SleepEZ and Sleeping Organic

In an effort to really look at all our options, we contacted both SleepEZ and Sleeping Oganic about their latex beds.

SleepEZ has on their website that the wool they use is 100% organic. They told us their wool comes from the Wool Gatherers.

Then we called Sleeping Organic. When asked if the wool was organic we were told that no wool in the US can be certified by GOTS, and they get their wool from somewhere up north and its processed by the Wool Gatherers as well. The lady we spoke to also said that any company that claims their wool is certified by GOTS is not true. But I read Savvy Rest wool is from CA and its GOTS certified. This is just one example I am sure there are plenty of others that the wool is from the US and its certified by GOTS.

Are these two companies reputable?

This is disappointing to hear. As I read through the SleepEZ site to see for myself I found it to be misleading as well.

  1. In one place they make the statement: “A organic cotton cover is quilted to natural wool and married to your all-natural latex mattress.” This seems accurate. Organic cotton. Natural wool.

  2. Elsewhere on the same page of their website, they make a different statement regarding the cover: “Quilted to 100% Organic Wool”. This, according to your research, is not accurate.

So at best this is sloppy advertising. At worst it is intentionally deceptive. Quite honestly, in my opinion, none of the discount online resellers are using this terminology in a very precise manner. I feel that “organic” and “natural” are often used interchangeably, and that one can’t really be certain without seeing the actual certifications. Speaking of which, I do not see a GOTS certification anywhere on the SleepEZ site. Only the Oeko-Tek cert. Nevertheless, these folks should not use these terms interchangeably, and they most certainly do know the difference between them.

Lastly, and this is just my personal opinion and a sidebar, natural vs organic wool inside the cover doesn’t make one bit of practical difference. I see no value in paying additional money for one vs. the other. But to each his/her own.

Hi LJGMDAD,

[quote]1. In one place they make the statement: “A organic cotton cover is quilted to natural wool and married to your all-natural latex mattress.” This seems accurate. Organic cotton. Natural wool.

  1. Elsewhere on the same page of their website, they make a different statement regarding the cover: “Quilted to 100% Organic Wool”. This, according to your research, is not accurate.[/quote]

I’m not sure where you are seeing a discrepancy. Their natural line says that it uses natural wool and their organic line says they use organic wool. They have recently launched a new website and their webmaster did make some mistakes in their descriptions that they are correcting as they become aware of it so if you can point out or link to the discrepancy you noticed then they can change it if it’s incorrect.

I do agree with you that if I was a consumer and organic certifications were important I would want to know and I would ask which specific components in a mattress were certified organic so I could differentiate between “soft organic” marketing terminology (usually in the name of a mattress) which is widely used (and IMO too widely used) in the industry and specific descriptions of a material that has an organic certification.

I think that anyone who knew the ownership and history of SleepEZ as well as I do would recognize that nothing they have ever done in their long history has ever been intentionally deceptive and I don’t think this is “sloppy advertising” either although like every other manufacturer they are not immune from making occasional mistakes or having incorrect descriptions on their site which of course they would correct when they become aware of it.

I would agree with this as well (more with wool than with cotton as you can see here) but there are also some people where certified organic materials are part of a lifestyle choice and there are also some other benefits to organic certifications as well that can be important to some people (see post #3 here).

Phoenix

Hi Lulu0915,

As I mentioned in my last reply to LJGMDAD, the wool they use in their natural line is natural and the wool they use in their organic line is organic.

You most likely misunderstood what woolgatherers told you because while their ecowool isn’t certified organic they do supply organic wool to the industry (see here). SleepEZ orders both types of wool for their different mattress lines and I would be very cautious before you accuse a reputable manufacturer of being misleading until you are certain you have accurate information because your comments are also somewhat (although unintentionally) misleading as well and as you can see in the reply after yours when you post inaccurate information it is often “picked up” and believed by others on the internet and then starts “duplicating” itself and taking on a life of its own even though it isn’t accurate.

