Small differences between latex options - HELP my head hurts! :)

Discussions General Mattresses Questions
8

Hi cprice88,

[quote]One of them is an OMI (Organicpedic) bed that’s way out of our price range and if we settle on that one we would end up purchasing something comparable online. It is probably our favorite of the three.

It’s the OMI Duo with all talalay, three 3" layers and we liked it with firm on the bottom and soft-soft for the top two layers.The top layer also was convoluted, though not sure how important that is. But it is $8,000! The sales guy said they also offer the OMI Duo “promo” (?) which is made with dunlop latex, but when I asked if it would feel similar he gave me a really confusing non-answer.

So that said, I’m wondering if there is any way to figure out which of the others (from my earlier post) offer latex layers with the same/similar density to OMI?[/quote]

There is more about the different ways that one mattress can “match” or “approximate” another one in post #9 here but the only way to know for certain that two mattress will feel the same is if they both contain the same types and blends of latex, all the layers are the same thickness and firmness, and they both have a very similar cover (including any quilting). Once there are differences between any of the specs between two mattresses then “approximating” a mattress based on specs can become much more difficult and the most reliable way to know how they would compare for any particular person would be based on your own side by side testing and personal experience because different people can have different opinions about how closely two mattresses with differences in their designs and components compare to each other because body type, sleeping positions, and individual sensitivities can also play a role in how they feel and compare.

Each of the manufacturers you mentioned would be the most reliable source of guidance about which of the options they carry would be closest to the OMI configuration that you tested (or any other mattress where you know the accurate specs) although they may not be the same because of differences between their covers and also because the convoluted topper would be a little softer than the same layer in the same thickness and ILD that wasn’t convoluted (there is more about the effects of convoluting in post #2 here). It would be very helpful if you knew the ILD of the latex layers in the OMI Duo because otherwise they would need to guess and the effective ILD of the OMI “soft” or “firm” layers may be different from the ILD of the soft or firm layers that are carried by other manufacturers.

The density of Talalay latex isn’t as important as the ILD if you are making firmness comparisons. With Dunlop latex ILD will also be a reasonable way to compare them but in some cases the ILD of Dunlop isn’t available or isn’t listed accurately or they can sometimes be tested differently so in these cases density may be a more effective comparison for the relative firmness of 100% natural Dunlop layers (see post #6 here).

You can see the ILD of the blended Talalay latex in the Pure Latex Bliss mattresses (including the Beautiful) in post #2 here.

[quote]-Evolve 10" latex (they said this is a local company) and it is all blended dunlop latex, sewn inside the cover so no changing of layers. For that reason, it is also cheaper than the OMI and Pure Bliss, but in the same range as all the online options for Talalay, so our leaning is toward ordering online. Anyway, they provide all the data on their label and it said: 6" 36lb core, 2" 28 lb support layer, 2" 19 lb comfort layer.

From what I read here, it seems we may want to steer away from blended dunlop, but that’s the one product where we could get real data about the density of the latex. The density numbers do not translate from dunlop to talalay, do they?[/quote]

Comparing the ILD for different types or blends of latex may not be as accurate as the comparing the ILD (for Talalay) or density (for 100% natural Dunlop) of the same type and blend of latex. Like all latex … blended Dunlop is a very durable material (as long as there isn’t a high percentage of filler in the latex) but it may not have the same elasticity and resilience or be quite as supportive as latex that is 100% natural rubber. It is also a high quality material.

This would be Intelligel which is a buckling column gel. You can read more about this type of material in this article and in post #2 here and post #2 here and the posts and topics they link to. A forum search on Intelligel (you can just click the link) will also bring up more information and feedback about it as well.

Phoenix

9

Yes, that is the hard part. There appear to be only two local retail stores that offer a variety of pure latex options in their showrooms and the only brands they carry are OMI (Organicpedic), Savvy Rest and Pure Latex Bliss, in addition to the one local Evolve option we discovered yesterday.

Those brands are just way beyond our budget.

The Evolve is only $2100 for king, but we have reservations about it being blended dunlop, plus can’t find any info about the company that makes it online, but I’ll ask more of the retailer when we go back.

We are pretty sold on the durability and the general feel of latex, as well as the long-term health/eco benefits of it, but we really need to stay between $1,500-3,000 for a king. It seem like that is easily doable with the online retailers - the challenge is to try to get close to what we liked that we have tried in person.

