I am in Gainesville Florida and have a 20 year old mattress - its time to get a new one - Theres a new MattressFirm in town with a Grand Opening Sale so I stopped in and was lead directly to one of the low end I-comfort mattresses for around $1,030 - $1200 extra for the adjustable base - which I really liked! The sales guy was relentless (Free blanket and delivery!) anyhow I told him I had to “sleep” on it (The decision) and would be back in the AM - I was pretty much going to buy one when I decide to surf around and ran into your amazing site really informative - I never knew there was so much to bedding - anyhow I’m now thinking “Fail” on the I - Comfort - but not clear what to get or where - I have some lower back issues and various aches and pains and like Firm but with enough give to not aching the hips - Foam seems intuitively the way to go - but have tried them in the past and always ended up sweating at night from over heating - I’m 175 pounds and like to sleep on my sides and would like to get a bed I can keep a while with out a lot of maintenance - being Floridian I also want to steer away from any issues that humidity etc. can pose any guidance direction would appreciated
Hi emonkeji,
Unfortunately you are in a part of Florida where the closest independent factory direct manufacturers are about 100 miles away. While this would be quite a two way drive, it could also save you some time mainly because you will get accurate information from people who really do know what they are talking about and you would know ahead of time that you were testing mattresses that really did have better value than most of the other options available to you closer by.
http://foxmattress.com/ Holly Hill. They are a local factory direct manufacturer that makes all types of mattresses. I have had some great conversations with Rick the owner and he is exceptionally helpful and knowledgeable. They are also a member here which means that I believe they compete well with the best in the industry in terms of their quality, value, service, and transparency. They would be well worth a drive to Holly Hill to include them in your research.
Furniture Row® Store Locations - Store Hours & Addresses Daytona. Regional factory direct manufacturer who makes a wide range of traditional innerspring mattresses including some with latex in the comfort layers and their iChoice which is a mostly latex mattress with either a latex or memory foam topper. Some good quality and value.
Find an Original Mattress Factory Store Ocoee, Orlando, Kissimmee, Apopka, Lake Mary, FL. They are a regional factory direct that manufactures all types of mattresses. Their mattresses include a two sided latex hybrid and memory foam models as well as traditional innerspring mattresses. They have some good quality and good value choices.
http://www.orlandomattresscompany.com/ and http://atlasmattressfactory.com/ Lake Hamilton, FL. They are local manufacturers who are working in partnership and make a range of good quality mattresses. They generally make commercial mattresses for hotels and cruise liners but they also sell direct to customers at the Atlas Mattress showroom. They make traditional mattresses (innerspring/polyfoam using a wide range of foam densities depending on budget), latex, memory foam, and microcoils and are transparent about the type and quality of the materials that they use. Both Orlando Mattress and Atlas Mattress can provide information about the materials inside any of their mattresses but at the Atlas Mattress Factory showroom their first language is Spanish so while they can certainly answer general questions … for more technical questions it may be a good idea to call Orlando Mattress if you don’t speak Spanish. They can also custom build.
http://www.superpages.com/bp//Coleman-Mattress-Co-L0007256342.htm Local factory direct manufacturer in Jacksonville that has been making mattresses for 30 years. they don’t have a website but I talked with Jack Coleman here and they make a range of latex, innerspring, and memory foam mattresses. Most of their business is commercial but they have a local showwoom that also sells direct to consumers and would be well worth a visit.
If these are just too far to drive … then I made a few calls to some local outlets that may be some of your better local choices. When I talked to them … they all seemed very willing to provide information about what was in their mattresses and if they didn’t know (most spec sheets for example don’t include the quality/density of the polyfoam they use) they would be happy to find out. The brands I listed beside each one may have better quality/value than other choices in the larger “name brands”.
http://www.dumasfurniture.com/ Gainesville, FL. Golden
http://www.completesleepandfurnishings.com/ Gainesville, Chiefland, FL. MLily memory foam.
Planned Furnishings - Gainesville, FL 32601 Gainesville, FL. Jamison (incl latex).
mydenmarkfurniture.com Starke, FL. Jamison.
There are basically 3 types of foam and almost every mattress you encounter will contain foam of one type or another. These are memory foam (and a variation called gel memory foam like the iComfort), polyfoam, and latex foam. Latex tends to be the coolest (most breathable) foam followed by polyfoam followed by memory foam although there are variations within each category. Part of the heat issues that some people have with some types of foam can be alleviated somewhat by using more breathable versions of that particular type of foam … natural or “heat regulating” ticking materials, breathable mattress protectors or pads (like wool) and the bedding you use. How soft the foam you use is and how deeply you sink into the upper layers of the mattress will also play a role in how hot it sleeps.
Hope this helps … and feel free to post with any questions or comments along the way.
Phoenix
Excellent reply - I will tell people about your site… Thanks. I’ll report back as to what I end up doing.
I also live in Gainesville and appreciate the information on this site and in this thread. I only wish I stumbled across it sooner. Emonkejl, did you find something local?
I really need to order something in the next dayfor so since we move into a new house on Friday and don’t yet have a mattress for the king platform bed over there. In the stores the three that most appealed to us are the Tempur Cloud Luxe and Cloud Supreme and the iCloud revolution.
