Good stores to purchase a Mattress in College Station, TX

[phoenix]

Hi djag67,

thanks for your “Houston feedback”

I think your experience with the Better Bed Store is fairly typical and they don’t appear to be as knowledgeable as other retailers or manufacturers. They are owned by the same group (Merrick Group) that owns Angel Beds and Tranquility mattress and other internet sites.

Knowing whether Talalay latex is 100% natural or blended can be difficult. It isn’t made any easier by the naming conventions used by Latex International who often calls their blended Talalay “natural” and their 100% natural Talalay “all natural”. This ends up leading to retailers who are confused about what they are selling.

In looking at the Tranquility site it’s difficult to know what they are currently using based on their terminology (the letter you listed was from 2005 and doesn’t indicate what they are currently using). In some places they call their Talalay “natural” (which could mean blended if they used LI’s terminology) and in other places they call it 100% all natural (which would mean 100% natural) and in other places they say 100% pure Talalay latex which could mean anything at all because Talalay is a manufacturing process and any latex, natural or synthetic, that is made with the Talalay process would be “100% pure talalay latex”. Normally though if an ILD is specified that is one of the rated ILD’s used by the manufacturer for their blended Talalay (you can see the Latex International ILD’s here) then it’s blended. It looks to me like they are using 100% natural Talalay though (which comes in N1 - N5 if its made by LI and not ILD ratings) and their Dunlop is also 100% natural but 100% natural Dunlop is much more common than Talalay.

Their information about fire retardants is somewhat suspect as well. If they are using a “salt” as their fire retardant then it is likely a halogenated fire retardant and most likely Bromine and as you can see on the wikipedia site here there are some fairly serious concerns about many Brominated fire retardants and some have been banned in Europe.

Prior to heading to houston, after checking most of what College Station had to offer I found that I enjoyed the two opposite ends of the mattress spectrum. I liked firm mattresses (denver mattress Dr.'s Choice zoned in particular) because my lower back really felt supported (I’ve had some lower back issues) but then I also liked the really plush latex because of overall comfort. As such, I envisioned a hypothetical perfect mattress as something with some sort of zoned coils with plush latex on top.

This actually isn’t so unusual because all mattresses are a combination of firmer support materials and softer comfort materials. A mattress that has firm support can have many variations of comfort layers on top of the firm support which can itself vary from soft to firm and would still be “firm support” . In other words the pressure relieving softness/firmness of the comfort layers are different from the “support” firmness/softness of the support layers although they certainly interact with and affect each other.

Any comments/concerns on this mattress idea would be appreciated. My intuition is that the zoned support will still come through the soft latex, does that seem right? Would I be better off just sticking with the original mattress instead of customizing?

Before placing the order, I was probably going to call the HMF and fully confirm what was in the memory foam layer of the original mattress. Is it worthwhile/useful to compare ILDs of memory foam and latex? Or is that more apples to oranges? I also should probably check to see if he gets latex from Latex International.

This would depend on the layering and specifics of the latex mattress you are using as a reference point (the one you called really plush) but overall I would tend to avoid latex layers that were that soft unless you are very light (and you aren’t what I would call light) and the 4" thickness may also be more suitable for a side sleeper than a back sleeper although your own experience is always more important than any “theory at a distance”. I would tend to use at least 24 ILD in the surface layer and then based on your experience with this see if you need an additional layer of softer latex (and I still wouldn’t go as low as the mid teens). Latex is the most durable of the foam materials but all soft foam will soften faster than firmer foams and most manufacturers would be very hesitant using ILD’s that low with your weight. Of course the advantage of having a separate topper is that it can be replaced without having to replace the whole mattress.

With memory foam, ILD is not really a relevant spec because it changes with temperature, humidity, and the amount of time it is compressed and it certainly isn’t comparable to latex ILD’s which in turn aren’t comparable to polyfoam ILD’s either. Even Talalay and Dunlop in the same ILD will have a different firmness level for most people because Dunlop gets firmer faster than Talalay once you are past 25% compression where ILD is usually (but not always) measured. ILD is really only comparable if you are making comparisons between the same material. There is more about comparing memory foam to latex in post #2 here. You can also read about the difficulties involved in using ILD to compare different materials in post #6 here.

As far as the source of latex I would consider both manufacturers of Talalay latex (Latex International and Radium) to be good quality (and there are some manufacturers who prefer the feel and consistency of Radium) and while latex International doesn’t make Dunlop … most of the Dunlop that is available is also good quality and I would compare it based on the blend of the Dunlop (ranging from 100% natural to synthetic) more than by who makes it.

Overall … when you are considering a design that you haven’t specifically tested then your recourse if you make a choice that is less than ideal can be an important part of your personal value equation.

Phoenix