Specialty Sleep products including all kinds of newer comfort, support and performance technologies, as well as “green” or “eco” bedding products were everywhere in Las Vegas at the World Market Center. If you are a mattress/bedding retailer, manufacturer or supplier, I do not really have to convince you . . . you already know that the hour of specialty sleep has arrived! No matter whether you are a dedicated ‘specialty sleep retailer’, a bedding/mattress store, a furniture store or a department store, even possibly a big box or merchandising store, there are in all likelihood a number of temperature responsive, visco-elastic or latex mattresses on your floor or in your stock. If you are a specialty manufacturer or a formerly traditional innerspring manufacturer, whether a top-ten brand company, or a small regional or new marketing guerilla company there is a very good chance that you are now manufacturing one or more products that fall under the specialty sleep umbrella. As the publisher and editor-in-chief of the bedding/mattress sleep retailer magazine that has been the leader and the prime advocate for new, innovative sleep technologies, I personally take great comfort in seeing the vigorous emergence of the broad umbrella category called ‘specialty sleep’.

Before I proceed any further, for the sake of clarity, let us define what we mean by the broad category of ‘specialty sleep’. There is the purist definition and then there is what I refer to as the component or added technology definition. The purist definition includes any non-innerspring product or material or new technology (green foams, magnets, Outlast®, fibers and tickings) that is used as the base, core and/or sleep surface of the sleep product. These would include airbeds; waterbeds; latex or foam rubber beds; visco-elastic or temperature responsive foam beds, latex/visco combinations, gel and gel/visco beds, as well as the whole school of “green”, “eco” “natural” or sustainable foams and materials Some folks also add futons, sleeper sofas, and adjustable beds to the specialty category.

An expanded definition of specialty sleep products also includes conventional innerspring mattresses that have added comfort layers of visco-elastic, latex, gel, as well as such green products as all natural wool, cotton or other “green” technologies.

About a month ago, a very high-end ultra-premium manufacturer from Europe put out a press release forecasting the end of innerspring mattresses as we know them in the years ahead. We do not really agree with that assessment. However, we do believe that a huge change in the entire paradigm of sleep technology is underway. From day one our advocacy has been based on the idea that specialty sleep technologies and products really do offer the support, the conformance or cradling, the pressure-relief, and the comfort that provides not only a superior night of sleep but real restorative and health benefits to consumers. We have been true-believers that there indeed is not one, but a series of steadily improving better sleep solutions offered under the umbrella of specialty sleep products . . . and that with improved scientific methods and better sleep research, there will be even more innovations in the years ahead.

Recent statistics reported both by the International Sleep Products Association (ISPA) and Furniture Today state that specialty sleep products now represent 22% of overall retail sales. Those presenting these numbers have also stated that by the end of 2010 specialty sleep products are likely to represent 40% of all dollar sales. (not units, but dollars). If we take a relatively conservative position and say that mattress/bedding retail sales levels will not reach $15 billion, but only $13.5 billion by 2010, and that specialty sleep products will represent 40% of those dollar sales due to a shift in the nature of products sold, then specialty will grow from today’s $2.4 billion retail to $5.4 billion in dollar sales by the end of 2010. If due to market shifts and projected growth, the category grows 30% a year, by the end of 2010 sales could indeed be $5.315 billion. This of course means that the $8.185 billion balance of retail sales would be in traditional cost-value or premium/ultra-premium innerspring mattresses and foundations. This surely does not mean innersprings will go away, but it does mean a huge shift in the market to specialty sleep dollars as part of the whole market mix.

Fourteen years ago, when we first informally partnered up with the newly formed Specialty Sleep Association (SSA) in late 1994 with a new magazine called Waterbedroom, later to evolve to today’s Bedding & Specialty BEDROOM Magazine, the specialty sleep industry was outside the mainstream of the mattress/bedding industry. We represented less than 8%, maybe 10% of all sales, and we were somewhat isolated and even called “alternative” sleep. We were ‘true believers’. We knew we had something better, but we were small, off the main thorough-fare and away from the larger sleep industry. Today ‘specialty sleep’ is the cutting edge leader in improved sleep technology. There are no more walls between the top branded sleep manufacturers and the innovative entrepreneur who brings out the newest gel, air, magnetic or all-natural sleep surface. Science, advanced technology, a true commitment to better sleep performance and the ‘green’ or eco movements, as well as just plain old good business have brought about a revolution in sleep. As the newly elected President of the Specialty Sleep Association, I am both thrilled and honored to be a cheerleader and an advocate for the newest and future sleep technologies offered by suppliers and manufacturers to bedding retailers, so they in turn can offer them to the American consumer.

Dale T. Read

Publisher/ Editor-in-Chief

(704) 841-8323