On the plus side, my spouse and I both actually liked several of the latex beds even with slightly different “feels” and I was surprised to find the two of us also seem to like the same ones and the same firmness/softness levels - so at least we’ve got that going for us. :slight_smile:

Thank you for the additional info!

10

Hi cprice88,

[quote]And those two brands are just way beyond our budget. We are pretty sold on the durability and the general feel of latex, as well as the long-term health/eco benefits of it, but we really need to stay between $1,500-3,000. It seem like that is easily doable with the online retailers - the challenge is to try to get close to what we liked that we have tried in person.

On the plus side, my spouse and I both actually liked several of the latex beds even with slightly different “feels” and I was surprised to find the two of us also seem to like the same ones and the same firmness/softness levels - so at least we’ve got that going for us. :)[/quote]

For most people there would be a range of mattresses that would make a suitable choice so it wouldn’t be necessary to match another mattress exactly although a “very close approximation” may be more important for some that are closer to the “princess and the pea” than the “I can sleep on anything” end of the sensitivity scale.

Most of the better online manufacturers and retailers will do a very good job of helping to “talk you through” the options they have available based on the information you provide them, any local testing you have done, and the “averages” of other customers that are similar to you and their experience and guidance in combination with a mattress that can be “fine tuned” by rearranging or exchanging layers will generally have a high percentage of success.

Phoenix

11

Two new pieces of information:

We found a small, family-owned mattress store that carries one additional brand of talalay latex beds.
www.austinmattress.net
We will attempt to visit this store within the week.

He says the beds are made by Royal Sleep in D/FW area. Phoenix, do you know anything about Royal Sleep or their latex beds or this retailer? He says they are sewn shut, not customizable or adjustable.

Also, after being told this I did a google search and am realizing Dallas, Houston or San Antonio might have more choices of beds we could try and buy in person. All of those are cities we visit sometimes. Should we consider a bed buying road trip? :slight_smile:

12

Specs

Royal Touch Latex is the brand name.

Princess Touch 10" Latex Mattress
4" 26 lb comfort layer
6" 36 lb core
bamboo organic cotton cover
“100% All Natural Talalay latex” is the claim

Kings Touch 12" Latex Mattress
two comfort layers of 3" 26 lb
6" 36 lb core
same cover

They do show a cross section in the photo here:
www.austinmattress.net/#!latex-mattresses/c6a8

They also have something else that’s a 10" with a soy HD core and talalay on top. We are avoiding the soy core, plus it’s not that much cheaper anyway.

13

Hi cprice88,

Austin Mattress is one of the options or possibilities that are listed on the Austin list here (which also includes the San Antonio list).

The Dallas list is here and includes some comments about Royal Sleep (City Mattress Factory) along with some of the other manufacturers and retailers there.

The Houston list is here.

In terms of quality/durability … a mattress is only as good as its construction and the quality of the materials inside it regardless of the name of the manufacturer on the label. Most manufacturers make a range of mattresses that range from lower quality and less durable choices to higher quality and more durable choices so the name of the manufacturer is less important than whether a mattress is a good “match” for you in terms of PPP and the quality and durability of the materials inside it. There is more about the most important parts of the “value” of a mattress purchase in the this post which I linked in a previous reply that can help you make more meaningful comparisons between mattresses but it comes down to testing for suitability, checking for durability, and then comparing your finalists for value based on the parts of your personal value equation that are most important to you.

Phoenix

14

Hi cprice88,

[quote]Princess Touch 10" Latex Mattress
4" 26 lb comfort layer
6" 36 lb core
bamboo organic cotton cover
“100% All Natural Talalay latex” is the claim

Kings Touch 12" Latex Mattress
two comfort layers of 3" 26 lb
6" 36 lb core
same cover[/quote]

These are all high quality materials and there would be no weak links in either mattress.

So called “soy based foam” is just polyfoam that has replaced a relatively small percentage of one of the two main chemicals used to make the polyfoam (the polyol) with a polyol that is derived from soy oil (see post #2 here). It would be closely comparable to other types of polyfoam that are the same density range. I would want to know the density of any polyfoam in a mattress.

There is also more about latex/polyfoam hybrids vs all latex mattresses in post #2 here.

