I think that my 10+year old Sealy Posturpedic has just about had it. But I’ve never in my life shopped for a mattress. Anybody have some recommendations, for a reasonable price? FTR, it’s a queen-sized bed. Also, the box spring is just as old. Should I replace that too?
I was just looking for threads on this yesterday. I don’t mean this in a “smarmy, Use the Search button!” way – I mean, honestly, search on “Mattress” in the subject line. There were 3 or 4 threads that I read just 24 hours ago. And if you make a decision then post about it…I am going to be buying in the next month or two.
We really want a Tempurpedic but cant justify spending that much loot.
mouthbreather, how much are those Tempurpedics? The pillows are $60.00.
Mouthbreaker: I tried to do a search and couldn’t find another thread (in the past week). I searched “titles only” and “within entire posts”. Still no luck. Mind providing a link to one of the aforementioned threads?
…puts bag on head, stands in tea-chest
…puts bag on head.
Tempurpedics are not what they’re cracked up to be. My parents had one for the “trial” period and returned it.
If you’ve ever tried one the foam that it’s made out of reacts very slowly. If you lie on it you sink in very slowly and if you get up your imprint is left and the mattress slowly returns to it’s original form. If your a sleeper who “readjusts” a lot while sleeping this is frusturating. If your lying on your back and decide to roll over and sleep on your side it’s very uncomfortable to be lying in a lumpy imprint of yourself until it reconforms.
Also, unless your a fit person who’s body weight is evenly distributed, you tend to sink down where your body mass is “your butt and belly”.
The mattresses run a few grand and while they do have a trial period you are not refunded the shipping cost ($200-$300 if I remember).
Ooh! Ooh! I know about this stuff.
It is incredibly difficult to get, er, solid information about mattresses – how they really differ, what’s important, what’s quality, etc. Apparently different brands of mattresses are often made by the same factories (just like different brands of canned corn are often canned at the same canneries with the same corn, just with different labels). New “this year’s model” mattresses often only differ in the material used to cover them.
Most brand-name mattresses are tremendously overpriced. Much advertising, and a little bit of fancy fabric for those overs, goes into making you think there is a a substantial difference between brands and between lines within brands.
The only important difference is how hard/soft the mattress is – and it’s not that a particular hardness or softness is better, but that you should get what you find comfortable. This is important. Many ads claim that a particular hardness is necessary for back health, but it’s just not borne out by any of the research I’ve seen, and I’ve been looking for years. However, research does show that if you’re not comfortable you won’t relax well and won’t sleep well, and that everyone’s a little different. (And of course if the mattress is lumpy or uneven or compacted, it’s probably time to get a new one.)
And please ignore any malarkey anyone gives you about “this mattress must be used with its matching box spring for correct support and maximum wear; they are designed to be used as a unit.” Utter BS. You can put any mattress on any boxspring – or better yet, any platform, bedframe, floor, or piece of plywood, so long as the mattress isn’t going to fall through it. If you go to a dump you can sometimes see ripped-open boxsprings – corrugated cardboard is a common material!
If you find you like “pillowtop” mattresses, get a cheap regular mattress and then buy a good pillowtop pad from your local bedding outlet or from a catalogue like The Company Store or Domestications.
Taller (“Extra Thick”, “Luxury Thickness”, etc.) mattresses don’t add significant comfort, unless you’re the Pea Princess, and your old fitted sheets might not stay on them, either.
Mr emilyforce and I now sleep on a $80 cotton futon with a $120 4" slab of no-name “tempurpedic” type (a.k.a. temperature-sensitive, viscoelastic, Swedish, NASA , etc) foam on top – the kind with the ads showing how your hand leaves an impression on it. We sleep very well. We’ve also used an Aerobed mattress on the floor (we couldn’t get anything bigger than a full-size regular mattress up the staircase to that bedroom) and slept very well on that too, until we got a bed to put it on and the cats started using their claws to haul themselves up onto it. Oops. (If you don’t have cats, I think the Aerobed is the way to go, BTW – it’s significantly better-made than camping-type air mattresses, stays inflated without needing top-offs every night, and allows you to customize firmness as often as you want.)
If you want a “regular” mattress instead of a futon etc., go to a mattress store and try several of them out - lie on them for several minutes at a time. Ignore the salespeople. Determine whether the one you like best is more or less soft than the average. Then shop around for prices of similar ones online, always accounting for shipping charges. If you do that instead of buying from a store, you’ll probably have to get rid of your own old one yourself - so you should also get prices from local stores, which may take your old one and dispose of it for free.
Be wary of mattress salespeople. Their tactics often resemble their car-selling brethren and sistren.
If what you want is a Tempurpedic, you should know that their mattresses are really several inches of non-tempurpedic foam laminated with a topper of the Tempurpedic stuff. So you can imitate this for about 20% of what they charge by doing it yourself, either with a piece of about 6" thick inexpensive foam or a futon for a base. Then buy a viscoelastic foam pad from eBay. Do pay attention to their density ratings - anything above “5 pounds” compares well with real Tempurpedic, which IIRC is about 5.5. I don’t much care for the lighter-density ones (I ordered free samples from six different places before I bought what we have) but many people find they prefer the ~4 lb. stuff, which “gives” more. ~3 isn’t enough different, in use, from plain old foam to be worth more, IMHO. 3" or 4" thick pads are noticeably better than 1.5 or 2. eBay prices are MUCH better than catalogue prices.
