Choosing a Mattress: Being Specific Matters

Science says that there’s no one perfect mattress, just the perfect mattress for a particular person. In my dealings with Saatva Mattress, and their memory foam division, Loom & Leaf, I discovered that is exactly their focus: finding a suitable mattress for each individual.

Saatva advertises their product as “America’s best-priced luxury mattress,” promising to provide a top quality coil queen-size mattress for $899, while the memory foam Loom & Leaf line starts at $999. If you haven’t seen Saatva or Loom & Leaf  mattresses in stores or the name is unfamiliar to you, that’s not a coincidence, as they are an online only retailer.

Ron Rudzin, the CEO of Saatva, said the company philosophy is to provide a clear, high-quality product at a lower price by eliminating brick and mortar costs.

When Saatva offered to send me a mattress for review, great, I thought. A new mattress? I need queen-size. What else is to decide?

Turns out, a great deal.

First, I had to decide between the coil mattress from Saatva or the memory foam from their Loom & Leaf division. I spent time googling information on mattresses in general and browsing the Loom & Leaf website before deciding.

I picked a queen-size memory foam. Why? Because I’ve slept on coil mattresses my whole life and while they seemed fine, they never did anything for my periodic insomnia. I wanted to take a chance that a different type would help.

Also leading to my decision was the promise of no motion transfer with memory foam. My husband is a heavy sleeper. My tossing and turning rarely wakes him. But I’m a light sleeper, and his tossing and turning wakes me. A solution to this issue seemed a godsend.

The research told me that the two biggest issues with memory foam are chemicial smells and overheating. However, Saatva, aware of this, have taken steps to eliminate both those issues.

“We have 16 companies in United States that put together our product. Some companies ship wet and  shrink-wrap, to save on shipping. We don’t,”Rudzin said.  That practice, shrink wrapping before the foam dries, contributes to  unpleasant smells.

“We do not allow the foams to come to any of our factories, moist or shrink-wrapped, we prefer to have any small amounts of off-gassing happen at our supplier before the beds get put together,”Rudzin added.

As for the overheating, a solution to that is built into the design.

“Our top layer is an inverted foam, which create air chambers,”Rudzin said. “There is also a medical grade cooling gel in the center of the bed to help keep the body cool, plus and organic cotton cover.”

Satisfied with my choice, I thought the call to customer service to order my mattress would be quick and easy. Not so. I ended up talking to them for about half and hour, and that was a good thing because without going through all the details with Darlene, my customer service rep, I might have ended up with the wrong bed.

Among the questions Darlene asked:

How high was my current bed? Did I sleep alone or with someone else? Was I a side sleeper? What about my husband, how did he sleep? Did his sleep disturb mine? Did my headboard have anything that might be covered up by a higher mattress?

Darlene walked me through the various firmness choices for memory foam.  I ended up going with their most popular, the Relaxed Firm. During the course of the call,  I had to decide on the height, both of the mattress and the box spring, and Darlene was patient enough to wait for me to grab a ruler and double check those heights. Estimates were not enough. Without measuring beforehand, I would have been surprised at the height of the mattress when it arrived.

This way, I knew it would be higher and that I would likely have to buy new sheets to fit the mattress. And, yes, there were several different heights available, for both the memory foam and the accompany box spring.

“The first qualification for people working for us is someone who is naturally nice,” Rudzin said of my experience. “We don’t try to sell the product. We explain the product so they know what they might like or might not like. If someone likes a real soft bed, we might not be the right people for the job.”

Darlene provided the kind of service they insist from all their representatives, Rudzin said.

“We are very adamant about heights because people can make errors when they buy. We train our people to go over this with our customers. We can’t resell anything we take back, so we’re being careful for the consumer but also for us too, as we get hurt anytime we do an exchange. That’s why we prefer not to have a true sales system but more of a customer service/information system.”

After that, comes delivery.

“Seventy percent of our customers need the old product taken out,” he said. “We have 112 fulfillment centers and, in most cases, we’re building the product fresh for you, so that takes 7-15 days, depending on where you are.”

I was informed the night before delivery when to expect the truck, they arrived on time, and then set up the mattress and box spring on my bedframe quickly and efficiently.

As promised, there was no unpleasant memory foam smell. And, as promised, my new Loom & Leaf is a comfortable but firm mattress. Best of all, no motion transfer. I don’t feel my husband rolling over any longer. That’s a huge relief.

Would I buy my next mattress from Saatva/Loom & Leaf? Yes, for several reasons:

• It’s been a quality product that has performed as promised so far, especially with the lack of motion transfer on the bed.
• I like companies that provide great customer service, like Southwest Airlines. Saatva did so. If I have any problems, I’m confident I could call them and they’d resolve the issue.
• The company is attempting to be as “green” as possible. The products are America-made and use plant based foams. The foams are 30 percent soy and corn oil/bio-based, cutting down on the petroleum in the foams.