My Select Foam Review

Discussions General Mattresses Questions
1

After having my mattress for a few months now, I wanted to give a full Select Foam review of my experiences with them to help other members of this forum that may be interested in buying their next mattress.

I have to say, I’m extremely disappointed in working with this company and HIGHLY recommend that you go with one of their competitors to purchase your memory foam mattress from. My entire purchase experience was a bit of a disaster. I talk about it a bit in my post here.

But now that I’ve had my mattress for the duration of their trial period, I wanted to give a further update, especially because I just finished my email conversation with their customer service rep.

Here’s the email that I sent them with minor editing of unneeded info:

Hey,

Thanks for reaching out!

So, here’s the deal…

I placed an order for a king bed back in early April and it ultimately took exactly 1 month for the bed to ship and be delivered to my house. During that time, I tried calling, emailing, communicating with anyone from Selectfoam but for at least a week, nobody was taking my calls, responding to my emails or anything.

I just wanted to know what was going on as I was completely left in the dark.

In fact, if you go through the email thread I attached you on, you could see there were multiple times that I tried to communicate with one of your representatives and he ignored my emails.

To say it was a frustrating experience would be an understatement.

During that period I had seriously contemplated canceling the whole order but I gave it a shot (perhaps I should have just cancelled based on the responses from Peter).

So that was my experience with the order process… fast forward to today and I emailed your rep exactly 2 business days after my 90 day trial was over asking if there were any other mattresses that could perhaps better suit me.

The bed I have now is great when I’m on my back but I find it to be on the firmer side when I’m on my side or stomach. I’m not saying it’s uncomfortable, just not super comfortable if that makes sense and I wanted to know if there was something else that may better suit me.

I get that I did email him past the 90 day window (your competitor has a 120 day window btw brooklyn bedding but it’s not like I’m coming to you half a year later. We’re talking about a couple days. I happen to be doing a lot of traveling recently and didn’t even think about this until last week. Forgive me for having other things on my mind aside from my mattress…

So that’s the deal. I’m not even asking for anything yet, I’m just curious to see if there are better mattress options given the way that I sleep and what could be done, if anything to accommodate me.

Thanks!

Their response was a simple, “you’re past the 90 day trial, sorry”. That’s not their exact wording but you get the idea. BTW, it took 2 weeks and 2 follow up emails for me to get that response.

And hey, I get it.

Technically, I’m past that time period, but we’re talking about 2 days. That’s pretty dang close in my book, especially considering all the crap I had to go through just to get the mattress.

I actually thought about emailing them earlier in the week and forgot. Crazy to think some of us have other things on our mind, I know.

All in all, I just find this company to be incredibly unprofessional and have zero customer service skills. As a business owner myself, I bend over backwards to make sure that I have raving fans of my product since, after all, they are my best and marketing sources.

That being said, I don’t hate the product, but I would never purchase anything from Select Foam again and I certainly would never recommend them to anyone.

I hope that my story and my experience helps other members of this forum avoid the headache that I had with Select Foam…

Cheers!

2

Hi jc118,

I’m sorry to hear about your disappointment with your mattress and your experience with Select Foam. I did take the opportunity to talk with them (as I often do when a member of the forum has issues their experiences or with a mattress that was sold by one of the members here or a retailer or a manufacturer that I know).

As I’m sure you realize … the most important part of any trial period that you have agreed to when you purchase a mattress is recognizing that it’s a “backup plan” with a final date beyond which no further options are possible unless the company has previously agreed to an exception based on their communications with you before the trial period ended. The reason for this is that in the age of the internet any exceptions that are agreed to after a trial period has ended and then discussed publicly becomes a “de facto” new policy which in turn becomes part of the expectations of all customers that are in a similar situation and read that you have been given an exception. In effect there is no longer a 90 day trial period at all. 90 days becomes 92 days which becomes 95 days which becomes 100 days etc as each new exception leads to a new baseline of future expectations and if a manufacturer then says “no” then every customer that is in a similar situation will say “but you did this for someone else … why not me”.

The reality is that long before 90 days is over a customer will know whether a mattress is suitable for them and for those few that are approaching the end of their trial period and they are still undecided then it’s their responsibility to ask for guidance or even an exception or extension before the trial period comes to an end. These types of communications should ideally be initiated by a customer long before a trial period is over so that there is still time to assess whether the options you chose are successful. If there is a previous history that a customer is unhappy and has communicated with a company looking for solutions then it would be much more likely that the issues will be solved much more quickly of if they aren’t that they will be given an exception based on timely communications much earlier in the process.

