My purchase experience from The Mattress Expert

Discussions General Mattresses Questions
1

I tried to convince my wife that buying from an online store, i.e., APMC, plus the forum’s 5% discount, would save us money on an all latex mattress. My wife though has to try before she buys, so we visited 2 retailers in our area that sell PLB mattresses , the Bedstore in Maryville, TN and Mattress Furniture Expo in Cleveland, TN. We tried the Pamper, Nature, Nutrition, and Beautiful models. The mattress is for our quest room so we thought that PLB’s Nature model would be the best. It has about a medium firm feel. I called 5 other PLB retailers within 120 miles of us to get prices on the Nature model. I also checked internet retailer’s prices and found that The Mattress Expert was the cheapest, $2199 for the Nature queen, plus $300. for the foundation, no sales tax, and free shipping.

All b&m retailers were willing to negotiate down from PLB’s MAP (minimum advertised price), and, of course they were all ON SALE.

The Mattress Expert’s website though could be a bit more transparent. There is info on the mattresses he sells and he will, upon request, provide you with more detailed specs. I emailed him about the specs for PLB’s Nature and within a day he emailed me back the same specs as listed on the forum.
There is contact info, email and phone, but no physical address listed. So I emailed him about this. He informed me that there had been a fire at his b&m store in Cherry Hill, NJ, and since most of his business was internet sales he has partnered up with Gardner’s Mattress in Lancaster, PA , A- BBB rating, and Home Mattress Center in Delaware, A+ BBB rating.

So I ordered a queen PLB Nature set from him. The mattress and foundation were shipped by freight, white glove delivery service, from Gardner’s Mattress. It took about 2 weeks for delivery, since the set was ordered new from the factory. Both the mattress and foundation were boxed, banded, and encased in thick plastic wrap.

This mattress is for the quest room so I am not worried about a comfort exchange; but I was curious so I emailed him about their comfort exchange policy. This was his reply, "The factory does not accept returns for any other reason than damage or defect. Comfort exchanges are done at the factory level, with any brand". I can see where freight comfort exchanges would be very costly and you would have to re-box the entire mattress. If you still had the box, since white glove service means that they remove all boxes and packing.

The Cliff Notes:
Pros: Lowest price I could find for a PLB queen size Nature mattress and foundation, free white glove service freight shipping with tracking, no sales tax. This saved me 9.75% in TN. His partners have A- and A+ BBB ratings. All my emails were answered within 24 hours. He has been in the mattress business 30+ years.
Cons: Website could be more transparent. Because of their comfort exchange policy make absolutely certain that if you decide to order a mattress from him you try it out first for a minimum of 30 minutes. Take the pillow you sleep on with you when you try out the mattress.

I would definitely purchase another mattress from him again if the price is right.

2

Hi BobP,

Thanks for once again taking the time to share your experiences and write another great post.

Do you happen to know if he’s shut down all his stores. He is listed in one of the local lists and had 4 stores in Wilmington, Dover, and Newark but when I looked at his site he no longer lists any local stores. Home Mattress Center is in Wilmington but the others don’t seem to exist any longer and I never did see a store on his site in Cherry Hill (the old site locations are on the wayback machine here).

I think you made a great choice for a guest bedroom and you should have some happy visitors :slight_smile:

Phoenix

3

Phoenix,
The only retail store that I know of that he operated was in Cherry Hill, NJ. He closed that store in 2009 due to a fire and did not reopen another. His old website was called ccmattress.com and the retail store was C & C Mattress.

There is another chain of mattress stores in Delaware called Mattress Expert(s), LLC. Here’s their BBB rating. The address in their BBB rating is the same as in the link you posted, 231 Executive Drive, Suite 4, Newark, DE 19702, and here, 3905 Kirkwood Hwy, Wilmington, DE 19808.
I also do not see his named listed on the BBB rating under Business Management.

BobP

4

Hi BobP,

Pete Cancelli has (and does) run many blogs over the years with different URL’s including

http://blog.pennlive.com/mattress/index.html

http://mattressexpert.typepad.com/the_mattress_expert/
http://blog.nj.com/the_mattress_expert/index.html

His blogs used to link to ccmattress.com and now (since about Oct 2009) they link to themattressexpert.com.

The NJ store may have been on their ccmattress website but the three I listed on DE were on their themattressexpert website until recently which is why I included them in the local list.

The address you listed in Newark was listed on their site as their clearance center. The one in West Wilmington was one of two stores they listed in Wilmington as well. There was also one in Dover, DE. My guess is that Mattress Experts LLC is or was probably a parent company or a sister company for themattressexpert (formerly ccmattress).

EDIT: I talked with Peter and he confirmed to me that they are now partnering with two different stores where you can test some of their mattresses (the Reverie is only available online though) which are http://www.homemattresscenter.com/ in Wilmington, New Castle, and Newark, (no PLB) and with http://gardnersmattressandmore.com/ in Lancaster, PA.

Phoenix

5

Just a guess, he may have sold his interest in the Delaware stores. Manta states that Mattress Experts LLC was established in 2010. It’s a bit confusing.

6

Hi BobP,

That’s for sure!

Sometimes when I do research on some companies it can seem like I’m researching a multinational corporation with multiple layers of ownership and multiple connections to all kinds of other companies.

Phoenix