If you sleep with a partner who strongly prefers a different firmness of mattress than you do, I’d look into the new “sleep number” mattresses – and probably get a knockoff. These types are at least partially air-filled, but with separately controlled right and left chambers, so you can each customize your own side. There are several brands out there, not just the “sleep number” one that has so many ads. Or you could consider getting a base mattress to share, then top it with two different densities of equally thick foam.
Interesting trivium: regular king size mattresses are exactly the same dimensions as two x-long twin mattresses. Several catalogues carry “joiner” thingies to make two twins a king in practice. So if you’ve always longed for a king size but couldn’t get it up your stairs, this is an option.
Let us know what you decide to do! Woohoo!
I’m looking at old “mattress” threads (as ppposed to “old mattress threads”? Eww!) as you suggested,mouthbreather. I just read the Is it time for me to buy a new mattress? thread… and I have to say that it’s a bloody shame these people didn’t have me around back in '02 to set 'em straight … 
I agree, though, with the abstract sentiment expressed there: it is worth it to get a mattress what you will sleep comfortably on. but IMHO what you have to “spend” is not money, but time, to get that – time to figure out what you really prefer, and time to find it at a decent price.
Thanks Emilyforce, we’re considering getting a new mattress when our tax refunds come in, so we’re starting to look now and that was real helpful. Though I’m tempted to just buy a good-sized slab o foam mattress from IKEA. At the moment, we have an old mattress we liberated from beside a dumpster, so pretty much anything will be an improvement.
Wow Emily. Thanks! I believe that you’ll be saving me some money. I was always led to believe that you shouldn’t take chances on cheap mattresses, unless you want a lifetime of back operations. But you convinced me otherwise.
Wow! I’ve overcome the Evil Mattress Advertising Overlords! Yay for me! Yay for you and your wallet! Yay! Happy mattress dance!
Well, okay, maybe no happy mattress dance right now; I’m still at work. But very soon!
I strongly suspect that what many Americans with iffy backs need is not a more expensive mattress, but more excercise for their backs. Otherwise, wouldn’t most of the world’s people over age 40 or so be crippled?
Sleep well, y’all, and have a Happy Mattress Dance weekend! If you’re coming to AustinDope I’ll see you at Chuy’s!
I bought a King-sized mattress and accesories recently. If you have “Original Mattress Factory” stores locally, they’re of average quality and below-average pricing. The stores are company-owned, and as a result they cut out several layers of middleman, distribution, etc.
I swear by the products of Sichel Sleep Products .
Their mattresses are similar to the Tempurpedics, i.e. a thinnish foam mattress over a custom boxspring, but MUCH BETTER.
There’s something different about their foam, it’s soft but firm.
It feels a bit different the first couple nights (like 2), but after that, it’s HEAVEN!
I’ve never been able to sleep on my back (as often recommended) and I’ve always tossed and turned a lot at night, but on a Sichel, I can fall asleep on my back and wake up in the morning in the same position. Just because I’ve been so comfortable (no “pressure points”) all night.
But that’s not even the best part!
The best part is… if you sleep with someone else, there’s this amazing dampening effect so that, if they (he/she) move, the whole mattress doesn’t. So a light sleeper like myself is not awakened each time my partner moves. It’s the greatest thing ever to get a whole night’s sleep!
They’re not cheap, I warn you, but the money is definitely worth it, especially if you have any of the issues that I have as discussed above.
Well, I bought myself a Select Comfort bed earlier this year. It rules. IMHO, the best part is the fact that it’s adjustable… want a softer matress? Press the button. Want a harder one? Press the (other) button. And you can get models with two air chambers so that you and your SO can have different firmness levels if you desire.
At about $1400 for a queen-size matress, they’re a tad on the pricey side, but think about it for a second: you’re going to spend more time on your matress then you will on any other piece of furniture in your home. Why some people can justify spending $1000 for a couch, but get upset at the thought of a smilarly-priced matress is beyond me. (and yes, you can get Select Comfort matresses for that price, I happened to go with a higher-level model for mine).
FYI - JJ
Search on keyword “Mattress”
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That yields about 10 or 15 threads, here’s the relevant ones:
Is it time for me to buy a new mattress?
Also, good info in this thread, Emilyforce. Thanks.
We also bought a select comfort.
We ended up with it because we’d gone through a King sized mattress in less than three years. (Must of been all that “married with small kids” sex you hear about"). My sister had done the same thing - her husband is overweight (over 300 lbs) and went through mattresses faster than I go through a can of Pringles. They’ve had their Select Comfort for five years - longer than they’ve had any other mattress - and they’ve replaced $100 worth of foam once.
We’ve had ours for a little less than a year, but it fees as good as the day we bought it. Nothing like sleeping on air.
They are pricey. But if we manage to get ten years out of it, it will have paid for itself.
As I’ve said in some of the other mattress threads, I’ve got a Select Comfort - I’ve had it for slightly over 3 years now.
I still love my bed. Every morning, I love my bed.
Absolutely recommend it.