Posh+Lavish has taken its luxury approach to mattresses to a new level with the introduction of its first-ever hand-tufted mattress.
However, instead of simply releasing this product and hoping that it would do well, the company invested in serious research to figure out what consumers were looking for in the luxury category.
When Posh+Lavish asked above-average-income consumers how they would distinguish high-end mattresses from midrange furniture and low-end mattresses, the consumers answered succinctly.
The above-average-income consumers said that high-end mattresses would first be hand-tufted, second, use better fillings, and third, be soft to sleep on yet supportive and long-lasting. When the company asked high-end consumers what a high-end mattress with these features would cost, the range was centered around $3,000- $5,000.
The breakthrough came to Posh+Lavish when they realized that consumers wanted hand-tufted mattresses at price points considerably under $5,000 even though the industry generally sells them closer to $10,000 and much more.
“As we talked through this line with retailers, they loved the idea that the collection stood for something that was different from other mattresses in the price point range and added great value by being hand-tufted,” Posh+Lavish principal Kurt Ling tells Bedding News Now. “We took that single idea and ran with it in every place we could. We were ready to think about these price points differently than we do, and differently than the industry. We had three design goals — hand tufted, a distinguishable high-end component, and plush mattresses that would last a long time.”
Hand-tufted mattresses have a distinctive resilient supportive feel. The tufting process prevents the layers in the mattress from bunching and developing valleys. The hand-tufting process compresses the mattress layers, driving long needles with ribbon binding tape through them, securing these tufts with rosettes on the top.
“One of the other things we learned as we launched this collection was to not only tell consumers why they should buy this mattress from a feature and benefit standpoint, but to explain exactly what to look at as proof,” Ling explained. “On the landing page of our website, it reads both “The tuft. Take note and behold” along with “The corner of the bed. Lift it and decide.” The old adage, ‘a picture is worth a thousand words,’ is true. But as the videos on our website show, a demonstration is worth a million words.”
He said that many premium-priced mattresses feature exaggerated peaks and valleys that feel uneven on the surface.
“Sales associates told us some luxury mattresses are designed for the showroom and not the bedroom, the camera and not the body, and mostly for eye appeal instead of sleep comfort,” he said. “These mattresses sacrifice feel for looks. Some quilting packages are too deep, leaving the surface feeling indented and bumpy on the body. Designed for visual impact rather than comfort, they look luxurious but don’t feel it. Posh mattresses are crafted with more subtle and smoother peaks and valleys designed to be slept on, not just seen.”
He also said that premium-priced mattresses are usually too tall for many consumers, according to sales associates he spoke with, because they rely on an excess of ordinary materials instead of fewer exceptional ones.
The Posh mattress collection offers firm, medium, plush and ultra-plush models in approximately 12-inch, 13 ¼-inch and 14 ½-inch profiles, respectively. All four mattresses are hand tufted, and have natural latex rubber in addition to exclusively using 3-pound and 2-pound high-density, Certipur-registered foam.
“There are multiple retail sales associates that were incredibly instrumental in helping us put this line together from both a product and communication standpoint,” he said. There is little that anyone will read on our website or see in our training materials that was not reframed, rewritten or tweaked by trusted retail sales associates and good friends along the way.”
