Memory foam-pros and cons

Hi TD Bauer,

Thank you. I’d like to think so. :wink:

“Review” sites (most of which are really “revenue” sites) are generally the absolute least reliable way to choose a mattress, and if you “depend heavily” upon them to make a purchase, I would suggest you hit “reset” on how you are going about selecting a mattress, as it’s not possible for a review site to make specific suggestions or recommendations for either a mattress, manufacturers/retailers, or combinations of materials or components because the first “rule” of mattress shopping is to always remember that you are the only one that can feel what you feel on a mattress and there are too many unknowns, variables, and personal preferences involved that are unique to each person to use a formula or for anyone to be able to predict or make a specific suggestion or recommendation about which mattress or combination of materials and components or which type of mattress would be the best “match” for you in terms of “comfort”, firmness, or PPP or how a mattress will “feel” to you or compare to another mattress based on specs (either yours or a mattress), sleeping positions, health conditions, or “theory at a distance” that can possibly be more reliable than your own careful testing (hopefully using the testing guidelines in step 4 of the tutorial) or your own personal sleeping experience (see mattress firmness/comfort levels in post #2 here).

People are also very different and if you choose a mattress based on the premise that “many people seem to like this type of mattress so I will probably like it as well” it can create unrealistic expectations because any individual (and for that matter most individuals) may be very different from the “average” of a group in terms of their body type, sleeping positions, and preferences and there is no way to know whether the specific mattress they are considering was even included in the group or has any weight in the results.

You can see my comments about many of the so called “review sites” which are mostly just revenue sites that know little about mattresses or mattress materials in post #11 here and in posts #4 and #6 here, many which don’t provide any particularly meaningful or accurate information and instead depend upon traffic and backlinks to build SEO and income.

A big part of the underlying problem with these types of marketing systems is that consumers as a whole put too much trust in mattress reviews in the first place (either positive or negative) in the mistaken belief that they are a good way to assess whether a mattress would be a suitable or a durable choice for them so they end up choosing a mattress for all the wrong reasons based on other people’s experiences and reviews or on the “deal” they think they are getting instead of legitimate “fact based” research that would be relevant to their own unique needs, preferences, and criteria. This is more of an issue with consumers in general that can really only be solved with education about how to buy a mattress.

The goal of this forum has always been to help educate and inform and to help people identify the criteria that are most important to them and to help with “how” to choose, not “what” to choose, and this way they can be well on their way toward making an informed decision when considering memory foam mattresses, especially those imported from Asia or China (read post #6 here) which may have been compressed for long periods of time in either shipping or storage before being purchased and would make this somewhat of a risky purchase IMO.

Phoenix