“Most” of the organic certified wool comes from outside the country but as you can see in the GOTS list here there are also US suppliers of organic wool (although the list doesn’t specify whether the raw wool was sourced in the US).
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I suspect that you may have misunderstood Sleeping Organic’s comments as well and they may have been referring to Ecowool and not wool in general because they would almost certainly be aware that there is GOTS certified organic wool used in the industry.

I do agree with you though that it’s not a good idea for a company to “bash” another one.

Phoenix

For an example of SleepEZ’s terminology discrepancy, click here. On that page, then click “Organic Covers”.

Now, at the top of the page you will see this statement:

Further down on the page, under the description of the cover, you will see this statement:

Two problems: b[/b] These statements should not co-exist in reference to the same cover. I.e. if it is certified organic wool, then and only then call it “organic”. If it is natural but not certified, then call it “natural”. How do I know which one I’m getting, or really even if they offer both. It’s confusing. And b[/b] the claim of organic wool is possibly false, based on supplier feedback. If SleepEZ does provide certified organic wool, then why can’t I find the certifications on their website?

Now again, I don’t feel SleepEZ is alone in this. And in fact I do, unfortunately, find it to be rather common. For those folks determined to purchase 100% organic, they would need to ignore what these companies advertise and go straight to looking for copies of certifications. And quite honestly, even for me, it knocks down my trust level a notch or two.

Hi LJGMDAD,

Thanks… I found the description that says “natural wool” (if you click the “organic cover” section). This mattress uses organic wool and because organic wool is also natural the description is actually correct although they are really “understating” the materials and they could replace “natural” with “organic” (although this is probably a mistake made by their site designer). Even though they are understating the material … I will let them know when I talk with them next.

I agree that it can be confusing but it’s actually correct to call organic wool natural although they are “underselling” the material and this is probably an error made by the people that developed the website (or an artifact from the old site) although it wouldn’t be correct to call natural wool “certified organic”.

The wool they use in their organic line is the certified organic wool supplied by The Wool Gatherers (see here). The “supplier feedback” you are referring to was probably misunderstood and was incorrect (see my reply previous to this one).

Phoenix

Hi Phoenix,

I spoke to the SleepEZ (I spoke to Sean) I asked who is your wool certified organic by. He said he had no organic certifications on the wool. And he said I should call Wool Gatherers, and he gave me the Wool Gatherers website and he told me to contact them to ask them.

I am a consumer trying to purchase a certain product. We have to purchase organic wool because my daughter has LOTS of allergies and every physician we have taken her to said to purchase an organic latex mattress and to make sure the organic and the wool are organic, since she is not allergic to latex or wool… So that’s why I am being extra cautious when I speak to a mattress company. I am just trying to get correct information.

If a company like SleepEZ said they have 100% organic wool in their mattresses, and they have no certifications and I conclude that their wool is probably not organic, how is that comment misleading? Maybe the person I spoke to was incorrect. Actually I hope he was because I would prefer to buy from them!

Do I wish one of these two companies actually had certified organic wool? Of course because then I could purchase from them and not have to spend the extra money of a Savvy Rest.

If they use organic wool in their organic line, then why not have the certification listed, like you do all the other certifications? Again if I am incorrect, please correct me. I am merely sharing what I was told, and what I see on the websites.

thank you

Hi Lulu0915

You may be misunderstanding what he told you (although of course I wasn’t on the phone call). When I talked with Shawn today and he told me that they purchase two types of wool which which is the organic and the natural for each of the two lines of mattresses. Just as a point of reference as well … Shawn tends to downplay organic certifications anyway because of all the confusing issues that are surrounding it in the industry as a whole and as LJGMDAD has mentioned as well there is really no difference in terms of “purity” between the natural wool which is farmed using organic farming methods and their organic wool even though it isn’t actually certified organic.

The Ecowool is the trademarked name for the non organic wool that The Wool Gatherers supplies and isn’t certified organic. Sleeping Organic describes it as “organically raised eco-wool” which is true but it’s not GOTS certified organic which is really the only type of certification that can legitimately be called organic so their description of the wool in various places on their site that calls it organic is more about marketing terminology than about an actual certification for the wool. It would be somewhat like a local farmer selling food directly from their farm that was farmed organically but didn’t have a certification (which in this case would be a USDA organic certification) that may actually be “more organic” than some of the certified organic food that you can buy in the store.

