Retail Bedding Tour

Better sleep crusade gets a boost

FINAL TOUR UPDATE: It’s the week after our exciting national retail bedding tour came to an end. I spent virtually every waking hour last week with a team of sleep and bedding experts, and I am much the better for the experience.

The tour, arranged by Leggett & Platt, took me to five bedding retailers, including three retailers that Furniture/Today has named Retail Giants of Bedding. The other two are strong candidates for that honor.

There is no substitute for being on the road. The insights you get from visiting stores are very different from those you get by reading an e-mail from a company executive. The learning process is magnified ten-fold when you walk the sales floor and talk with the men and women who sell mattresses for a living, and when you sit down with top company executives and talk about their challenges and their hopes for their companies.

The tour, which L&P called its Spring Alive Tour, gave me access to some of the top bedding retailers in the country: Mattress Firm, Verlo Mattress Factory Stores, The Original Mattress Factory, Mattress Giant and Sit ’n Sleep. I’ve got a notebook full of insights on selling better sleep and selling more mattresses, and I’ll be sharing them with you in stories that will run in the weeks and months to come.

The tour was the brainchild of L&P bedding executive Mark Quinn, who assembled a team of bedding experts to help educate the retailers we called upon. Craig McAndrews of Innovative Retail Group, an expert on the mattress shopping experience, talked convincingly about the advantages of moving from a mattress expert to becoming a sleep expert. And Kurt Ling, president of Customer Kinetics, gave us invaluable insights into the minds of bedding consumers when he led consumer focus groups throughout the week.

That trio — Quinn, McAndrews and Ling — provided the spark each day of our bedding crusade. They worked together seamlessly, each contributing in his own way. It was a collegial group, one that I joined as an observer.

As the tour wound down last week, we spent some time in the plane talking about what it all meant. We used words like “passion” and “pride” and “commitment.” This could be the start of something very important for the industry, we concluded.

“If you want to take on a very big issue and make it your personal mission,” Quinn said later, “then make sure that you surround yourself with team members who share your passion for the project. If those people end up being good friends of yours, then you are truly blessed.”

Despite the name of the tour, it wasn’t focused on pushing innerspring bedding. Some retailers expected a strong pitch on the advantages of innerspring bedding, but they didn’t get that. Instead, they got insights into the importance of selling better sleep. And Quinn and the members of his team got first-hand insights into consumer and retail views of the mattress shopping experience.

“No matter what you do,” Quinn said, “if you place the customer at the center of it you will be hard-pressed to get it wrong.” He’s right about that.

The columns in this series that you will find linked to this piece were written from the road. As I look them over today, from the vantage point of my office in Greensboro, N.C., I think they capture some of the excitement that we experienced on that national retail bedding tour.

Yes, there are exciting things happening in the world of mattresses. And the opportunities that lie ahead are plentiful. Let’s all work together to sell better sleep.

Mattress Giant touts pillows, better sleep

TOUR UPDATE: Today our week of retail visits comes to an end. It’s been a great experience. I’ve had a blast being a participant on this retail bedding tour, which Leggett & Platt calls its Spring Alive Tour. 

L&P executive Mark Quinn has been a great host, bringing some top consultants to each of the bedding retailers we visited this week. Sure L&P has an innerspring message, but it has added real value to its visits with bedding experts.

This has been a week of total immersion on the retail side of the business. It has been an intense experience, but also a rewarding one. I feel like we are just getting started. But now the tour ends and we all get back to our regular jobs. The need to promote better sleep continues, of course. Hopefully this tour has planted some fruitful seeds for that cause.

As I write this we are at a terminal in Albuquerque, N.M., where we have stopped to refuel on our trip to Los Angeles. Our day began in Dallas, where we met two top Mattress Giant executives for lunch and a tour of the Arlington, Texas store. Terri Stephens and Sharon Smart of Mattress Giant were our hosts.

I really like what Mattress Giant is doing to make pillows an integral part of the mattress shopping experience. Smart, director of training, told me how the retailer introduces its customers – which it calls “guests” – to pillows at the beginning of the shopping experience. That’s not standard operating procedure, and that’s the point. And it’s one of the things that Mattress Giant does to stand apart from the pack. Very impressive.

BETTER SLEEP MOMENT: Are women better equipped and better able to tell consumers about the benefits of better sleep? Yes, said the eight women who attended a focus group narrated by consultant Kurt Ling. The women said that women can connect with them on an emotional level and talk convincingly about the benefits of better sleep. One of the Mattress Giant executives watching the focus group said the message was clear: Hire more female sales associates.

INSIGHT OF THE DAY: “The industry realizes that retailers hold the key” to building momentum for better sleep messages, said Terri Stephens, vice president of marketing and advertising at Mattress Giant. Retailers can join with manufacturers and other companies, like Leggett & Platt, to form a partnership to promote the benefits of selling better sleep, she said.

THE VIEW FROM 25,000 FEET (LITERALLY): Our L&P pilots this week have been Kent Egger and Richard Schneider. They kept our Hawker 400XP, a fast jet, in fine trim. The plane flies at about 500 miles per hour at altitudes from 25,000 to 38,000 feet. So we really have had a 25,000-foot perspective on the world. And thanks to the L&P jet, we were able to adjust our travel schedule as needed – commercial airlines wouldn’t have waited for me to get my copy filed each day – and get us to our big and small airfields without incident. Great job, guys.