I do understand your frustration over a matter of 2 days but the real issue here is that your initial communication was 92 days after you received your mattress when it would have been much more appropriate to have communicated with them closer to 30 or 60 days after you received your mattress when it was already clear that there were issues that you hoped to solve. This way you could have asked for some guidance, suggestioins, or options or even an extension long before 90 days was over rather than being pressured by a clock ticking or waiting until after the alarm has already rung. Acting in a timely manner is both the responsibility of a customer for the parts of a transaction or communications they are responsible for and the responsibility of a retailer or manufacturer is for the parts of a transaction or communications they are responsible for. As you know, there are companies with both longer and shorter trial periods so making sure that you understand and are comfortable with the specifics of a trial period for the company you are dealing with before a purchase and then initiating any actions that are necessary in a timely manner inside that trial period is an important part of the entire purchase process that starts with researching mattresses and the different policies of each company you are considering and ends when know you are happy with the mattress you purchased. The length of other companies trial period may be part of an initial purchase decision but isn’t relevant once you have purchased a mattress.

Select Foam makes some very high quality and good value mattresses but quality and value isn’t important if a mattress isn’t a good match for you in terms of PPP (Posture and alignment, Pressure relief, and Personal preferences) so when this happens it’s important to explore all the options you have in a timely manner because the time frame that you act in is just as important as the time frame that a company acts in. Both of you are equal partners in every transaction and each of you have your own set of responsibilities based on what you agreed to when you purchased your mattress.

Having said all that … and based on my conversations with Select Foam … my understanding is that while you are outside the time frame where an exchange or return is possible … they did make an exception for you to help you with the comfort or pressure relief issues you are having which is which is to purchase a topper at a 50% discount instead of full retail price. Based on your post it’s not clear that you remembered this or were aware that it was still open to you so I thought I’d mention it in my reply so that you (and others who are reading this) are clear that they are still giving you a reasonable option to help you solve the issues you are having even though you didn’t communicate with them before your trial period was over … or better yet long before it was over.

While Select Foam has had some issues with their “after sale” service and delays (which you also experienced with your initial delivery) … in this case the reason for your situation is really your own responsibility and it seems to me that in spite of the fact that your trial period is over that they are still making a reasonable exception for you that may help you solve the issues you are having.

Phoenix

3

Hey Phoenix,

Thanks for the follow up and hey, I acknowledge that I should have contacted them sooner. I’m not saying that it wasn’t my responsibility but what I am saying is that I’ve very rarely been in a situation where a couple of days wasn’t something that could be accommodated. This is on the business and on the customer side.

I’m just shocked that a potential exchange, where I would be expecting to pay them more money, was treated in such a manner.

That being said, in this particular case, I can legitimately say that I didn’t notice or think that the mattress wasn’t best suited for me until a week or so prior to me contacting Select Foam. I didn’t even mention anything to my partner until a few days prior to notifying select foam what I had noticed given my sleep patterns.

For all I know, the mattress could still be best suited for me, I just want to know if there’s something that’s a better option given the way that I sleep.

All in all, that’s really not the point of my review though. It’s mainly to point out that I’ve had a terrible service experience from start to finish with Select Foam. Oh yeah, I didn’t even mention that it took me a week after my initial email, following up to see if there was a resolution, before they replied. The product itself I think is pretty decent, it’s the service that I’ve been really frustrated with every step along the way.

4

Hi jc118,

Unfortunately … there are too many unknowns, variables, and preferences involved to know this with any certainty based on either specs (yours or a mattress) or “theory at a distance” that can possibly be more accurate than your own testing or sleeping experience. This is the reason why a trial period is so important because if this could be known with certainty then a trial period wouldn’t be necessary. Having said that … it would be well worthwhile to have a conversation on the phone about the topper option they have made available to you to see if it might be a reasonable solution because they would almost certainly be willing to provide you with the benefit of their knowledge and experience and I doubt that they have lost the desire for you to have a more positive experience with their mattress.

[quote]Thanks for the follow up and hey, I acknowledge that I should have contacted them sooner. I’m not saying that it wasn’t my responsibility but what I am saying is that I’ve very rarely been in a situation where a couple of days wasn’t something that could be accommodated. This is on the business and on the customer side.