There are also other wool cooperatives around the country that also have very high quality wool that aren’t certified organic (some of the woolen mills are listed in post #3 here).

The most reliable way to deal with all of this in the industry as it currently stands (which I agree is confusing and difficult to “decipher” is if an actual organic certification is important to you regardless of the “purity” of the wool then I would ask to see the organic certification so that even if the wool was organic if there isn’t a GOTS certificate available that goes with it then you have the option to purchase a mattress where the actual wool certification is available for you to see.

Phoenix

thanks Phoenix. So their organic wool is not certified organic correct?

[quote=“Phoenix” post=52689]Hi LJGMDAD,

[quote]For an example of SleepEZ’s terminology discrepancy, click here. On that page, then click “Organic Covers”.

Now, at the top of the page you will see this statement:
Quilted to 100% Organic Wool

Further down on the page, under the description of the cover, you will see this statement:
A [sic] organic cotton cover is quilted to natural wool and married to your all-natural latex mattress[/quote]

Thanks… I found the description that says “natural wool” (if you click the “organic cover” section). This mattress uses organic wool and because organic wool is also natural the description is actually correct although they are really “understating” the materials and they could replace “natural” with “organic” (although this is probably a mistake made by their site designer). Even though they are understating the material … I will let them know when I talk with them next.
Phoenix[/quote]

Yes, I understand that organic is a superset of natural. But think about this from the perspective of someone who wants organic. If you use the terms interchangeably, then the consumer can’t really be confident in what they’re purchasing. The worse offense, of course, is to label a natural component as organic which you seem confident is not occurring in this case. But as a “blind” consumer, who doesn’t know better, I’d really have my doubts.

Resellers can clear up all confusion by simply providing a product matrix that provides a clear breakdown of all mattress components in which they don’t mix terminology, and by providing a link to all relevant certifications.

A simple mock up looks something like this:

[table]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td]Natural Line[/td]
[td]Organic Line[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Cover: Cotton Type[/td]
[td]Certified Organic[/td]
[td]Certified Oragnic[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Cover: Wool Type[/td]
[td]100% Natural[/td]
[td]Certified Organic[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Latex: Dunlop[/td]
[td]100% Natural[/td]
[td]Certified Organic[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Latex: Talalay[/td]
[td]100% Natural[/td]
[td]100% Natural[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]

Oh and by the way, one could argue that an “organic” mattress should never contain Talalay latex. But they do offer Talalay in “organic” mattresses all the time!!

Hi Lulu0915,

Just to put all of this to bed … the wool in their organic line is GOTS certified organic and the wool in their natural line is eco-wool and doesn’t have an organic certification.

They don’t have the GOTS ceertified organic certificate added to their site yet (see here) so if this was important to you and you don’t believe that the wool is organic then you could always wait until they list it and then make your purchase then or of course you could also make a purchase from another manufacturer that already has an GOTS certified organic certificate listed for their wool.

Phoenix

Hi LJGMDAD,

If a consumer wants organic and believes that it is somehow “better” than non organic wool (which may or may not be the case depending on how they define “better”) then of course they would need to be satisfied that the manufacturer was describing their organic product accurately. In some cases they may wish to see a GOTS certified organic certificate for the wool although “in theory” this could also be listed even if the wool in a mattress was different from the wool that was described by the certificate. All of this comes down to a matter of the level of “trust and verify” that a consumer is comfortable with and different people may need different levels of “proof” based on their own criteria and on the integrity and reputation of the merchant they are dealing with. Once a certificate is listed then some consumers will ask (and similar questions have often been asked on the forum) “how can I know that a certificate on a website is for the actual wool in my mattress” and of course it really wouldn’t be possible to “prove” this for someone that at some point wasn’t willing to “believe” what they were being told.