Phoenix

15

So Royal Sleep and City Mattress are one and the same?

And is it safe to assume Royal Sleep all talalay mattresses are of good quality? How else would we assess the quality other than just making sure it truly is all talalay (which it appears to be)? How do we compare the quality of this company’s talalay to the other online retailers?

We totally understand this and it has been repeated. That is why we are trying to find more local options that we can see and test in person that are in our price range. This Royal Sleep/Royal Touch brand is in our range, though it’s still a little more expensive than what appear to be online comparable quality from online retailers.

It seems like we will end up with IRL finalists and online finalists that meet our personal value equation in all objective/measurable ways. But the online ones seem like they will be a better value price wise. We are ok with some risk of having to return/swap pieces of the mattress, but we’d like to get as close as we can to understanding the right thing to order in the first place.

I talked this morning with SleepEZ and Flobeds. SleepEZ said they are very comparable to Savvy Rest in feel, other than the cover, so he said the Savvy Rest we try locally would feel a little more “tight/firm” b/c they have a woven cover. That was very helpful to know. He was not really able to compare with OMI (Organicpedic).

16

Hi cprice,

Yes (see the names at the top and bottom of this page)

It’s never “safe” to assume that any mattress uses high quality materials until you find out the specific type and quality of the materials inside it (see this article) but if the only material inside a mattress is Talalay latex and there are no lower quality materials or components inside it then all Talalay latex is a high quality and durable material and there would be no weak links in the mattress regardless of the name on the label.

All manufacturers have access to the same types and blends of latex which they can choose to use in their mattresses and in the case of latex the type and blend of the latex is the information you need to know to make meaningful comparisons with other mattresses. There is more about the different types and blends of latex in post #6 here and there is more about the differences in “feel” between Dunlop and Talalay latex in post #7 here but the best way to know which type of latex you tend to prefer would be based on your own personal testing and experience. If the type and blend of the latex is the same then they would be directly comparable in terms of quality and durability regardless of the name of the manufacturer that uses it in their mattress. Of course there is a wide range of different latex mattress designs and firmness levels so if the materials are the same in two mattresses it doesn’t mean that the firmness or feel of the mattresses would be the same because one may have softer or firmer layers in their mattress than the other.

Once you have narrowed down your choices to to a list of finalists that are all choices between “good and good” and they are all a good match for you in terms of PPP and there are no “weak links” in any of them and if at that point 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 local testing and experiences or online conversations with each of them, your confidence about the suitability of each one, the options you have before and after a 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

17

We are ONLY looking at mattresses that are latex in all layers. The only ones mentioned in my previous posts that aren’t all latex were some of the ones at Urban Mattress b/c that was our first trip and we wanted to get a feel for other things to compare.

So we aren’t looking at anything with “weak links” I don’t believe.

I tried to go to The Clean Bedroom today and it seems they have gone out of business! It must have been fairly recently.

Austin Mattress no longer sells Restonic, only Royal Touch as far as all latex.

Sleep World does not have any latex mattresses in the Austin showroom and they no longer manufacture mattresses here in Austin at all. I just hung up with someone at their Houston facility and he said all of them are now made in Houston and that’s the only place to try out their all-latex mattresses.

So as far as where in Austin to try and buy an all-latex mattress, we are really just down to only retailers:

Austin Natural Mattress with 4 brands: Savvy Rest, OMI, Pure Latex Bliss, Evolve (local)
Austin Mattress with 1 brand: Royal Touch

Mentioning this in case it someone else trying to figure out where to go.

18

So our final options seem to be:

Evolve 12" all blended dunlop, around $2100, fully encased, no changing of layers - PPP feels good, but concerned b/c don’t have a lot of info about the blended dunlop

Royal Touch 10" all blended talalay, around $2700, fully encased, no changing of layers - it seems fine for Posture and Pressure Points, though as far as Personal Preference it’s a little firm and we maybe would end up buying a topper

SleepEZ 1000, $1900, blended talalay - can’t try in person

Pure Latex Bliss Beautiful, blended talalay, $3800 (maybe can haggle a bit) - PPP feels good, but above what we would like to spend

This is tough.

19

Hi cprice88,

Thanks for all the updates on the Austin list … I appreciate it :slight_smile:

One of the forum members here visited them in Austin in late December and they were still open (see here) so it must have been very recent. They are also no longer listed on the Clean Bedroom site and I’ve removed them from the Austin list.

they still list Restonic which would be a good “possibility” … just not their latex models.

