Consumers are researching the internet then going to traditional mattress and department stores or the internet with the idea they that want a mattress made with more natural and healthy materials but coming away with more marketing hype and little no natural materials in their new cheaply made mattress. Many companies are now using names for materials that sound more natural and organic. Unfortunately, most of these materials are the same synthetic foams and polyesters disguised by natural sounding names.
As experts in the field of natural and organic materials, we would like to offer some advice to help you in not making the expensive and frustrating mistake of purchasing something that you aren’t happy with and not what you really wanted.
If you conduct a search using Google using the terms “organic mattress” and/or “latex mattress”, most of the pages that come back in your search are not what you are looking for. The first few items are paid advertisers from anywhere around the world who are experts in making you think you are getting what you are looking for. Many of these companies are able to accomplish the task of coming up first in web searches for many different products and they sell whatever products they have access to. Be cautious of these companies because they come and go and can be operating out of anywhere and are only in the first ad spot due to their ability to spend a lot on internet advertising.
The word natural is used all of the time for many different products and materials. A memory foam bed made of polyurethane foam and doused with chemicals and covered with a cover that contains just a small amount of cotton can be marketed as “natural” or made with natural materials. Natural is a term that is over exaggerated and used way too often in all consumer products. Look for all-natural untreated materials and look at every material in the mattress – not just the cover!
These are probably the most common terms that people fall prey to. Mattresses made with foam that claims to be plant or soy based foam are made with polyurethane foam that may be infused with 10-20% of a soy or plant based substance. All other materials remain the same so there are no benefits to these mattresses for consumers but they definitely benefit the retailers and they sure are creative on marketing it to be more than it is.
Some certifications such as Global Organic Textile Standards (GOTS) and Global Organic Latex Standards (GOLS) are true third-party certifications that are used throughout the textile and latex industries. There are other certifications that claim a product doesn’t contain formaldehyde or heavy metals or a product has low VOCs. Those certifications come from organization that are managed by chemical companies. The same chemical companies that want to continue putting chemicals in consumer products because that is how they make money.
This one may surprise you but to process bamboo from a plant stalk to a fiber that can be used in textiles is a very chemically comprehensive process as well as in many casing very environmentally harmful. Most bedding items such as mattresses and pillows that are marketed as “bamboo” products only contain a cover that is made with bamboo fibers. The inside is generally foam. There is at least one company that fills a cheaply made bamboo cover that does not contain any wool with natural latex and calls it an organic mattress. A mattress made like this with no flame resistant wool would go up in flames immediately as both bamboo and latex are highly flammable and the bamboo is full of chemicals. Including wool also provides the benefits of body temperature regulation and dust mite resistance.
This one is a good one. Why would a company who is known for mass-producing and selling traditional mattresses come out with a “natural” version? There is one answer to this – money! Do mattress manufacturers and retaillers care about the health of their consumers? Do retailers who sell traditional mattresses made by mass producers care about the health and wellness of their customers? If you believe in natural and organic mattress materials then you don’t believe in toxic and chemical based mattress materials. If a company believes in natural and organic bedding then why produce traditional bedding at all? Also, are all of these produced in the same facility? The companies who do this are those same companies that often show up in the first lines of your internet searches.
One mattress fits all philosophy. In a perfect world, a retailer could rent enough space to fit one mattress and that’s the one everyone would buy. There would be no need to rent, heat and cool large spaces. The new fad of buying the one mattress that the internet company sells and returning it if you don’t like it is great if you are the small percentage of population that likes that one level of plushness or firmness. Fortunately, the internet companies build the returns and the fee or discounted toppers into their price so they still make a significant profit on each mattress roll packed and mailed to a customer. We have seen statistics that 20-30% of mattresses purchased online are returned what a hassle and what a waste of resources and money.Why not just try a mattress out and actually finid the one that is right for you?
Advertising gimmicks such as the compare to XXX. This is where a retailer presents a mattress worth $800 and asks the consumer to compare it to high-end brands that cost thousands of dollars more. This creates a value to the consumer for higher end brands that are of lesser quality than those they are compared to. Believe me there are no mattresses sold on the internet that are of equal quality to the higher end brands they are comaring themselves to. A better comparison would probabaly be the truckload sale on the side of the road.
Wow, that’s a lot of reviews for one company. When a mattress company has hundreds and even thousands of 5-star reviews something just isn’t right and these reviews are more than likely farmed. I think we are all smart enough not to fall for this one.
Telling you how greedy and expensive everyone is why they sell you a cheap mattress. This seems to be a new strategy gain your trust by making everyone else seem bad while at the same time luring you into marketing gimmicks. There is one company that has hours of videos under a educational name telling you about all the tricky sales tactics as they give you pitch similar to TV infomercials. Did you want Ginsu Knives or a good nights sleep?
Shopping for healthy mattresses for your family has never been easy. Now that Organic and Natural mattresses are becoming more popular, it is difficult to distinguish between the greedy traditional companies who are entering the market to increase sales versus the real companies who are offering safe and healthy products because they truly care. We, at The Organic Bedroom can take pride in:
Best of luck on your search and if we can help, let us.