I’m just shocked that a potential exchange, where I would be expecting to pay them more money, was treated in such a manner.[/quote]

I think that outside of your delivery experience … they did the “right” thing with your exchange for all the reasons I mentioned in my last reply. They stuck to the terms of their agreement with you regardless of whether it may have helped or hurt them (in other words profit or loss wasn’t the issue and it was a “principle based” decision) and they offered you a possible solution that was outside of their policy as an exception to help you solve your issues.

The logo of the site is a set of Borromean rings with a Mobius strip connecting them. This reflects my belief that there is a partnership of sorts between manufacturers, retailers, and consumers and that if there is a weak link in any of them that breaks then all the rings fall apart and you end up with “challenging” situations where the most common outcome is that each part of the partnership ends up blaming the others. The Mobius strip signifies my belief that in reality (or at least in a perfect world) that all of these are on the same side and that all of them are accountable for their own actions.

The goal of the site is to help strengthen each part of the industry (manufacturers, retailers, and consumers) so that manufacturers make better quality mattresses and are more transparent, retailers can provide better service, guidance, and value to their customers, and consumers can make more educated and informed choices based on knowledge and legitimate research instead of marketing stories. The goal is to work towards each of these being more accountable for their part of the “partnership” they are responsible for so that it functions more as an equal partnership where the “best outcome” for all three is the same. The biggest issues in the market today IMO are manufacturers that make lower quality mattresses and are not transparent … retailers that have little meaningful knowledge about the mattresses they sell or that are more concerned with their profit margins or selling anything that a customer is willing to buy than the legitimate and reasonable best interests of their customers … and consumers that have unrealistic expectations about what is possible and what isn’t in a mattress or that don’t do the legitimate research that can allow them to replace hindsight with foresight.

I am not one of those who believes that “customers are always right” because while all areas of the industry (manufacturers, retailers, and consumers) have a long way to go and none are immune from making mistakes or not living up to the terms of their agreements … based on my experiences customers tend to have more unrealistic expectations about what is or isn’t possible and what isn’t or about exceptions that they believe should be made for them when they don’t take care of their end of the purchase agreement. In other words complaints from consumers on the internet that aren’t always reasonable, are based on unrealistic expectations or lack of meaningful research, or not realizing that they are only one part of a much bigger picture where the interests of all the parties in a “partnership” need to be taken into account has become much too common … especially because it’s so easy for consumers to be anonymous on the internet today and a single anonymous complaint (reasonable or otherwise) will affect so many people who also believe that customers should always be given what they ask for and that their interests should be more important than the other two parts of the industry. These types of complaints based on “I’m entitled” or “I believe I should be an exception because of “fill in the blank”” has replaced responsibility or even gratitude to a large degree and when a business does make an exception (such as your topper) it still isn’t enough to generate a “thank you” and leads to a complaint or “negative review” anyway … even when they are under no obligation to do anything at all.

While I understand that this may not be what you wanted to hear … and there have been other examples of “frank” and direct replies I’ve written on the forum in response to other members that have also “blamed” a manufacturer for choices that they are responsible for (see post #6 here for another example connected to a different manufacturer) … one of the goals of this site is to use situations like this to help educate other consumers so that they don’t end up making the same mistakes as you did.

Phoenix

5

We can agree to disagree on that one.

They didn’t offer me anything or even respond to my inquiry until I had to follow up with them a week later.

The only reason they are offering anything is because I wrote a review online (which I told them I would do via email) of my experience. I gave them 5 days to reply to that email and they chose not to.

Everyone is free to come to their own conclusions as to whether they did the “right” thing based on those facts.

I’m not sure the point you’re trying to make here or if you’re trying to say I’m ungrateful or what?

I’m telling my story, that’s all.

At no point have I said that I’m entitled to anything. All I’ve discussed in this post is my dissatisfaction with their service and communication with me. While I’m grateful that they are now trying to make it right, this all could have easily been avoided had there been better communication with me.

6

Hi jc118,

Again … you were past the deadline so anything that they offer you would be a “bonus” based on an exception so it wouldn’t matter whether you wrote an online review or not … you were still past the trial period as a result of your own decisions. My understanding is that they offered you the chance to purchase a topper at a 50% discount when you first contacted them on August 4th when your trial period was already over (and before you wrote anything). This isn’t a “new” offer based on a review.