My point about their use of “natural” in the description is that it’s not actually incorrect and that if anything SleepEZ could replace it with organic and this would benefit them since it would also be accurate. It doesn’t put a consumer at risk of buying a mattress that contains organic wool and then finding out that it doesn’t have a certification. If a consumer believed the “natural” description over the other organic descriptions and certified organic was a make or break issue for them then it could cost SleepEZ a sale (although I can’t imagine that that same consumer wouldn’t talk with them to ask which one it was when they see this type of discrepancy). SleepEZ also tends to downplay organic certifications to some degree because they are well aware that it doesn’t necessarily affect the quality of a material and they are experienced enough in the industry to know that many consumers “buy organic” for all the wrong reasons because they don’t fully understand what organic really means. Having said that it’s just a result of the change in their site and there are probably several corrections that they will need to make over time as they become aware of them.

This is very similar to what they are doing now. It’s also somewhat ironic (and it has come up on the forum previously) that in some cases manufacturers that try to be as transparent and honest as possible are often a bigger target for criticism than manufacturers that don’t provide any meaningful information at all.

In addition to arguing that a mattress that contains Talalay shouldn’t be labeled as organic … it could also be argued that a mattress that wasn’t certified as organic “as a mattress” also shouldn’t be labeled as organic even if every material in the mattress was certified organic (see post #3 here for more about the different levels of organic certifications). This is not what is happening in the industry though and at this point wouldn’t be a realistic argument and if a manufacturer decided to take things this far they would almost certainly lose sales to other manufacturers that are less transparent and in many cases less “organic” than they are.

IMO the “best” solution with the industry as it stands today is for consumers to educate themselves about what questions to ask so that they are confident that a mattress they are purchasing is “organic enough” for their criteria. The most meaningful changes will come from having a much larger percentage of consumers that are more educated about what all the different types of organic descriptions and certifications really mean rather than what they have come to believe or what they “think” they mean.

Phoenix

That’s great news!

I don’t need it but my wife wanted it. Since I paid for it believing it was 100% organic wool, the pending certification is satisfactory to me.

Thank you for mediating it for those concerned.

Thank you, This was very helpful. I’m about to either purchase a sleep ex mattress or sleepingorganic today :slight_smile:

Hi FernandezP,

You are certainly looking at two high quality/value options and I’m looking forward to finding out what you end up deciding.

Once you are down to finalists that are all choices between “good and good” and none of them have any obvious weak links or lower quality materials in their design (which you are) and if there are no clear winners between them then you are in the fortunate position that any of them would likely be a suitable choice and post #2 here can help you make a final choice based on your material and layering preferences, your conversations with each of them, their prices, the options available both before and after a purchase, any additional extras that are part of each purchase, and on “informed best judgement” based on all the other objective, subjective, and intangible parts of your personal value equation that are most important to you.

Phoenix

Phoenix, thank you for your comments, they were very helpful.

We decided to purchase 2 Savvy Rest mattresses. At the end of the day, we both also felt more comfortable with the customer service and transparency including all our questions about organic certifications. Again this is my opinion.

thank you for your help though this forum definitely helped us in making this decision!

Hi Lulu0915,

Not only will SleepEZ tell you that “I’ll be honest with you” … they really are being honest with their customers and the suggestions they provide are the result of many years of experience (much longer than Savvy Rest) so it’s unfortunate that you “translated” their comments the way you did.

While the same combinations aren’t recommended to everyone … each of the basic configurations that they generally suggest as a starting point are based on fairly wide weight ranges. For example S/M/F would by far be the most common recommendation because it provides layering combinations that are suitable for a very wide range of people as a starting point (see post #13 here).

[quote]At the end of the day, we both also felt more comfortable with the customer service and transparency Savvy Rest provided in everything including all our questions about organic certifications. And they don’t have the owners answering the phone calls which means that they are obviously selling enough mattresses to hire people to do that. The other two companies just seemed like they were hiding facts, and not really being honest. Again this is my opinion.