I realize that might just be the showroom feel and having slept on a firmer coil mattress for several years it is hard to know what we will most like after the break in timeframe. I had a Tempur celebrity I liked about 10 years ago. My wife is pretty small but I am 6’2 230lbs so it seems your recommendation is something firmer getting over the 5lb threshold. I am wondering if any of the ones that seem to get great reviews on amazon would work well for us (or if any of the other manufacturers would work if they ship). Two that seemed like they might fit the bill would be:
https://www.amazon.com/SilverRest-Sleep-Shop-14-Inch-Mattress/dp/B002K4I5LA/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
I am tempted to try it because of the cost compared to the national brands but figured I’d ask your opinion.
Thanks,
Dan
Hi swassbac,
The two mattresses you are mentioning are a classic case of “buyer beware” and an example of how misleading various descriptions can be. I’ll break down the description of both of them to highlight what I mean and to show that both of them use low quality/density memory foam. Both of them are sourced in china and are not certified by anyone that I know of in terms of chemicals or offgassing which means that their “safety” is also unknown.
Dynasty Mattress 12":
This uses 5" of memory foam over 7" of poyfoam.
The King size weighs 114.7 lbs (and for the sake of ease I’ll exclude the cover in these calculations which if it was removed would make the shipping weight even lower).
5" x 76" x 80" = 17.59 cu. ft. (cubic ft of the memory foam)
17.59 x 5 lbs/cu.ft = 87.95 lbs. (weight of the memory foam if it was really 5 lbs)
114.7 lbs (total weight) - 87.95 = 26.75 lbs (should be the weight of the base polyfoam)
7" x 76" x 80" = 24.63 cu ft (base polyfoam layer)
26.75 lbs (remaining weight) / 24.63 cu. ft. = 1.09 lbs which should be the density of the base layer if the rest of the stats are correct. This is clearly not the case (or if it was it would be complete “junk” form and a base layer should be at least 1.8 lbs density or at least 1.5 lbs in a lower budget mattress with higher quality comfort layers).
If the memory foam was 4 lbs … then the base layer would work out to 1.8 lbs which is far more likely.
In addition to this … the durability of memory foam is determined by its polymer density. Many lower quality manufacturers will add filler materials to their memory foam to lower the cost and also raise the density of the material so it looks to be higher quality than it is. This addition of particulates (like sand) actually lowers the durability of the memory foam it is added to while also making it firmer.
So this mattress is likely to be a 4 lb memory foam which could be even lower density memory foam with some type of filler added to it (typical of some cheap Asian manufacturers) which would give it the quality/durability of sub 4 lb memory foam which was over a 1.8 lb base layer also of unknown quality. In other words … it is a roll of the dice becaue they don’t disclose which Chinese manufacturer is making their foam. The absolute best case is that it is a basic 4 lb memory foam over a basic 1.8 lb polyfoam. In addition to this … if it really is high quality memory foam … then 5" is a very risky construction (some people would be out of alignment with this much “pure” memory foam depending again on what was in it)
SilverRest Luxury Grand 14":
This is also imported from China.
It uses 6" of memory foam over 8" of polyfoam and weighs 120 lbs.
6" x 76" x 80" = 21.11 cu. ft. (cubic ft of the memory foam)
21.11 x 5 lbs/cu.ft = 105.55 lbs. (weight of the memory foam if it was really 5 lbs)
120.0 lbs (total weight) - 105.55 = 14.45 lbs (should be the weight of the base polyfoam)
8" x 76" x 80" = 28.14 cu ft (base polyfoam layer)
14.45 lbs (remaining weight) / 28.14 cu. ft. = .5 lbs which should be the density of the base layer if the rest of the stats are correct. This also is clearly not the case or it too would be “junk” foam and I doubt they even make foam of this low quality.
This mattress would “work out” if it used about 3 lb memory foam (the base layer would then be about 2.0 lbs) or 3.5 lb memory foam (the base layer would be about 1.6 lbs). Of course the cover looks fancier and is probably more expensive and the mattress is “thicker” overall which means that a higher price can be “justified” even though it may use even lower quality materials than the Dynasty.
Bottom line … these are not the “deal” they appear to be.
Are they “worth” the prices they are charging?
To me the answer to this would depend on many things but one of the most important would be how comfortable someone is with unknown materials that are also unknown in terms of how suitable a particular mattress construction is for their own circumstances (height/weight/body shape/sleeping positions/ preferences) and the cost of returning a mattress if the layering isn’t suitable for you regardless of the quality of the foam.
These two examples are typical of the type of misleading advertising and low quality materials that are flooding the market and people are still buying it because they don’t have the “reference points” to check the claims that are being made.
So hopefully this answers what I “think” of these types of mattresses and “deals”.
I personally would not take the chance either from a perspective of long term safety of from the perspective of using 5" of lower density memory foam for someone who was over 200 lbs. Even someone smaller would likely do much better with a thinner layer of memory foam or at least a different type of layering.
I personally would avoid both of these both because of the quality of the materials, the unknown suitability of the layering, and because I would not want to support any business which represents their product as being something other than they are … regardless of how many people are “happy” because they think they received such a deal, were blinded by the price they paid, and had no way to really know the quality of what they purchased. Even cheap materials can feel good … for a while … especially for someone who is already subjectively predisposed to like it because they think they found such a “bargain”.
Before considering any memory foam mattress … I would make sure it fits the four criteria listed in post #10 here.
Phoenix