We are looking at the Pure Relax Mattress by Relax the Back. I can’t find as much information on them as I would like. I’m wondering how ‘Pure’ they really are.and if there is any off gassing with these mattresses. They are a bit pricey but they come the closest any green mattress I’ve looked at so far.
Another interesting mattress they carry is the Estasi Mattress, from Italy, even more $$. But it’s cool! Here again, not much information to be found online.
The Pure Relax house brand mattresses are made by Anatomic global which is owned by FXI/Foamex which is a CertiPur certified* American foam manufacturer which makes some high quality foam. FXI uses a VPF (Variable Pressure Foaming) manufacturing process which produces a very open celled and breathable foam.
These are not in any way “green” or “natural” mattresses though and both memory foam and polyfoam are petrochemical based foams no matter what type they are. Most of the American foam pourers do make foams that replace a small part of the petrochemical polyols (one of the two main chemicals that are used to make polyfoam and memory foam) with plant based polyols but even though these are “promoted” everywhere as being “green” or in some cases “natural” … nothing could be further from the truth. They are still polyfoam or memory foam which has replaced a small portion of one of the chemicals (usually under 20%) with a plant oil based alternative. This is certainly a step in a good direction but doesn’t qualify a foam to be called either “green” or “natural” which is what is called “greenwashing”.
Knowing the quality and value of these mattresses would depend on knowing the density of the memory foam and polyfoam they use and the thickness of the layers so they can be compared to other similar mattresses. Without knowing this (or without an outlet that is willing to tell you) there is no way to know the quality and potential durability of a mattress. While these are likely to be good quality, their prices seem quite high compared to similar mattresses that are available that use the same or perhaps higher quality materials (although a better comparison can only be made if you know the density of the material).
The Estasi is one of the mattresses made by Technogel and a forum search on “Technogel” (you can click this) will bring up quite a few posts with comments about them. They are a very high quality and performance material with viscoelastic properties, non toxic, and very durable, but they are also very expensive and there would need to be a clear difference between them and other high quality options in terms of performance ad feel (there are many cool sleeping mattresses) in order to justify their much higher price IMO. The technogel layer is an inch thick and is inserted in a polyfoam layer (either across the whole surface as in the Estasi or Sollievo or across part of it in the Piacere.
Very nice but difficult to justify. They also make some pillows which would be worth considering for someone who loved the feel of this material but they are also very expensive.
If you are looking for non gassing memory foam then have a look at www.myessentia.com
The process is still under patent so who knows how they do it. But using natural latex as a base and adding a few other organic ingredients they have come up with a non toxic mattress that has the feel of memory foam.
Could be more along the lines of what you are looking for than Relax The Back. Very pricey unfortunately.
It may help to read the two threads in the forum about the misleading claims that Essentia is making. One of them is here and the other is here (where they actually registered on the forum and made some comments but then disappeared like they have in other internet forums when the questions started to get more specific and “difficult”). One of these threads was actually active today.
I would strongly recommend doing more in depth research and taking their claims (and many others as well) with many grains of salt before recommending them based either on the comfort of their mattress (which is an individual preference) or the claims on their website (which are suspect at best).
I hadn’t seen those threads. Thank you for pointing them out, it made for very interesting reading. My apologies for jumping the gun, considering Essentia has already been discussed at length on the forum.
You might want to try the tempflow mattress. www.tempflow.com. I bought one in January and I have been happy with it. In fact I wrote a lengthy review (which I haven’t posted yet) I did find some odor with it kind of a musty smell but which I attribute to it being wrapped (full size) in plastic. The smell did wear off in less than a month and was not overwhelming. They also claim no VOC’s and no harmful chemicals used in the binders of the mattress as well. We bought the Salene model which might be too firm for some. for us it was between the Harmonia and that model and my wife liked the firmness of the Salene ( a happy wife gives you a happy life) I cant say enough about their customer service, the people there are great and answered all my questions every time I called. I have since bought a all organic protector from them and another pillow for my mother in law who loved our mattress (she has an old tempurpedic). They don’t list prices on their website we bought a cal king and got it for a little less than 2K with delivery, and a bunky board which was less then we would have paid for the tempurpedic or Icomfort we were considering. I didn’t buy a foundation because I have a platform bed and all I needed was bunky board. If they improve anything I think it should be on the way they price, its hard to tell if you are getting a good deal if you don’t know if it was a price you got or a price everyone gets or if there is any discount. Another plus to this mattress and one of the main reasons I bought is the ventilation system of the mattress actually works and keeps it cool (for memory foam)
I also saw the relax the back mattress you are looking at and they told me the foam was 5lb but with nothing in writing it was hard to establish that. Also they have an exchange only policy and with very few mattresses you will be exchanging up in price because the only other ones they sell are temperpedics. Tempflow offered us a complete refund in 120 days if we didn’t like the mattress NOT AN EXCHANGE. (we would have to pay for return delivery but I thought that was reasonable. They also do toppers if you want to try that out first but it wont give you the same support as a mattress. They also have a latex model but we didn’t see that in their showroom so I cant comment on how it is. If you go to thier showroom in L.A it is small and all the models are twin size there, but you can hop from bed to bed and check them out, they are very accommodating. I think they do have some dealers across the country (not many) so check out thier website for that info or call them.