Online startup mattresses - ever tried one?

I think you know the ones I mean, like Leesa, Casper, Tuft & Needle, Helix, Sapira and so on. You may see them advertised on TV or on Facebook. They are mostly layers of different kind of foam, including memory foam and varieties of latex, in different configurations. Then there’s Purple, which is kind of its own thing, and Saatva, which has springs as well as foam. They generally come shipped to you rolled up in a box and when you set them free they expand and look more like what you’d expect a mattress to look like. Typically they also have a 100-night no-risk warranty (they will pick up the mattress and refund all your money including shipping, although this varies). They are also typically less expensive than mattresses you would buy in a department store or a mattress store, based on the idea that we are saving by them having lower overhead (i.e. no stores).

There are some potential issues, such as out-gassing from the foam, and durability (all of the companies are so new, none of their products are anywhere near old enough to have tested their warranties yet).

So has anyone tried one or more of these, and what was the result? I’m seriously thinking about one or two of them. I like the idea of less motion transfer, and cooler sleeping than memory foam (at least as claimed). There are a couple of decent review sites online (Sleepopolis and Good Housekeeping) but I’m interested in your first-hand experience.

I picked up a mattress sold on Woot.com, a “Sarah Peyton 10 inch memory foam mattress”. It cost about $200 on special. Apparently, no one named Sarah Peyton exists, it’s just another pseudo no-name brand. (the brand still exists 5 years later, so I guess it’s a quasi legit brand now, like “Anker”)

Anyways, it comes rolled up in a tube, and since you’re buying online, all the overhead of a mattress store aren’t costs you have to pay. You cut the tube open, and it very rapidly expands to a much larger size - you can fit the tube into a small car, but you need a trailer or pickup to carry the full mattress.

There’s various volatile chemicals you can smell coming off it. I just put the mattress outside in the sun a couple days to vent the volatiles. After that, I couldn’t smell anything. Probably safe enough - it’s not like you aren’t exposed to similar such chemicals with every new piece of furniture or new piece of clothing you buy.

I’m not hugely picky, and to me, it felt amazing the first time I lay down on it. Still is a decent, comfortable bed 5 years later. I have heard that memory foam mattresses don’t last quite as long, but for the price I paid, I’ll be totally fine with replacing it. I use a memory foam pillow with it - recently I upgraded to the countour pillows they sell at Kohl’s.

If I were buying a replacement, I’d look at Amazon reviews of memory foam mattresses, and use the website fakespot to analyze the reviews. I’d only consider products that have an A fakespot rating, meaning the reviews are probably genuine, and a lot of reviews, and a decent rating.

Then I’d probably wait for a deal, unless for some reason I needed a new mattress immediately.

I’m not going to do your shopping for you, but if you just go onto Amazon and look, the second from the top result is the “Zinus Memory Foam 12 Inch Green Tea Mattress, Queen”. That one is only $261 bucks, is 12 inches thick, fakespot gives it a B rating (good enough), it has an incredible 11,000 reviews and 74% of them are 5 star and 12% of them are 4 star. The wisdom of the crowd says that for most people, this is a great mattress and it’s a fraction of the cost that mattress stores will charge you.

Who cares if “Zinus” is legit - memory foam is a commodity, some factory in Shenzhen has bought some memory foam, put it inside a fabric covering, squeezed it into a tube, and loaded it on a ship. It’s not high end engineering and small manufacturing errors won’t even be perceptible. And apparently this company is doing a pretty decent job of it.

You won’t even need a boxspring, you can either buy a platform bed, also off Amazon, or make your own from plywood, or just stick it on the floor.

If you’re exceptionally sensitive, though, maybe these marginally better mattresses - for 5 times the cost - are more your style. I won’t judge. I wouldn’t trust advertising or biased reviews, though, I trust large numbers - like 11,000 people and fakespot saying the people are real - over “testimonials” or other bullshit.

Oh. The bestseller on Amazon is Tuft & Needle. Amazon, who has no reason to shill any particular mattress, says it’s the #1 bestseller. $460 at the moment. Also around 11k reviews…but Fakespot gives them a D rating. Fakespot thinks only about 63% of the reviews are legit…which is still a “maybe” but it doesn’t look so great. It might be a decent mattress and Tuft & Needle just paid a clickfarm for a bunch of fake reviews to get their business started.

The fact that it’s the #1 bestseller…and more than half the reviews are still legit…makes me skeptical but if $460 is in your price range and you don’t like plain memory foam, it might be your next mattress.

On the other side of things, there’s a hybrid spring/memory foam mattress up for only $140. Probably not as good of a mattress, but if you’re not hugely sensitive, it might be just as good, and it’s a fraction of the cost.

Up to you. But don’t trust facebook b.s. Most trustworthy sources are :

a. Legitimate direct consumer reviews on Amazon
b. Professional reviews for large sites - like sweethome and wirecutter and especially consumer reports - who review a lot of products and don’t have a financial incentive to be dishonest.

yes, I got a Tuft & Needle last year and I like it. comfy and no need for it to out-gas/“air out.”

Another decent review site for all things “bed” is Sleep Like The Dead.
Link goes to current mattress reviews.

Thank you! That’s the review site that I saw last week but I didn’t write down the name and then I couldn’t find it again.

SleepDelivered is another review site; they have affiliate relationships with some or all of the companies so they earn a small fee if you buy through them, but they disclose that on every page and the reviews seem thorough and honest.

