Infant Car SeatsTravel System Car SeatsConvertible Car SeatsBooster Car SeatsCar Seat AccessoriesPremium Car SeatsCar Seat BasesStroller & Car Seat Toysshop our car seat deals of the dayCommon Sleep Customs Around the World How Sleep Works Buying a Mattress: Online Vs. In-Store Shopping Where is the best place to purchase a new bed?You spend one-third of your life on a mattress—so it’s no wonder that you want to make sure that you buy the right one. But since mattresses last for years, maybe it’s been a while since you’ve purchased a new one. As a result, you might feel confused about how to go about comparison shopping and getting the best deal without sacrificing satisfaction. As with most purchases, you can sometimes get a better deal online than in a brick-and-mortar store. But there are also benefits to taking the more traditional path and doing your shopping in person.If you want to go the virtual route, rest assured that there is no difference in satisfaction between people who buy mattresses online, compared with those who get them at mattress showrooms.
But you can’t just log on to a website and pick a mattress randomly—you still need to know what you like. That’s why, regardless of where you want to ultimately make your purchase, you should first go to a mattress showroom and test out different mattress styles to find out what you like. Springs or memory foam? Shed your embarrassment and lie down on lots of different mattresses. Change positions a few times, making sure that you spend a few minutes on each side, your back, and your stomach. Even if you already have a specific type of mattress, you should still take this first vital step. Technology changes in the years between mattress purchases, and you may find that your preferences shift. Once you identify what you like, you can narrow down your options.So why not always buy the mattress in the store? One reason is price. You will typically pay 15 percent less online, compared with in-store (sometimes less than half the retail price!). And many websites offer easy returns. Website retailers know that customers will want to test out a mattress, so some include things like 90-day free trials as a way to convince customers that it’s a low-risk transaction.
It is – but remember that you usually have to bear the burden of wrapping up the mattress and getting it to the post office or carrier for return. It also comes down to preference: Some people just like shopping from the comfort of home or don’t have a store nearby that sells what they’re looking for.That said, some people feel really uncomfortable making such a big purchase online. Maybe, for instance, you are worried about having to return it or want to lie on the actual mattress you’ll be buying. If that’s the case, you can still get a great deal at a store. If you find a mattress on a website for a great price, bring an online deal into a store and ask a salesperson if the store can match the price. Unlike websites that have a set price, mattress salespeople in stores have the ability to negotiate with you and get you a price that makes you happy. You might also end up with some great add-ons by shopping in a store, like a free mattress pad or free removal of your old mattress.
For many of us, it’s about 40 prone, self-conscious seconds, clothes on, in a showroom, staring into a fluorescent light, followed by an “I’ll take it” that’s more about relief than approval. But wait, there’s not a lot of relief, because the markup on mattresses is mysterious enough that it’s impossible to know if you’ve been taken or not. And your 40-second test didn’t tell you much anything about whether this is a good location for you to sleep, fuck, and scan Twitter for the next two decades. That’s why a new approach to selling mattresses is so novel, and so welcome. Casper is one of these new-age businesses. Based in New York City, it doesn’t have a showroom. It ships the mattress to you, in a compact box. That’s right: Your mattress comes to your house in a box via UPS! You cut along the dotted line and—voila!—like a pool toy or a Stephen A. Smith diatribe, the mattress inflates. You position it on the bed, and then comes the really relaxing part: You have 100 days to decide if it’s the mattress for you.
This approach marks Casper—and a similar rival, Leesa—as part of the new wave of consumer goods sellers with a decidedly consumer-first focus. Think Warby Parker and Netflix. The queen-sized example Casper sent to my home goes for $850, with a $50 discount coupon floating on the Web, which is very competitive for a good mattress. In fact, if it lasts as long as my previous mattress (20 years), it'll be a stinking bargain. (Casper does offer a 10-year warranty on top of the 100-day evaluation period, and claims that to sell the same product in stores it would need to charge three times more. Some of the latex mattress makers offer a 25-year warranty.) So the big question: Is this mattress any good? I put it through its paces for 30 wintry nights, then spoke with the Men’s Health sleep expert, Dr. C. William Winter, about what I learned and what you should be thinking about when you pick a mattress. (Check out the Best Sleep Positions to find out what the way you sleep says about you.)