THE VIEW FROM 25,000 FEET (FIGURATIVELY): Bedding retailers have to do a lot of things right to be successful these days. The best retailers know their customers, give their sales associates solid training, carry a broad selection of bedding lines, provide great service, and execute each and every day. Most retailers know what they should do to be successful. But actually doing the right things day in and day out can be a challenge.

SPRINGING FORWARD: L&P cites improved air circulation as one of the benefits of innerspring bedding. It says the Active Support Technology in its innerspring coils creates air exchange inside the mattress. “It literally is a breathing apparatus for the mattress,” says L&P executive Niels Mossbeck. “Without air exchange, heat can build up in a mattress, affecting temperature and air conditions.”

Heat build-up can be a potential problem with some alternative sleep surfaces, according to L&P. I hear that from some bedding producers and consumers, too.

TOMORROW I’LL TELL YOU ABOUT: Hey, tomorrow I’m on my way home. More on the Spring Alive Tour next week.

FOR MORE ON THE TOUR: See Leggett & Platt’s special Web site, www.LeggettSleep.com, for daily tour updates.

Cleveland bedding company is a real Original

TOUR UPDATE: As I write this it’s Day Three of Leggett & Platt’s Spring Alive Tour. We are in Cleveland, where we visited the Original Mattress Factory earlier in the day. As that name suggests, that is a factory direct operation, the second we visited in as many days on the tour. 

This company is headed by Ron Trzcinski, who was a top lieutenant to Ernie Wuliger back in the glory days of Ohio-Sealy. Wuliger was one of the savviest bedding operators of all time, so Ron learned from the very best.

I’ve heard good things about Original Mattress, but this operation, like Verlo Mattress Factory Stores, which we visited earlier this week, is one I haven’t devoted much ink to over the years. That changes right now.

We were all impressed with the energy level in the conference room where we met with almost three dozen of Original Mattress Factory’s sales associates. And, interestingly, there were many women in the audience, a departure from our earlier meetings with sales associates and store owners on our tour. We like to say that our customer is a “she.” If so, why don’t we have more female sales associates? That’s a question I am exploring on this tour.

Ron Trzcinski himself attended our training session, and wrapped up our meeting with an overview of the company’s business philosophy: Push for excellence. Be courteous. Be friendly. And be knowledgeable about the products the company sells. He said the company’s sales associates should strive to become more knowledgeable in all aspects of the business, and suggested our presentation on selling the benefits of good sleep could be a bridge to learning more about sleep itself.

BETTER SLEEP MOMENT: Does better sleep sell? Yes, according to consumers in the focus groups we are holding. Kurt Ling, the consultant who is moderating the groups, was surprised by how much more money the consumers said they would spend if they realized their new bed would give them better sleep. The answers ranged from $200 to $300 more, or even up to twice as much as they last spent on a mattress. Those are impressive numbers. That’s just one of the reasons why the industry must focus on selling better sleep – not cheaper beds.

INSIGHT OF THE DAY: “We strive for excellence in all we do.” That is point Number One of Original Mattress Factory’s philosophy. Trzcinski, president of Original Mattress, asked his sales associates to recite the top points of the philosophy. Several did. Many companies have philosophy statements and mission statements. But Original really takes those statements seriously. That’s impressive. The company has those key messages printed on laminated cards. Trzcinski gave me one as I left the company’s flagship store in Cleveland.

THE VIEW FROM 25,000 FEET (LITERALLY): An interesting thought strikes me as I look out the window of the L&P jet and gaze at the ground far below: Our attitude in life is often determined by our altitude. We are literally thousands of feet above the cares and problems of the world down there. True, we will be landing shortly. But this grand view of the earth helps me put those petty battles that face us all in perspective. Plus, we are flying over beautiful countryside in the Midwest.

THE VIEW FROM 25,000 FEET (FIGURATIVELY): One of the great benefits of this tour is the chance to sit in on consumer focus groups. The consumer, we must remember, is the end user. It is all about her. Thus our industry’s attempts to understand her behavior are critical to our ultimate success. Consumer research is a valuable tool, but it is one that not all bedding producers utilize. I admit that I’m not an expert on conducting consumer research. It is more complicated than you might think. (Or more complicated than I might have thought.) No, we aren’t hearing from a huge number of consumers in these focus groups, but watching Kurt Ling skillfully drawing the consumers into discussions on key bedding issues is a fascinating experience.

SPRINGING FORWARD: L&P is sharing pocket-sized brochures with retail sales associates on this tour. They tout the benefits of a better night’s sleep, and also include some key messages on innerspring bedding. The brochure says that innerspring mattresses provide personal comfort, active support, and air circulation. “From comfort to support to durability,” the brochures say, “the innerspring sleep set provides a superior night’s sleep.” As I’ve noted in past bedding columns, the innerspring category has a story to tell. L&P is in a strong position to tell that story.

Dave Young, CEO of VyMac Corp., the parent of Verlo Mattress Factory Stores, made some very positive comments about the importance of innerspring units in today’s sleep sets in an interview with me earlier in the week. Innerspring bedding still leads the pack, he said. And today Ron Trzcinski added more pro-innerspring statements to the mix when I interviewed him after the training session.

TOMORROW I’LL TELL YOU ABOUT: The Dallas bedding scene.

FOR MORE ON THE TOUR: See Leggett & Platt’s special Web site, www.LeggettSleep.com, for daily tour updates.