They didn’t have a local store at all after the ownership changed (see post #29 here). Have they re-opened a local store in Austin now (just not with latex)? If you can confirm this I’ll update the description on the Austin list to mention that at least some of their mattresses are once again available to test locally.

I’ve updated their listing as well including their non latex options.

Any type or blend of latex would be a good quality and durable material relative to other types of foam materials and any mattress that is “all latex” wouldn’t have any weak links in terms of durability.

Pure Latex Bliss mattresses have MAP pricing (minimum advertised pricing) and there are some dealers that sell them for this but dealers are allowed to sell for less as long as they don’t advertise it and they are certainly available for less than their suggested retail prices. If you do decide on one of their mattresses there are some PLB dealers that will ship across the country listed in post #32 here that you can call to use as a pricing reference point for any “negotiation” and I would start by giving Jeff a call at Matt-To-Go who is one of the members of this site.

You are certainly looking at some good options and when your final choices are “tough” and there are no clear winners between them then it usually means that you’ve done some very good research :slight_smile:

Phoenix

20

Yes, sorry, to be clear I was only talking about stores that have ALL latex options.

Hmm, for Sleep World, actually now that you ask, I’m thinking back on the conversation and am not 100% clear about if/where they have an Austin location. He said something that made it sound like they have one, but that it doesn’t have the all latex. Now I’m second guessing how I interpreted it. Maybe he meant all the mattresses are in Houston. I’ll post back if I can figure out the answer.

21

Hi cprice,

If you can’t remember I’ll give Michael a call and find out. It’s been a while since I talked with him so it’s probably a good time to catch up anyway.

Phoenix

22

Hi cprice,

I confirmed that they still don’t have a store in Austin (there is a cigar store at the old location) but they deliver there every two weeks … and sometimes weekly depending on volume.

Phoenix

23

Good to know!

So that pretty much leaves Austin Natural Mattress as our main retailer for natural options.

While I liked some of the beds at Urban Mattress, not too many were natural.

My husband visited Austin Mattress/Beds 'n Brass and tried the Royal Touch and he did like one of them, but still not as much as the ANM Evolve.

So, we are actually thinking about getting the Evolve. Today I went back and hung out at ANM for about an hour and I found that my favorite was the more plush Evolve.

However, it is Dunlop and I guess from reading here I got turned off about Dunlop b/c a lot of what is said here comes across as kind of negative - or at least not as sweepingly positive as the opinions on Talalay.

So I’m finding myself needing to be convinced, especially because this is BLENDED Dunlop. Also the cover is not all natural, but it’s very thin, and we are realizing we like that better so we can feel the latex more and really sink into it.

Are there any retailers online that you know of with either blended talalay or all natural talalay and a very thin cover?

When I say thin, it’s really thin, kind of like the Tempurpedic covers.

Thanks!

24

Oh, also, we are realizing we must like super soft latex b/c when they switched around all the pads on the OMI (Organicpedic) for me to try today, the combination I liked best was MED-XSOFT-XSOFT and that still wasn’t as soft as the Evolve that I liked the best.

Is that weird?

25

Hi cprice88,

These are all preference choices and not so much “better/worse” choices and I certainly wouldn’t want to “convince” you one way or the other. There is more about the differences between Talalay and Dunlop in the previous post I linked (post #7 here) but the most reliable way to know which one you prefer is based on your own personal experience. All latex is a very durable material compared to other types of foam. FWIW … my daughter prefers the feel and performance of Dunlop which is what she purchased even though her father prefers Talalay because I told her to test both of them and choose the mattress and type of latex that she preferred regardless of what anyone else (including me) may prefer … and she did.

Different types of covers are also a preference choice and some people will prefer a quilted cover to lessen the resilience of the latex and others will prefer a thinner and more stretch cover because they prefer the feel of sleeping more directly on the latex. There is more about the difference between different types of quilted covers and thinner more stretchy covers in post #12 here and the posts it links to.

Off the top of my head I know that SleepEZ and Arizona Premium and Flobeds and Plushbeds and possibly Sleeping Organic (their cover may have cotton batting quilting so I would ask them) have options available that use Talalay comfort layers with thinner unquilted stretch knit cotton covers.