I agree with this and hopefully others that purchase from them will learn from your experiences and won’t make the same choices that you did and put themselves in the same position where they are dependent on a manufacturer making an exception to their policy that could cause harm to their business by setting a precedent for future customers.

To put it directly … it seems to me that your unhappiness is the result of your own choices and “forgetting” to contact them when you were still inside your trial period and that you are passing the responsibility for your choices on to them by writing a negative review that “blames” them for sticking to the terms of their agreement with you and because they didn’t make an exception for you (outside of the topper offer). To me this is “sour grapes” based on trying to portray them as being responsible for the choices you made.

In this case … the lack of timely communication came from you when you waited until your trial period was over before contacting them and it was already too late to correct any issues that you had with your mattress.

While I agree that their communication can sometimes leave something to be desired and your initial experience with your delivery wasn’t the best … you still had a full 90 day trial period and in this case the communication issues were the result of your own choices. The best way to have avoided all of this would have been if you had contacted them before your trial period was over.

This isn’t personal … and I am still happy to help you with any issues you may have to the degree that I can … but it is “direct” and is my best assessment of your situation when all the parts of the bigger picture are taken into account and both sides of the story are included in the topic.

Phoenix

7

I was wondering where you were getting this topper thing…

No, your understanding is incorrect.

They never offered me a discounted topper (which I didn’t ask for). I had a service rep ask me to clarify what the situation was on August 8th and had to follow up twice to get a response from my email on the 20th (2 weeks later).

Nope, them not trying to accommodate me was icing on the cake. The lack of communication, ignored phone calls and emails, is what is frustrating and is why I’m sharing my story.

Sure, I feel that after my experience throughout the entire order and delivery process they would be a little more accommodating but that’s less of the point.

We can agree to disagree here… In my book, when a customer service rep asks to know what is going on, they should respond promptly when the customer does. Not make the customer follow up with them twice in order to solicit a response (2 weeks later).

Anyway, you seem to be arguing business practices that we clearly disagree on which is fine. I appreciate your help with this matter nonetheless.

That being said they have contacted me now and offered to return my mattress so for that I’m grateful.

I’m not sure that’s the route that I’m going to go just yet as it wasn’t my intention to just return it. I just wanted to start a dialogue and find out if there are better options for me…

So, to be fair, they’ve now tried to make both of my issues with them right. They sent me free pillows when I had my issues with the shipment of the mattress and now they’re allowing me to return the mattress. I just wish that I could have had this dialogue with the reps themselves and not feel like I had to share my experiences online…

Cheers!

8

Hi jc118,

[quote]I was wondering where you were getting this topper thing…

No, your understanding is incorrect.

They never offered me a discounted topper (which I didn’t ask for). I had a service rep ask me to clarify what the situation was on August 8th and had to follow up twice to get a response from my email on the 20th (2 weeks later).[/quote]

My “understanding” came from an extensive conversation with them and their detailed records of all the conversations and emails that you have exchanged. While they certainly have some issues with clear communications … they do keep extensive internal records of every interaction with their customers. I realize that you didn’t ask for the topper but it was offered on August 4th as an alternative to a return or exchange in an effort to solve the issues you were having. Unfortunately it wasn’t mentioned again in your later communication on August 8th when it was confirmed that no return or exchange was possible. I told them in my conversation with them that it was quite likely that you didn’t realize that the offer was still open (or may not have remembered it was even made in the first place) because it had come from a previous conversation (on August 4th) that had been superseded by your later communication and that had I been in your shoes I probably would have thought the same thing as you did.

I also told them (in fairly harsh terms) that they needed to be clearer in their communications and that there needed to be one person that you were dealing with so that you weren’t getting mixed messages originating from different people. My comment was along the lines of “if I am having difficulty understanding the options you offered and when you offered them and which options were still available then I would imagine that your customer would be as well”. I told them that I believed that they needed to reach out to you and clarify that this was an option that was still available which it seems they did.

While I didn’t suggest it … I’m glad to see that they have reconsidered their position about a return as well given the uncertainty involved in all of this although I continue to believe that the primary responsibility for the situation you are now in is yours because your initial communication didn’t happen until after the 90 day trial period had expired.

[quote]That being said they have contacted me now and offered to return my mattress so for that I’m grateful.