Yes the Savvy Rest cost more that SleepEZ and Sleeping Organic but knowing we got a great product from a very reputable seller was more important than the price difference.[/quote]

Savvy Rest certainly uses very high quality materials and components in their mattresses and if you are comfortable with the higher prices involved and having a few less options for your layering choices than some of the other similar options that are available to you and the lack of a return policy and it’s the best “match” for you based on all the parts of your personal value equation that are most important to you (including making a local vs an online purchase) then IMO you certainly made a good choice … and congratulations on your new mattress :slight_smile:

I’m looking forward to your comments and feedback when you receive it and have had the chance to sleep on it for a bit.

Phoenix

Hi Phoenix,

I last posted in May of this year when we decided to purchase a Savvy Rest vs. a SleepEZ. f

We were looking to purchase another organic latex mattress and I thought ok I’ll see if I should get a SleepEZ…

1… Whenever I call the company, Shawn answers and he says someone will call me back. Since July, which is when we initially called them about possibly getting a second mattress, they keep saying “they are moving into a new facility” and they are having problems. It is now October.

  1. Every time we email the “contact us” email on their webpage, it bounces with this error “Your message to [email protected] was automatically rejected:
    Quota exceeded (mailbox for user is full).”

  2. Their website has not changed even though you mentioned they were working on a new site in may to include their certifications and the wool info.

  3. They still do not mention that they have the option of getting 100% organic dunlop. But on the phone they tell you they can get it for you from Latex Green. But Latex Green doesn’t even say on their website they have 100% organic dunlop www.latexgreen.com in fact the latex green website doesn’t’ work for half the links including the mattress link. So Latex Green doesn’t have on their website you can get certified organic dunlop.
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  4. The GOLS certification for Latex Green on the Sleep EZ website expired July 2015. Did Latex Green lose their GOLS certification and no longer has organic dunlop? It looks that way because even on the latex green site there is no GOLS certificate, only an Oeko-tex one http://www.latexgreen.com/Class%201.pdf

  5. Someone else mentioned this but on the SleepEz site when you click on organic mattresses, at the very top of one of them (for example the 10" model) it says “100% Organic Cotton Knit Cover Quilted to 100% Organic Wool.” that right there says they are using Organic Cotton and Organic wool. Phoenix you yourself said in May
    “They don’t have the GOTS ceertified organic certificate added to their site yet (see here) so if this was important to you and you don’t believe that the wool is organic then you could always wait until they list it and then make your purchase then or of course you could also make a purchase from another manufacturer that already has an GOTS certified organic certificate listed for their wool”

It’s now the end of October and they still have not added that.

Hi Lulu0915,

I’m glad to see that you are happy with your Savvy Rest mattress and that it’s working well for you.

Your comments about SleepEZ not being a reputable company given their long history in the industry and the thousands of people that have purchased from them over many years and are happy with their purchase (not to mention the other companies and people they have mentored over many years) is somewhat strange. I think you would be hard pressed to find a company that has more integrity or that has developed the type of reputation they have developed over a period of decades … although of course everyone is free to believe whatever they choose to believe regardless of whether the reasons behind it would be valid for anyone else.

I don’t think there is much I can add to my previous comments in my earlier replies and I really don’t know why you appear to be on such a vendetta against SleepEZ when you haven’t even purchased anything from them. Some of your comments appear to be based on a desire to “bash” a company when you don’t really seem to know much about either the people behind it or their history or the many reasons they have developed the reputation that they have.

I don’t know what “problems” you are referring to that would be connected to moving to a new facility. They are certainly shipping out mattresses and many of the members here have purchased from them over the last few months and have had no issues with their mattress or their delivery or the information that they have been provided when they talked to them. I suppose that it’s possible that they have come to believe that you are more interested in criticizing them or finding reasons “not to buy” than purchasing a mattress and that nothing they can tell you will satisfy you anyway.

[quote]2. Every time we email the “contact us” email on their webpage, which surprisingly is to Jeremy’s email, it bounces with this error “Your message to <> was automatically rejected:
Quota exceeded (mailbox for user is full).” Now is this what should happen when you email a trustworthy company that you are about to pay close to 3K for a product they sell?[/quote]

I checked and confirmed that their mailbox is full but I don’t know what this would have to do with how trustworthy they are. Most people would just call them if their email isn’t working and unlike you they don’t seem to have any problems reaching them on the phone or finding out the information that is important to them.