It wasn’t that long ago that nearly all mattresses were built around coiled springs. There were outliers, like the Temper-Pedic (memory foam) and Sleep Numbers (air bladder) brands that you likely heard marketed on the radio, but it was a world dominated by Serta, Sealy, and Simmons. That’s changed to a degree in recent years, with non-spring-based mattresses increasing their market share. There are air-bladder-based mattresses, like those made by Sleep Number. They promise endless adjustability. You can change the amount of air in the bladder on a daily—heck, hourly—basis. But most people don’t want endless change; they want to set it and forget it, for a long period of time. On the negative side, the mechanical nature of the air bladder introduces the ability for your mattress to “break." A latex mattress is another option. Its selling points: personalization, durability, and eco-friendliness. "The cool thing [about latex mattresses] is that they are completely customizable,” says Winter, who sleeps on one, from Savvy Rest.
“You could have a mattress split down the middle, where your side is different than your partner’s side. And the absence of springs means one less thing that can wear out. "Theoretically, the mattress never needs to be replaced. If part of it wore out or needed to be replaced, you could simply open the liner and replace the faulty layer with a new piece, which isn’t terribly expensive,” says Winter. He adds: “If your needs change or your preferences change—or your partner changes—you can unzip the mattress and pull her layers out, and throw them out, and get new layers for your new girlfriend." Memory foam mattresses—like Tempur-Pedic—are celebrated for their body-enveloping support. People with back pain often sing their praises. On the other hand, that enveloping can make them uncomfortable on hot nights and can make moving around on the mattress difficult. And sometimes it’s very important that we be able to move around on our mattresses. “It’s like screwing on a marshmallow,” Dr. Winter writes in an email about foam mattresses in general, adding, "I unfortunately have to disagree with the band Spinal Tap's conclusion, 'The bigger the cushion, the sweeter the pushin’.’
The Casper is a bit of a hybrid, with a latex layer on top and the memory foam underneath. You get the benefits of both, Casper claims. What you lose, though, by purchasing from a startup with a lean business model and an eye on costs, is the ability to customize it. Large, deep, cushy mattresses have taken the market by storm in recent years, with some exceeding 14 inches in depth. Dr. Winter said that while the plush tops no doubt feel very comfortable, a lot of factors go into what’s right for you. The Casper is just 10 inches thick, with a 1 1/2-inch synthetic latex layer atop a 1 1/2 inch layer, this one of memory foam, with 7 inches of foam as a base. The Leesa has a similar mattress, which was just redesigned (and a similar 100-day vetting period). Even if you go to the independent mattress seller’s store and put in the Consumer Reports' recommended 10 minutes of lying-around time, you’re not going to know much till you sleep a night on the darn thing. When you do, you might find the mattress is too firm and hurts your back, or what was pleasingly plush in the showroom is claustrophobically enveloping or sweat pore-dilatingly hot in the wee hours.
In fact, the only thing that Dr. Winter recommends in purchasing a new mattress is that you have a guaranteed window to return or replace it. “I’d avoid a mattress deal or a mattress dealership that says you buy, you own it,” Winter says. “You can’t just sit there, lie flat on your back in your street clothes, and say this is the mattress for me for the next X number of years. “I’d encourage guys to work out a deal so the mattress can always come back in, at least, the first month." While a 100-night trial period is great marketing, my experience was that it took about a week to make a decision. My first couple nights with the Casper were a bit off-putting. I had, strangely enough, grown accustomed to the trench that ran through the middle of our bed from 20 years of sleeping with my wife. Gravity—and our great love for each other, honey—pulled at us inexorably each evening. If we didn’t come together, it was because someone didn’t want to. And sleeping close to each other has its benefits.
Recent research showed that couples that slept within touching distance of each other got more, better rest. By Night #3 we were past the newness of it, and we settled in. Casper’s latex-over-memory foam construction gives it some of what Dr. Winter calls that “reinserted into the womb” feeling. At the same time, the latex is firm enough that you—and your sex life—aren’t swallowed by it. After a week on the Casper, my wife said that a pain she had been feeling in her leg and hip through the fall had gone away. "I know people who say they bought a mattress and the back pain they had for 10 years went away; I believe it,” he says. “I went on a trip to the Midwest and slept on a hotel mattress for two nights and my back never hurt worse. People often wake up after a bad night’s sleep and say, ‘Oh, my back’s all locked up and I have sciatica or whatever. It definitely works the other way, too.' All in all, we're sold—for now. The Casper is plenty comfortable, and we’re sleeping soundly, night after night.