I’m not sure that’s the route that I’m going to go just yet as it wasn’t my intention to just return it. I just wanted to start a dialogue and find out if there are better options for me…[/quote]

This may be the only additional option they are willing to provide. This means that you would have the option of keeping your mattress, returning it, or buying a topper at a 50% discount. I would clarify whether they are willing to exchange your mattress for another one (if that’s what you mean) because this would be a bigger risk on their part and if they were willing to do this at all they may not be willing to provide any additional return options afterwards so you may not have any recourse if you decided that it also wasn’t suitable for you.

I also told them in my conversation with them that the communications between you needed to be more clear and that they shouldn’t need a “translator” to untangle what was said and what was probably understood based on the sequence of events and communications that happened between you and their staff. They certainly have some significant room for improvement in clarifying their communications so they have less “fuzzy edges” and to clarify the “chain of command” so that their customers aren’t getting mixed messages by dealing with different people that may not be telling you exactly the same thing or may not have the full context of previous communications.

Now that you have at least one additional option I hope you have the chance to share what you end up deciding to do.

Phoenix

9

Thanks for following up on this, I really appreciate your help!

But… if those are the records that they have, then they happen to be false. At no point did they offer a topper to me. I received 2 emails from one of their representatives on the 4th and neither of them suggested anything about a topper.

I’ve added screenshots (minus personal info) below that show their correspondence to me.

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785Ă—406 18 KB

As you can see, neither of those show a topper was ever offered.

I even reviewed my voicemails from 8/4 to see if perhaps they called and left a VM and they did not.

So, it’s very disheartening to hear that their records are showing this was offered when it clearly wasn’t. Just to make sure I wasn’t crazy, I did a search in my gmail for a select foam topper and nothing came up. Sorry, but it was never offered.

Anyway, again I really appreciate your speaking with them on my behalf.

I will update the forum with whatever resolution I can come to with them.

10

Hi jc118,

The topper offer was on a phone call and not in an email which is why I suspected that it may have been lost in the chain of events and was the reason for my suggestion that they call you to confirm it.

It’s a fairly “standard” option that they provide when there aren’t any better options available so it would be part of their “normal” suggestions that they have made to others as well but it doesn’t surprise me that if it was offered (which would be their “usual practice” in situations like yours) that it was “lost in the mix” of events.

Phoenix

11

Hey there,

Thanks for following up!

It definitely wasn’t “lost in the chain of events” as it was never offered. Just went through my phone logs and I don’t have ANY phone calls on the 4th, let alone from select foam.

See screenshot:

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They never offered me a topper…

Thanks again for all your help!

Cheers!

12

Hi jc118,

I don’t think there is any point in going down to the last detail of every interaction between you and Select Foam and it’s certainly possible that I may have made a mistake in some details of the conversation I had because I didn’t record it and was much more interested in solving the issues and clarifying the sequence of events than identifying every fine point of “he said she said”.

The bottom line for me is that offering a topper would be “standard practice” for them in these types of situations and it would be unusual if they didn’t and since it’s also in their notes that they did, IMO it’s very likely that they did regardless of whether you remember it or not or whether it’s in your “notes”

The bigger point though regardless of all of this or getting bogged down in an endless “he said she said” of finer and finer datapoints which lead nowhere is that if they did then it wasn’t communicated to you as an option when you were told that you couldn’t return or exchange the mattress which is why I suggested they call you to confirm it. All the micro details of every part of every interaction which took place are unproveable and would only end up missing the point of all of this anyway which is that I’m more interested in solutions than trying to “prove” something that can’t be proven.

Phoenix

13

Hey Phoenix,

Thanks for following up!

Actually, this can all be proven. I have every single data point.

I only am showing you this because you were so adamant that they offered this to me, that they “keep extensive records” and that I should be “grateful” for their offer. Even went so far to tell me the sequence of events that everything happened. This evidenced in post #8 of this thread.

This made me very concerned that they were lying to you when I have all the documents that support otherwise. I wanted to make sure that if they were telling you that, that you knew that that information was not correct and they never offered me anything until yesterday after my post was made on this forum.

For the sake of having the correct information in this review, I feel it’s important to make sure the information represented is correct.

Thanks again for all your help!

14

Hi jc118

Quote from my last reply …

I have no interest in pursuing all the microdetails of all of this ad nauseum.

This part of the conversation has reached its limit and I’ve said what I have to say and what I believe and so have you. I think it’s time to move on from “history” and look at potential solutions and the options you currently have to choose from.

Phoenix