Hi Betsy80,
The foam manufacturers that are CertiPur certified and which of their foams that have been certified are listed on their site here*. These are the foam manufacturers though and not the mattress manufacturers. Only a very small percentage of the mattress manufacturers that use CertiPur certified foams are listed on the CertiPur site in the products section*. In more practical terms … I would be quite comfortable if a foam was manufactured in North America and would only make sure it was CertiPur certified if it was manufactured offshore … especially in China or Asia. Most reputable manufacturers will tell you if their foams are made in North America or elsewhere.
ADMIN NOTE: *Removed 404 link|Archived Footprint 1: certipur.us/pages/for-industry/find-a-foam-supplier/ |Archived Footprint 2: certipur.us/pages/for-consumers/find-products/
The other certification you are probably referring to is Oeko-Tex which is a certification that is more common for latex as well as other materials such as fabrics. There are other certifications as well. Even “organic” is a certification. I’m not so sure I would try to become an “expert” in any of this and would tend to stick to the “basics” unless there is a particular reason that you would need or choose to spend a lot more time on a very confusing and controversial subject. I would tend to keep it simple.
No not at all. Latex has some great qualities but so do other materials as well and the choice of materials that are in your mattress is a matter of personal preference. The goal is to make sure that no matter which type of material you prefer … that it’s the highest possible quality because all materials have lower and higher quality versions. Like other types of foam … latex comes in a wide range of firmness levels from very soft to very firm.
All memory foam and polyfoam is made from chemicals but the real question to me is one of safety which is where the certification or country of origin comes in. The question of “how safe is safe enough” is something each person needs to answer for themselves. There are people that are ill or have multiple chemical sensitivities or weakened immune systems or even some who as a matter of personal belief want more “absolute” answers and this can lead to many years of frustrating and confusing research and still no clear or “black and white” answers in many cases. There is memory foam that most people would consider to be "safe’ (made in North America or CertiPur certified) and yet others would say that there is no safe memory foam and point to examples of people who have reacted even to CertiPure certified foams. I personally tend to avoid extreme or more “absolute” positions unless it’s for very specific reasons that are more important to me than they would be to most other people.
For some people for example a bee or wasp sting can be life threatening and they would go to extraordinary lengths to avoid it. Others would take more reasonable precautions because it was uncomfortable and some may not even worry about it at all. Exposure to the sun would be a similar example. Since eliminating all risk completely … in mattresses or anything else … is impossible, each of us needs to decide for ourselves what is “safe enough for me” and how much research and time they are willing to invest before any buying decisions can be made.
That depends on how you define “best prices” and on which specific products you are comparing. It’s not the norm that you would find two mattresses that are exactly the same and be able to make this kind of “exact” assessment. I think in terms of “value” rather than price and price is only one part of what I call each person’s “personal value equation” when it comes to mattresses. “Best” is always relative to what is most important to each person and what you are comparing it to.
Having said all that … I can tell you that Parklane is an invited member of this site which means that I believe they are among the best value in the country. Of course that doesn’t mean that only the members here have great value or that they are the only source of good value in an area (there are others as well) or that there isn’t a single mattress in Portland that by some person’s definition may not be “better” than one of theirs but that there is always a point of diminishing returns where the extra hours days or weeks it may take to find out may not be worth the potential small gains and you would need to compare a specific mattress to another specific mattress to know. I can also tell you that I wouldn’t hesitate to buy any mattress that they made that was suitable for me in terms of PPP (Pressure relief, Posture and alignment, and Personal preferences).
Hope this helps
Phoenix