Mattress Advice — Try Before You Buy
Some of the best mattress advice that you could ever get is to make sure you try out any mattress before you buy it. That’s pretty simple and straightforward, but you’d be surprised at how many people actually overlook this, and just buy a mattress based on how it looks, the reviews it gets, or the brand name. Surely it is a good idea to look at Consumer Reports and read customer reviews on the internet about mattress brands and styles, and that’s a good first step. But until you have tried a mattress you won’t really know if you can sleep on it every night for years on end.
Carefully Assess the Return Policy When Buying a Mattress Online
The trend for a lot of consumers these days has been to cut out the middle man and get their mattress shipped to them factory direct by buying online. There are many advantages to this approach. The online mattress retailers don’t have as many overhead expenses obviously, so they can offer their mattresses for sale at less expensive pricing points. But, does that leave you as a consumer in the lurch, not being able to “try before you buy”? Not necessarily, because the online mattress retailers understand that you are taking a risk by negotiating for something sight unseen, and believing that the product is represented truthfully. So, many times the retailer will shift the risk back onto himself or herself letting you have a sleep trial. If you aren’t satisfied you can ship the mattress back to the merchant for a refund, although there can be some hazards if you haven’t done your due diligence by studying the return policy carefully beforehand (who pays the shipping charges, who is responsible to contact the shipping company to pick up the mattress, must the mattress be in a pristine, unopened condition in order to accept the return, etc., etc.).
How Much Does the Mattress Cost Per Sleep Hour? But Don’t Leave Out Quality
Another bit of advice as it comes to mattresses is to do the math so you can know how much money you are paying “per sleep hour”. This is especially for the budget-conscious of you out there that want to stretch your dollar as far as possible and get the best ROI. Let’s say you are looking at an “expensive mattress” and comparing that to a less expensive mattress. Essentially you need to find out if it is better to spend less money now or more money for a mattress that might last longer. You want to know how much each mattress costs you per sleep hour. You might be surprised to find that the “expensive mattress” costs less per sleep hour if you do the math, knowing how many of the “less expensive” mattresses you might have to buy to equal the longevity of the “expensive” mattress. Your inputs would be the price of each mattress you are comparing, the expected longevity of each mattress, how many mattresses you’d have to buy of the cheaper version to equal the more expensive version, the rate of inflation, and some sort of time value of money equation. But, recognize that the math doesn’t account for quality, and that is a BIG factor.