Nothing is “weird” to me when it comes to mattresses that are the best “match” for the needs and preferences of different people. Everyone is different :slight_smile:

Phoenix

26

So, I’ve read that article 2 or 3 times now about dunlop vs. talalay and it confuses me b/c my experience in the store here is that the one dunlop mattress feels noticeably softer and I sink into it more than any of the talalay mattresses in the same showroom. Since I went in there having read that dunlop should feel more dense/firm, I kept going back and forth between the mattresses over and over to make sure I wasn’t imagining it b/c what I was experiencing did not line up with what I had read. The plusher Evolve is a full 12" (I think it’s a 6-3-3 configuration) but that doesn’t seem like it would make a difference as big as what we felt.

Which leads me to wonder/worry that the dunlop in the Evolve might be made of a higher % of synthetics in the blend. That is the one question the salesperson could not answer when I asked about it. He did not know what % of synthetic (or didn’t want to tell me). That worries me a little in terms of long-term durability as well as how “healthy” the bed is.

The other factor that is hard to ignore is that this 12" dunlop Evolve bed, at $2,600, is nearly $1,000 more than 10" talalay online options we were considering. That’s a big difference. I know you’re going to say this is part of our personal value equation. :slight_smile: But it’s helping to “talk it out” here now that I feel like we have a better baseline idea of what mattresses we liked in person.

So, comparing with the Plushbeds looks very similar to the locally made Evolve - even the description of the cover with the plant-based flame barrier sounds the same, except the Plushbeds has talalay for the top 2 layers whereas the Evolve has all dunlop and I think the stretch cotton may be blended with something synthetic in it.

However, the price difference between Plushbeds and Evolve is small (only about $200) so wouldn’t justify the risk of ordering something online that we hadn’t tried in person.

I talked with SleepEZ and he said their cover does have some quilting in it, but that it is stretch. We didn’t really find any “choose your layer” mattresses in the showrooms here that were quilted stretch. The two quilted ones (OMI and Savvy Rest) both have woven covers, and I did feel that those covers restricted the latex in a way I didn’t love. It felt tight and firmer and it did seem like the cover was a big difference. The PureLatexBliss cover was somewhere in between with how the cover felt; it had some give and seemed a little stretchy, but also had some quilting. We like it better for sure than the wovens, but still prefer the super-thin Evolve cover. My husband said the Royal Touch also has a thin cover that feels like a microfiber.

All of the ones here in town with thinner covers are enclosed mattresses, not the zippered build your own kind.

Who knew the cover would matter so much - I never would’ve guessed that when we started b/c I really don’t think of us as being super fussy and this seems like such detail nit-picking! :wink:

Price wise Flobeds is also about the same or more expensive than the Evolve so again, probably doesn’t justify the online ordering risk.

However, SleepEZ and Arizona Premium would be considerably less expensive (somewhere in the $800-1,000 range less) depending on the details of the online choices) less than the Evolve.

So that point is also getting us stuck.

27

Hi cprice88,

Both Dunlop and Talalay come in a wide range of firmness levels so Dunlop will only feel firmer if you had a single layer that was the same thickness and ILD as a Talalay layer but it can feel softer if the ILD was lower. There are also other factors that can affect how soft or firm a layer or a mattress feels as well besides just the ILD of the material (see post #4 here) and all the layers of a mattress will also affect all the other layers of a mattress to differing degrees and the mattress as whole … not just a single layer. There is also more about the effect of thickness in post #14 here.

Careful testing will be the most reliable way to know whether a particular mattress is suitable for you in terms of PPP and I would avoid using more complex combinations of “comfort specs” to try and decide whether any particular mattress would be a good choice for you.

All latex is a durable material relative to other types of foam materials. The “safety” of latex is also not something I would be concerned about and all the latex you are likely to encounter (Dunlop or Talalay made with either natural or synthetic rubber or a blend of both) will all have been certified by either Oeko-Tex or Eco-Institut for harmful substances and VOC’s (see post #2 here).

Once you have narrowed down your choices to to a list of finalists that are all choices between “good and good” and you are confident that they would all be a good match for you in terms of PPP and there are no “weak links” in any of them and if at that point 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 local testing and experiences or online conversations with each of them, your confidence about the suitability of each one, the options you have before and after a 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