I actually have this exact mattress. Purchased 2 years ago for my grandson, who is now 13. I’m currently sleeping on it while in between mattresses for myself. I weigh too much at 5 ’ 6" and 175 pounds and I would not recommend it for anyone heavier than me.

I have seen the ads for Purple and I’m intrigued. I’ll be following this thread with interest.

I just bought one about two months ago. I love it. I went with an established company (Sealy), but bought their “bed in a box” product (which they call the “cocoon”) which I suspect they don’t actually make themselves. It was about a thousand bucks for a queen and came delivered in a few days. I got the “chill” version which is cool to the touch. It is awesome and we both love it. The GF tends to “sleep hot” and this really keeps her cooled down.

We also watched a whole bunch of online review sites before deciding what to get. I don’t remember what they were called, but they all loved this one. At a cool grand, it was more expensive than a lot of the memory foam mattresses you see online, but it was still a fraction of the entry-level ones at a brick and mortar store.

I bought a new mattress a couple of years ago, from a conventional mattress store. When I was trying out mattresses there, I tried lying on a memory foam mattress (which is what most of these mail-order mattress stores are selling). I thought it seemed “dead” but perhaps that’s because all of my experience was with conventional innerspring mattresses.

I ended up getting a conventional mattress and box spring set, which was delivered the following day. And the salesguy warned that I might get some odor from outgassing of the pillowtop on the mattress. He suggested jumping on the bed for a while to help dissipate the gases. But it really wasn’t that bad.

(And by the way, isn’t mattress shopping still one of the most awkward things to do? You’re in street clothes lying on a bare mattress flat on your back in a fully lighted mattress store. Not at all like how you’re actually going to use the mattress.)

FWIW I got this mattressfor my mother from amazon. I never got a good look at it because I moved her from California shortly after. Her neighbors were very impressed and she really liked it. It came in a box and when they took it out of the box, it sprang to its full size (it was a twin), and it was ready to sleep on that night. She said it was very comfy, no strange odors. No need for a box spring. She used it on a hospital bed frame. YMMV.

I had to chuckle a bit at this. I know they’re paying rent for their stores, but otherwise a mattress business must be about the lowest overhead there can be. In this area, they seem to consist of a featureless showroom laid out with beds, a truck for delivery, and a sales staff consisting of one Russian chick who presumably spends most of her time running whatever business the mattress store is a front for.

:wink:

I would think getting one of the “returned after 99 days” items would be a pretty serious issue. :smiley:

I dunno. Buying a mattress online? Seems a little like a double-blind date. Something you need to touch and feel beforehand.

But then again, before I was married, I got all my mattresses from garage sales or thrift stores. :wink:

As far as I can tell, any “returns” don’t actually go back to the mfr because they can’t be re-used commercially. The most common outcome is that they are donated to charities, if they are usable, or else recycled. The seller doesn’t expect to re-sell used mattresses, and as a point of interest they don’t get many requests for refunds. It’s just a necessary sales tool for internet sales, as is the 100 night sleep testing period.

Most of these mattresses in a box consist of a variety of different foams and memory foams, and they have a variety of feels (according to the reviews, anyway). They have stuff to facilitate cooling and movement of air, and different formulas so that some are bouncier than others. In fact, two of the review sites above talk specifically about suitability for sex, i.e. bounciness vs. deadness. The firmer ones don’t have much sinking-in, either, at least not at first.

Well, I just got one myself so I guess I’ll be giving my initial impressions shortly.

I’m very happy with my Saatva. Honestly, the only reason I chose them was:

  1. I didn’t want the glorified futons that you get from the mattress-in-a-box companies like Casper, and
  2. They were the only “real” mattress company that would guarantee me something better than a 12-hour delivery window. And they arrived right on time.

Not a mattress, but I got a Purple Pillow via Kickstarter earlier this year. Is is by far the best pillow I’ve ever used, and I no longer have any neck issues or frequent flipping around when sleeping. I did have to supplement it with additional pillows underneath to increase the height due to my broad shoulders (I’m primarily a side sleeper), but that’s not a problem.

About a year and a half ago I got a Green Tea mattress for my son, and he loved it. So this summer we ordered a queen sized 8-inch Green Tea mattress for our platform bed.

It’s great. We picked the 8-inch size because that would fit in the platform bed.

It did smell a little funny at first. You let them fluff up for 24 hours (or until they get to 8 inches, or 12 inches, or whatever you ordered) and then put them on the bed. By the time it fluffed and we had it under a mattress pad and sheets, no detectable odor.

I don’t know what all this memory foam is. I now have memory foam on my bed, in my shoes, and in the last bathroom rug I bought. I believe it is just foam. It doesn’t seem to have any memory and does not remind me to wake up, take 10,000 steps a day, or hang up my towels.

I bought a Tuft & Needle a year ago. It is fine; fairly firm, no outgassing smell on the first night, not hot and no sinking in like memory foam (I hate the feel of memory foam), and has not developed a sag or indent.

Don’t know if this has changed or not but at the time I bought mine the return policy (they pick it up at your house) did not apply to purchases on Amazon (you had to ship it back to Amazon), so I bought direct from T&N.

In a lot of these products the “memory foam” may only be part of one layer. In any case thay are made of various forms of differently engineered polyurethane foams, of different densities and elasticities, one of which would be a viscoelastic foam that resembles but may not be what was called the original “memory foam”.

My Live And Sleep mattress took a bit to decompress fully (overnight some of the corners were still not full) and yes, it had some new-plastics smell but nothing overwhelming.