First and foremost, I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to this forum! The information passed along here has been extremely resourceful, very interesting to learn, and most importantly - unbiased. I am a very easygoing person and am not one to complain, but I genuinely feel that I should pass along my negative experience so that others can be aware.
After doing my homework here, I decided that I wanted to fly out of state to visit The Mattress Factory. My girlfriend, family, and friends thought I was crazy to go through all of this to buy a mattress. “Just buy a Tempurpedic! It’ll be the best investment in your life!” they say. Lol. Nope, I was a man on a mission and determined to find a high quality mattress. My motto in life has always been “buy once, cry once” so I value high quality items and always enjoy the research process that goes along with it hence why I’m on this forum!
When I first walked into The Mattress Factory, I was helped by Trey at first and then the owner, Peter, happened to come into the showroom a moment later. I mentioned that I was from out of state, I found out about them through the Mattress Underground forum, and my flight back home was in a few hours. Peter was pleasantly surprised and turned to Trey and mentioned “We’re going to take care of him.” They were both very friendly and helped me choose the best mattress for me which had the talalay latex comfort layer and dunlop latex core. After talking for a bit, he looked at Trey and mentioned “Give him 10% off” and after building rapport a few more moments later he mentioned “Take off another $100.” I sincerely thanked him. To be clear, I never asked for anything. I’m just a simple person who values customer service.
I asked Peter about the total combined height of the mattress and foundation due to concerns of how the overall appearance would look with a new, sleek mid century modern bed set I just purchased. I showed him the specs and dimensions of the bed on the manufacturer’s website and showed him the wood slats that came along with it. He mentioned that he would custom make me 2 foundations to lay side by side in the king bed frame and make it 2" in height to maintain the low profile look and not cover up too much of the headboard.
The sale was quick and easy and the first tiny red flag that I noticed was that he did not take off 10% + $100 off that he mentioned earlier. He took off $200 total and I didn’t bother to mention anything because I’m not that type of person to nickel and dime. I honestly respected them, trusted them, and I valued the service so I paid no mind to it. I thanked them for everything and left there extremely happy and could not wait to spread the news to everyone I knew back at home.
The following day I sent him an email asking about what type of latex that was used for the support and comfort layers of my mattress and what are the benefits of each. I mentioned that I would like to be able to describe to my family and friends the quality of his mattresses. I missed his call that day, he left me a voicemail, and mentioned that he would email me a detailed response later that night. He never emailed me back.
Upon receiving the mattress, which arrived late about 1 week after the expected delivery date, the first thing that I noticed was that the foundation had a 4" wide slit/hole through the felt. The second thing I noticed was that the foundations looked horrible. The felts were cut crooked/misaligned and bad stapling all around so the wood and cardboard were exposed (imagine a Christmas present wrapped poorly by a young child). My main issue was that when I tried to place the 2 side by side foundations into my king bed frame, it did not fit. The mattress fitted perfectly. I informed Peter the issues with pictures via email. I kept it professional, I did not complain, I did not ask for anything. Once again, he never emailed me back.
I waited 3 days and gave him a call. The next big red flag I caught was that he mentioned that he emailed me right back. His attitude was a bit on the snarky side and mentioned that the dimensions of the foundations he built are standard size and that they should fit any standard king bed. He asked me to take measurements. I was at work at the time so I had to get back to him. Once again, I maintained being kind, polite, and respectful just like every interaction.
Before I was going to take additional pictures, I decided to lay one foundation on top of the other to measure if there were any misalignments. When I aligned one end of both foundations so that they’re both flush laying flat, the other end of one foundation became completely misaligned! The opposite end became 2.5" crooked! I aligned them standing up against the wall and the misalignment becomes very noticeable. The foundations honestly look like they were built by someone with the worst craftsmanship I have ever seen. Peter called me back and his words were “I’ve never seen that happen before. You already have wood slats that came with your bed frame right? Do you need those foundations? I basically gave them to you for free. I will send you another warranty card.” I was in complete shock. Wow, just wow. The ball was in his court. I never became irate or disrespectful. I was just waiting for him to simply take care of a potential lifetime customer (I personally need 2 more mattresses) and a potential raving fan (I would have bought business to him with family and friends), but it saddens me that he never even attempted to try resolve any issue. All this time I technically did not need a foundation because he knew that my bed came with slats when I showed it to him, yet he still sold me a foundation. In addition, the foundation wasn’t free because that was money I could have saved with the supposed discount. I found it odd that after the phone call he finally sends an email and included the words “per our conversation”. It makes one wonder if he doesn’t like responding to emails because it may have been used against him in the past. He mentioned that he would send me “another” 20 year warranty card, but I never received 1 from the beginning. After a week, I finally received an envelope from him in the mail. No warranty card, no message written by hand, it was just a generic pre-printed thank you card. To be completely honest, even if he gave me lifetime warranty I have very, very little faith that I would trust Peter to honor it. Trust means everything and he has failed miserably.