181–190 of 269 posts
DIY mattresses will be the next big thing, and will disrupt the industry. A mattress you can tune as you build it to give you the exact feel you’re going for. You could even have a different feel for both sides of the bed. And for way cheaper. We’re working on it.
You can almost do this now with mattress toppers.
Surprised that nobody has mentioned Zinus, which sells similar stuff but for (relatively) dirt cheap via Amazon, Walmart, etc. A year ago, I paid under $200 for a full size foam mattress, very comfortable for my partner and I.
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I think that's fair enough though. If the product ships with a different plug attached then it makes sense to have a slightly different number. With most tech brands (Dell monitors spring to mind) that variation is consistent across their lineup and across the slightly different models they put out each year.
Not sure if this is common with the higher end TV's, but with the more budget brands sold in supermarkets, it's not uncommon to find an otherwise identical model in multiple stores, but with slightly dithering model numbers, or in some cases, complete rebrand (box and badge).
I've seen that on induction hoods and computer displays. Another trip to the shop to get the missing part that's overpriced.
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Slightly off-topic, but if you genuinely think that there's no such thing as high-end wine, I feel a little sorry for you. Surely you can tell the difference between the Budweiser/Calsberg-type beer and beer from an independent brewery? If so, then surely you can imagine the same might be true of wine? I get that the fact that some bottles cost thousands may offend some people's sensibilities, but this hardly covers…
A handful of people might be "super tasters" and be able to tell the difference. I suspect most people in a properly run double blind test would be able to tell you what they like, but that wouldn't be repeatable over time and it wouldn't correlate with price. Your last sentence about audiophiles is odd, because everyone knows audiophile hifi is full on nonsense.
Being able to slap a label on someone else's product and have them handle both production and distribution while you just do the marketing is the dream for a large chunk of the Valley, I guess!
The margins in this industry and its structure are almost an economic paradox. The dynamic is basically (1) markups are very high (2) manufacturing is a solved problem and (3) there is lots of competition. This should resolve to a very competitive market with costs trending to marginal manufacturing cost. Instead, you have high prices for consumers and competition for the tremendous sales margins driving a marketing…
Slightly off-topic, but if you genuinely think that there's no such thing as high-end wine, I feel a little sorry for you. Surely you can tell the difference between the Budweiser/Calsberg-type beer and beer from an independent brewery? If so, then surely you can imagine the same might be true of wine? I get that the fact that some bottles cost thousands may offend some people's sensibilities, but this hardly covers…
Don't feel bad for me though :) Being a philistine is not life-threatening.
Wine is a good example because it's proven to be nonsense. Neither experts nor consumers can rank wines for taste in either a consistent way or a way that corresponds to price. Prices & blind test preferences are random. OTOH, people demonstrably prefer expensive wine when they know it's expensive.
This comes back to my earlier point, it's not all economics. Human beings are complicated. In these cases, some of us want to pay a premium for a premium product. There is no such thing, so the market spoofs it.
As an American that moved to Europe before I was old enough to ever buy an expensive mattress, what Americans spend on mattresses is always incredibly baffling. New, king sized (1.8 x 2.0 m), mattresses go for €200-1500 (about $250-1800) in Germany, with prices gravitating towards the lower end of the spectrum. Americans use much springier mattresses (box springs are unheard of here, and foam mattresses are standard)…
Mattress is an item where its very easy to misjudge the value. You spend 1/3 your life on it! Whats that worth? $3000. Seems legit. There was some movie where these street guys were talking about the best stolen stuff to sell on the street. Scissors. Everybody needs em, no one knows what they cost. Go for good sleep surely but living alone $100 air mattress I sleep fine. Glad I didnt go for the $1000 matress in a box…
You're throwing numbers that are a year of disposable income. That's madness for the rest of the world.
The journalist spoke to all these founders and to marketing people, but didn't ask a fairly obvious question: What makes the mattress market so much weirder than for other products? Let's compare mattresses to big-screen TVs, which are also $1000+, infrequently purchased, bulky items: - The article says, "If consumers recognize a brand, it creates a situation where mattress stores are slashing prices to compete with…
As an American that moved to Europe before I was old enough to ever buy an expensive mattress, what Americans spend on mattresses is always incredibly baffling. New, king sized (1.8 x 2.0 m), mattresses go for €200-1500 (about $250-1800) in Germany, with prices gravitating towards the lower end of the spectrum. Americans use much springier mattresses (box springs are unheard of here, and foam mattresses are standard)…
I have a theory about mattress shopping: Purchasing a mattress can be like purchasing a car when it comes to getting a good deal. Let's say you know what car you want, so you just e-mail dealers back and forth until you get their lowest offer. The same could be done with mattresses. Thoughts anyone?
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These recommendations seem wholly legitimate. Funny thing is, though, the only person I know well who owned one (my brother-in-law) liked it but said it was simply too damn hot, which I've since heard others discuss as well. They had to return theirs, just couldn't live with it. I don't think of a normal mattress as providing ventilation, but I guess it does, at least somewhat -- less thermal mass, at least.
This is a problem with memory foam mattresses in general, they trap too much heat. It's not too bad if you live in a cold climate, but I live in a hot climate and during the summers it got to be too much. Gel memory foam is the nice compromise. You get the memory foam but with a gel topper. It's noticeably cooler and a bit firmer than typical memory foam. We got one and have since moved the regular memory foam into t…
DIY mattresses will be the next big thing, and will disrupt the industry. A mattress you can tune as you build it to give you the exact feel you’re going for. You could even have a different feel for both sides of the bed. And for way cheaper. We’re working on it.
The hardest part of shopping for this was finding pocket coils and a mattress enclosure/cover. My troubles finding this may have been because of my personal preference. There may be some alternatives to the typical mattress enclosures.