticed that most mattresses have longer warranties than cars. Does that make any sense to you?

Another consumer, struggling to find a mattress she can live with, is replacing a bed she’s had for less than one year. Problem: The padding in the pillowtop bed “bunches up.” She wrote: “If there had been only a one-year warranty when I originally bought, I would have been out of luck.”

Comment: Comfort materials do settle; body impressions are a sign of a mattress contouring to the body — a good thing. Your salesperson should have told you that. You need to make better buying decisions. A good retailer will help you do so.

Another reader expressed a retailer’s perspective: “We need the warranty story to help sell the product (as long as we use it as a tool and not the main selling point).”

Comment: Wrong! You only think you need the warranty to help sell the product. Haven’t you got better things to talk about, like the features and benefits of the bedding itself?

Another reader wondered where the International Sleep Products Assn. stands on this issue. ISPA President Dick Doyle gave me this response: “Warranty information is important to many consumers when buying a new mattress. ISPA supports the use of reasonable, objective and fair criteria in defining warranty claims. But it is up to each individual company to independently decide the terms of its warranties.”

A bedding producer had this reaction to my column: “What’s the next step? Do the majors step out first? Can the industry come together in some way to move this forward? No one likes to be first, and the smaller manufacturers typically have more to risk doing so than the majors.”

Comment: Those are excellent questions. Some major producers, displaying true leadership on this critical issue, should step forward with shorter warranties.

I hope they will.