I’m also not clear what the time frame involved in launching a new website has to do with how reputable they are. I have also been working on changes to this website that have been planned for years and that I originally hoped to launch about a year ago (and it will still be some time yet) so I can appreciate some of the issues that are involved in changing websites if you want to do it right. Sometimes things can happen where time frames just don’t work out as well as you hoped for when it comes to websites.

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This isn’t an option that they advertise or promote because it’s not one of their default choices and they tend to believe that 100% natural Dunlop is a better “value” so they generally steer people away from organic certified latex so for those who specifically request it (even though they don’t normally even mention it) they would need to place a special order. They don’t choose to list it as a specific option on their site and there are many manufacturers have options available that aren’t listed on their site.

Latex Green still lists a GOLS certification on their website but they don’t show the actual certificate. It used to be possible to log in and check the control union site to check on the companies that have GOLS certifications but there is no longer a link to the GOLS certification database so I can’t confirm for now whether Latex Green is still GOLS certified. I have seen a number of companies that showed a GOLS certification for Latex Green that expired in July of this year so they were certified up until a few months ago but it’s possible that it wasn’t renewed after that or it’s possible that they haven’t provided their new certification to their customers or that the manufacturers that use them haven’t listed an updated certification on their site but I don’t know either way. Latex Green itself (like most latex manufacturers) doesn’t have a particularly informative or detailed website but they only deal with manufacturers so their website isn’t meant to be targeted towards consumers that are looking for more detailed information and they would normally provide more specific information directly to their wholesale customers.

[quote]6. Someone else mentioned this but on the SleepEz site when you click on organic mattresses, at the very top of one of them (for example the 10" model) it says “100% Organic Cotton Knit Cover Quilted to 100% Organic Wool.” that right there says they are using Organic Cotton and Organic wool. Phoenix you yourself said in May

“They don’t have the GOTS ceertified organic certificate added to their site yet (see here) so if this was important to you and you don’t believe that the wool is organic then you could always wait until they list it and then make your purchase then or of course you could also make a purchase from another manufacturer that already has an GOTS certified organic certificate listed for their wool”

It’s now the end of October and they still do not have that added! So are they really using organic wool?[/quote]

As far as I know and based on what they told me when I asked them several months ago they are or were using certified certified organic wool in their organic cover. As I mentioned in my previous reply though they didn’t (and don’t) have the certification listed on their site so if this is important to you then it’s just a matter of purchasing from a supplier that can provide you with any certifications that you are looking for that are important to you. The reality is that some manufacturers will provide products that meet your criteria and some won’t and that’s just part of why people choose to purchase from different manufacturers or retailers.

As I’ve mentioned on many occasions on this site … each person can have very different criteria that are important parts of their personal value equation and if for some reason any particular manufacturer doesn’t meet your criteria then there are certainly many others that are available to you that you are always free to purchase from. If you are OK with the more premium prices you are paying compared to other manufacturers that are using the same or very similar materials and you are happy with the tradeoffs that are connected to the higher prices you are paying then for you that would just be part of the “value” of a mattress purchase whether or not anyone else would put the same importance on the criteria that are more important to you.

I think the “bottom line” is that for some reason you just don’t appear to like or trust SleepEZ or the information they are providing regardless of their integrity or the reputation they have developed over the years and when you are predisposed not to like a particular company then almost everything they say or do can become just another reason to reinforce what you already feel so for you it would probably be a good idea to purchase elsewhere even if that may involve paying a significantly higher price.

Phoenix

On may 22nd…

[quote]Just to put all of this to bed … the wool in their organic line is GOTS certified organic and the wool in their natural line is eco-wool and doesn’t have an organic certification.

They don’t have the GOTS ceertified organic certificate added to their site yet (see here) so if this was important to you and you don’t believe that the wool is organic then you could always wait until they list it and then make your purchase then or of course you could also make a purchase from another manufacturer that already has an GOTS certified organic certificate listed for their wool.[/quote]

  1. Five months is a reasonable time frame to add the certification if they have it.
  2. They shouldn’t advertise it prior to proof of certification.