Has anyone bought or tried out the Novaform Serafina mattress from costco? I was originally looking at the icomfort series but was concerned when sleep country would not supply a spec sheet. So after reading reviews online I checked out the costco website and saw the Serafina for $999 canadian. The specs on it seem to be inline with some high priced foam mattresses Ive seen in stores (restonic tempagel restorative mattress, $3499 at Best sleep centre). I loved the feel of the restonic tempagel, but could never justify spending that kind of money on a bed. So when I saw that the specs on the Serafina were comparable to the restonic, for a third of the price, I figured this was the one to buy. A lot of online reviews say the Serafina is very hard, even though its listed on the nova form website as medium/firm, and is not the most firm mattress they offer. So back to my original question, has anyone tried it? Can anyone who knows more about mattresses confirm that the specs are comparable to the Restonic tempagel Restorative mattress? Any help would be very appreciated. Thanks!
Hi MattS,
I would be very careful before considering the Novaform Serafina because the specs may not be nearly as good as you are indicating.
The Gel memory foam is made by Sleep Innovations (the same company that makes the Serta iComfort gel memory foam) but uses lower quality gel memory foam than the icomfort and I believe the Luratex is a 3 lb memory foam (which is very low quality as well). I don’t know the density of the polyfoam support core but it would be reasonable to assume it is lower quality as well (and I would want to know this for certain)
A mattress is only as good as any weak links it contains and I would never consider any mattress where you didn’t know the quality of the layers that are in it (or that used 3 lb memory foam). In the case of the Novaform there are many weak links. It is also very risky to buy a mattress from an outlet that knows very little about mattresses and doesn’t have the knowledge and experience to either tell you the quality of the materials that are in their mattress and may not be particularly good at helping their customers make the best possible choices for their needs and preferences. Even if you buy a mattress that has good value (which I don’t believe the novaform has) … if it doesn’t “fit” you in terms of PPP (Pressure relief, Posture and alignment, and Personal preferences) then you have either spent money on a product that isn’t suitable for you or you have to go through the frustration of returning it and “rolling the dice” once again. The only good news is that in most cases … Costco gives you a “free roll” because of their money back guarantee but even this isn’t likely to protect you against low quality materials if the mattress no longer works for you in a couple of years.
The Restonic uses much higher quality materials (both in the Gel memory foam layer which uses a much higher quality gel memory foam where the gel is mixed in as a liquid rather than a gel particulate and the latex below it is much higher quality as well) so the comparison is not “apples to apples” however I would also not consider the Restorative to be particularly good value either at that price compared to other alternatives that you probably have available.
All of this is based on an analysis of the quality of the materials of course and not on any personal experience with the feel or performance of either mattress which would be different for different people (depending on the body type, sleeping style, and preferences of the person sleeping on the mattress). Since you can’t “feel” quality (except when low quality materials soften too quickly and you lose the comfort or support that it originally had) … the reviews you read can only tell you how well the mattress “fit” the person using it when they first bought it and how it “feels” to one person or even a group of people may have little to do with how well it works or how it feels to the next person that buys it.
If you let me know the city you live in I’d be happy to let you know if there may be some better local options available to you that I’m aware of.
Phoenix
Thanks for the info. I live in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Ive visited Best sleep centre, and I liked the restonic’s they sell, but the prices were a little high for me. And I can’t find the Restonics at any other dealer. Do you know how the Novosbeds compare to the Restonics? Novosbed.ca says they compare favourably to the postur pedic foam mattresses, with over 5lbs of memory foam, at a significantly lower price point. Any info on them?
Hi MattS,
When you are looking at a memory foam mattress there are a few things I would want to confirm before I consider it that are listed in post #10 here.
In the case of novosbed … they are not CertiPur certified and their memory foam comes from China. (NOTE ADDED: this has since changed … see post #513 here and post #8 here)
Without CetiPur certification … you have no way of knowing if the memory foam they use is the polymer density (which indicates the quality) or a filled density (which uses fillers to increase the density of the memory foam and which can be common with Chinese memory foam).
In addition to this … I would want to know who the people are who are selling the mattress. Do they just have an online presence or are they accountable to the “real world” with a brick and mortar presence or with verifiable information about who they are. In the case of Novosbed … they are just a marketing company which is buying cheap memory foam products from China and with the help of an Alberta voucher program is re-selling them in Canada. They are not what I would call “mattress people”.
What is their level of knowledge about mattresses and their ability to “fit” a mattress to the needs and preferences of each customer? If an outlet is trying to say that a particular mattress is “one size fits all” … then they clearly don’t know how mattresses need to fit individual people based on your body type, sleeping style, and individual preferences. I wonder if they would actually tell a customer “I’m sorry … this mattress probably wouldn’t work for you” or if they would put their efforts into convincing you that “anyone would do well with this mattress”. Are they marketing people or are they “mattress people”?
My conversations with them have indicated that they aren’t very transparent about the source of their mattresses.
On the plus side … the reviews are good and they appear to pay for the shipping on a return so like Costco and the other big box stores … you get a free roll of the dice if you are comfortable with the source of the mattresses and that they aren’t CertiPur (or otherwise) certified.
Personally … with something as important as a mattress and with the importance of making sure that it fits your needs and preferences … I would tend to first look locally if there are better options near you that provide both the knowledge and experience to help you make better choices and also have the quality, service and value that is just as important (and is the reason many people look online in the first place believing that they can find better “value”).
Some of the better local options in the Winnipeg area are listed in post #2 here including one of the members of this site.
Hope this helps.
Phoenix